Throwback Thursday- Greening Halloween: Made in America and Recycled Halloween Decorations

I love holiday decorations. If I waste money on something, it is probably some sort of sparkly holiday-themed creature or lights. I love holiday lights. If I won the lottery, our house would be lit up for each day in a different theme. Our dining room frightened my mother on Skype today, because a small army of cats guard our table. I am not working in hyperbole here- themes just make life better.

So, now that I try to slow down our consumption as a family and buy ethical, green, and made in America stuff, I feel genuine sadness that I cannot go to Michael's and splurge on this junk. I love this junk. I don't want our house to look scary, I want it to feel fun and festive. And unabashedly cheesy.

But if my sparkly cats were made of cheap, wasteful plastic by someone who was treated badly, and then it had to travel thousands of miles using a bunch of fuel and resources, can they still be pure joy?  Because right now, they fucking bum me out. I am not sure the cats can just be fun anymore (I mean, I still love mine, but the army won't expand any time soon), but I feel like my holiday closet can continue to grow until it has to be a holiday room. You can make lots of things, so we will be trying some of our own in the next few weeks. I also love Etsy, because some stuff is adorable and some is wonderfully bizarre.

So, in case you are like me, and can't let go of kitsch while you let go of all this crappiness that comes with it, I have started looking for Halloween decorations I can still buy. Here are a few gems!

Dorky Art- You can find basically any art on Etsy. If you want Victorian silhouettes of skeletons, they have that (from Murfreesboro, Tennessee no less!) You can also get something much more subtle like this print. They have candy corn family blocks (less kidnappy than the car stickers). Hanging candy corn (this reminds me I haven't had any yet- horrible oversight) I love this wood skull garland as well. Or you can get this bat banner from Erie, PA!

from Trendy Wall Designs

Stickers and Clings- You can either buy window stickers like you are rocking an elementary school classroom or you can get all kinds of cool silhouette wall stickers on Etsy. We had bats on our previous walls, and they were pretty high impact for like 17 dollars (not sure if you can find reusablew ones though- how do you feel about year-round wall spiders?). This witch would look amazing near your stairs.

from abbeynekola

Pillow Covers- This is a relatively cheap, high impact choice that can suit lots of styles from bravely tacky to pinterest ready (white walls, wood, and slightly industrial? haven't seen that before)! You can have this chic baby one, or this awesome Mr and Mrs Frankenstein ones (that I may have bought by the time you read this). I love this simple "trick or treat" one and this spiderweb pillow.

from shopgeezlouise

Candles- I bought a beeswax skull made here in Seattle as my own Halloween decoration this year (because when you have a baby, it's time to add more fire). It is really freaking cool and made in Seattle. So be cool like me and buy some Halloween candles- here's some skulls from Indiana, a Damien Hirst number, creepy melting hand, or a random owl in a pumpkin.

from whimsy workshop

Pumpkins- Anything with a pumpkin motif can come out in September and last until Christmas decorations go up, so you get more bang for your buck.  Rustic wood ones seem to work well for all purposes, and these ones from GFT Woodworks is made of reclaimed wood! Recycle Reuse! I love this mosaic pumpkin- so pretty and it could read just a teensy bit spooky (in a good way). Fishsticks sells little ceramic jack o lanterns. You can get burlap pumpkins as well. If you want pumpkin decor, you have about a million options; search "pumpkin" on home and garden on etsy, and you get 50,000 finds. You can find exactly what you want Made in America!

from Lovebug Handmade

Wreaths- You can make a pretty classy statement with a wreath. My cousin just made fall wreaths that look absolutely amazing- we can do it too! If making wreaths isn't your jam, you can buy a pretty jack o lantern one or a simple berry wreath. I actually love this simple Boo one, or you could get the fancier one.

from Fuzziggles

Something that Doubles as a Toy- Oy, children. They really must touch everything. Rather than fight the battle all the time, you are better off to find things that also work perfectly well as toys to decorate with (and things that hang way way up). I LOVE these fuzzies by Fuzzigles. So genius and so adorable, while still being on theme as well. A candy corn worm? How have we celebrated Halloween without it? I am also obsessed with these little felt mummies, but the skeletons might be the most impressive thing I've seen all day.

