Fun Fall Afternoon

Tuesday, before going on a business trip, the mom of the family I nanny for asked me to do something with all the apples in the house. (A neighbor has an apple tree and there over a dozen apples here that were sure to go to waste.) She knows I like to bake, so she asked me if I thought I could make something with the apples.

I had never done anything like that before, but I thought I could manage the task... and guess what! I did! AND everyone liked it... REALLY liked it. The parents were still talking about it this morning.

I started off the assignment by going to (of course) Pinterest. I typed 'Apple' into the search bar and a bunch of different things came up. I just looked around until I found this. At first I wanted to make a pie, but to be honest, I was scared because I've never made a pie. Plus, I'm comfortable with cakes and I was already branching out by using apples.

I'm not going to re-write the recipe because Monica from Lick The Bowl Good just wrote an excellent post about it... which I followed perfectly (here). But I took a lot of pictures so I'll just share those!

It calls for 1 1/2 cup finely chopped apples. I wasn't exactly sure how many that was, so I peeled 3 apples and chopped them up. It ended up being a little more than I needed, but I just added the extra apple pieces to our cider.

Chopping the apples... 

Dry ingredients combined

Mixing the dry and wet ingredients

Adding the apples. 

The kiddos were helping me so much and having a lot fun. This was a PERFECT fall day activity for us.

I sent them to nap time when I put it in the oven.

Fresh out of the oven

Making the brown sugar glaze... This part is YUMMY. 

The finished product

I was a little disappointed because I used a knife instead of a toothpick to see if it was done. This is normally fine, because you can just put frosting on over it. But this glaze goes on hot, so it seeped in without actually covering the hole (I need to remember that for next time). But it still tasted really good.


NEXT it was time to make the cider. I followed this recipe that I found on (I'm obsessed) Pinterest. We used a little less Hot Tamales than the recipe calls for, but it was enough for us.

Mr. 7 stirring the cider

Oh! I forgot to say that during nap time, I used 3 more of the apples by turning them into cider cups! They were very exciting cups.

Perfect fall afternoon snack

Overall, it was a lovely afternoon that really got us in the fall mood. I highly recommend both recipes!

Linking up to:

Welcome Home Banner

As I've said before, I'm a full time nanny for 3 kiddos- ages 2, 3, & 7. This is a busy time of year for the mom of the family. She's traveling about once a week- usually only for a night, but sometimes longer. It's nice that I am such a constant in their lives (rather than having different sitters all the time), but it is harder when the mom is out of town. They love her (a lot) and even if they wouldn't normally notice she's gone, they just get a little grumpy. 

Last week was the first trip of 'busy season' and I decided we should do something to welcome her home. 

We have a big art closet filled with crayons, markers, paints, paper, coloring books, etc. So I looked around and decided to make a Welcome Home Banner. 

For this project we used: Construction Paper, Crayons, Markers, Pipe Cleaner

During nap time, I cut out a bunch of triangles. 

16 triangles (we had one left over)

Next, I put hole punches in 2 corners of each triangle.

I hadn't used a hole punch since I was a kid!

Then I wrote a letter on each triangle (w-e-l-c-o-m-e-h-o-m-e-m-o-m-!). I could have let Mr. 7-year-old do this, but he was still in school and I didn't think about it until after I had finished.

Once everyone was home from school/awake from their nap, I divided up the triangles between them, got out the crayons, and let them go crazy.

Mr. 7-year-old's coloring skills

Mr. 2-year-old's coloring skills

I laid them all out in order.

And we started attaching them together with pipe cleaner (I had already cut each one in half).

Mr. 2 got super distracted at this point because there was a bulldozer in the neighbors yard. 

Once everything was attached, we went to the front porch and tried to figure out how to hang it. There were some hooks already on the beam for hanging plants, so we just used those. 

The finished product

Overall, the kids LOVED doing this, the dad made fun of us for putting up "prayer flags", and the mom said it made her day when she got home.

