Costumes are my “favorite things”,  I have one closet and two giant bins full of costumes in my house.  I love dressing up and traditionally around Halloween time I get calls from friends & family who come over to raid the stash. I have wigs, furry suits, accessories and dresses galore. I just can’t seem to stop collecting the stuff (which isn’t a really a bad thing… as long as I have space).

So, yesterday while browsing for some Halloween decoration ideas for my office party I found this on MarthaStewart.com

So CUTE! I had to make it!

When I got home from work, and finally put my little spider to sleep, I started weaving the web.

I’ll share more once the transformation is complete!

I’ve just recovered from my battle with the flu (don’t know if it was the H1N1 or not, although I did get my flu shot over a month ago, and apparently that’s the only thing going around here…), and am happy to have energy again!

I HATE BEING SICK, as do all I assume.

So, last night we set up the dining room table as our Birthday Invitation Center! Etta munched on some “Organic O’s” and played with my old cell phone, while we got to work!

For the front, we cut out some #1’s and are printing some keepsake photo’s of the sweetie! You’ll just have to wait for that in the mail!

To make up for my three days of bed rest & fever spells, we hit the Harvest Fair in style this afternoon!

I think Etta wanted to take home ALL the pumpkins, but we only made it home with one.

Grandpa Dodge Medlin recently posted this amazing photo of Etta on his photo blog.

I just love those pants!

I call them her pirate pants!

We even visited a pirate ship that day in the San Diego Harbor (I think it was that day… we had quite a few of them in San Diego and each one was better than the day before!)

The world’s a whole different place before the sun get’s up.  I haven’t experienced it much in the past few years. But this week, I’ve experienced a whole lot of it!

We’ve re-arranged the baby & Mama & Papa work schedules, and now I find myself waking up at 5:20am. It’s quite a shock, since I used to be a 8:00am sleeper-inner, but I’m adjusting. Now I get my 8 hour work day in before 2:00pm and that’s just fabulous! More time with baby in the afternoon makes for a happy Mama! Let’s just hope I  can do it all again next week.

As the color’s of the leaves change from green to yellow, orange & red, I’m reminded of just one year ago, when my belly was fully ripe with baby! It’s amazing to think about… I was going through past Halloween photo’s  getting some  costume ideas flowing and found these treats, I thought it’d be awfully nice to share them.

Here I’m pictured 19 days before she was born, just as the leaves we’re changing their colors! And below, just 4 days before she was born, on Halloween of course! We we’re quite cute as a “Deviled Egg”. It was actually a super easy outfit to make. I took my mom’s original bright red empire style prom dress,  and sewed on two pieces of felt, the “white” and then the yellow “yolk”, then put on the matching cape (that she actually wore to her High School Prom) and added some devil horns and a tail. Oh, and for the icing on the cake, I added some chocolate cupcake earrings, so I was “Devil’s Food Cake” too!

Our little baby is almost one! For her birthday, I thought it would be nice if I made her a pretty dress to wear to her  party! We have a great fabric/sewing store in Downtown Ashland called Fabric of Vision, which I love to frequent. They carry Oliver + S patterns and also make the Oliver + S clothes to sell (They are the CUTEST BABY & Kid clothes ever)! When I was in there last month I noticed the ladies crafted up one of the  Tea Party Sundress‘ by Oliver + S, and I fell in love! It was ridiculously cute and would have looked stunning on  Etta! So with a birthday gift certificate I purchased the pattern, and decided to make her one of her own!

Now, over a month later, on a relatively lazy Sunday afternoon I’ve finished the Dress! I’ve spent time during evening naps,  papa play time, and after baby’s gone to sleep time, to craft this up.

I’m very pleased! Of course, there we’re some snafu’s,  I’m a relatively new sewer, and this is my first pattern outfit. Luckily, I don’t think Etta will notice!

Picking out the buttons was awfully hard, so I let Etta help! She chose the pink shiny ones with little squares inset into them. I think it was a good decision, here are the runner ups.

I’ll let you know how it looks on her, when her birthday rolls around! Until then… Shhhhhh…..

I know it’s not asparagus season here, but they looked soooo yummy in the store. Hopefully it’s asparaus season somewhere close? Like Californa?

Anywho… Here’s what we made.

My family likes their pizza without the tomato sauce, so BBQ is always a close contender.  This BBQ sauce is called “Alien’s East Bay Style Blues-Q” It’s made by Colton’s cousins! It’s to DIE for!

