Paris Street Market

One of my FAVORITE summer activities is going to the Paris Street Market.  It is at a local shopping center the first Saturday of the month May through October.  My sister and I hopefully get out together with our bags and sunscreen and a bottle of water and a hair tie (we learned that one the hard way:) and hit the parking lot.  Usually the trick is to get there early so that you can find a place to park and in the depths of summer so it isn't too hot.

We walk and look, talk and gab, and hopefully come home with something fun, different, special.  We have brought the kids with us, but it is always a little funner when you aren't chasing a wee one, and aren't having heart palpitations as your child runs into someones booth and touches everything at once.

Some time around 11 we head over to Panera and have Barbeque Chopped Chicken Salads and perhaps a frozen lemonade.  Amazing. 

September and October are always my favorite ones because everyone has out fall decorations.  Both my sis and I were very inspired to get home and set up some autumn decos of our own.  I did make some fun pumpkins, but that is a post for another day.

They put a 7-eleven right by the shopping center, so our new tradition is to stop and get slurpees as big as our bodies when we leave.  At the beginning of the summer they had a lime slurpee that when mixed with the cherry is AWESOME!  They haven't had the lime recently, but the old standby of cherry and coke is not sad either.

I will do a post soon on some of my favorite market finds.  I have some really, really good ones.  I just LOVE that you can buy something vintage and original. 

Happy Fall everyone.  There air here has had a very fall feel and some of our leaves are beginning to change.  Always one of my favorite times of the year.

Bingo

My sister and I were shopping at a cute, local vintage store one day and I came across an old Bingo game.  My Gramma loved to go play bingo and when I saw the game I instantly thought of her.  When our whole family gets together we often will have a bingo game night in honor of her.  The bingo game gave me a fun idea for a collage that encompassed Gramma and would be a nice visual for so many of things that embody her.

 We had a mini-family reunion recently with some of our family and I made each of us a Bingo Collage.  In addition to the bingo cards and the numbers, I included cards because Gramma was always playing at her kitchen table and trying to wrangle others into a game with her.  Everynone has a chicken as she collected them in her kitchen.  All of them are different, but they all contain elements of what I think of when I remember my grandmother.

Apple Sloppy Joe's

Last night I made a twist on Sloppy Joe's or Messy Fred's as we call them.  I had a friend in college who always said that and it has stuck. 
I have been in a terrible dinner making rut.  I just feel so uninspired to cook.  I was looking through some recipes and was going to make a chicken with apples, but we only had one chicken breast.  I hear Costco calling our names.  I did have one thing of ground turkey and my mom had some Sloppy Joe's in the crock pot the other day and it had smelled amazing, so I went with it.  The apple idea from the chicken was already in my head so I combined them.

1 lb of ground turkey or beef
1 apple - chopped or minced - depending how chunky of a texture you want
1 cup of ketchup
3 T of spicy mustard
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 T cumin
1 T red chili powder
garlic salt to taste
1/4 cup apple juice

Brown meat in a saute pan.  Add apple and let saute on med heat to let the apple become soft for about five minutes.
Combine the rest of the ingredients in a bowl and mix together.  Pour over the top of the meat and let simmer for a couple of minutes.

The Sloppy Joe's turned out so sweet and good.  I really liked the added twist with the apple.  I added the apple juice as a last thought because everything seemed a little dry and it made a huge difference.  I also added some fresh dill from our garden and it was very yummy as well.

Picture Wall

I did this picture project at the same time as I did the valance below.  I thought, oh, I'll wait a day or two and then post it.  Two weeks later, here I am.  We finished a painting project I have been working on for almost a year.  Trust me, not that complicated, just hard to find a block of time to paint when your three year old wants to "help."  Once the painting was done I hung some family photos, many of them that I have had set aside to hang up for a few years.  I guess the title of this post should really be procrastinators anonymous or something.

 

It did take a lot of measuring, but worth it to have everything even.  I bought most of the frames at Walmart for only about two or three dollars a piece.  I made sure to get a couple different varieties of frames so I could add over the years and it wouldn't be too obvious.   I am really happy with the ribbon and overall how the wall turned out.

Cherry Valance

I bought the cherry fabric that is in the middle of the valance for another purpose.  I really loved the fabric and should have bought more, but you know, hate to buy more than you really need.  Just for fun I had thrown it over the curtain rod in the kitchen to see what it would look like.  It ended up staying up there for about five months.  Yesterday I finally got my act together and sewed it into a real valance, instead of a jagged piece of fabric.

I had a half yard of the cherry fabric and sewed a five inch boarder of red gingham to each side and the bottom.  I was originally going to just leave the valance hanging straight, but it seemed like it needed a little more to it and I just saw a cute tutorial on a valance with the tie ups.  I grabbed a little ribbon, pulled it all the way around and tied the bows.  I definitely like it better with the tie ups.

The valance looks a lot better than a little piece of fabric thrown over a rod.

Ribbon Organization

Really should have rolled up all the ribbon before taking the picture.  Oh well, I think I was getting a little too much help!

My husband made me this stand a long time ago to display scarves I had made for a few craft shows.  Since then it has sadly been hanging in our storage room going unused and mean while my ribbon has been in a jumbled mess.  I have been in major craft organization mode while setting up my cabinet and getting all my stuff moved from one location to the next.  It is taking a long time.  Hopefully when it is all done I will be happy, organized and ready to go.  I do know one thing for sure, I am not allowed in the fabric store for a long time.

Anyway, while organizing, it seemed like a good idea to marry these two together and create something useable!

Little Fawn

This little guy was hanging out in our back today.  So cute.  He was happy to let us watch him for quite awhile and then his mama came and they moved along.  When I am driving a half hour to and from work everyday I need to remember this moment and why we choose to live in the boonies.