Candy Holder- You don't want to be that sad person who hands out their candy from a bag (oh, you do? That probably works then). If you do want to put it in something, this is pretty cute and made in the USA! If you don't want a candy holder, you can get some on point booze holders like these ones from Mary Elizabeth Arts.

As a side note, I also really like these Halloween temporary tattoos as a candy alternative, for people who hate children. I will never be granola enough to not love candy. It's delicious, people have to deal with it. But the temporary tattoos are cute.

from Be There in Five

I also love these doormats from Be There in Five- they even give microloans to low income women starting new businesses (and their less seasonal mats are also awesome), so this seems like a great place to spend your decoration budget!

So there you have it- TONS of decoration options for the season that are made in America. I just have to stop shopping at Michael's and spend even more time on Etsy. It's a big sacrifice, but I think I can handle it.

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Gussing up for Fall with Etsy and Pinterest

 

 

 

Even though fall is my favorite season, this is the time of year where I really start getting homesick for Pennsylvania.By the end of September, beginning of October, Franklin turns colors, and it is so beautiful. In California, nothing changes (it is horrible all year long ;o). So I have been etsying and pinteresting ideas of how to bring fall into our sad, Season-less world. 

from pinterest.com

Awesome idea from pinterest to cover fallen leaves with  wax. This arrangement is pretty...

from pinterest.com

But this one is gorgeous. This would also be a cool thing to do with the leaves my Grammy sometimes sends me from the lake.  Very cozy and warm, and it might be a nice detail if you wouldn't see the leaves changed otherwise.

from pinterest.com

I like the lanterns with the pumpkings in it- thisis whole schpiel looks like only a middle aged woman would make it based on something she saw in Pottery Barn. But there are still some udable good ideas there.

 

These glasses are from Connie's Creations on Etsy (http://www.etsy.com/listing/109185470/fall-leaves-water-glasses-hand-painted?ref=usr_faveitems). I think they are so sweet and I love the rendering of the leaves.

 

I love this mobile more than anything else on Etsy. It simultaneously captures the color and movement of falling leaves. It just looks like fall. I am seriously considering getting one.  You can find them here: http://www.etsy.com/listing/72235083/changing-color-leaves-mobile-medium?ref=usr_faveitems.

 

I love that this watercolor (from http://www.etsy.com/listing/107181789/autumns-colors-an-original-watercolor?ref=usr_faveitems ) doesn't shy away from really bright color. People over-associate brown and gold with the fall, but the most beautiful part is when a whole gamut of color is on display.

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30 Day Lady Positivity Challenge- Day 27

Day 27- Someone who is beautiful because of how they see, not only how they look.- Natalie

We are getting to the end! I think this is a really great topic- when a baby is born, part of the pleasure of being present for the start of their of their life is seeing the world through their super fresh eyes. We are quick to notice how a person situates themselves around what they see, but if you reflect on how they actually see the world differently, you might discover a whole new wonderful side of them (not to mention something new to love in the world around you). So if you aren’t going to do this challenge (and it does take forever), I think this might be a good mini-challenge, to empathize enough with the people we love to try to figure out why what they see is beautiful to them. 

My cousin Natalie is another one of those people who just seems effortlessly cool and creative with everything she does, and I think a huge part of it comes from how she sees the world. She is also an amazing artist, but we can talk more about that later. Natalie grew up in Kenya in a community of missionaries, so right from the start, she has an incredibly unique perspective. After visiting Nairobi myself last year, I can see that her family occupies this kind of strange middle space in both Kenya and in the States where they would spend their furloughs. They belong to unique communities in both, but they also exist a little bit as outsiders wherever they go. They never completely blend in, and I bet they feel pretty self-aware in most situations (at least in their transitions).

