It's Not Easy Being...Orange

Today seems appropriate to share some of our fall projects with you. I LOVE this time of year and have been wanting to reflect it in our home. So, for starters, if you came to our front door right now, this is what you'd see...

Our festive wreath

This "homemade" wreath was as easy as can be. Here are the instructions: 1. Buy wreath and bright embellishment 2. Stick bright embellishment into wreath 3. Hang wreath on door, and VOILA! That's right, I didn't even glue anything. That's the kind of craft that leaves you feeling accomplished in 2 minutes. I may add to it next year...if I get around to it.

This weekend while I attempted to make paper pumpkins as a center piece for our table (not pictured because I did not like the results), the Hubs had a project all his own. I don't remember how he got onto this but he discovered a way to make hot meals on the trail or while camping using dehydrated foods in freezer bags. As per recommended by the websites he read, he tested one of the meals at home...where there is other food in case the attempt goes awry. So here he is with his homemade stove (made from pepsi cans), homemade fire shield (foil), homemade stove stand (wire from wire hangers provided by the local dry-cleaners), and his "pot" of water (or the cup from his canteen). By the way, it was a success, but that is for another post.

So we bought a pumpkin a few weeks ago and had yet to carve it. I had ambitious thoughts of carving St. Michael the archangel...something like this...

But then realized that, indeed, my thoughts were QUITE ambitious (maybe next year) and so we settled on something a little more simple. We of course had to have snacks while we worked on said projects... and what is better this time of year than...

Snackies while carving the pumpkin

Tim had purchased a pumpkin carving kit and in it had this little thing to trace your stencil onto your pumpkin. After tracing once, we couldn't see the dots, twice, still couldn't find the dots, used a tack the third time...barely could see the dots. So I drew on the pumpkin to help me find the third set of dots. I worked hard to carve the pumpkin before I wore out and resigned to let the Hubs carve the pumpkin while I made yummy pumpkin seeds.

Carving the pumpkin

Spicy pumpkin seeds and sweet pumpkin seeds

Ok, well I didn't "make" the pumpkin seeds...God did...but I embellished them. I made spicy pumpkin seeds from a mix of spices including paprika and chili powder (I didn't have cayenne pepper like the recipe called for), and sweet pumpkin seeds from a mixture of sugar, cinnamon, and ground ginger. I highly recommend the sweet ones, but Tim liked the spicy ones.

Oh, I suppose you want to see what we actually carved into our pumpkin. After lots of hard work, we sat back, ate pumpkin seeds, and enjoyed the glow of...