It's Starting to Look Like Fall... 🎃 🍃 🍂

It's definitely pumpkin season.

 I was amused walking through the supermarket the other day seeing all the different varieties of pumpkins they had.  

Big orange classic pumpkins...

Small round white pumpkins...

green lumpy pumpkins...

pink flat pumpkins...   

round pale blue pumpkins...

How beautiful they all are in their own unique way.

 Pumpkins are one of my favorite things about Fall.  I wanted to bring home one of each. 

But, alas, I only brought home a few.  Enough to spruce up a corner of my front porch.  

The fun part was getting them home and putting it all together.  The welcome flag was in the Fall basket I won at the ladies retreat.  It ended up being the perfect size to hang on this old chair.  I have a yard flag hanger but I liked the way it looked here better.  The bear I picked up on a trip to Cloudcroft a few years back.  He has a permanent place out here on the patio.

The bigger pumpkin sits between my two patio chairs.
🎃🎃🎃🎃🎃🎃🎃🎃

The other pumpkins I grouped into an old galvanized tub.

You see the frog peeking out the bottom?

The mums were on clearance at WM.  I bought a few for the church planters and kept one for myself.  I set it in a old rusty enamel pot.  It makes a perfect planter.

Even a scarecrow found a place in the mix.

The first of the falling leaves have made their way to my yard.
🍃🍂🍃🍂🍃🍂🍃🍂

This ceramic kitty has been a faithful companion over the past few years. She likes to be outside where she can see all the comings and goings

We've had beautiful weather these past few days.

Cool mornings and warm, sunny afternoons.
I love this weather and I love this time of year.

What's your favorite thing about Fall?

Grace ♥

I love scrolling through my favorite blogs and seeing

photo after photo of pretty Fall decorations.  

Porches...

yards...

living rooms...

table settings...

 mantels...

it's all so inspiring to me.  

I've spent a few hours at the church this week decorating it for the Fall season so I haven't gotten around to sprucing up my own home yet. When I spend too much time at the church I feel like my home gets neglected.

The Halloween twinkle lights over my kitchen window is the extent of my decorating.  It's a start at least.  I'm not quite finished at the church but it's close to being done so I'll leave it like that until later in the week.  Today I think I'll spend some time out in my front porch.  It needs the attention, bad.

I attended a ladies retreat this past weekend with a few other ladies from our church.  It was quite a large event.  I think I remember someone saying there were over four hundred ladies in attendance.  A church from a nearby town puts one on every year.  The good thing is that it was close to home and we didn't have to travel long, only twenty minutes.  

I'm not usually a fan of this type of event.  In fact, if I can be honest, I was dreading going.  I get a little anxiety being in a group this large and besides, I could think of many other things I could do with my time  ((and my money))  if I just stayed home.  

I hesitate to say things like that because people expect pastors wives to be perfect social butterflies who have no struggles and do everything right. I don't want to disappoint anyone but I just want to say, we are just ordinary people with real flaws and real struggles.  Anyway, I'll leave this topic for another day.  For now, I hope you all understand me.

The speaker was good.  She spoke on the subject of grace and how we needed it every day in all matters of life.  We need grace in order to extend kindness to others, to be good mothers, good wives, to forgive others, and to forgive ourselves.  Her words were simple and practical but important and needed.

They had eighty - one gift baskets to give away.  I was the recipient of one giant Fall basket.  It had all kinds of things packed in there.  Things to eat, things to bake, things to decorate with, and a lot of paper goods for Thanksgiving day.

Although I didn't want to go, I'm glad I went.  I was blessed not only by the message but by the time I spent with my girls (my church ladies).  They are a fun group.  Within fifteen minutes of being in the van with them my mood lifted.  Of course I was sitting by the feisty, playful one who gives everyone a hard time and makes everyone laugh.  Doesn't every group have a friend like that?  I sure hope so.  They make everything funner. 

 Thankful for my sister hood.

Feeling blessed
♥♥♥

A New Month...

~ Hello October ~

Hello Chrysanthemums...

