Happy Halloween!

 Oops!  Looks like I failed to say it in any of my previous posts this week.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Sunday Supper - Halloween Trail Mix

 

photo courtesy of foodlion.com

I'm a little late with this Halloween trail mix recipe for actual Halloween but it will be a great way to use up any left over candy.  Like there's ever any left over candy. Ha!  Okay, so maybe we all need to carry ourselves to the store and buy out all the Halloween candy corn and Reece Pieces that are left so we can make this.  It sounds delicious!  And super easy!  And there's nothing that says you can't enjoy candy corn in November.

More Bazaar Knitting

 Knitting for the upcoming bazaars continues.

This week I'm focusing on creating Christmas gnomes.  I'm sure I'll share photos when I actually get a few finished.

The making is going slowly because the house selling ordeal continues.  No acceptable offers yet but interest in the house remains high and it feels like we have to leave the house almost daily for showings.  And yes, I am aware that I shouldn't be complaining.... but .... I'm starting to complain..., pretty loudly.  

Meanwhile...

Quack, quack, quack.

Hayden's duck feet worked well.  She went to a local trunk-or-treat event this past weekend and had a blast.  She remembers being a ladybug last year but she doesn't remember getting candy.  She is Quite excited about the Halloween candy this year!

Sunday Supper - Carrot Cake Smoothie

 

photo courtesy of foodlion.com

Okay, I'll admit, I'm not too sure about today's recipe.  Food Lion lists carrot cake smoothies as a healthy meal, and I'm sure they are.  My eye doctor would be thrilled with them since she wants me eating orange and yellow foods every day.  I have the feeling these smoothies are either delicious or disgusting.  I can't wait to try one and find out for myself.

A pretty exciting life

I'm leading a pretty exciting life these days.  

I got a new reusable Starbucks cup and it came with an awesome, striped straw.

I reordered business cards and they came in this cool, colorful box.

Because we put our house on the market, we replaced the random rolls of toilet paper that were sitting around the house with real tissues.  I feel fancy and grown up now.

I spent the majority of this past week weaving in ends in preparation for next month's Christmas bazaar.  There's only a little less than three weeks before the first one I signed up for and I'm starting to panic just a teeny tiny bit.

I started a new hemmed brim hat.  The yarn looks so much better in person. In person, it's a very pale, grayish olive green.

And while this was totally unplanned but I happened to realize the bag was in the background, if you want a little more excitement in your life, get yourself some Creative Snacks Co. Drizzled Granola Bites.  They are so good! And they come in several different flavors (my personal favorite is the lemon blueberry. Yum!!)  And slightly more healthy than snacking on candy corn.  Look for them in your local grocery store.  My store keeps them on the cereal aisle.

What's your exciting life been like this week?

Sunday Supper - Ground Beef & Tortellini Skillet

 

photo courtesy of foodlion.com

My husband will call today's recipe for Ground Beef & Tortellini "homemade Hamburger Helper" but who cares.  It sounds tasty and it's cheap and super fast to make.  The recipe calls for ten minutes of prep time and another ten to cook.  But as far as I can tell, the only prepping needed is locating a pan and grabbing the ingredients from the fridge.  My kind of meal!

On the needles

First, we finally have a house full of pumpkins and candy corn.  I just Love autumn!

I am so happy to have cooler temperatures and pumpkins.  My jeans, sweaters and boots have been dug out of storage and we've even turned on the heat.  I love fall!

I'm still frantically knitting for this season's Christmas bazaars.  The first one is on November 12th so I have some time but unfortunately, work takes up a lot of my time.  And then there's the whole house selling thing.  Cleaning up all my crafty mess, putting it all away, leaving the house for an hour or so, then coming home and getting it all back out again takes up a surprising amount of time.  I shouldn't complain.  Having lots of interest in the house is much better than having no interest.  Amazingly, according to Zillow, the listing has had 2,268 views in 13 days.  Thankfully not all those people have come to see the house, although it does feel like I've dumped the trash cans and mopped the floors that many times.  😄

At the moment, I'm focusing on knitting fur headbands.  They were extremely popular at Winterfest last year so I decided to make them again this year.  They don't look like much until you put them on  but they are super comfortable, soft and warm.

I wore one pretty much the entire time I was working Winterfest last year.

What have you been knitting?

Sunday Supper - Cheesy Chicken & Asparagus Pasta

 

Today's Cheesy Chicken Asparagus Pasta is another popular Food Lion recipe.  It sounds healthy, easy to make and budget friendly.

  

The Birds!

 I've been doing a little more knitting this week but still not as much as I'd have liked. 

I'm almost ready to start decreasing on this hat.  Only a few more rows to go.

Wow, that's orange!  Hayden is going to be a duck for Halloween so I'm knitting her duck feet to go over her shoes.  I don't have a pattern and they didn't flare out and 'web' as much as I'd hoped they would, but they do fit over her shoes perfectly.  Now I only have the challenge of making the second one match the first. Hope my notes are better than I think they are.

I've also knit 40 billion chapstick holders for the upcoming fall/Christmas bazaars I'm doing.  

But the real reason I haven't gotten much knitting done...

My sister took her grandkids to the Richmond Metro Zoo and invited me to tag along.

I never pass up a chance to go to the zoo.  We saw the penguins,

And of course we fed the giraffes.

The wolves were awesome!  I had never seen live wolves before and was surprised how big they are.  I expected them to be large dog - labrador, german shepherd... size but they were much, much larger.

The black one is a "baby" and looks like a Hellhound.  The others seemed mostly indifferent to the visitors' presence but that black one looked like he'd like to eat us all alive.

 

The camels are always fun to see and thankfully they were in a good mood.  No spitting this time.

 

But my favorite was the birds.  I didn't think anything could surpass my love of feeding the giraffes but those birds....  I didn't want to go into their habitat. I had no idea I have a slight bird phobia.  I mean,  I'm fine with sitting on the deck watching the birds in the yard.  I'm cool with birds in pet stores.  But the idea of going into that giant cage with a zillion birds flying around... Yikes!  But I white knuckled it and went in.   And I'm SO glad I did.  After I got over my initial anxiety wig-out, I had a blast.  The birds landed all over me, and yes, they pecked me a little but the experience was worth the tiny bit of pain. At one point, I had three on my head, several on my back, one on my shoulder pecking at my cheek, three on my arm and another crawling up my jacket sleeve.  So much fun!

Oh, and let's not forget the pygmy hippo.  He was singing to us.

I can't wait to go back!

Sunday Supper - Slow Cooker Crab Dip

 

photo courtesy of foodlion.com

Today's recipe is for slow cooker crab dip.  I won't be able to eat it (I'm Horribly allergic to seafood) but we play the Cowboys today, our team is pitiful this year (they may as well have Hayden and I playing on the team,) my husband has been working extra hard lately and he loves crab dip so... Slow Cooker Crab Dip.  Maybe it will bring us good luck on the field today.