Weekend Wrap Up

 Jaycee made this centerpiece in her floral design class.  It's in a real pumpkin and fresh flowers.  I want to buy a plastic pumpkin and flowers and have her make another one that will last through November.  I really love it!!

 I saw a wreath on one of the morning shows Halloween morning.  I have been looking for something for my front door and decided to make one real quick before I had to work that afternoon.  Got out my trusty glue gun and gathered some dead branches from the backyard.  I broke the branches into about 6 to 8 inch pieces.  I didn't have a wreath to glue them on so I cut a circle out of a thick foam poster board.  Then I glued the twigs around the circle.  I spray painted it gray and let that dry.  Then I sprayed it with a metallic silver.  This is the wreath part way painted with the silver.  Love the way it makes it "pop!"

 Then I grabbed a bag of rings I picked up at the dollar store last week.  I cut the ring part off and then hot glued them to the wreath.  Then I glued a piece of black ribbon to the top of the wreath so I could hang it on the front door.  This really is a fast, easy wreath to make.

 Ta-Da!!  All ready to greet my trick-or-treater guests Halloween night!

 Since Gary has been working so much I decided to help him out with the yard work on the weekend.  I got out the lawn mower.  I hate to admit it...but I've never mowed the lawn before.  My friend from work gave me a pep talk and some great hints for working a lawn mower (Thanks Sandy!).  I found the red button to prime the lawn mower.  Sandy said she pushed her 5 times.  The instructions on Gary's mower said to push it 3 times.  Well....it was a cold morning.....so I decided to push it 6 times.  Yup.  I think I flooded it.  I had to get Jon to start it for me the first time.  After that it was pretty easy.  It took me all morning to mow the lawn.  I had to stop and rake up all the apples off the ground and scoop up the dog poop.  

 There are still plenty of apples in the tree.  Darn...we really should spray the trees and use the apples.  Maybe next year...sigh. 

 I was about to rake up the leaves when Gary called from work.  He told me he just mows them up.  That saved lots of time!  I had a little trouble figuring out how to empty the bag, but Jon showed me how.  It was a really productive day out in the yard.  While I was mowing Jon and Bekkah were in the way back yard cutting up some branches and stacking the wood.  The back yard looks great!  I'm thinking I'll have to help out more with the yard work.

I was feeling energetic and so I decided to drain the pond in the back yard.  I have to admit I was a little nervous about doing it.  The water was really icky.  I was worried that a chicken that went missing a few weeks ago might be in the bottom of the pond.  Whew....thank goodness she wasn't.  Still not sure what happened to her.