to paint a pumpkin

On Monday, we had a gorgeous, sunny, warm day – one that was much more reminiscent of early spring than of mid-autumn. Add to that the fact that Nana was down for a visit and it seemed like the absolute perfect day to bust out some good ol’ fashioned pumpkin painting fun.

We’ve had a few pumpkins laying around since the day we went to the pumpkin patch, where Evalyn chose and brought home two to call her own. I kept thinking about carving them sometime but, honestly? That idea gave me anxiety. The mess and the gunk and the toddler who would inevitably spend the entire activity reaching out and trying to grab the knife – it just didn’t sound like something I was interested in doing with her quite yet. Maybe next year. Or the next. Or something. I decided that leaving the pumpkin intact, without any sharp objects present, would be a more enjoyable activity for us all.

So, we took advantage of the warm, sunny day and spread a plastic table cloth out on the driveway. I filled a plastic container with finger paints, dressed the tot in clothes that could be made messy and let her go wild.

And go wild, she did. She kept her interest in this activity for almost an hour. That is like, at least 16 days in toddler attention span time. She had so much fun! Talking about the colours, mixing them around, painting our names, different shapes and patterns, and, you know … sitting ON the painted pumpkin. She was happy to get her chubby little fingers all messy and paint covered. She was happy to see Mommy and Nana getting messy with her. She all around had a blast.

Since then she’s been asking for more painting again and again and again. So I guess that means it’s a good thing I left the pumpkins sitting outside on the patio table overnight. When it rained. And totally cleaned our (washable finger paint) painted pumpkins off.

They are good as new. So guess what we’ll be doing again on our next sunny day?

we’ll call this the kick off

It is absolutely no secret that autumn is the favourite time of year around our home. The smells, the tastes, the colours – we love it all. This year I haven’t gotten as “in” to fall as I normally do. Because I’m still working on basic every day settling around here, getting out fall decorations has been the furthest thing from my mind. It would be kind of hard to decorate when there’s not much to put decorations on as we don’t have shelves or anything up yet. Anyhoo – I wasn’t feeling my normal sense of peace and contentment that comes with the fall this year and that was starting to bother me. But then this weekend happened and I was reunited with my favourite time of year.

Saturday was a beautiful day. Sunny, cool and crisp. The token autumn day. I spent my morning baking four pies (which has not happened around these parts in a long time), making a pot of chili, washing and hanging laundry on the clothes line. I felt productive, organized and all together good.

And then it got even better when the girls woke up from their naps and we headed out to the Pumpkin Patch with a few friends. Evalyn was so excited about it - she had a blast leading everyone through the corn “amazing”, seeing the animals in the barn and picking out her favourite pumpkin. Gwen had a blast too, clearly.

It was wonderful time spent with our dearest friends. And don’t worry – no one got hit in the head with the “falling” acorns. Although there certainly were some close calls (um, yeah, my husband is definitely the one who thought it would be funny to chuck acorns at people’s heads while in the hay maze).

And of course the day wouldn’t have been complete without three crazy mothers attempting to wrangle their four children into a pile of pumpkins for some pictures. Never mind the fact that only one of these children is remotely able to follow instructions and 2 of them cannot even move, let alone support their own heads. As you can see, that turned out well for us.

(Aren’t my besties perrrrrdy?)

It was a lovely, perfect day. We shall call this the kick off to the fall season.

Family Photos

A few weeks ago, we ventured off to spend the day with my brother and his wife. We had a yummy lunch, my dude put together a quote for their kitchen renovation, and then we headed off to the park for some photos before going out for dinner.

I have said it so many times, but I’ll say it again – I’m so lucky to have a bro who enjoys photography. He’s done us so many favours, doing family photos, newborn photos, maternity photos and the list goes on…

So, I’ll let the photos do the talking. Here are some shots from our day.

Despite what these photos suggest, Evalyn is not a fan of sitting in the leaves. As soon as I put her down in them she looked up at me and starting saying/signing “Help. Help. Help”.

Her face. Kills me.

Duckies in the park.

My heart.

Pumpkin Patch: Take Two

Remember a few weeks ago when I had the great pumpkin patch fail of 2011? Well, I figured with the month coming to an end we better hurry up and remedy the situation.

