Friends, Food & Fall

I am blessed with a plethora of fabulous people in my life.  Surrounded in fact but women who are fiercely seeking out the life the Lord has for them and it is so encouraging.  However, over the past year I have slowly come to realize that while I “know” a lot of people, my circle of close friends is…limited.  These past few months I have been intentional about building, investing and cultivating relationships with women who are quickly becoming my tribe. 

Two of these fabulous women are co-workers of mine!  Tamara teaches first grade next door & Sarah is our phenomenal art teacher. {She is amazing.  One of my littles actually used the words, “organic shape” to me last week.  I am a certified professional and could not tell you what that means if my life depended on it}  Sarah is also the owner of Paint the Town Waco and the last two months Tamara & I have become pretty obsessed with her classes!  This past weekend Sarah hosted a “Pumpkin Painting Party” to bring in the pumpkin season.  There were so many women in attendance and we had the best time laughing, painting, eating and fellowshipping.  In the spirit of fall and pumpkins I have a couple of themed snacks to share with you!

The first is the pumpkin oranges.  I {obviously} stole this idea off of Pintrest and I am contemplating handing them out along with candy to trick or treaters!  Coach and I love fruit so we might give it a try.

Pumpkin Oranges

·       Clementines/Tangerines

·       Celery

--Peel your citrus fruit

--Slice celery into small pieces

--Place celery in the top, middle section of the citrus & serve

Confession.  I hate the taste of pumpkin.  It’s totally not my thing, so when I stumbled across this recipe for Pumpkin dip in an old cookbook I thought I would bring it for those who do enjoy pumpkin things.  After trying it though, I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it!

Pumpkin Dip

·       1 can pumpkin

·       Cinnamon (to taste)

·       Ginger (to taste)

·       Cloves (to taste)

·       1 package vanilla pudding mix

·       1 8 oz. tub Cool Whip (thawed)

--Mix pumpkin, spices & vanilla pudding mix together in medium sized bowl

--Fold cool whip into pumpkin mixture until mixed through

--Refrigerate until ready and serve with Nilla Wafers or graham crackers  

Obviously you could not have a painting party with no chocolate!  The acorn cookies were a tad bit more labor intensive but the taste at the end was scrumptious!

 Acorn Cookies

·       Nutter Butter Bites

·       Milk chocolate chips

·       Hershey’s Kisses

--Melt ¼ bag of chocolate chips

--Smear melted chocolate on the bottom of an un-wrapped Hershey’s kiss

--Attach Nutter Butter Bite to Hershey’s Kiss

--Chill in refrigerator

Mrs. October Goals

October Goals

train for the Zoo Stampede 5K

start the process to become a Habitat for Humanity volunteer

begin planning the Emily/Bre winter vacation

make my own laundry detergent

read 2 new books

fall decorations out

host a tea party for two precious littles in my life

begin Christmas shopping lists

finish family room projects

October is one of my favorite months of the year!  It is also the month where football runs long and my heart grows lonely for Coach. We are only a few weeks away from bye-week and I am so excited for an entire weekend of having my husband home.

3rd & Long

Game #2 of high school football is complete, Coach Husband is currently napping in the recliner & I am attempting to quietly clean house around him.  This week I have dealt with the exterminator {don’t ask…but if you find yourself moving into a new home that has sat vacant for almost nine months, schedule the exterminator way before you move in}, dishwasher repair man, carpet installers, a no-show yard man {happy anniversary present Coach, no yard work through football season} and a classroom full of kindergarteners.  Around Thursday night while CH was finishing up his freshman coach responsibilities and I was once again almost asleep before he was home I found myself feeling resentful.  Resentful that I was left to deal with all these little things that cropped up this week by myself.  I held on to that feeling until Friday night after a hard fought win when I saw the team celebrating at mid-field and received a (side) hug from a young man that despite what life has thrown at him, has risen above and is refusing to settle for what everyone thinks he deserves.  His face lit up and his words were, “Can’t wait for next week.”

post-game smiles this week after another win 

And I realized again in that moment that Coach Husband is not mine alone.  I have the privilege and honor to share him with a group of boys on the cusp of becoming men.  So last night when he crawled into bed around 2 a.m., and then this morning when the alarm went off at 6:45 I thanked God for giving me a Coach as a teammate through life.  This #coachswifelife is such a blessing and one I am grateful to be apart of.  It might have been 3rd & long this week in respects to me winning the game against Satan, but I'm playing on the same team as King of Kings.  It won’t be the last time darkness creeps in with selfish thoughts and reactions, but I refuse to let him win, steal my joy or my support of Coach.  

Tomorrow we start game week three and I'm ready for the all out blitz.