Welcome September

It's still warm in many parts of the country but September is here and soon there will be crisp days and cool nights.  In 21 short days, September 23 it will herald the first day of fall. 

I'm ready right now.  I'm ready for pumpkin spice everything from coffees to beers.  I'm ready for apple festivals and pies.  I'm ready for heirloom apples that you can't buy in the local grocery store.

I'm ready for the leaves to turn the beautiful magentas, reds, oranges and golds.  I'm ready for majestic blue ridge mountains to frame these colors with the backdrop mountain pines. 

I'm ready for tailgating, football and warm and spicy, hot and bubbly chili.  Craft and Renaissance fairs.  I'm looking forward to apple butter in big outdoor pots and kettle corn made fresh.  I'm ready for weather that begs for warm cozy sweaters and fires in the fireplace. 

You know how makeup companies sometimes categorize complexions into seasons.  Even if they label me a winter I guess you could say I'm an really an autumn at heart. 

What season are you?

Dress up your Halloween table with a sparkle spider.  He will guard your goodies in style! Quick and easy sequined spider is a fun project to do while watching TV.  This is a great group project too!

You will need:

2 ½” Styrofoam balls, each ball makes two spiders

Serrated steak knife

½” sequin pins

Gold and silver sequins

Two large red sequins

Tacky craft glue (other glues may dissolve the foam)

Chenille stems, in white/black striped and sparkle white

Black felt

Scissors

White colored pencil

Ruler

1.     Cut the Styrofoam ball in half using the serrated knife.  Rub the two cut sides together to smooth out.

2.     Place the cut circle on a piece of black felt and trace around with a white colored pencil.  Cut out.  Cut four 4-inch pieces of chenille stems from each color.  Add a dab of glue on the ends of the cut stems. Insert into the bottom sides of the Styrofoam ball half alternating each color.

3.     Add a generous amount of glue on the bottom of the ball half and attach the black felt.  Trim any excess if necessary.

4.     Begin adding the sequins.  Add some tacky glue to each area as you work smoothing with your finger. Insert the sequin pin through the hole in the sequin and push into the Styrofoam.  Continue until you have covered almost the entire piece.  Add two larger red sequins on the lower front for the eyes.  (See photo)

5.     Bend the chenille stems to form the legs and display your spider on your holiday tables.

Birthday, birthday, birthday

September is here and September and October are big on birthdays in my family.  First of all tomorrow is my sister-in-law and brother-in-law's birthdays.  They are siblings, not twins but born in different years on the same day!  Next, comes my step daughter on the 10th, after which my brother follows. His birthday is the 23rd, one week away from mine which is the 29th.  You'd think I'd be done with birthdays by then, but nope, not a chance.

My other brother is the 13th of October, my sister's the 15th and my daughter's is the 16th!

By the end of October I'm pretty darned sick of that birthday song and have gained about 15 lbs. from all the birthday cakes!

So for all you who are having birthday's this month...put on that birthday hat and maybe tip a glass or two and have a

Happy Birthday!

If you want to make a glass special for all the birthday's in your life check out the following tutorial on Make it easy crafts. 

Birthday party wine glass

Free apple bookmark printable

click for free printable

You may wonder where I’ve been lately.  First off, my hubs and I took an impromptu road trip to help our 22-year-old son in the military drive his car all the way across country.  Comfort was in short supply in a tiny little car that was so low to the ground that I hit the ceiling whenever we drove over a pebble!

We are also in the middle of redecorating our family room.  If you’ve ever started a project in a home you have lived in for several years then you have also opened the proverbial “can of worms”.  How so?  Well, after the painting, we had to get a new carpet.  After the carpet we had to get a new sofa.  After the sofa we had to get a better TV stand.  After the TV stand…well you get the drift. 

So as a result my blogging has gotten a bit lax.  After all, waiting 4 weeks for a sofa delivery has sort of displaced a lot of things.  I can barely find a chair to sit in so creativity has taken a back seat.

I know that school is either in session or almost ready so I am reposting a free apple coloring bookmark printable from my other blog Make it easy crafts that you may have missed.  Get them reading…and coloring.  And enjoy those little ones before they get old enough to buy a car for looks alone!

Tiger burning bright

In case you are wondering I am suffering from spinal stenosis or a slipped/herniated disc, so I haven’t been around much lately.  Today is the first day I am able to get on a computer.  Unfortunately, the pain meds made me sicker than the illness!  Go figure right.  So now I’m back to plain old ibuprofen and muscle relaxers.  Please forgive me If I haven’t visited or commented in a while.  I’ll be up and about soon, because nothing keeps me down for long!

Halloween is right around the corner and sometimes its fun to dress up as a favorite animal.  Tigers have got to be one of the top choices.  I’ve done a lot of face-painting and I found that Snazaroo face paint works the best.  No, I wasn’t given anything to say that, I’m just speaking from experience.  I really don’t like the greasy face paints and this kind is soft, dries on the skin and stays on till you wash it off.

Did you know that the stripes on a tiger are like fingerprints and no two are exactly alike?  I painted this tiger from one at the national zoo. 

Hopefully tigers will be around for a long time but as you can see from the list below tigers are very endangered:

Bengal tiger: Less than 2,000


Indochinese tiger: 750-1,300


Siberian tiger: Around 450


Sumatran tiger: 400-500


Malayan tiger: 600-800


South Chinese tiger: Extinct in the wild


Caspian tiger: Extinct


Javan tiger: Extinct


Bali tiger: Extinct

If you sporting a tiger costume this year, why not educate others about tigers and give to a wildlife preservation organization?