She gets home from another trip today and I don't have anything planned... we did make a wonderful apple cake yesterday though, so maybe that'll be enough. I'll have to post about that later this week. 

Linking up to:

Divorce Sale Finds

I love garage sales. They are awesome because you can find nice things, unique things, inexpensive things... you know the drill.  I especially like estate sales because you can walk around someone else's house (You may call it creepy, but I call it fun). But have you ever heard of a divorce sale? Which is more sad? Is it bad to enjoy them? Because I can't lie. I do.

A few weeks ago, Paige and I had set aside the day to "craft" (Brian left the house for the whole day to let us do our thing). A couple days before our "craft day" (which was actually "do the gallery wall" day) I was searching around Craigslist for things I want, but really don't need. When I saw a listing for a Divorce Sale (I so wish I could find the posting, but I think it's gone).

The posting made me laugh and basically said that everything was going for cheap. Like REALLY cheap. 

Now, I'm not the type to wake up early for a sale.  I usually walk into an estate sale around 10 or 11 or whenever I feel like getting there. But this one looked good. Like wake up at 7am on a Saturday good.  

So off we went. I wish I'd taken a bunch of pictures (again, I didn't know I was going to blog), because this sale had a LOT of stuff. And it oddly didn't have any price tags. I was confused because literally nothing had a price tag. You had to pick something up, look at the woman, ask how much, and she's say a number like "$1" or "$1.50" or MAYBE "$5", everything I bought was super cheap. She was just making up the numbers as she went. She OBVIOUSLY didn't care about making money, but about getting everything out of the house. 

There was even a pile on the other side of the yard with a sign that said "HIS STUFF". Ridiculous. 

I spent a whopping $9.00 at this sale. Here's what I got:

Sorry this one is blurry. I don't have an up close photo, but those two 3D boxes that are on my Gallery Wall were from this sale. 

3 candle holders for the dining room table. I have yet to put anything on them. 

The 'Latte' and 'Mocha' signs hanging in my kitchen were $1 each. 

Up close 'Latte' sign.

Up close 'Mocha' sign.

THIS IS THE PRICE TAG ON THE BACK OF EACH SIGN!!!!! I bought them for $1.00 each!

All of that totaled to $9.00. Paige got a bunch of stuff too. It was awesome. I still can't believe those signs were originally $50.00 each, and I only spent $1.00 each. SO CRAZY! 

Today, I've been asked to make something out of all of the apples the family I nanny for has... I think we'll be baking! And I also bought all the ingredients to make this sometime this week. Maybe it's an apple pie and cider fall day...

Thanks for stopping by!

Today I'm linking up to:

A Simple Goodbye

I have a friend who made my move to Atlanta a lot easier and she helped me a lot over the last 9 months. I'm sad to say that after a nice promotion, her family is moving back to the North East.

Happy for them. Sad for me.

I was trying to think of a nice going away present. Something simple, yet meaningful. Something inexpensive, yet nice... Her son was born here, so I thought having something to remind her of Atlanta would also be nice.

So with that criteria, here's what I came up with. A framed Atlanta postcard that can go in her nice, new office.

Brian knew what kind of frame I wanted (it's the same kind I used in my Colorado Map Art), and took me to a nearby store that was having a moving sale. I think the frame was around $10, and the post card was $0.75. (However, I did buy 5 different postcards because I couldn't decide in the store...) 

I wrote a nice note on the back (which will be facing the wall when it's hanging).  

I blurred out my note to keep it a little personal. 

After getting all the supplies and writing my note, assembling this present took about 5 minutes. I took out the glass, cleaned it, taped the postcard in, and put the frame back together. So simple.

The best part is that she really liked it! I figured she would, otherwise I wouldn't have given it to her... but still, it's always nice when someone likes a present. I'm sad she's moving, but it just means one more place to visit! 

Oh and I just got a great idea! Brian and I should start a collection of postcard art like this from all the different places we live! 

Happy Monday!

ps. I'd love it if you'd follow me!

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