We also harvested the butternut squash. YUM. This is them after their bath.

Now that she can walk! She’s got some shoes!

They arrived in the mail from Grandma Dodge Medlin (THANK YOU).

To celebrate we went for a walk to the park. I thought she might want to play at the park, walk around, point at the other kids, climb on equipment.

No. Not at all. What does she want to do?

Enjoy the feel of tan bark in her hands!

During  September I had two near death encounters with Squirrels. Yes. Squirrels.  As you know, I’ve been participating in the BTA Bike Challenge, so for the whole month, I’ve been riding my bike to & from work, with a little help from Public Transportation (aka the city bus), on the way to work.

Last friday, I was greeted on the bus with a very chipper 26 student school group, thankfully I didn’t actually have to carry my bike onto the bus (there was still a spot on the rack out front!). They were the most entertainment I’ve ever had on a bus ride. Each stop, turn, jolt, they Oooohed and ahhhed, and tried to stay standing (there was no sitting room left!). Each exciting attraction we passed they, Ooohed and ahhhed… Is that a wolf? A wolf? A wolf?…. It was quite a fun ride, and yet I was so thankful to be off the bus, and riding my bike the rest of the way to work!

So. How did I do this month? Well, 11 commutes, with a 68.8% commute rate! Not to bad, considering I had a week of vacation, and a holiday during the month. I rode approximately 77 miles, and saved 68 lbs of carbon dioxide! I also saved a pretty penny on gas, and my bus ride is free (thanks to work!).

Back to the squirrels, well, they frequent the bike path that  I take for a couple of miles on my homeward commute, and they are very suicidal, running in front of me on the bike, jetting across the path, luckily I haven’t killed one yet!

The frost has arrived.

Yesterday afternoon (before the cold)I picked the last zucchini (a rather large one too).

Tonight it was made into dinner! My favorite Veggie Enchiladas, or Enchilada’s al’ la Tiffy!!The recipe I wrote up below can be made into enchilada casserole (when you are just pooped and don’t wan to roll up a bunch of ‘chiladas) or traditional style, like what we made tonight!

Enchilada’s al’ la tiffy

You will need…
1 package corn tortillas (small, organic stone ground if available)
1 can hot enchilada sauce (cause everything is better spicy!)
1 can black beans or pinto beans (or pre-soaked beans from the night before)
½-1cup Cheese shredded (cheddar or jack)
2 Zucchini (medium sized, small diced, or thinnest setting with grater on mandolin)
1 medium onion (small diced)
1 head of fresh spinach (washed, dried, and small chopped)
1 carrot (small diced)
2 cloves garlic (minced)
1 Tablespoon Canola oil
Salt & pepper

Note: Any of the veggies can be substituted for whatever ones you have on hand… for instance I had a plethora of peppers in the batch tonight (orange & green).

To do….
Preheat Oven to 350 degrees.

Mix all the veggies, beans  & most of the cheese (reserve some cheese for the top!) together in a big bowl (the picture above is all the veggies & beans before we added the cheese). Pour in about 2 Tablespoons of the enchilada sauce, stir around, add the salt & pepper and stir some more.

In a large casserole dish, pour about 1-2 Tablespoons of enchilada sauce in the bottom of the pan, use a spoon, or move the dish around so that the sauce spreads all over the bottom.

FOR ENCHILADA CASSEROLE: Make a layer of tortillas on the bottom of pan, pour in your veggie & cheese mix, then pour in about half the can of  enchilada sauce add another layer of tortillas, pour the rest of the enchilada sauce over, and put the rest of the cheese on top!  Bake for 20-40 min… depending on crispness you want.

FOR ENCHILADAS (ROLLED): Heat tortillas in a small saute pan. Flip after 30 sec, after a minute, take the hot tortilla, and fill with veggie & cheese mix roll up and place in baking dish. Repeat till you run out of veggie mix, or tortillas… pour the rest of the enchilada sauce in the pan, and add the extra cheese! Bake for 20-40 minutes, depending on the level of crispyness you want.

Once these were cooked we ate them up pretty quick, henceforth the lack of cooked enchilada picture! I used a green enchilada sauce (as you can tell), and the tradional rolled up style (I had a late afternoon Mocha, which is where the rolling energy came from!), and the green bits are some yummy red chard that I added too.

All in all, it was one yummy zuchinni!