Well. They’re not all Halloween themed. But they’re all mazes. I messed around with some of them in PicsArt and Instagram.
Try a few. Get the solutions on your social media of choice. Tag me in it. I’m always @AiXeLsyD13 unless someone is being a butthole and takes it first for some reason even though it’s my handle across all platforms.
Share them too. This may be a fun Halloween activity for the kids or for the whole family.
I wish I could follow that advice. Wading through the temperamental pool that is social media, one occasionally finds a bright spot in a news story. I thought I found that with an article posted by a local news channel notifying those that aren’t already in the know about the significance of teal pumpkins. It subtly linked to this cool little video:
Simple enough, right?
It’s a brief article explaining the significance and the history of the Teal Pumpkin Project. If you go through to the FARE website, you an even get free activities and advice for non-food treats. We have participated since 2014, and I have written about it before.
Then, I read the comments.
Some people are garbage. I mean, I know that is harsh, and I know what we are supposed to be kind to everyone, but that can be a struggle when people out themselves as disgusting human beings. Did these people not ever watch Mister Rogers?
I think this is why they are teaching kids these days to “Be The I in Kind” or to Be the kind kid. They’re not going to pick it up at home if these are the mentoring adults.
I had a few replies that still stand.
To some nut job making this political:
Just so I can understand, how do any of the following (totally optional) things ruin your holiday, and just exactly how are they associated with liberals?
1. Putting out a symbol to indicate that your house is safe for food allergies.
2. Providing nut and/or gluten free treats, and maybe even non-food treats in addition to whatever you normally provide.
3. Displaying compassion and empathy to others already afflicted with a life-altering medical condition.
4. Teaching others by example how to be kind to others.
I never did get a direct reply there.
To the uniformed, absolutely resisting this new information:
No one is forcing you to buy a teal pumpkin or to pass out allergen safe treats. The article is just to inform you of the meaning so you don’t buy one as a decoration just because it matches your cold frozen emotionless heart.
Just some more advice:
We have been doing this for years. Having food allergies myself, dining out, social gatherings, and many events can be a harrowing experience.
We have 3 separate bowls… traditional things like Reese’s Peanut Butter cups, nut-free stuff like Smarties, and a bowl of totally non-food treats like pencils, stickers, little toys, etc.
We help spread awareness, the toys go as well as the candy, and hopefully we teach a bit of kindness and empathy.
I don’t even have the energy to get into the “it’s been a tradition for hundreds of years” comment. I think candy and trick or treating weren’t a thing until about the 1920’s in the United States… so that’s ONE hundred years ago at best. The push for chocolate was after WWII’s rationing… So, kick it back to 70 or so years. Earlier Celtic/Samhain traditions probably didn’t involve candy, but what do I know?
So please, this year, show a little compassion, empathy, and kindness. Pass the word along to your friends, family, and neighbors. You don’t have to preach about it, but you can lead by example. Also, learn to recognize the signs of an allergic reaction for yourself, your friends, and your community. You may help save someone’s life! That is, if it doesn’t inconvenience you in any way or support the grand liberal agenda.
I have been posting them to Instagram, just not here much. I have a few I have drawn but haven’t shared. I may share them here. Is anyone interested in them? Should I save them for a publisher or Etsy shop? I need to get with CI3 and make some mugs!
Yeah, that one is on my guitar case. It would be killer if someone could complete that one… just not on the actual case. Ha ha.
Thanksgiving is my favorite. Maybe after Halloween.
I am so proud of my little artist!
You know you wanna print one and try it, or use an app on your phone/tablet to draw right on it. Then you wanna tag me in social media with the solution or leave it here in the comments.
So, do you like mountain pies? I sure do.
Typical mountain pie preparation, assembly, & cooking at church camp.
We used to make them every time we went camping when I was a kid, and we camped quite often. Nothing beats cooking a mountain pie over the hot coals of an aging campfire. We generally make pizza ones, and we have made Reuben ones, and you have your standard pie-filling from a can/powdered sugar on top ones… but other than that I haven’t gotten too crazy. One time I did make a baked bean one. I mean, why not? Also, once we put leftover nine-can vegetable soup in an electric sandwich maker that we got on clearance from Kmart for $5. So, that is sort of similar to making a mountain pie. I mean, it would have made a good one.
Look at those crimped edges!