So yesterday (right after the hubster returned home with a pumpkin spice latte for yours truly) we headed out to a cute little pumpkin patch for the afternoon and definitely had better luck this time around. I mean, there were actually pumpkins – so that right there was 100% better.

Part way through our visit we ran into Eva’s buddy Lyla from church. We confused the heck out of the kids by making them sit on a pile of squash and attempted to get a good picture of them. Well, we failed. At least in the 15 shots I had, we didn’t have a good one. Then we went on a hay ride on the tractor. Evalyn thought this was nothing short of amazing since she is all about tractors lately. As soon as she saw it coming around the corner to pick us up she started pointing and yelling, “Tacta tacta”. She sat still on her daddy’s lap and pointed at the trees and other kids the whole time.

We saw the animals in the barn – a cow, a goat, some pigs, some chickens and some other gross looking birds – and she quickly discovered that cows? WAY scarier in real life than in her animal books.

We took a (quick) stroll through the corn maze but the amount of mud quickly deterred us so we spent the rest of the time snapping photos and checking out all the different kinds of squash and pumpkins that they had kickin’ around. Or, should I say, all the “apples” that were everywhere.

Middle photo? “Wait, you are trying to tell me that this is not an apple?”

My very favourite is that even in the photos were you can’t see her face, you can still see her lips enough to be able to tell that she’s in the middle of saying “Oh” or “apple”. She was more than excited when she finally found a tiny apple pumpkin that was just her size. I kept trying to lead her back to the big pile of pumpkins to get some pics but she was determined to carry this one around.

It was the most beautiful fall day to spend at the pumpkin patch with my little family. So long pumpkin patch, see you in 2012!

Hello, fall.

This past weekend marks the official end-of-summer-beginning-of-fall weekend for me, and so I wasn’t the least bit disappointed to see that the weekend brought fall weather with it.

We spent the past few days up north in the Muskokas at my parents new cottage. Which, I might add, is very quickly going to become my favourite place on earth, I believe.

My whole family was together – an event that becomes more and more rare as the years go by – and also one that I cherish more and more as the years go by. I celebrated my 25th birthday while we were up there and we also celebrated my brother-in-law’s 29th. There was fishing, boating, board game playing, eating, movie watching, and lounging. It was a wonderfully relaxing weekend – a great way to end off summer 2011.

We got home early this morning and Eva and I have been having a lazy day at home, doing laundry, playing and going for walks (bundled in a blanket, I might add). I’m actually quite excited to dig out the boots, sweaters, pashminas and blankets. Today I have a fall candle burning. The scent is called “Welcome Home” and it’s filling my kitchen with the delicious smell of autumn. Although I love summer and the fun that it brings with it, I always find myself ready for fall. I find it refreshing. It’s the best time of year around this home, for many different reasons.

I have a feeling summer hasn’t had it’s last hoorah, though. Something tells me we’ll see a few more scorchers. But for now, I’m cuddling up in a blanket with a hot chocolate and I’m welcoming fall.

Falling for Fall

I love autumn. It is by far my favorite time of year. One thing I love about autumn is being able to decorate my house with leaves, pumpkins and scarecrows. Obviously, this autumn is going to be a little different for our family as we're going to be spending it adjusting to having a little one kicking around. I decided that I did not want to forgo the things I love about fall, so I decorated last week, a little early, in order to ensure that it was done before the Monkey arrived (are we surprised?). I haven't really picked up many new fall decorations since last year, so if you've been a reader for a while, you have probably seen a number of my decorations but I thought I'd share anyway!

I will let the photos do the talking....

An autumn table runner and gourd candle holders

The dining room

The living room

The hearth - my favorite space in the fall

The pumpkins tucked away in the corner

The bathroom doesn't have many decorations but this little wagon adds a little fall touch

Scarecrows everywhere...

My pumpkin nightlight. One of my favs!

The kitchen

I love the scent of fall as well. Starting in September I almost always have a candle burning. This year, my choice scents are Harvest Pear and Cranberry Orange. Delish!

What do you do to make your home cozy for fall?

Family Photos

Last weekend, Evan and Laura were visiting. On Sunday afternoon, we spent the afternoon at Balls Falls and Evan took some "family" photos of our wee family. Here is a slideshow with some of my favourite shots.



To see some more of my brother's photography, take a minute to venture over to his blog. There you will be able to see some of his best shots as well as a link to his Flickr account.