Happy Halloween

I just had to buy a Halloween costume for Lacey this year. It's her first Halloween with us, so I wasn't sure what to expect, but she's generally a roll-with-the-flow kind of girl, so I had high hopes.

Sheba and Otis both have had costumes in past years and they have never lasted longer than 5 minutes. Otis just lays on his side and Sheba looks totally embarrassed and will not move an inch, so I didn't even make an attempt with them today.

Miss Lacey was fine to start off, although I'm not sure the jockey can see over her massive head.

But once she laid down and started rolling around on her back, trying to chew her jockey's foot off, I ditched that plan. I'm pretty sure that is not allowed at the Kentucky Derby!

So I switched to plan B which was a skull and bones bandanna (again, no one else would wear a bandanna). Two out of three animals sitting down at once, not moving, not sniffing butts and sort of looking in my general direction was the best I could do.

Hope you enjoy your Halloween evening.

I'll be staying home, watching It's The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown and suturing someone's foot.


   

Winner, Winner, Vintage Christmas Dinner

Linda at My Vintage Soul had a giveaway last week. And...I...Won.

Yes, little old me won a giveaway. I was so excited!

And then when it arrived in the mail, I was even more excited!!! Three exclamation marks worth.

I adore this wreath. It is like everything I love about vintage Christmas decor all wrapped up into one scrumptious package.

Yeah, and that little thing about me whining about bloggers talking about Christmas already (on my Black, Orange and Spooky post).

Yep, add me to the list.

Ho, ho, ho, Merry Christmas!


   

Simple Sundays

Rex, the planter turned remote control holder, is going as a witch for Halloween. Me, I think I'll be going as a middle aged blogger who needs her roots touched up.

Are you getting dressed up for Halloween?

BTW, see that chemisty beaker full of orange and black Peanut Butter Kisses on the table. I love those things. Chewy on the outside and filled with peanut butter on the inside. Yummity yum yum yum.

As I was just casually scarfing down one of those things yesterday, I noticed some unexpected graininess. I thought it was just a little piece of hard peanut butter stuck in there. Or a dead cockroach. Take your pick.

I kept chewing though because, like I mentioned, I love those things.

But no, it was one of my dental fillings. One of my favorite candies turned on me and stole my filling. I'll never be able to just innocently eat one of those again without worrying about them robbing my mouth.

Just thought you'd want to know in case you have a bag of Peanut Butter Kisses at your home. They're sneaky little candies.


   

Black, Orange and Spooky

I love me some black and orange this time of year. Black and orange and I are joined at the hip. We go together like peas and carrots. Yessiree Bob, I like that color combo.

Notice how I said this time of year though? After October 31st, I am pretty much ready to barf at the very sight of any shade of orange and I will ban the color from my house until next October.

Isn't it weird how we love something so much and can't get enough of it and then we kick it to the curb like a used Snickers wrapper.

I blame it on marketing. Halloween decor has been in stores since August. It has been shown on blogs since July (you know, that month that has the 4th of July in it).

Why can't we just enjoy the holiday seasons when they are upon us? Why are we rushing into a new season before this one is even close to being done?

(Very cool witch sign that my sister in Oregon made for me)

I've seen blogs highlighting Christmas decorating ideas already (you know who you are, don't duck your heads). I wonder if these people will be sick to death of red and green long before Thanksgiving even gets here.

I sort of have a dusting rule. If your Christmas wreath is going to be up long enough to be dusted, you might be rushing the season.

Just to be fair, I did show a ceramic Christmas tree last week.

To each their own. I am certainly not the blog police.

But why not try enjoying the holiday season you are in? Stop and smell the roses. Live in the present. OK, I'm all out of stupid cliches now, but you get the idea.

Anywho, I need to get off the computer and go enjoy my orange and black, before I start work on my Easter baskets tonight.



Linking with Vintage Inspiration Friday, Feathered Nest Friday, Home Sweet Home, Inspiration Friday, Saturday Night Special, Tabletop Tuesday and Cowgirl Up

   

The Lantern With No Candle

Although I wasn't sure I was going to be keeping this lantern when I first bought it, because it's HUGE and a little out of scale for the room, I have kept it on the dining room table pretty much non-stop since March and have come to love it. I just keep altering the poor thing for each season.

It's been a bird's home, a patriotic lantern Paul Revere would have been proud to carry (You know he did more than just make cookware, didn't you?) and I've occasionally even used it as a boring old candle holder.

For Fall, I threw a white pumpkin into it, wrapped some acorn garland that I have had forever and a day around it,

tossed some stained gourds on the table,

popped in a vocabulary card and called it a day.

The vocabulary card would have made so much more sense if it had said ACORN wouldn't it? Oh well, LEAF still says Fall and it makes much more sense than the COW card I have.

On another note, my son seems to be doing better today. We ended up taking him to the ER Monday night for a few hours because his kidney stone pain kept getting worse and worse, but the stones seem to have settled down and his pneumonia/cold is much better also. So I think he's finally on the mend now. I'm off to knock on some wood now, because now that I've said that, I've probably just jinxed it.


   

A Walk In The Park

Life has not been a walk in the park this weekend.

My son has had this damn cold for weeks and weeks. So long that I can't even remember when it started. Sometime around the beginning of school, I guess.

Been to the doctor's three times for it, so took him back for the fourth time on Saturday. Just for kicks, because we didn't have anything else to do on this fine Fall weekend (insert sarcasm here).

The doctor said his chest sounds like he has walking pneumonia, although they didn't do an x-ray, so we're not a zillion % sure. We try to limit x-rays, since he's already had a ridiculous amount of them in his short life and he's practically glowing as it is.

Plus they suspected a sinus infection also, so they decided to just do a course of Zithromax to kill two birds with one stone.

(I totally did not plan for the killing of birds to be right above the duck photo)
Oh, and speaking of stones, last night he passed what we think are kidney stone pieces. He has ongoing kidney stone problems, so nothing new, but just not a good thing to add to his mix this weekend.

So, not a walk in the park for him, but things will get better once the Zithromax kicks in and the kidney stones have calmed down and life gets back to normal around here.

I'm looking forward to taking a nice hot bath tonight, because it has definitely been a Calgon-take-me-away kind of weekend here.