Perhaps because of this position, Natalie especially has struck me as a sensitive observer. She is super fun and silly, but I think she plays things close to the chest, is endlessly graceful and quiet when dealing with strangers, and a keen responder to others. She comes off as shy (though as a toddler she was super outgoing and really good at jumping on the bed). Being a missionary kid means you are meeting new people all the time, and I am consistently impressed with how she handles that discomfort in a way where she both connects with people and seems to accept the disconnect.  Plus, she has let it propel her into a life brimming with courage, and I feel like for the rest of my life I will be jealous of her adventures!

When Natalie moved (semi-permanently) to the States for college, she went to a school driving distance from our grandparents (both of her sisters landed closer to their other set) so we were lucky to get o spend a lot of time with her. I know my grandparents loved having her at the house as well. I have loved having Natalie around, because she has a great sense of humor and fun. The key to success at family events (and life really) is having someone else in the room who says YES, let's do it. Natalie is always that person. She never needs to be the center of attention, but she is a good leader and friend to many of our cousins who live nearby. She recently moved to Texas, and I really missed her when trying to pull together s'mores and togetherness. We got spoiled to have her around.

I also have the sense that Natalie is a real girl's girl. She has a big, very loyal group of girlfriends, an she is the favorite of many of my girl cousins (my cousin Shawnie is currently plotting Natalie's marriage to a pro athlete). My theory is that being a girl's girl or not primarily depends on one's ability to listen and care, both of which seem to be strengths of hers.

Natalie also loves to shop and to play with fashion, and who can blame her when she looks like a model? Natalie is a tall drink of blonde water, and she dresses like these girls on Top Model after Tyra makes them give up their accessories and put their hair back. I have heard from many people that Natalie looks just like her mom did (but Moffitt blond), but she actually reminds me of Shelly (none of us look all that much alike, to be honest). I feel like her seeming effortlessness comes from a deep knowledge of what works on her, what she likes, and a quiet confidence that shows she knows what she is doing.

  

This same beautiful vision of the world, aesthetic sensibility, and confidence in her own choices has led Natalie to the fine arts. The art world systems are built to kick your butt in the beginning, but I hope she sticks with it, because she is really talented. For her senior project, Natalie painted these gorgeous small-scale abstract landscapes, and now that I am genoming, these small geographies resonate with a lot of what other artists are thinking about. If she had a website, I would send you to it, but she is only 6 months out of undergrad and hasn't gotten there yet, She also spent a summer interning at Kitengala Glass, a giant, bizarre, and totally amazing workshop outside of Nairobi, where she learned to blow glass and make mosaics and be cooler than all the rest of us put together. 

Of all of my Mom's siblings, her brother Steve has always been the quietest but one of the most adventurous, especially when it comes to trekking up mountains and climbing rocks (also in life choices, you don't move your whole family to Africa if you let your fear of the unknown control you). He reminds me of my Poppop in that they seem perfectly comfortable with silence, just looking around, especially when they move through natural settings. I see this quality in Natalie as well, a comfort with the quiet, a connection with the natural world (she slept in a tent by herself for a week on her school campus once- how cool is that?), and a  lot of subtle tools to communicate what is most important to her.

To be a successful artist, we all know you have to be a skilled maker, being able to effectively manipulate whichever materials you choose. To be really great (or anything worth paying prolonged attention to), you have to be a great observer and thinker. In one of her senior critiques, Natalie was kind of backed into a corner to talk about a very personal experience in a way that made her uncomfortable, but I think there is some power in her doing that. She is already a great observer with a very unique perspective, so the more she shares what she sees, the greater she will be as an artist. This powerful combination is what gives me faith that she can be really successful as an artist if she chooses. 



