This and That

October is drawing to a close. The trees are finally reaching their peak color around here and it is so beautiful.  I wish the lovely days of  Autumn lasted longer because it was 34 degrees when I woke up this morning and the high is only supposed to reach into the low 40's. It's been blustery and grey for days and I have to say, in spite of the mums and trees and pumpkin fun, I have to admit fall is not my favorite season. Don't get me wrong, I love aspects of it all to pieces, but I need sunshine, a growing garden and the promise of fireflies and crickets. Mostly I need sunshine and the shorter days do not thrill me.  Winter in Michigan can be brutal. Time to hunker down and count the days until the winter solstice when the days get longer.

 In the meantime, I will be busying myself with baking, and decorating.  I plan to have a pie baking party sometime in November to show some friends the finer points of pie crust.  It isn't hard once you understand the process. My mother hated to cook and bake, so she always asked me to do pie crusts. I watched my little grandmother on the farm as she baked pies and everything else.  That dear woman still ranks as one of the best cooks and bakers I ever met. At 7 years old I became the maker of crusts. I was too young to know it was supposed to be difficult so I wasn't intimidated.  Teach your kids to cook and bake early so they have the confidence of youth!  I used leaf shaped cookie cutters that I got on clearance from William Sonoma a few years ago to make the top crusts on these fresh peach pies, but I just saw a similar set at Michaels for a good price.  If you use a coupon it would be a great price!

 My main decorating project will be this, the back entryway.  It is tiny. Super tiny even.  Really just enough room for the door to swing open but it is right off the kitchen and it's the door we use most often.  I looked back at old posts and this photo is from 2007, (my first year of blogging!) and I said the wallpaper was put up a couple years before that.  So 2005? Ready for a change? Yes!  The green trim will be painted a bright white and the wallpaper will be replaced with....

This. An anaglypta, or raised design that can be painted. It will give some texture and pretty pattern to the entry but I will be able to update the color easily without stripping the paper, as an added bonus it is fairly inexpensive.  I haven't decided whether to keep the blackboard paint or beadboard over it or maybe just use the wallpaper there too. I know I have seen lots of opinions that blackboard paint is still going strong, I think I might just be ready for a change.  What do you think?  Is blackboard a trend that has seen better days?

So here is my next question, when do you switch out the fall decorating for Christmas?  November 1 or after Thanksgiving? I already feel the siren call of Christmas. Maybe just a little here and there in November?

October

The year is flying past! I don't do as much seasonal decorating as I used to, but I like to decorate the front porch and a few areas inside.  I wanted to keep the beautiful red geranium and bacopa baskets my daughter, Victoria, made for me for Mother's day. They have weathered this hot dry summer so beautifully!  

 Adding some orange accents did the trick. True to form I have a hard time passing up the seasonal flowers at the farmer's market, so the orange mums came home to join everything else on the porch. The pumpkin came from Kroger and I added a pumpkin accent pillow to the front porch chair.  The birch branches were cut and brought home by Earl last year after he visited the family cabin up north for the annual family hunting party.  The branches stay tucked into an old copper pot season to season and I decorate around them.

 The basket on my front door gets a few fresh seasonal flowers, leaves and a little pumpkin pick.  It is so easy to change out and I always love the new look.

Inside, I gathered the pumpkins that grow year to year on our compost heap and piled them into a dough bowl that my sweetheart carved.  That man is so talented! I tucked in some sweet autumn clematis, lemon verbena and rosemary from the herb garden along with some teeny battery operated fairy lights on copper wire.  The greens were tucked into some floral water tubes. You know those little green tubes the florist uses to keep flowers fresh until you can get them into water? I had a small collection and they really helped keep the herbs fresh longer. The pumpkins and greens helped hide them.

And that is about the extent of the decorating around here.  I'm mostly drinking coffee, working on etsy orders and working up the gumption to strip wallpaper off the tiny back entry so I can redecorate. I also want to cover the old living room love seat, make new throw pillows, finish the quilt I'm working on for my son in law, finish the quilt I started for a sweet little great niece, finish planning the annual women's ministry Christmas dinner for our church,,, hmmm, I think I see why I'm not getting everything done.
But it all will, so time to put down the coffee, er maybe I'll take it with me, and get crackin'.
Wish me luck and lots of energy! ;)