A Little Taste of Fall

 We got a little taste of fall this last weekend.  The temperature dropped enough to wear long sleeves and drink hot chocolate.  It got hot again on Tuesday, but I was in heaven while it lasted.  I think I just get excited when the seasons change.  I get bored when things stay the same for too long.  Usually spring and fall don't stick around long enough for me to get sick of them, so I'm a huge fan of both.  To celebrate, I broke out our fall decorations, and even made some new ones.  I saw this book page pumpkin on a blog a while ago, so I decided to make some.  I love how they turned out.

I'm having a hard time figuring out what to do with our fireplace mantel.  The ledge isn't really big enough for anything, but it looks too bare without any decorations.  If we owned this place I might consider framing the mirror, but since we're renting this will have to do for now.  I think some candle sticks could be cute too.

These are the blocks I made last year.  I still love them.

And here's some pictures of Lucas being cute.  He has seriously grown up so much in the last few months.  He's definitely not a baby anymore.  He's always surprising us with some new word he learned, or doing something we didn't think he knew how to do.  Look how grown up he is here swinging in the big boy swing.

And he loves to do the airplane swing.  He is so funny.

But no matter how old he gets, he'll always be our little baby, and he'll probably be riding his Mater until he's old enough to drive the car.

A-line Skirt

I've really been wanting a new skirt lately, but I just can't seem to find what I want in the stores.  I have a skirt that I really like the way it fits, so I just decided to use that as a pattern, and make myself a new skirt.  Here is the old skirt that I got like 6 years ago.

 And here is the one I made.

 I added a little lace trim like the other one had.

 Lucas wanted to help me take pictures.

 I love my new skirt.  It took me a few hours to make, but at a fourth the price of what I was looking at in the stores, it was worth it.

I can't wait to use the other pattern I have to make another one.

Jelly Belly Tour

We decided to get out of the house yesterday and do something fun, so we went to the Jelly Belly factory and took a tour.

I promise Lucas was happier than he looks in this picture.  We actually had a pretty good time.  Turns out Lucas LOVES jelly beans.  After his first taste he kept asking for more.  And every time he saw Jelly beans down on the production floor he asked if he could go down and eat them all.  They had windows at his eye level so he loved running around looking at everything.

 There was this really cool cupcake jelly bean thing.

 And they had fun jelly bean art too.  Pictures weren't allowed on the tour, but I went online to find some of the art and it turns out you can make your own.  The ones on the tour looked much better.

After the tour we got to sample any flavor jelly bean we wanted.  I tried pretty much every one except for all the nasty booger and barf flavored ones.  Why would anybody get those?  They gave us little complimentary bags of jelly beans too. Lucas ate almost his whole bag in like 10 minutes. It was a fun trip.

Sewing

Joann's was having a $0.99 sale on their sewing patterns.  I was searching for a skirt pattern for myself and I found this.  I just couldn't pass it up.

Now someday if I ever have a girl, I can make cute little dresses for her.  In the mean time if someone with a little girl wants to buy all the fabric and stuff, I'll experiment for you.  :)

I got this skirt pattern as well.  I'm going to be working on a few sewing projects in the next few days so look forward to seeing the finished products.

Goofball and Lunch

Lucas has been doing some really silly things lately.  I don't know how kids figure out that they can fit their legs into their shirts.

Or that fruit snacks fit in their ears.

 Lucas fell asleep like this on the couch the other day.  I scooted him to a safer position as soon as I got a picture.

 I made some roasted potato and leek soup the other day.  It was really tasty and really easy.  I used this recipe except I didn't put in the arugula.  Look how pretty the potatoes and leeks are ready to be roasted.

 My mom and Becky came over and we made panini to go with the soup.

 And we watched Pride and Prejudice.  I love eating yummy food and watching a good chick flick.

Bedtime Stories

Our Neighbor Friends

We have some neighbors that we met at the park a week or so after we moved here.  They have a little boy around Lucas's same age and Lucas and him love to play together.  We've been going out on walks in the morning and then letting the boys play at the park.  It's been nice to have someone to go on walks with again, and have someone to chat with during the day.  Here's Lucas and his new friend playing at the park.

 I tried to get them to both smile at the camera at the same time but I never once did get them both looking. Oh well!

Lucas's Room

We are finally done with Lucas's room and I absolutely love it!  I took a bunch of pictures so you could see everything.  These first two give you the main idea.

This is Lucas's little reading spot.

Here is his dresser, I love that it has a space for his books.

And here is a close up of the pictures I made to go over the dresser.  Lucas loved doing the foot prints and hand prints.  He keeps asking to do them again.  And I cut the head silhouette with my silhouette machine.  Hee hee, I'm a genius!

I love how cute these turned out.  I didn't do any for Lucas when he was a baby cause I just never took the time to figure it out.  It is super easy!  I will definitely be doing these again.

Lucas loves having his own little bed.

And this is the rug in his room.  It's probably my favorite part.

I put Lucas's name up on the shelf so he can't get to them and rip off the paper again.  And did you notice the things in the room that match the curtains?  This little book...

And I made a basket liner and a pillow case.

I might even make a coordinating duvet cover for his comforter when it actually gets cold enough to need one.  And there you have it.  Lucas's room is completely finished.  I've gotten a lot of things here and there decorated, but this is the only room that's totally done.  It feels good to have something accomplished, and we're pretty happy with how it turned out.  Now if only I could make my own room that cute!

The Backyard

I realized that I didn't include pictures of the backyard when I did pictures of the house last time, so I decided to take some pictures to post.  The backyard really is not big at all, but it's bigger than what we used to have, which was nothing.  Anything is better than nothing.  Lucas thinks it's pretty awesome, although, it's a good thing we have a real park nearby cause there is only so much you can do out here.

We got a little pool for Lucas to play in and he loves it.  It's the perfect way to spend that last hour of the day before daddy comes home and mommy is completely out of energy and ideas.

We have these big trees that block people from being able to see into our backyard and our house.  We love it.  And they are pretty.  We think they might be redwood trees.

And the biggest surprise of all is that there are rose bushes back here.  I LOVE roses.  They just started blooming this week and they are beautiful.

I'm excited to see what this one looks like when it has opened up.

I might try to plant a few more things back there next year, but for now I have enough to do getting the inside put together and pretty.  I have 75% of Lucas's room together, I just have to get a few more things done and then I can post pictures.

Water Fountain

I took these pictures forever ago when we very first moved, but then I kinda forgot about them.  So I decided I would just go ahead and post them now.

Downtown Livermore has this fun water fountain that kids can play in.  The first time we went downtown to walk around and see what there was to see, Lucas saw the fountain and started insisting that he be allowed to play in it.  He loves running through fountains and sprinklers. We hadn't brought a swimsuit with us, though, so we just let him get his pants all wet and ride home without pants on.  Lucas prefers to be naked so he was fine with this.

He had so much fun we decided to come back a few weeks later with some cousins that were visiting California.  They had so much fun playing together!

 And I had to include this picture of Lucas sitting on one of the jets.  He thought it was pretty funny to sit on it.  I thought his plumber crack was equally hilarious.