I think Natalie's (and her sisters') view of the world is so much more transitive than those of us who had the privilege of an easy and mostly unchanging environment. I love when she opens up more about what she is seeing, thinking, and feeling, and I have learned a lot from watching her behavior and kindness the past few years. I just think she is fearless, awesome, and able to see the world in all sorts of beautiful color. In my opinion, she is an extraordinary person, and so much of that comes from how she carries her history and wonderfulness right with her. She looks at the world with both freedom and caring, and this lens creates a view new to me and many around her.

So here's to you, Natalie, for rocking big earrings like every day is your birthday, for having an endless supply of fun ideas, for making really beautiful abstract paintings, for being yet another tall person when I am doomed to only the slightest verticality, for building an amazing console, for turning one room in Nana's house into a colorful art gallery, for using your talents when people ask, for having the courage to put yourself out there over and over again, for your optimism and faith which I hope you never lose, for knowing this is what you should be doing (and for being right), for weathering the horribleness which is being 22 and starting adulthood, for giving our grandparents so much love and confidence in the time you lived with them, for letting the rest of us know little by little the beautiful way you see the world. You are beautiful and I am so grateful for the past few years and chances to know you better!

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My 6 Favorite Apple Week Recipes

Since we finished up Apple Week yesterday, I thought I should write about our Apple recipes that really work. I am going to do this instead of things I am grateful for, because a whole lot of my daily gratefulness is for food and a partner who can really cook!

6. Hot sausage sandwiches- I think I maybe got a hot sausage sandwich at Applefest once, but I associate the smell with Liberty Street, crowds, and fall colors, so we usually go this route at some point in the week. My only tip you might not already know is that the peppers and onions stay better if you put them on the bottom. Also, apple mixed in works alright, but not great.

5. Apple Curry and Chicken- This was our big experiment this apple week, and I think the combination of sweet and super spicy was delicious. We were going to do a Chutney, but one of our friends who was potentially eating with us hates garlic (isn't that tragic? Who hates garlic?) We got this recipe from allrecipes.com, and we cut the chicken in half. The whole thing (with rice added) lasted us 2 and a half meals, so it is also a great cost-efficient meal. My only other advice is to double (at least) the curry, and a little salt wakes up the other spices. We like our food spicy, so if you aren't as much that way, you can probably go with the original recipe.

4. Apple cinnamon rolls- For the brunch on Saturday, I made my cinnamon rolls with chopped up apples in the filling. People ate 2 o 3 of them, and I have never had complaints about them (another hand down from my Mom- there aren't too many of these, since she is also not so much with the cooking, so she makes her specialties absolute homeruns). I think there have to be ways to make these more "apple-y" but I will have to work that out next year!

3. Roasted Brussel Sprouts with Apples and Bacon- Apples and Pork are such a perfect combo, which is funny if you think about Judeo Christian history. This recipe, which we found here, singlehandedly (singlesproutedly?) changed my mind about brussel sprouts. The Boy also added raisins. If you want a little extra for any apple recipe, just add raisins.

2. Apple Pancakes- Easy peasy. First, whatever your batter looks like for pancakes (we usually start with a mix, and we found a cool one local to Seattle), throw in a tablespoon of brown sugar and a couple good shakes of cinnamon (why do recipes always give wimpy amounts of cinnamon?). Mix that in for your pancake base.

For the apple topping, cut up 2-3 apples. Put in a bit of brown sugar, cinnamon, and vanilla. Add in 1 tablespoon of butter and a couple squeezes lemon juice. cook over low heat until it reduces and your apples are soft (The Boy says not too soft!).

1. Grilled Cheese with Cheddar Cheese, Bacon and Green Apple- Ahhh, I had totally forgotten just how delicious this is. You make a regular grilled cheese, but do it with sharp cheddar. Start by cutting your apples (we use granny smith for this) into thin slices (thinner is better, because bigger slices fall out). Fry the bacon until it is crispy, and wipe off any excess grease. Then, pile it in your sandwich (buttered bread, cheddar, apple, bacon) and grill it. It may sound crazy, but try it, and thank me later.

