Sitting around a campfire and making s'mores has quickly become an "end of the weekend tradition" in our backyard. The smoke billowing through the trees is the signal for the neighbor kids to join in on the fun.

Charley's new invention: sticking a Hershey kiss upside down in the marshmellow and roasting it to melted chocolate perfection.

Off the top of my head

- Did a little break dancing in the living room. It's hard to spin on your back.

- I sold a piece of mid-century furniture to wedding photographers. They emailed afterward and said to keep them up on other finds. I like that.

- Doing that allowed me to keep another piece that I never really wanted to sell.
That was my master plan. Jon was on to me.

- Friday was National Bald Day. Be proud of your shiny dome!

- Hearing about people's hardships stays with me for a long time.

- Just can't get into the toilet paper art craze.

- Twisted my ankle super bad (not from break dancing) and hobbled around at an event. Kinda bad when you're trying to promote health.

- Dolls made from dried up apples freak me out.

- Was hired to take sports photos in the rain - fun!

- Cried with Reese when he had a bad morning which made Blair cry and then Trae.

- Bought new bracelets made from steer horns from women in Africa.

- Have no idea why I say "Doy burgers" instead of "duh."

- Charley told me her "worst church dance story" involving an ill-mannered dufus and when I retold the story to Jon we decided that he'd go kick his a$%. (JK of course)

- The Way We Were is still my all-time favorite movie.

- Trying to find a 2 day a week daycare facility is hard.

-Unbeknownst to us, Jon and I each led the kids in the Bohemian Rhapsody head shake while we were driving separately. Doing that never gets old.

Autumn inspiration

Here we are the 2nd week of October and I haven't done one "fall" thing anywhere, not even the pumpkin stand for the kids like last year. Chalk it up to a busier than normal season for us.

We're still in the process of putting the basement back together. And while we're at it I decided to move the family room furniture up to the living room and vice versa. Let's just say it was an experience.

We moved all of the living room furniture into the kitchen and then Jon and I had to lift the huge couch from the basement up the stairwell, which didn't fit. So we had to go out the back door of the basement and bring it in through the front entrance. Charley used a rope to pull the light out of the way and Belén watched in horror, yelling, "Stop!! If you drop the couch it will kill mom!!" when we got stuck trying to heave it over the wall.

We were laughing so hard, and telling her to stop since we (sorta) knew what we were doing. It turned out ok. I'm alive and the couch is in place and we are enjoying it so much more. We learned from that and ended up taking the living room furniture out through the kitchen deck and around outside to the basement entrance. Whew! Now we just have to switch out a few more things and we're good.

But as for welcoming fall at our house, it's still either boxed up or hasn't been planted so I needed some inspiration from good old BHG. And just maybe I'll get to it next week. You can also find some other inspiration here from a while back. Enjoy!

I lie to my children

The snowball tree grew in such a way that it created what looked like an igloo. When I was little I would play inside with my dolls and make fairy furniture for the fairies that I thought lived there. Those were magical moments for me.

While I was on a walk with Blair she asked, "Do you believe in fairies?" and even before I could say, "Of course." she said, " 'Cause I do!"

I'm not one to spoil any thoughts about what is "magical" for my kids. Sure, I will even lie about it when they ask if something is real, like fairies or Santa.

I'm guessing it may not be the "right" thing to do by some standards but the day will soon come when the truth is out and I don't think it will be a mind blowing, earth shattering, negative experience for anyone. It will just be what it is -a natural progression of learning. If my kids ever see a therapist it won't be because I told them Santa was real. There are plenty of other ways I have screwed them up I'm sure.

Sometime last year, I found salt all over Reese's windowsill. When I asked him why, he said it was to keep the Sprites away from the Fairies but that he needed more salt. So I bought him a supply, keeping the magic alive one more day. He eventually went on to discover other things and left behind his salty windowsill. Natural progression.

So it was to my delight over the weekend when I saw Charley teaching Blair how to make a fairy house in our backyard just like I had taught her some years before.

I ventured over to have a look and stood back to admire the house's construction. Then I lifted off the bark roof to peek inside.

Yep, it's pretty magical.

See for yourself...

Large pieces of bark and twigs bound together to look like a stump, complete with flag.

Peeking through the top

Fairy dust glistening on the leaf and roof

A peek at the pretty buttons and a trophy cup from a recent birthday party.

What do you/did you tell your childen?

Charming finds

When we would take family vacations my mom always looked for souvenirs that wouldn't end up in the junk drawer. Inevitably, we came home with a big eraser, snow globe, coin purse or fool's gold, but she wanted us to have some lasting memories, besides the photographs. Her choice - charms for bracelets.

They were not as easy to find as the "I walked across the Mississippi river" sticker we got in Park Rapids, MN, or the Indian jewelry throughout New Mexico, but that just made it more fun to look. It was especially fun when the name of the location was part of the charm itself.

I don't make it a point to collect them but if I happen to find an old charm bracelet, I'll look to see if it has any significance like a place we have vacationed or somewhere we have lived. Charms in shape of states or the ones of child silhouettes with a name and year engraved on the back, are especially nice even though I have no idea who they are.

A few of mine: This was from Yellowstone Park. My mom had my dad stop by the side of the road so she could feed a bear marshmellows. Other travelers stopped and video taped her doing this while we watched from the camper. She was a bit of a daredevil.

This bracelet from France is one of my favorites which reminds me of our whirlwind trip to Paris. We won the plane tickets and jetted off without any real plans on where to stay which is probably why we ended up in a not-so-nice-part of Paris. One night, Bastille Day to be exact, we jumped off the bus after midnight and watched the Parisians look in horror as we exited the bus. Their faces said it all so we ran all the way to our hotel between dark alleys, broken windows and boarded up buildings. It was scary and thrilling at the same time.


I recently found this charm for just $2.00 and it's all about California. Jon was in Russian language school in Monterey Bay when we got married. He moved me there a week after our wedding and we felt like we had won the geography lottery. It was one of the most beautiful places I had ever seen. What a way to start married life - next to an ocean, Big Sur, 17 mile Drive, The famous Lone Cypress, and the quaint towns of Carmel and Pacific Grove. Ahhh...

Now we just need to win a real lottery to be able to live there again.

Over dinner

"Mom, is the Chinese government evil?"

- asked by Little B from the backseat of the car as we were running errands today.

I think we should change our dinner conversations.

A thousand songs in my pocket

Thanks Steve.