harvest festival

Here are some pictures from the harvest festival we went to last weekend. It was at the Agricultural History Farm Park in Derwood, MD.There was so much to do, we did not even get to half of it, but the kids had a great time. If you live in Montgomery County and have elementary aged kids it is definitely worth checking out next fall!

The "shuttle" from the parking lot to the farm grounds.

There were tons of crafts for the kids, we just did a few...
putting together little flower bouquets from the garden

painting clay pots

coloring party favor butterflies

an archaeological dig

and tinsmithing.

Some of the other highlights were the tractors
and the corn maze- we almost did not make it out alive :) Grammy and Poppy actually quit and snuck out, but the rest of us stuck it out and made it to the exit, a little tired and sure that next time we would ask for a map first!

And who can resist a family photo op like this? We gained a couple kids for this picture (two of my nephews) :)
My list of things I plan to do today (all before we go to AWANA tonight) is getting a bit ridiculous-

-Bake and decorate cupcakes
-Bake these
-Make these (just happened upon the lanterns at Michael's today, so had to buy some)
-Make my own version of this (I have been thinking about this for a week and Jen's post gave me a bit of motivation to make it happen)
-Cut out and sew some cloth napkins
-Put together this wreath kit with the kids that I got on clearance last for for $3!

Luckily dinner is already in the crock pot :) Hopefully I will be able to tackle at least some of it and share some pictures tomorrow!

dahlias

Saturday we spent the afternoon at a Harvest Festival down the road from my parents house. I have a whole other post of pictures for that, but I just had to share these gorgeous flowers with you first! They were selling the blossoms for $1 a stem and you could even go into the garden to pick your flowers and have them cut fresh! They were so amazing, I have never seen anything like them- Looks like I may have something new to plant in my garden next spring!
It is hard to tell from the picture, but this one was bigger than my head!

waterford virginia

Last Friday Phil took the kids to DC to see the dinosaurs and I got to go with my mom and my sister, Sherri to Waterford, VA for their annual fair. My mom has been going since the 70's and I have gone with her a handful of times in the past 15 years. It is such a charming little town with rolling hills and beautifully maintained old houses. I took my camera with me this time so I could share some of the wonderful things we saw while we were there.There are house tours, great food (like carmel dipped apples and homemade ice cream) and juried craft exhibits. I especially enjoy watching the crafters do their handiwork.

This hat is hand carved from wood!

I always love these leather masks- wish I could buy them all for the dress up bin!

This house was for sale, I told Phil I want to move here :)
I have lots more pictures to post from our trip to MD, but I will save the rest for another day!

just popping in...

Last night I whipped up my first (and second) "hooter hider". I made one for a friend and one for myself using this tutorial. It was super easy, took about an hour to cut out and sew two of them. My friend, Kim, just called to say she tried it out and loves it and her little one does too :)

We are getting ready to leave for Maryland in the morning, So far it's been a productive day, but now it is time for the hard stuff (folding laundry, packing, cleaning the house and car etc.) so I am getting my second dose of caffeine and heading for the laundry pile!

a backpack of her own

Being the youngest of 4, Tallulah gets a lot of hand me downs, but this time I decided it was time she got something of her own, made especially for her. I searched for hours until I found the perfect fabric for the job and finally, last week, got the notions and such needed to put it all together. I bought the pattern here and once it was all cut out I would say it took me about 3 hours to put it all together, not too bad for only my second time sewing a zipper and my first time using piping! The fabric is a light weight canvas, so it does not have a lot of body, which if I make this again I might try something heavier-weight, although I do think is was probably easier to sew the lightweight fabric than a heavier one... anywho, here it is, all sewed up!

I am so glad I bought more fabric than I needed and was able to make Lulu a matching Lazy Day skirt... my model was a bit resistant to pose for me though

We'll just pretend she was trying to show off her new backpack here :)

Wait, what is that? A smile? Still, no standing up and showing off her new digs, oh well!

What? Mama's taking pictures? "I wanna be in the picture too!" sings the chorus :)
I am off to enjoy the last of my weekend by taking a nap! Hope your weekend's end is full of sunshine, smiles and naps too :)

captive

Do you ever feel like you have so much to say, but you just can't seem to get it out? Like there are so many things spinning through your head and heart that you could burst but yet you remain silent? I have been feeling like that this week- totally overwhelmed with a need to create but not being able to find the space or venue to do it... like there was so much noise all around me that I could not make sense of what was in my heart until I was finally so overwhelmed all I could do was cry. Sounds traumatic/dramatic but in reality I am pretty amazed that I have made it this far in my pregnancy (23.5 weeks) with a generally even keel, at least- even keeled for a/this pregnant women :) Anyway, back to my story- so after an afternoon of tears and ruined pizza's (another story all on it's own) I finally found a bit of silence and allowed myself to just sit in it. One of the thoughts that kept ringing in my head throughout the week was "if I could get all this creative turmoil out of my head and onto canvas, what would it look like?" I have not found the answer, but instead decided to paint/glue/cut/sew the story as it unfolds, so here is piece one of what I think will be a series of pieces. I titled this one Captive, the next will be Breaking Free.This isn't the best picture as I took it at 9pm tonight, but I am too impatient to wait for a sunny day to photograph it right.

my quilt!

I finished my quilt Monday evening and finally go some pictures of it yesterday. Here it is, in action- don't look too closely though, I am not the best quilter, I am pretty pleased with it though!