Hello pumpkin bread, pumpkin pie, 

pumpkin spice, and everything nice...

Hello cool breezes...

Hello wet sloppy rain...

Hello long evenings curled up in bed

 watching movies type of weather...

I have missed  you.

I was walking through the produce department at the grocery store the other day and noticed the big bins of pumpkins had replaced the watermelons.  A new season is here and there's a different feeling in the air.

I had  been a good girl and hadn't gone out treasure hunting in a while.  Well, I don't know if it was really because I was a good girl or because life had just been busy, but for one reason or another I hadn't gone junking.  My oldest daughter had a day off last week and we both headed into town to do some shopping.  It always feels so good to get out of the house and do some of the "fun" shopping.   We stopped at my favorite shop and although we didn't score big, I did manage to bring a few things home with me.

The decorative tile fits right in with my Southwest kitchen.  I couldn't resist the yellow planter.  Even if it's Fall I need a little bit of cheery sunshine in my day.

$1.99 for this ginormous bag?  Sure, I'll take it.

All I could think about was how much yarn this could hold.

It holds a lot.

:)

I'm still working on this baby blanket.  It's coming along at a snails pace.  It seems like crochet goes a lot faster than knitting.  It takes a long time to see any progress with all of those little bitty tiny stitches.  

I've been doing a lot of this lately with the wet weather and all. Binge watching my favorite Netflix series and knitting a little in the evenings.  

With October here it makes me want to decorate my home for Fall.
I haven't gotten around to it yet but I'm hoping to get to it soon.

 ~Til next time ~

Through the Laundry...

I had a thought this morning that helped me see things from a different prospective.  One thought led to another, which led to another, and then to another.  And it all started with a pile of laundry.

This morning I walked into the laundry room and was immediately disappointed to see a big heap of dirty laundry, just sitting there, begging for my attention.  My first thought was, my work is never done.  I felt a little annoyed that even though laundry gets done most days, a new pile seems to mysteriously reappear every morning.

I walked away from it thinking I would come back to face it later.  I started washing the morning dishes and as I stood there it all became clear to me.  

I am that dirty laundry. I am a big heap of blemishes and flaws.  But my heavenly Father doesn't give up on me.  He doesn't lose his patience and throw his hands up in the air and walk away from me.  He's right there with me every morning.  He keeps on loving.  Keeps on giving.  He probably looks down from Heaven and sees the mess that I am but he keeps on working, shaping, and molding.  

I stood there thinking about that for a few moments then I walked back into the laundry room to start a load only this time with a better attitude and a blessed heart.

While I am working on the laundry, God is working on me. 

And that, my friend, should lift anybody's spirit.

♥♥♥

Speaking of blessings, hubby was gifted some football tickets by one of our church members.  It's for our local college team.  Looks like hubby and I have a date for Saturday night.

Happy first day of Fall!

Lately...

Hola mis amigas!

September started off with a flurry of things to do and places to be.  Here we are already halfway through it and I haven't made a single post.  I haven't had time to take any pictures and I can't make a post without pictures.  What fun would that be?

I have a couple of things I'm working on at the moment.  

I'm trying to finish up this shawl I started on a year or so ago.  It's a granny stitch shawl that I was going to do with just those little balls of remnants that always seem to hang around.  Now I'm trying to finish it with whatever yarn I have on hand whether it's a remnant or not.  So far I'm liking the way it's taking shape.  All I lack is the edging. I can't decide what to do.  

This is a knit baby blanket I started on recently.  I'm following this pattern.  I really should get some stitch markers though because I'm having to backtrack a lot to correct a stitch where I knit but should have purled.  Ugh.  Beginner knitter problems. 

I haven't picked this up in a couple of days. 

 I'm making it for my future grandbabies so there's no rush.

 I had to skip my morning coffee a couple of days ago because hubby and I had to fast for a physical we had scheduled for that day.  We both had caffeine headaches all day.    It's amazing how much our bodies miss our morning brew.  My coffee tasted extra good the following morning.

