Williamsburg Christmas Tree

Okay, so this Christmas tree is actually just one of the many displayed at our library's annual "Festival of Trees."  But when I saw this tree, titled "A Williamsburg Christmas," at the library last night, I thought of the gorgeous Williamsburg-style decoration that my 'blog-friend' Amy made last year to go over her front door.  Of all the funny things, today Amy blogged about her door-topper for this year -- you can see it here.  Merry Christmas, Amy!

As often happens, this picture doesn't do the tree justice.  There is a lot of fruit on it (including pineapples which, unfortunately, you can't see in the picture), a lot of roses and birds, and I love the pheasant-feather topper.  Beautiful!  It is a style that I definitely want to dabble in someday. 

Colors of October

My family and I spent the first three weeks of October on the road, visiting family and friends...so my October pictures will follow our travel route!

Colors in South Carolina

Sunrises

 

 Sunset

Colors in Maryland

 

 Colors in Washington, DC

 Colors in New York

 

 

 

 

 Colors in Ohio

 Colors back home to Georgia...I had planned to get more of the foliage but just haven't had the time!

Go here to enjoy colors from around the world!

Colors of September in Northern Georgia

I had more pictures to share, but they are stuck on my camera and my cord is MIA.  Sometimes you just have to roll with the punches.  We don't have much in the way of bright colors right now, but we are starting to experience the lovely daytime breezes and cooler nights of autumn.

Here is a shimmery dragonfly on a fence...

And here is the stuff September is made of -- crisp mornings!  My son took this picture one morning earlier this month.

 Go here to enjoy more September colors from around the world!

August colors in North Georgia

Don't forget to go here if you'd like to see the colors in August from places all over the world!  Here are the colors in my part of the world...

A lovely plant at the State Botanical Gardens

 Some butterflies on flowers, also at the Gardens

The butterflies we "hatched" as a school project

 A gorgeous double rainbow as seen from my front porch

 The one stray vinca from last month became a whole beautiful clump!

 The roses are beginning their late-summer bloom

A quick hint for blog commenters

My blog-friend Amy clued me in to this helpful hint last year...by changing this setting (see instructions below), when you leave a comment on someone's blog, the author can respond to you directly via email.  It's especially helpful when you ask a question in your comment!

 1~ Go to your Dashboard; click on "Edit Profile" (blue link on LH side)

2~ Click the box that says "Show my email address"

 3~ Save your changes...and now I will be able to respond to your comments with a direct email!

Fair warning!

I am going to do something I don't usually do...backdate some posts.  I don't like it when one day gets a glut of posts...and I have quite a few to add...so if you don't get here from an RSS feed, you may want to scroll back through the last few weeks so you don't miss anything! :)

Queen of Hearts and Alice in Wonderland Costume Set GIVEAWAY!!!!

Queen of Hearts and Alice in Wonderland Costume Set GIVEAWAY!!!!

Although we don't actually "do" Halloween in our family, we definitely play dress-up...a lot!...and this would be the dress-up set to top all dress-up sets.  This dress is only part of the package!

I have yet to win one of grosgrain's amazing giveaways...so here's hoping!!!

Join the sewing fun!

This was a very apropos theme for me to join in on since we have several pajama-needs in our family that I have been planning to sew for.  Spare time in which to sew might be an issue this month...but this will be some good inspiration, anyway!

Hide N Seek Woodland Frock GIVEAWAY!!!!

Hide N Seek Woodland Frock GIVEAWAY!!!!

Google 8...just for fun!

This is one of those memes I saw on another blog...I skipped the tagging part because I thought it looked like fun. :) Likewise, I'm not going to tag anybody, but you're welcome to do it if you'd like! Instructions: Search for your answers using Google images and post one from the first page of results.

~

1. Age at my next birthday:

2. Place where I was born: (Community General Hospital, Syracuse, NY)

3. Favorite place:

4. Favorite objects: (hugs...maybe this is a stretch as far as "objects" go, but...!)

5. Favorite food:

(Deer heart...I spared you the picture of an actual deer heart!)

