Backyard Un-Beauty

One day, I hope to have a post titled Backyard Beauty. One day....

That day is not going to come unless I put quite a bit of sweat equity into the backyard I have now. I have a big backyard. It is a great size and of course, Luna loves it. However, it is far from being a relaxing hang out. There are few things that needs to be taken out like the rusted clothes hanger. Every time I mow, I am terrified that I am going to hit my head.

The previous owners of my house were an elderly couple, who I believe kept their yard up while they were physically able. I know they even had a garden for a while. Unfortunately, the remnants of the garden are still visible. I even found some rhubarb growing along the fence this year.

Last spring during my first backyard clean up, I found several barren spots where leaves had sat all winter in addition to the huge barren area on the right side. Late last fall, I discovered why the grass may have stopped growing. Because of the trees in my yard, as well as my neighbors' yards, a thick carpet of fallen leaves covers the ground.

This pile of leaves is all from my backyard. Thankfully, they were out by the curb in time for the city to pick them up.

This year, I am seeing a little bit of growth where there had previously been nothing. I am going to put grass seed down in the fall and probably again next spring. In the meantime, there is plenty of work to do as my yard moves forward to become a backyard beauty.

Snapshots Into My Life

What I am seeing through my lens this week.

I don't think my kitchen has ever been this clean before. The backsplash was reflecting on the countertop like glass. I was pretty impressed with myself. It also made me not want to do anything in my kitchen for several days.

My mom and I have tickets to the Pop Series at the Toledo Symphony. Last Saturday, they showed The Wizard of Oz and the orchestra played the music. They did an amazing job!

I was under the impression that it was spring, but we have had cold and snow several days this week. Luna is so ready for warmer weather...and so am I!

I have been on the hunt for a table or something to go in my entryway. I finally found something! I really like it, but it took me a few days to get used to something being there instead of it only being in my head. Now I am looking for a mirror to go above it and some cute decorations for the top. More to come...

Another little girl will be joining our family in June and I couldn't be more thrilled! I LOVE being an aunt and I am already getting a head start on spoiling this little one.

Baking Center With a Holiday Spin

How can it be December already?!?!? I feel like I missed fall and all the wonderfulness it brings. Nevertheless, time moves on and the holidays are right around the corner.

I am hosting my first Christmas Open House in my new home on Friday, so my schedule is packed with cleaning, cooking and, of course, baking. My baking center is going to make my holiday baking - and all my baking throughout the year - a little bit easier is because everything is close at hand.

Along with my flour and sugars, this cute little Santa basket holds some of the special holiday baking items like M&Ms and Peppermint Hershey kisses. It provides a little fun holiday cheer to this area.

With flour, granulated sugar and brown sugar kept on the counter in pretty canisters, the top cabinet is left with lots of space for baking staples - cocoa, powdered sugar, vanilla, yummy baking spices. It also keeps some of my back stock items and some bowls.

Please don't pay too much attention to my messy drawer, but I know what is in here. Measuring spoons and cups, spatulas, pastry cutter. I am sure as I bake more and more this drawer will become more filled making organization a priority.

The cabinet below is the home for all my baking pans. My cookie sheets are missing, but that is because they have a special spot right next to my range that holds all those big flat items, like my cookie sheets and cutting boards.

Time is ticking away and I need to get baking. First on my list are these yummy White Chocolate Peppermint M&M cookies. Definitely give them a try!

One Mess At A Time - The Office Bookcases

Is it really the middle of November already? The last few weeks have gone by so fast. The holidays are just a round the corner and I am not ready for them at all.

I am having a Christmas Open House in a few weeks, so I am trying to get things organized. In addition to the people who will be coming that are local, my cousin and her family, as well as my brother and his family, are coming. Neither have been here since I moved in, so I want to make sure everything is perfect.

I look at these bookcases in my office every single day and it just got the point where I couldn't stand looking at them anymore. They were such a mess. Books everywhere and the dust was unbelievable.

So it was time to organize these things. I started filling the bookcases because I sounded like I was in a hole when I was on my work phone. Everything echoed.

The first step was cleaning them all off and dusting them. I was already starting to feel better.

I wasn't too wrapped up about making them pretty. This is where the bulk of my books are going to go. They didn't need to be in alphabetical order, but I wanted some order to them. I grouped my books by category. On the bookcase closest to the door, I added my Christian fiction and Christian living books.

The second bookcase is a little more sparse because I still have boxes of books in the garage that still need to be unpacked. That will eventually happen, but probably not until after the holidays.

Getting my house organized is work in progress, but at least it is in progress.

Feathering My Nest - Where to Start

Since this is the last week of October, I decided that I should try to make an effort to finish out the month on a high note. I have not kept up with my Home Sweet Home series and I was really excited about it. But I have also learned that I need to be more prepared.

I started a second job this month at a popular home store, so my nights and weekends just got busier. On the plus side, I have a discount! And I am using the money to help pay off some bills, which I will talk more about next month.

Since I have had my kitchen redone, my dispensable income has dwindled quite a bit. However, this extra time is giving me opportunity to really think through want I want to do with a space.

As hard as it is to do, I am forcing myself to focus on one area at a time to complete. The first area is going to be my entryway.

Right now my entryway is a empty. This is the area I want to make pretty. The wall needs a little touch up painting done by the baseboard. It was damaged when my flooring was going down.

This area isn't very big. The wall is a little over 30 inches wide. My vision is to have a small table with a mirror above it. I found a little cabinet that I like at Hobby Lobby, but I am afraid that the color is too similar to the wall color and it will disappear in the space. My search is still on.

