All I asked Santa for this year was for a little less chaos and busyness. You can imagine the pressure the jolly ole elf is under now, so it’s up to me to make a few changes.
Despite the overwhelming busyness I wanted to take the time to post.
From our home to yours Audley and I wish you a warm and cozy holiday filled with joy.
Although it is still very steamy and hot out right now, the fall and winter season is coming up sooner than you think. I don’t know about you, but I am extremely excited for cool weather. Orange and red leaves, comfortable, layers clothes, and pumpkin everything. Just like most, fall is one of my favorite times of the year, and I’m especially looking forward to it this year, after the hottest summer ever! I mean, truly – it has been almost unbearable this year. And you know what they say? When we have an insanely hot summer, we will more than likely have a very cold winter. So, it’s time to gear up and prepare for the next season – the cool weather season. Here are a few things to do in order to prepare for a new season headed our way:
Check your wardrobe
Before the cool weather hits, check your wardrobe and make sure that you are prepared for the cold weather headed our way. Start with fall and do a simple run through of your closet. Do you have transition pieces and pants that fit? Fall is easier than winter because you do not need a ton, other than some warmer items, like pants instead of shorts. Winter, on the other hand, needs a little more thought put into it. You will want to make sure that you have a good weather-proofed jacket, hat, and gloves to be safe. You will also want to think about warm and waterproof foot gear – shoes, socks, and boots, if possible.
Get ready to embrace the pumpkin
Pumpkin patches and pumpkin carving is one of the most fun, traditional home activities and for good reason, too – you need a pumpkin for Halloween! Don’t worry though, if you are not the Halloween type, there are so many great perks you can get from carving a pumpkin such as pumpkin pie, toasted pumpkin seeds, pumpkin bread, and more. There is also awesome soup recipes that you can make with a whole pumpkin…and once it is made, fill the pumpkin with the soup. Festive AND tasty! But really, one of the best family activities that you could do this fall is by heading to North Georgia and visiting a pumpkin patch. Have fun with it! Another way to embrace the pumpkin? Pumpkin spice everything!!!!
Change out your home decor
Now, getting out new decor is one of my favorite things about a season change! When it comes to fall specifically, it is my favorite because the decor just seems so cozy and inviting. Fall decor makes me feel like my house is cozier, more inviting, and honestly, warmer (which is needed in the colder months, anyway). If you are slacking on your fall decor pieces, head over to Home Goods – they already have fall items out on their shelves (crazy, right?).
Meal prep like a pro
I am sure that your meal plan could use a little sprucing up. Now is the perfect time to make some freezer meals to get ready for the cooler weather, when you are not going to want to go to the grocery store every few days. Grab some frozen fall veggies, start making broths and soups to have on-hand just in case you get sick, and start thinking about warmer meals that you are going to want to make.
Spend time with loved ones
When it comes down to it, the best part of this beautiful fall weather is the fact that you get to spend time with the ones that are important to you outdoors. Grab a few chairs, enjoy the weather, and sit outside and just talk, eat, drink, and have time. Ultimately, this is what life is all about, right?
Do a goal check-in
Last but not least, do a goal check-in and then find ways to get back on track, or progress even further towards reaching those goals. If you’re anything like me, you need a “tribe” or support team to help you through. If one of your goals is getting in better shape, make sure you find a gym that has that support team to help you. Places such as CrossFit Solid Orange are committed to not only great workouts that are fun and effective, but also creating a community, which is so important. This Murfreesboro Crossfit Gym has everything that you need to be successful and reach your goal of getting into shape.
Guest post by Alex Berger
It’s been seven months since Audley changed career paths and began working remotely which opened a world of possibility for us. It’s been only four months since we got a little wild, bought a house, packed and moved to our sweet, little farmette in North Alabama; settling down after 17 construction job related moves in our almost 27 years of marriage.
Somehow, between two photography trips to Texas, a trip to South Carolina to see grandbaby number one, two visits to Florida (one to spend time with grandbaby number two … I can’t wait to share with you!!!), a weekend in Nashville, driving cross-country from California with our new, honorably discharged Marine, and a week in North Carolina for the Grandfather Mountain Highland Games, we have managed to unpack, do a little decorating and grow a garden.
Also, during this time, I celebrated my 50th birthday, accepted a job teaching 3rd through 6th grade social studies and language arts at a private school, and now here I am thriving on chaos, loving every minute of it!
To say the last four months have been crazy is an understatement, and school starts in exactly two weeks!
While I would love to share all of our home with you, all of our new home projects have been outdoors as we really wanted to create a garden this year. I mean that was one of the reasons we picked this property to begin with! We also needed to build a chicken coop. We had little chicks living indoors for a lot longer than we anticipated … or maybe they just grow really fast!
I mean who buys chicks and puts them under heat lamps in the garage of your rental property when you haven’t even closed on your new home yet?!
They actually only stayed two weeks before going to my parents screened in porch.
No matter the case we have a lovely garden, and I am collecting fresh eggs daily, even if they are so very small as our hens are still quite young.
Audley was amazing creating our garden space and chicken coop. I’ve collected magazine and Pinterest ideas for absolutely ages so planning everything was fun, even if we had to move fast. I mentioned the chicks growing quickly, but we were also racing against getting seeds in the ground for summer picking.
