Preparing for Pirate Day, Arrrrrr!

The countdown to Halloween has begun. In the next week I have to make pirate costumes for all my offpring and try to sell some bodice outfits on Ebay. Yeah, I did put it all off until the last minute.

Last Saturday, we went to BAWb's house, and dressed up a bit for it. The kids look pretty good already, I think. It's amazing that putting a "do-rag" on screams "pirate!"

I also made my first Tarte Tatin. It's a French caramelized apple tart. Pretty easy, really. Peel, core and quarter about three pounds of apples, melt a stick of butter and a cup of sugar in a 10' cast-iron skillet, and arrange the apples neatly in concentric circles. Cook about ten minutes so that the butter and suger cook into a lovely caramel. Turn the apples over so that the other side is bathed in the buttery sugary goodness and cook five more minutes. Top with pie crust (homemade, of course) or phyllo dough. Then bake for about 35 minutes in a 350-ish oven. Swoon! (I used my Joy of Cooking cookbook's recipe.)

My Hen Day

Today was my turn for everyone to come for Hen Day. Usually, I have the house fairly clean, but either I've lost whatever shame I had for the Hens to see my house as is, or I figure it's being worked on, so why kill myself?

The project of the day was sewing me some more Chloe Toes snap diapers. I have a motley collection of diapers I've made for myself with assorted free patterns, but most of them are velcro closing, and I love the snap ones. Here is a picture of the ones we completed.

My ultimate favorite new one is the lavender with acid-green snaps and black edges. I call it my "Maleficent" diaper because it reminds me of the outifts she wears in Sleeping Beauty. However, they all just make me wring my hands with joy every time I see them. Thanks, Hens!

The children also had a stellar day. While we Hens were busily cutting, sewing, snapping and clucking, the children played outside. This is the result:

No, that's not blood, it is paint. Left over from one of my last Hen day projects, might I add.

Then later, my own precious offspring decided to undo some of their father's hard work on the upstairs walls:

"Someone" took a crowbar left lying around and smashed holes in a piece of sheetrock....punishment was applied.

Anyway, we all had a great time and ate some lovely pizza made by Rebecca:

And the new dipes got the Ivy seal of approval.

We've Finally Begun to Finish!

After living in our house for going on eight years, we've finally decided to finish it. Let me explain. My husband is a contractor. He is so busy building other people's houses that he rarely has time to work on ours. So...eight years later, I still don't have doors except on my bedroom and the bathroom (the non-negotiable doors). You know the old saying, "The cobbler's children go barefoot."

There may be other factors at work. I think there has got to be an Article of Faith concerning the amount of time a LDS family must keep Tyvek exposed to the elements on the outside of the home. Tyvek is the sturdy paperish stuff most people wrap their homes with just before siding installation. Surely, brethren, we have done our part, but now it is time for the siding, please.

But enough sarcasm. For now. We started with upstairs, where a goofy little gable room will become a play room for the kids and all the toys they have collected. It is small and claustrophobic, all slanty ceiling. But if you're three feet tall, there is a lot of useable floor area. We decided to put a window seat in under the little octagonal window.

Hollis loves to be involved in construction work. He later set up an elaborate track under the sawdust port of the miter saw visible in the lower right, so that it "snowed" sawdust when a board was cut. You can see behind him the frame of our new window seat. W'Hoo!

I am a Fall girl. I love stew. Woodsmoke, crunchy leaves, hot chocolate, gray rainy days, putting on a jacket for the first time. These are some of the things that I like about the season. Maybe I'm a hobbit.

I am as excited about Halloween as any of my children. People here in the BB (that's Bible Belt, to you who aren't in it!) are divided about fifty-fifty as to whether it's the Devil's Day or not. Don't we have better things to worry about? Things are often what one makes of them. I think a little innocent dress-up and candy won't hurt the kiddies. By the way, most of mine want to be pirates this year. I know that EVERYONE else will also be pirates, due to the big hype still left from Pirates of the Carribbean 1, 2, and 3. But I will be a big girl and let them do it, because I just keep telling myself,"My child's Halloween costume is not about me."

I have been busy at work sewing some corsets for Damsel in This Dress custom orders. As I was boxing the last one up, I realized it was pretty close to my size, so I strapped it on. Man, my arms are ginormous.