The other thing I want to change is the light fixture. I actually have one to replace it, but I haven't had it changed yet. I wouldn't mind learning how to change a light fixture, but I am terrified of electrocuting myself. I think that job is better left to someone else.

I am excited to get this space spruced up a bit. I want everyone who walks through my door to feel welcome and this will be the start.

Baking Buckeyes

I am an Ohio girl through and through, so I am no stranger to buckeyes whether referring to trees, football or candy.

When I was in West Virginia a few weeks ago, buckeyes littered the ground after falling from a tree. I was going to do this little easy craft with acorns, but instead I used buckeyes.

To get rid of any kind of any yuckiness, I wiped the buckeyes off and baked them at 200 degrees for several hours. I didn't see any hole in the buckeyes so I don't think there were any bugs, but better safe than sorry.

Tomorrow, I am sharing where I am using all my buckeyes!

Homemade Pumpkin Puree

So I haven't been doing a great job at keeping up with the 31-day challenge. I hadn't prepared as well as I thought and I was in a little bit of a funk last week. Everything suffered from that, including my blog. But I am back at it today with an easy way to stock your pantry with a seasonal favorite - pureed pumpkin!

This recipe came from Portuguese Girl Cooks. It is super easy and is definitely quite a bit cheaper than buying the canned stuff. Even if the can says that it only contains pumpkin, I know for sure that this is 100% pumpkin and nothing else.

I bought my pie pumpkins from a local pumpkin farm. They were 50 cents a piece, so much cheaper than the canned version. The first step is getting all the guts out of the pumpkins.

Then off into the oven, they go! The recommended baking time is 60-90 minutes. I went right in between. Since I had 2 cookies sheets in the oven at once, I rotated them around the halfway mark.

After the pumpkins are finished baking, the flesh is scooped out and then pureed in the food processor. Super quite and easy! And you are left with beautiful pumpkin puree.

Draining the pumpkin is really important. As you can see there is quite a bit of liquid that drained from the pumpkin. I let it sit for about an hour.

I can't wait to use this puree.

From my 4 pie pumpkins, I was able to get about 4 and a half cups of pumpkin puree.  I kept the half cup in the fridge and put the rest in the freezer to use in the future. To swap out a 15 ounce can of pumpkin puree with the homemade version, use about 1 3/4 cups.

The next step is to use this puree. I am thinking cookies!

Chocolate Pumpkin Spice Cookies

Making cookies is one of my favorite things to bake. My dad made cookies all the time so I think I inherited the making-cookie gene from him. And who doesn't love the smell the baking cookies.

Since cookies are a fun treat to have on hand, I decided to use Saturdays during the 31 day challenge to share some cookie recipes.

Last year, I couldn't find Pumpkin Spice M&Ms for the life of me. This year, I got my stash early. In my excitement over finding this autumn delicacy, I may have been a little ambitious with my stash. So off to Pinterest to find something to do with all these M&Ms.

Cue in Inside Bru Crew Life and her Chocolate Pumpkin Spice cookies. They have a little pumpkin, some chocolate and have a enough cinnamon and nutmeg for this cookie to taste like fall.

Definitely give these cookies a try!

Welcoming Autumn

I finally have a front porch that I can decorate! In my last apartment, I had a little landing that I would decorate. It is nice to walk up to the front door and see pieces of autumn welcoming me home.

I made my wreath last year. The ribbon is from Hobby Lobby. I saw it around Memorial Day of last year and knew that I had to do something with it. It became the foundation point for my wreath. The leaves and sunflowers are randomly placed around the bow. One problem I am having this year is that my storm door smushes my bow. I tried to fluff it up a bit for the picture.

I bought mums at the farmer's market last weekend. They are huge and were only $5! A great buy. The container they are in left a little to be desired. I really wanted an apple basket or something simple to put the flowers in. Thankfully, Michaels had the perfect options. These cute baskets are the perfect size. One says Autumn and the other says Welcome, so I can use it all year long.

My pumpkins are making a statement on the porch as well. The bigger one sits by the pillar by the step so it can be seen from the driveway.

The other is sitting next to my Welcome ladder in the corner. I didn't get a good picture of it, but it is because I really need to sweep my porch and that spot is particularly messy. :)

I am really looking forward to decorating my porch for all the holidays and seasons. How are you decorating your porch?

Painting Pumpkins

One way to help keep my decorating budget low is to do some DIY. Today I am sharing my painted pumpkins. This isn't an original idea, but it is cheap and easy. It also adds a little sparkle to plain orange pumpkins.

First, the pumpkins. My mom and I visited Gust Brothers Pumpkin Farm on Saturday and they had so many pumpkins. It was a lot of fun to walk about and pick out what we wanted. It would be so easy to go pumpkin crazy.

While my purchased pumpkins were sitting on the porch, a critter munched on them. I have a few neighborhood cats that wander about and I suspect one of them had a little snack sometime during the night.

Picking colors to paint my pumpkins was actually a little more difficult than I thought. I wanted colors that would stand out against the orange, but still needed to have an autumnal quality to them.

The colors I chose were rust, pearl and gold glitter. I love all things glitter! I really liked the color combination and how they looked against the orange.

I used my handy dandy round sponge brushes to make my little circles. I just punched them on the pumpkins.

The round brushes made it so easy to make quick dots, which is the look I wanted. There was no rhyme or reason to the design.

I was happy with the rust and white colors, but the gold did a weird bubbly thing. I am not sure why, but it still looks okay. These pumpkins were not going to be in any museum as works of art.

The finished product! I am happy with how they turned out. This project took all of about 15 minutes from start to finish. Also, the mess was kept to a complete minimum. Tomorrow I will share where I am using my jazzed-up pumpkins.