  I'll give you an update on my breast biopsy.  I had a breast biopsy done on  my right breast two weeks ago at a breast cancer center.  I had a lot of anxiety about it but I got a call last Wednesday and they said the microcalcifications were benign. No cancer cells were found, thank the Lord.  I have to go back in six months to get another mammogram so they can take another look at it.  Hopefully all will be well then too.  

The news was a big relief to me.  It's amazing how much something like this can send you into a spiral of worry.  Even though you try not to, it's inevitable.  Your mind starts to think about the what if's and you start preparing yourself for the worst.  Thank goodness it all worked out for the best.  Thank you for all your well wishes and prayers.   I feel very blessed.

My Grace is Sufficient For Thee

August roundup.

Another month has come and gone.

Farewell sweet August.

Thank you for the encouraging words from my last post.  I will keep your kind words in my heart as I  prepare for my biopsy today.  I hope I didn't come off sounding weak or whiny.  What some of you may not know is that I am already a uterine cancer survivor.  My father passed away last September of gastric cancer.  The thought of being diagnosed with cancer once again is a little frightening.

I've had this verse in my heart since yesterday.  It's God's still small voice comforting me.  Letting me know He is with me and walking along beside me all the way.

The Mounting Anxiety of a Breast Biopsy

I have an upcoming biopsy scheduled for Thursday on my right breast.  I can feel the anxiety building up within me.  As hard as I try to stay positive and calm, the anxiety is mounting and I can feel the burden I carry as my chest feels tight and my muscles feel achy.  It's tension and stress and all those other emotions that come with this kind of worrying.

I'm usually a calm person.

I don't get frazzled easy 

but waiting to find out if I have a highly deadly disease 

growing in my body has me a bit worried.

I went in for my very first mammogram on July 11th.  I received a letter in the mail a few days later that they had found something abnormal and they needed to do a diagnostic mammogram and possibly an ultrasound if needed.   This is not what I expected from my first mammogram.  Although other ladies I talked to said it had happened to them once or twice over the years.  

They scheduled me an appointment for Aug. 22, a whole month later.  I was a little nervous but my husband reassured me it was merely precautionary.

I went in for my appointment last week where they took six more images.  The radiologist told me he couldn't tell what it was either way other than it looked suspicious and a biopsy was the way to go.  They sent me home with a cd of my images to take to my biopsy at a breast cancer center two hours away.  

I am a Christian and even though I have peace in my heart and I trust the Lord, the fear of the unknown is always unsettling.  

I was walking through the grocery store the other day and saw this.  An appropriate message for me.  Just what I needed.

 I ask for your prayers and if any of you have gone through something like this let me know.   I'm sure your words of wisdom will be of some comfort to me.

In the mean time, I'm knitting.

August Inspiration Board

A few beautiful, share worthy images...

because sometimes it's fun to just sit back, look and be inspired

I'm on a bit of a boho kick.  I'm fully embracing the southwest New Mexico style, and loving it.  It only took three years to take the "Texas" out of me, so to speak.  There will always be a special place in my heart for Texas but New Mexico is growing on me more and more every day.  

Here's a few things that I've pinned.

I NEED one of these.

photo source Pinterest
Traced back to this website

So perfectly pretty!!

Photo source Pinterest
Traced back to Etsy

This one would require a lot more thinking and dedication but the end

 result would be totally worth it I think.  

Photo source Pinterest
Traced back to this website

I love everything about this shawl.  

Photo source Pinterest
Traced to this website

Drool...

Photo source Pinterest

And who can resist Baby Groot?

Photo source Pinterest
Traced back to this website

Hubby and I are probably too old for this movie but I talked him into taking me to see it a few months ago when it first came out.  By chance I had just watched the first movie at home on cable tv and liked it.  My kids informed me that there was a new one coming out so I checked our local theater and it happened to be playing.  The second movie was good too although the ending dragged on too long but even so I enjoyed it.  Hubby thought it was funny too.

I may have to make ones of these.  He makes me smile.
:)

Hope you're as inspired as I am.

♥♥♥