You gotta use a cast iron pie iron though, not those goofy aluminum ones. I have melted many an aluminum pie iron. I make those coals blacksmith hot. Also, you need one that seals the edges. The ones that don’t make a seal are just sandwich-heater-uppers and that’s bogus. I know they also make round ones where you can cook an egg and make an Egg McMuffin-ish type of sandwich.
My wife & I counsel for church camp every summer, and my camp always makes mountain pies… a tradition my family brought to our camp group when I was younger. Usually my friend Laurel & I end up being the cooks, over a fire in a pavilion fireplace that rivals the fury of Mount Doom of Mordor.
Some of the campers have made cool ones with Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. I need to try that. (Side note: have you ever had a campfire banana? Do it!) An old preacher friend of ours enjoys one filled with butter & powdered sugar. I bet it’s like a donut.
Moutain Pielander? THERE CAN ONLY BE ONE! #MountainPieMadness
So, what are your go-to mountain pie recipes? I hear some people also call them hobo pies, pudgy pies, campfire pies, jaffle pies, and other crazy stuff. They have to rank up there right behind hot dogs and s’mores as the #1 campfire food. I have thought a cheesesteak one would be delicious, maybe an Italian Sub on, maybe a burger melt/’Frisco burger kind of thing, maybe one with baked beans and a sliced hot dog would be the ultimate campfire mashup? You could go with a classic grilled cheese.
Share your tried-and-true recipes and your zany ideas in the comments!
The kids were really into Jovie-Belle, their Elf on the Shelf, this year. These are a few of my favorites. Post your favorites in the comments! (I have a bunch on Pinterest too… some appropriate, some not at all.)
We didn’t get crazy creative every night, but the kids really made a big deal about finding her every morning. Maybe next year we’ll get a second elf and have some more fun.
Did you see part 1? I quickly realized I like a vast odd selection of Christmas music. There are so many I dig that didn’t make the cut, and I’m sure ones I forgot. Throw me your favorites in the comments!
I have been trying to post a Christmas song per day since the beginning of December. I think I make a new YouTube playlist every year. (I must have set YouTube to tweet when I add videos to playlists way back… because it seems to be doing that with the stuff I’m adding.)
I enjoy some Christmas albums, but seem to have found a bunch of random songs that I like over the years. Some traditional, some quite the opposite. Here’s the first batch. There is no rhyme or reason or favorite order or anything.
Post some of your favorite Winter Holiday songs in the comments. Links to videos, album names, artists, etc. Show me what you dig!
1. No Doubt – “Oi To the World” (Vandals cover!)
2. MxPx – “Xmas Night of the Living Dead”
3. Willie Nelson – “Silent Night”
4. Run DMC – “Christmas in Hollis” (The A.K.A.’s do a neat cover too.)
5. Johnny Cash – “What Child Is This?”
6. RAMONES – “Merry Christmas (I Don’t Want to Fight Tonight)”
7. The Mighty Mighty Bosstones – “This Time of Year”
8. Bing Crosby & David Bowie – “Little Drummer Boy”
9. D.I. – “Mr. Grinch”
10. Laurie Berkner – “Santa’s Coming to My House Tonight”
Well. Damn, you Pinterest. Ha ha. We made more progress on the Back Yard Race Car Track. It may now also be a construction zone, gravel pit, monster truck arena, and dinosaur garden. Molly even asked about building a volcano. I do have an extra bag of concrete.
Check out the latest photos. We added a gravel pit, some large rocks for edging-work to try to contain the gravel, and dug out the grass so we have a dirt pit. Not sure if I should plant grass and leave a dirt track, or make it all a dirt pit. I may try to buy some river rock to make the outside edges look a little neater, and mix some more extra sloppy concrete to smooth it over, and fill in the edges smooth.
I bet it will evolve greatly over time.
I’m anxious to see photos of other projects like this. Show me what you’ve got in the comments!
🚧 🚧 🚧 👷 👷♀️ 🚚 🦕 🚗 🏁 🧚 🌱 🚧 🚧 🚧
So, on Labor Day this year, we labored. We finally got around to pouring cement for the Backyard Race Car Track, and we started a Fairy Garden.
I have been sitting on the race car track idea for a while, and wondering what to do landscape-wise around the one small tree in the back. We recently got some fairy garden furniture stuff as a gift… so we thought that would be a cool second (3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th?) backyard play-space.
