Fabulous Fall!

From the time I could speak I always had said that summer was my favorite season.  Vacation plus my birthday plus the fact that I hate being cold makes that a pretty easy statement.  But I must say this is the first year that I've been excited about Fall!  Chalk it up to being in North Carolina for the beginning of the season to see the trees change and taste autumn's bounty of apples and feel the crisp air ... whatever it is it's gotten me excited for the season change!

Of course down here on the coast it's still in the eighties most days, and we have one lone tree at our condos that is half-way changing to a fiery red.  Since the weather isn't cooperating as much as I'd like, we've had to make our own season celebrations.

We started with decor.  Nothing says fall like mums by your front door!  Stuart and I went to a local Fairhope plant store called Old Thyme Feed and picked out a mum that looks like something yellow just exploded.  It's gorgeous!  It's my first mum and I must say I feel quite like a little grown-up Southern wife having it by our front door!

I felt like that alone was a little plain, so inspired by my new favorite website Pinterest, I decided to make a fall wreath.

Grapevine wreaths are messy apparently.  I still have little pieces stuck in the carpet.

I struggle actually saying I 'made it'.  Basically I bought a grapevine wreath, some 50% off florals, and a wooden "S".  I painted the "S" and then wired the flowers into the wreath. It was super simple but I think it looks pretty!

Yay!

Our festive fall door!  Also with the mat!

And as you know well, faithful reader, we always celebrate every occasion we can with food!  Remember when I wrote about the pumpkin we picked out at the Charlotte farmers' market?  It got turned into soup this week!  I can't decide if it's harder to carve a jack-o-lantern or cut, peel, seed and cube a cooking pumpkin.

Our beautiful Cinderella pumpkin

Thanks, Stu for wielding the knife!

Look!  Isn't that gorgeous?!  Yum!  I cleaned and dried the seeds and then roasted them the next day.

Finished product!

This recipe was also inspired by a Pinterest post I saw.  It's basically onion, bacon, and pumpkin with a few spices.  Simple like food should be, nutritious, and delicious!

We also took a long overdue trip to Bed Bath and Beyond to use up our remaining store credit from the wedding.  Stuart and I each got a toy.  For him, a meat grinder with hopes of making our own sausage soon.  For me, a mandolin slicer with hopes of creating perfect OCD slices of whatever produce I choose.  We haven't busted out the grinder yet, but I did use the mandolin to slice up some of our NC apples to make chips!

So ... we're working on eating all that now!  We still have a ton of pumpkin leftover and are trying to find creative ways to use it up.  Any ideas?!