Our ultimate goal was that our garden, and the coop actually flow together becoming a place we could enjoy as well as reap benefits. Our home does not sit facing the road, which creates a lovely sense of privacy, but it also means we have a huge side yard that is visible to everyone who passes. It was important to us that it look appealing as well as functional.
With the side yard also being our main area for outdoor entertaining, we really wanted it to be pretty. I wanted to put the “garden” into garden party.
We are not totally there yet, as we decided to do things in stages instead of overworking ourselves in the spring, but it’s looking really good.
For our chicken coop I ordered a child’s playhouse from a local manufacturer. They came out and set it up, then Audley painted it red to match the trim on our home and built a run. The playhouse had a ladder and a loft area that added roosting and play space for our sweet birds. It also included windows with screens so we can open them up for airflow and ventilation. This winter we can close them at night to help keep our girls warm.
We built four semi-raised beds for the summer. We didn’t put matting or anything under the beds, so our plants are actually in the ground. I’m a firm believer in creating a manageable garden which is why we chose this method of planting. Our plants are in the ground, but separated and easy to care for.
For our first summer we have grown red and green okra, several varieties of heirloom tomatoes, jalapeno, serrano, and poblano pepper, cucumbers, leeks, carrots, purple hull peas, crookneck squash, mini spaghetti and butternut squash, pumpkins, green, purple and yellow bell pepper, green beans and eggplant. Audley is experimenting with growing potatoes. In two separate spaces on either side of our chicken coop I have herbs growing. We have rosemary, sage, pineapple mint, orange mint, English thyme, Italian oregano (which is a bit milder than the Greek variety), parsley, cilantro, and lemon thyme. Lemon and lime shrubs are in pots in the garden corners.
I also have ginger growing in pots. In the yard we have planted two Southern Belle freestone peach trees, as well as two brown turkey fig bushes. I have six olive trees lining our driveway. These have been raised in pots over the last few years and were excited to have a place for their roots to grow. We will buy heaters to help protect them this winter. I have had success with olives in pots, so I can’t wait to see how they do with space to grow!
While it has been a lot of work battling the extreme heat, crazy pop-up storms, weeds, June bugs, vine borers, and tomato eating chickens, we have enjoyed all of the truly organic, fresh veggies at our fingertips instead of eating imported food from the grocery store. I have even canned a few things including blackberries from the wild vines in the woods beside our house, squash, okra, and pickles. I’ll make salsa in the next week or so, put away green beans, peas, dry herbs and preserve Audley’s potatoes for use this winter as well.
My seeds should arrive this weekend for our fall garden. Audley is planning on adding two more raised beds that will be deeper and possibly building a cold frame for some winter planting. We will build a fence around the garden area so my chickens can free-range and stay out of the tomatoes. Beside the raised beds, I have English roses and blueberries planted in the area. Audley is also wanting to experiment with growing espalier apple trees. President George Washington did this at Mt Vernon, but you can also find examples of this done well at George Vanderbilt’s Biltmore Estate.
Audley is also wanting to add beehives in the spring next year. He is becoming quite the gentleman farmer and we are having so much fun making our dreams a reality!
Til Next Time,
After 5 1/2 weeks of many hours and lots of labor, our sweet new home is coming together into our forever dream.
Of course, when you have twenty-seven years of magazine articles in a notebook and Pinterest boards detailing home and garden plans it does come together rather quickly, much to Audley’s chagrin.
Even though we have been crazy busy around here, we have still managed to welcome spring and celebrate all the little things from Easter to birthdays and tomorrow, we will be hosting Mother’s Day here at our new home.
When deciding what I should prepare, I went way back into my archive of hand-written recipes that I began back in college and pulled out one of my favorites; a cheesy poundcake from Southern Living around 1994.
It’s probably one of my favorite pound cake recipes as well as one that is so versitle. With ingredients like sharp cheddar cheese, cream cheese, all the butter and real vanilla this pairs well with coffee, berries, a chocolate sauce, a lemon cream, or cranberries soaked in a sweet red wine.
My favorite way to enjoy this cake though, is still warm from the oven, with fresh plain strawberries and slightly sweetened homemade whipped cream. The flavors pair so well together and with all the sugar in the cake (it IS a pound cake after all), you don’t need to add any more.
So let’s gather some ingredients.
You’ll need 1 1/2 cups of butter, 1 8-ounce package of cream cheese, 3 cups of sugar, 6 large eggs, 3 cups all-purpose flour, salt, 2 cups finely shredded cheese (this recipe is SO much better if you shred it yourself. Trust me), and 1 Tablespoon high quality vanilla.
{I never said this recipe was healthy.}
While baking this recipe in a Bundt pan is perfectly fine and definitely less work in the kitchen, I used a flower cakelet pan from Williams Sonoma for my pound cakes just for aesthetics and a cuteness factor.
After baking, I trimmed the bottoms so that the cakes would set flat. That is Audley’s favorite part of baking, because he is a crust kinda guy. As I said my favorite way to enjoy this cake is with strawberries, so that is definitely the way we’ll be serving it up!
I’ll add the entire recipe in just a sec., but I would love to hear your Mother’s Day plans!
Check out this rich and scrumptious recipe below and have a fabulous weekend!
Fiddle Dee Dee by Jennifer Jones 