6. Favorite colors:

(my favorite changes constantly...it could be any color on any given day, but never crayon-yellow) 7. Nickname:(Marsupalami)

8. Place I'd like to travel to:(English countryside)

A *giveaway* celebrating my mom's blog-iversary!

My mom is doing a giveaway to celebrate her 2 year blog-iversary -- stop over to her blog anytime Mon-Thurs this week to leave a comment and be entered in her giveaway!

Quilt-treasures giveaway

I was happy to find this blog with so many lovely quilts to inspire me...and now there's a great giveaway going on with beautiful quilts, quilted items, and quilting supplies up for grabs -- any one of them would be a treasure to win! Here's just one of the lovely items this blogger is giving away...

RockPaperScissors GUEST GIVEAWAY!!!!

RockPaperScissors GUEST GIVEAWAY!!!! I love stationery, and this giveaway is for a gift card to a shop that sells some lovely stationery (among many other things). Not that I need anymore, but there's still room to collect some more...!

Boojiboo Flirty Apron GUEST GIVEAWAY!!!!

Boojiboo Flirty Apron GUEST GIVEAWAY!!!!Considering my love of aprons, I sure hope I win this giveaway happening at grosgrain!

Giveaways galore!

The blog Sew, Mama, Sew! is in the midst of their Giveaway Days...tons of blogs giving away craft-related and handmade stuff. The giveaway lists are separated according to category, so you can see the list of knitting stuff/fabric stuff etc...or enter them all. I've entered a lot of them...so this post will work for any of the giveaway-ers to leave a comment to let me know if I won (oh please, oh please!)!!! :)

Caleb updates

I have been updating my original post about Caleb but I don't think the updates show up on Google reader...so for those of you interested, please check out the original blog post. Thanks for praying!

Amy Butler fabric giveaway...

An Amy Butler fabric giveaway at Philigry this week... while you're over there, take a minute to enjoy the soothing color palette of her decor and projects...I always do!

Simple Skirts GIVEAWAY!!!!

Simple Skirts GIVEAWAY!!!!

...by grosgrain!

A post for clarification...

Two people have now mentioned something to me, which means that there are probably more of you who thought the same thing and just didn't say anything...so I felt that I should post an addendum to one of my earlier posts to offer some clarification. I almost didn't post this picture originally, because in the blurriness of the picture, it looks like David's feet are bare, and I thought at the time that I should mention it so that no one drew the wrong conclusion; however, against my better judgment, I posted the picture without clarification and now here we are! First, let me point out that David's bike has an excellently-designed chain guard. It would be very unlikely, although not impossible, that his toes would get past that guard, even if he slipped or crashed. Second, David IS wearing flip-flops in this picture (re-posted below at a higher resolution so that hopefully you'll be able to click on it and see the yellow flip-flop strap). Thirdly, yes, I am aware of the danger of riding bikes without shoes. Let me also mention that our house rule is "no bikes with bare feet". Typically, I even require something more substantial than flip-flops. I considered his footwear choice that day and decided to just let him ride without trading in the flip-flops. Mother's prerogative.

"Purple Angel Sleeves" smocked dress giveaway

...from a site that I have been following lately, Spend Freely. It is a blog by a friend of a friend and I have gotten some helpful info from it. I had been planning to post about her blog here anyway, so I'll combine the two -- entering the giveaway and letting you know about her blog! Spend Freely is where I learned about signing up for the Betty Crocker mailing list and thus receiving the Warm Delights Minis treat I blogged about yesterday. I've also now joined the Eight O'Clock Bean rewards program -- it's our favorite coffee brand, I've bought it for years, but now I get points (which add up for free stuff) for every bag that I buy, too. There's lots of other interesting info on the blog, too, so you may want to check it out if you're anything like me -- I'm always looking for ways to save money, but I do NOT have time to check out every sale and comb through every flyer. Okay, enough of the recommendation. Would you like to win this dress? I would. :) Enter here.