Nakita Grinie

Now that it is finally October, I feel justified in decorating for the fall season.

We already eaten the pumpkin Oreos, the pumpkin muffin bars, and purchased our apple spice Scentsy wax. I even have my Fall hairstyle! But the Texas weather continued to stay hot and humid. I can always rationalize eating holiday Oreos, but I couldn't justify decorating the house until it was officially October. Maybe the Texas weather will cooperate soon and bring cooler temperatures so I can bust out the hot chocolate and a new cinnamon broom!

As I described in last year's post about Fall decorating, I love using picks to dress up the fireplace mantles and door wreath. Picks are those small items attached to a stick you see at Hobby Lobby. They are convenient, easy to store, and they allow me to change up my decorations each year. They are also pretty sturdy, so when your kids try to use them as drumsticks on a pumpkin, they won't break. (My older kids helped me decorate this morning, and it took less than 2 minutes for them to start banging away on my poor pumpkins.) But it was fun to have the kids help, and Grace was especially exited about placing leaves on the mantle.

Below are this year's decorating pictures:

Last year, I showed how my door wreath changes from year to year. I thought it would be fun to continue that tradition. First, I'll show you this year's door wreath. I thought I would stick with a simple wreath this year, because I intend to add a cute banner sign saying, "Happy Fall!"

Now, in keeping with my new tradition, here are all the previous wreaths lined up.

When does your family decorate for the Fall season? What are your decorating tips?

TGIF.

The F has a few meanings.

Thank Goodness It's FRIDAY

(I survived my first week back at school, but I am EXHAUSTED!!!)

and 

Thank Goodness it's FALL.  

FINALLY!! 

We have been having some cray cray "Fall" weather here in California.

Last week on October 1 & 2 it was 102 degrees. You read that right. 102 degrees. 

We swam. In October. Not Okay.

You see, I am obsessed with Fall. It's my favorite. But when it's 100 degrees out in the Fall? Not a fan.

I want boots, sweaters & scarves. Not swimsuits. (Especially 2 months post partum. Yikes.)

I normally put out all my Fall things on October 1st. 

October 1st is one of my favorite days of the year. 

October is my favorite month, so to celebrate it's arrival, I normally decorate on October 1st, and bake my first batch of pumpkin bread to celebrate the arrival of October.

But, this year on October 1st it was 102. It was way too hot to make pumpkin bread.

So, instead we picked all the pumpkins from our garden! Last year we only got 2 pumpkins, but this year we got 8!

I have a sprinkling of Fall decorations that I put up around the house.

I also love the flavors of Fall....like Pumpkin Ale.

These are the BEST Flavor of Candy Corn. Go buy some now.

My girls have a love of pumpkin also. While we at Target, Kate wanted to buy as many Pumpkin foods that we could find. Here is what we got:

The Pumpkin Eggo waffles are AMAZING! And, I LOVE Pumpkin Ice Cream. I top it with chocolate chips & pecans. YUM.

They were delicious!
Speaking of delicious....be sure and check out the Crock-tober post! So many yummy Crock Pot recipes have been linked up. I made my meal plan for the next 2 weeks & am going to be trying out several recipes that were linked up! Can't wait!
You can add your recipes until October 18th, so feel free to link up if you haven't already. 

Today was a chilly day & I busted out my UGGS.
And, look....a single leaf has fallen in our yard. (Fall in California...watch out! ha!)
Fall is officially here & I couldn't be happier!
It's Friday Night Pizza Night which I plan on enjoying with a Pumpkin Ale and then going to bed early because this mama is exhausted! It's 6 o'clock & I am already in my jammies.
Happy Fall to you & Happy, Happy, Friday!

According to my calendar, today is the first day of Fall!
But, according to the weather man, Fall it was not.
Check out our temperatures this past week:
This week was the hottest week we have had all summer.
So Crazy. I am OVER it. Once school starts, I am in Fall mode & these summer temperatures have been messing with me! Ha!
The good thing about the warm weather we have had most of September has meant that our garden is still flourishing. I am still getting tons of tomatoes!
We decided this week to finally cut our 1 watermelon off the vine & eat it!
It was HUGE! And, so heavy. I wasn't sure what to expect when I cut it open.

But, lo and behold, we actually grew a legit watermelon!

The girls were so excited to taste it (and so was I!) It was delicious!

They were a little leary of the seeds. They had never seen seeds in watermelon before.

This made me realize that all the watermelon at the stores are seedless now. When I was a kid they didn't have seedless. I had to teach them how to spit out the watermelon seeds.

Another perk about the 95 + degree heat we have been having this week is that we have gotten to swim almost everyday. Tonight we swam until bedtime because it hasn't been cooling down at night. It was still 90 degrees at 6:30. Yuck!

I enjoyed a glass of wine while watching everyone else swim. A great way to spend a Friday night!

As nice as it is to sit outside at night with a glass of wine by the pool, I am over this heat!
I am longing for cooler weather, the brisk Fall air, colorful leaves & pumpkins on my front porch.
I am ready to bust out my boots, scarves & sweaters and decorate my house with my Fall decor. I just can't do that when it is 90 degrees out. It just feels wrong.

Come quickly "real" Fall. You are my favorite time of year!

Hope you have a great first weekend of Fall.
I am heading to So Cal for a girls weekend at Julie's house for Blog Sugar. (She is one of the speakers) I can't wait!