I had purchased some Quikrete coloring from Amazon a while ago, and some bags of Quikrete Sand/Topping Mix from Home Depot this Saturday knowing that we had a full day to work today.
We had also started the digging a while ago when Ian was over-zealous and wanted to “Dig, Dig Dig!” in the back yard.
We had an easy enough start, put down some gravel, and mixed two of the three bags of Sand/Topping Mix with the coloring. I mixed it a little thick, and really what was all the coloring was meant to cover. The track was only about ⅔ of the way complete. So, I mixed the one other bag we had on hand. It was a little sloppier and went on really well. The kids helped in a kid-helping capacity, and Bethany did nearly all of the troweling/finishing work. Molly told me that she wanted to use the trowel because that’s what “brick builders” use to put the stuff in between bricks. I have no idea where she learned that.
So. It was obvious we needed a quick trip back to Home Depot to get some more bags. Ian & I went on a mission.
I asked the little man if we should get 3, or 4. He was adamant about getting 4. We also got the cheapest bag of garden soil, and some pebbles. Sadly, the bottle of coloring didn’t last long, and maddeningly Home Depot didn’t carry it… even with two shelves full of Quikrete products. I ended up asking if they had anything in the paint department, and they just had a concrete paint or dye to use after the fact.
We got back and Bethany made us a delicious salad for lunch. We needed to re-fuel for more work out back! I mixed 2 more bags, with some help:
After that, we did use just one more bag… but that’s OK. I can use the rest for some driveway patch work now that I have some more recent practice with this stuff. (A long time ago, I worked for a bit for a general contractor, and would sometimes mix mortar all day for the subcontracted bricklayers.)
For now, that’s about all we can do. The bag says it needs to set up for five days. Hopefully we can be patient and the neighborhood wildlife (including my children) stays out of it. I did grab an odd old brick from out front that had originally been in the back yard, and made a sort of garage out of it. I plan to get some river rocks or pebbles or something to kind of clean up the edges of the track. Maybe they will need to go on with concrete, or some of that stuff that comes in a caulking-gun dispenser. If they’re not stuck down, they will end up all over and most likely destroy my lawn mower.
The other quick family project was to make a fairy garden. I was hoping to use stuff that we had around in addition to the recently gifted furniture and starter items.
After thinking about a couple of different ideas, we settled on me taking a chainsaw to some large branches and small logs that we had out back, and driving nails partway into the bottom so we could drive them into the ground and they would hopefully hold. It worked!
I played with the chainsaw, demonstrated the nail technique, then Bethany and the kids did most of the nail-driving… and I think that was mostly Bethany. Molly helped me place them around the tree in sort of a kidney bean shape, including an old wooden bucket that I think we bought from the estate sale of the previous owner of this house (who coincidentally said she would miss the little tree in the backyard most of all).
Then we pulled up 90% of the grass, and Ian hauled it away in his wheelbarrow. We put down the bag of cheap garden soil and it was perfect for coverage & fairy garden decoration placement. We also planted a small succulent plant that my mom had recently given us in a small pot that should be durable outdoors, but may look cool covered in small round stones so it looks like a fairy house. We’re putting Grandma on craft duty to help make little projects to decorate the space. I would love to use some of the stuff we have around the yard or house like tiny terracotta pots, or Popsicle sticks, or wire.
It would be nice to plant some small ornamental succulents, moss, or super tiny flowers eventually too. Luckily (?) Pinterest is an endless rabbit hole when it comes to fairy garden stuff. Speaking of rabbits, our backyard is overrun with them as well as squirrels, chipmunks, birds, deer, and who knows what else. Think they’ll leave this stuff alone?
At any rate, playing in the dirt has been proven over-and-over to be good for you. These spaces offer two additional opportunities for the kids to get into the dirt in the back yard. It’s great to learn about gardening, ecosystems, using your imagination, and more… all without even realizing that you’re learning.
Check out some photos from the day if you have the time and interest, and let us know what you think in the comments!
If this is something you’d like to try yourself, check out these Pinterest boards for inspiration:
If it’s something you have tried yourself, please share your stuff in the comments! I would love to see some other backyard family projects.
I think I made this a draft, & forgot to post it… I got some video of the kids having a blast on the Swingset, and played around with the YouTube video editor before it disappears.
World (and Lunar) Domination 