{P,F,H, R} Early November

{Pretty}

(My mantle on All Saint's Day.  I tried to get a panarama pic, but it didn't work so well.)

I had my kids bring down all of their favorite saint statues from their rooms, and we lighted as many candles as I could rummage.

(There's a shelf next to the mantle, the statues didn't all fit, so we kept on lining them up)

(I taped the Stations of the Cross under our mantle last Lent. I just can't take them down--they fit perfectly, and I really love them there)

At the end of our night time prayers,  we sang a litany of saints.  Very special.

{Happy}

I told you we were painting!!  Wanna see?

This is still not a "reveal", but I have a feeling that by the time I "reveal" this room, it will already have been revealed about 50 times.  The color: Behr "Banana Cream", and I love it!! Arwen's goldfish painting needs to be framed, but I wanted to see it up.  And I hung a guardian angel icon up as well.  The pretty colored balls that light up? Target dollar section! I picked them up over the summer and saved them just for this very purpose! (That's very unlike me, btw).  And I love how cheerful they are!!

Work in progress: I need a second white board to hang next to the first one, I need more writing space when I teach.  Apparently, I'm a very visual teacher (wonder if my kids are visual learners? ;))

photo bomb: Eowyn

{I guess this is my Funny, just to be official and have all of the sections filled...oh darn, they're not in the right order either...I'll never get this right!}

Remember our daily scripture work?  Ever so often I'll catch a glimpse of my children's work--I need to do a photo dump for you--today it was Galadriel (my just-9-year-old) whose notebook caught my eye:

"for the Lord has heard the sound of my singing"

 Must. love. Galadriel's illustrations!

Tell me, which is cuter: the bee or the bird?!

I can't get enough of this girl's work.  If she was my only child, I know I'd be annoying by raving.  Please remember that she's #4 out of 8, so this is a big-family-mom taking a moment to delight in one of her "middles".  It's important. (And the deer?! ok, ok.)

{Real}

I just had to stop to say hello to "Alfalfa", while I was out...

It has been the crazy-warmest, most beautiful fall ever!  This has meant the leaves lasted a long time on the trees, and are finally almost all falling.  So, I've been up to a little leaf removal effort in our yard.

Do you see the piles in the background?  We've taken 50 bags to the dump so far.  In my estimation we have another 30 to go.  If  I lose courage, we can always just rake a bunch into the forest...but that leaves "forest clearing" as a task for another season.  I don't like to "put off until tomorrow", but I may find a way to make my peace with  "good enough"!