My honey's birthday....MONTH, ha! & weekly recipe :)

Well, today marks the actual day of T's birth...however, he has been celebrating since Oct. 1st ;) He came home that evening & said "I can't believe no one has wished me a Happy Birthday Month yet"...no, I'm NOT kidding. (He's a 38 year old kid and we love him for it).

So on the 2nd, we made him cookies. On the 14th, we went to eat w/Escilito, Bling, Indiana D & American Girl and they wished him a Happy 14th day of his Birthday Month...nope, again...not kidding.

And of course, to go along w/the theme, I sent T several cards from the animals (7 in all!)...and it all came together this evening w/gifts, cards from J & myself and a pumpkin pie! He has been spending the afternoon at the gun range and is now playing w/J's gift to him...a Playstation hunting game :) I am the most blessed woman to have such a wonderful husband. He is the love of my life, has always been, and I am more thankful for him everyday.

Yesterday, we finally got in the spirit of fall and talked T into making a scarecrow for the yard. While I was in school in Knoxville, so many people did the haybale & pumpkin yard decoration thing...it was not as big of a deal down here until the last 7 years or so. I've always thought it was fun, but we just never got around to getting anything together (not surprising, I know!). Well, this year, we bit the bullet...or the pumpkin as the case may be. Hitting the Farmer's Market, we scouted out a few great pumpkins w/the help of our friend Judy. We also walked through the Bat Cave maze they had set up, although it wasn't a Batman Cave as J hoped it was, ha!

Here's the scarecrow...we haven't put a face or a hat on him yet, but isn't he great?

October is just passing by so quickly. It seems like Christmas will be here in no time. Just a week after Halloween I will be heading to Dallas w/mom to walk in the 60 mile 3-Day Breast Cancer walk and I am so excited! Quickly after that is hopefully a TCU game (Go FROGS...they are rockin' this year!), then Thanksgiving, shortly followed by J's 10th b-day (double digits!! ARGHHHH) and then our favorite holiday in this house...Christmas! I know it passes like this for most of you also, just comes & goes before we see it happening.

Last weekend, I had a glorious time with 5 of my wonderful friends at a scrapbook retreat at Lake Whitney. The lake was so peaceful and beautiful (I know...could I possibly use any more words ending in "ful"?). I was able to sneak down & sit by the lake for a bit to work on my bible study in the cool morning air each morning. Yes, I actually woke up before 9am on a weekend away! We had a really good time laughing, talking, eating (of course!...it was a scrap retreat, ha!), catching up on movies and yes...we did scrapbook a bit.

We found several fossils down by the lake, it was really cool! And perfect weather :)

Before quitting for the night, I have to add...speaking of frogs above reminded me...I'm sad to say I didn't get a photo of this but 2 mornings ago as I headed in to the bathroom to get ready for the day, I spotted a little frog on the toilet. Yep...froggy wasn't goin' courtin' in this house, he had a bit more serious business to tend to apparently :) Not sure how he got in, but T thankfully helped him out!

Weekly recipe...Pleasing Pumpkin Pie (this is T's favorite pumpkin pie now, I think b/c you can taste the spices more w/the lighter texture)

1 can pumpkin
1 can fat free sweetened condensed milk
4 egg whites
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp salt

Lay out pie crust in pie plate. Mix all ingredients together and pour into pie crust. Bake @ 450 for 15 minutes, then decrease temp to 325 and bake for 30-40 minutes until set in center. I use one of those pie crust shields also to keep crust from becoming too dark. Oh...and then of course add it under a HEAPING mound of cool whip, ha!