Pumpkin Chunking 2014

Somehow Sunday morning I got Baylor to leave the house early in the morning to go to the flea market.  We have not gone for years and I love rummaging around markets.  Oddly I found a stand selling the product we make and sell at our company store.  I am sure they would not have a job if a supervisor found this stand!  But he does not work directly for the company and I don't know who he is. And I am not the RB police so he was fine with me.  I just took the photo to show my coworkers.  We have often guessed that this was being done watching some people stuff their bags.  

We found two older model Hess trucks at one stand and they were two for $15.00 so  Baylor was excited to pick out two new to him trucks.  I know he is getting the 2014 from Heather and we have three or four other years I bought online.  He does love to play with them and the new ones even had the batteries!  I did not find any major finds for me which was OK.  I am not sure what I need with more stuff.  We went to Lowes to pick up a few things and went home to paint some stuff we already own.  I want to put a shelf in the living room and remembered I have one in the shed that my grandpa and I built years ago. I used to have it hanging over the kitchen window with all kinds of kitchenalia sitting on it and lights hanging from the large dowel.  I don't remember why we took it down but I know it will work in the living room.  But it is currently cream colored with green paint showing under the crackly cracks.   Not really a good match with the new living room.  I really wanted to get the shelf up quickly so I thought I would just spray paint it cream.  Which did work OK but I was really not thrilled with it when I was done.  

I bought a quilt rack at the thrift store on half price day several weeks ago and it is really banged up but still sturdy enough.  

We primed it.

And painted it brown, rather like the stain only not so banged up looking now.  It fits well in the bathroom as an extra towel dryer.   

We had also stopped at AC Moore and bought a tree that has holes for lights to be put in it as a lite tree.  We primed that as well as the pine always shows through if it is not primed.  Baylor is pretty good with a spray can now.  

While we were outside the girls came over to play.  When I was done painting I decided we needed to take care of the pumpkins still stilling by the door.  One was already a mushy, rotting mess. I dispatched him with a snow shovel and piled the other gourds into the wheelbarrow.  We hollered over to Mr Doug to make sure it was OK for the girls to go with us to the creek bank and off we went.   

They even took over the barrowing.  

And then the chunking began.  

Good bye pumpkins, hopefully the deer had a tasty snack! 

After we dropped off the girls next door we walked thought the garden path between our houses.  With the plants all dead and brown Baylor spotted a yellow Easter egg.  Too bad it was not one of the money eggs because the jelly beans were a bit worse for wear after all those months in the bee balm.  

The tree was mostly done by evening: all white lights and lots of red in the ornaments. 

And a cat, who we are hoping is not a tree climber.  

They played with the only pumpkin that survived the toss.  

Holiday Prep

To get in the holiday spirit I made eggnog pancakes for breakfast.  Baylor usually loves eggnog but this year he was not as much a fan as he has been in the past.  I loved them!  

With Thanksgiving being so late this year I did not have a lot of time to decorate the house for the Gingerbread Party the first weekend in December.  We put the tree in the new living room in the little corner in the stairwell.  Since I bought a tall, thin three years ago the fit was perfect.  I love LOTS of white lights on my tree so I put them on as I am putting on the rows of branches.  The first two rows have a string and a half each.  When I think it is nearly done, I take a blurry photo to check the lights and find dark spots.  And then I fix them!  

Baylor would help out when the mood struck him.  He is a bit better than years past when he hung everything in one small corner of the tree.  But it was still rather clustered where he was concentrating his work.  

I love the color of the room with just the lights on.  Baylor loved using the step ladder to reach the high places.  

With the Christmas lights 

With the flash.  I like the lights only best.  

And while he was up there he slide down the railing.  Might as well!  

I forgot to get everyone to add when they are thankful for at Thanksgiving but I did get Baylor's on there: God, Toys and Family.  With an addition of earth and movies added later.  

While I was resting and wasting time online Grimm needed some attention as well.  

And then he attacked the screen as I was watching something that was moving.  

While I was unpacking the pet photos I found the one we had taken the day we got her 13 years ago this weekend in 2001. We took her right to the pet shop as we did not have anything for a dog and Santa and Mrs Claus were there.  She had her first photo taken as a little 4 month old rescue puppy.  She was so sweet and a good girl right from the start.  

Thanksgiving 2014

We hosted Thanksgiving this year and while it is a lot of work, we love having a full table with our family around.   And I loved the giant sweet potatoes I roasted.  They were huge!!!

 I made a turkey in the oven with an herb mayonnaise rub.  Gloria loves mayo and I thought it would be fun to try it out instead of using butter.  The turkey was really good.  I made some stuffing for in the bird (which I hate doing but the Thatchers love it). Mom brought the boxed stuff along with the canned cranberry sauce, pickle and olive tray, and homemade green bean casserole.  I also had a ham in the crockpot, mashed potatoes and gravy, succotash, and the roasted sweet potatoes.  Meme brought homemade cranberry relish and pumpkin pies.  I made a cherry pie and Pap bought vanilla ice cream.  

My parents, Gloria's parents and our nephew Jason were all there to celebrate with us.  It was a good meal!!! 

Baylor assigned the seats again this year, but he did not want to sit with Jason for some reason. 

He wanted his Meme this year.  I was on the other side!!  

Happy Thanksgiving turkey!  

A Little Snow

I was in the dining room I noticed Grimm was on Eddy's bed and poor old Eddy was on the cold wood floor.  She did not seem to be too upset about it as she could have pushed him off if she wanted to.  She is just a good dog. 

We had our first shovelable snow and Baylor and Gloria worked on it while I worked in the house.  Work let us leave early so it was still light out.  Usually when we get home at 5:15 it is already dark.  Baylor loved being out in the snow and playing with the shovel.  

Instead of removing the snow from the driveway, he made piles on the driveway of the snow on the grass.  But they were big piles of snow, something to be proud of!  

Eddy still loves the snow too.  She has always enjoyed it but now does not want to stay out for as long as she used to.  

A coworker gave me these lighted foam sticks she had from a wedding she attended. Baylor loved them of course!  They showed off his ninja skills!