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;o)

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9 Things for this Week- Sandwiches, San Frantokyo, and Rothkos in Space

1. That I never have to watch Patton again- Boooo. BOOOO. Why are so many of the movies everyone is supposed to see Dude Movies about War? How has no one noticed how boring this stuff is? It's a bad sign when your big iconic moment is the first five minutes (and then there are HOURS of movie left).

2. Starting to bring in the finishing touches on the nursery- We have reached the fun part, hanging pictures and the mobile. I don't think the perfect magazine-ready nursery is ever going to happen (don't tell the Boy), but I am pretty proud of what we came up with using things we already have or that we can definitely use later when BBG decides he wants a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle room. There are a few things I wish we could add, but at some point, you have to make practical choices, right?

3. Handiness- The Boy killed it with the handiness this week, switching out our doorknobs, fixing a piece of furniture that came broken, and fastening things to the wall. I think even though the house is still kicking our ass, you can see that we have learned some stuff in the process, and that is worth getting excited about (also, never watch Property Brothers, because they will curse you).

4. Synthetic, horrible for you, Sugar Cookies- Oh yes, we have reached rock bottom here, and it tastes delicious. My current theory is that we are having a last breathe of immaturity, so I am not fighting our horrible decisions.

5. Tilthe- We had our last fancypants dinner just the two of us for a while (my Mom is here on Tuesday and then we have some number of parents in the house for a straight month! It will be awesome, but I am guessing the rest of 2014 will not scream romance). Tilthe is a restaurant built inside a little house in Wallingford (and not unlike our craftsman, has lots of character-I may have pulled the WC doorknob off accidentally), and they pride themselves on local and organic food. It was fun to be brave trying new things (I am not sure I actually had risotto before) and to just have a little adventure.

6. The Butcher and the Baker- We have been trying to go to this restaurant for months, but it was always closed when we tried! It is now one of my favorite places in Seattle and my absolute favorite place in our neighborhood. It just makes me so happy to find places that we want to be "our" place, and it is across the street from The Boy's bus stop, so now I have dreams of him bringing those sandwiches home with him sometimes. Plus, it is so small and cute that you can see the whole kitchen and everybody there while you are eating. Best sandwiches I have had in a long time.

7.  Sunny Fall Days in Seattle- I have already solved the mystery of why people get seasonal depression in Seattle. It is not the rain. In fact, the rain is pretty nice. It is not the seasons, because the whole area looks beautiful when the trees start changing. It's that the sun sets so early you barely see it (the beautiful sunset on the right? I took that photo around 4 o'clock yesterday)- so when it is nice, you have to get outside!

8. San Frantokyo- All in all, I did not love Big Hero 6. In fact I am pretty over this very particular brand of character design (why do all the characters look like lazy versions of The Incredibles? Why is the lead kid a slightly more Japanese version of the kid from How to Train Your Dragon? Why are the female characters' torsos smaller than the male characters' necks?). It feels like a bad sign when the design of a film is so unabashedly lazy (not to mention the line writing- if you have a great story, you need things to also work on the dialogue level. Show don't tell people! You are professional filmmakers, for goodness sake! Especially if you are dealing with a bunch of engineers, where the personality types are so easily demonstrated). Anyway, clearly not a huge fan, but kudos to whoever did the design work for San Frantokyo, because it was gorgeous. Not only was it beautiful, but it was loyal to the shape of both cities and it took something familiar and changed it just enough to make it really interesting to look at. I really loved the play with the city spaces.

9. Ralph Pugay- This artist won the Betty Bowen Award and was on display at SAM (we went to see Pop Departures, which I haven't settled my opinion on yet, because I need to read the essays in the catalog). He painted this picture of Rothkos in Space (like Pigs in Space, come on!) which I now know I have been waiting to see my whole life. It's not often you laugh out loud in an art museum, so you have to love an artist whose paintings make you laugh and critique the institution in such biting ways. And he is based out of Oregon, so not too far away.

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