I’m typing this while I sit on the porch in a sweater cardigan and under a fuzzy blanket. Basic or not, I love you, fall. 

The good weather has had the girls and I spending extra time outside and it’s put us all in happy moods. Today is pizza Friday, so we are of course all looking forward to rolling out dough, getting in , and watching a seasonal flick. I’m thinking possibly Hocus Pocus, The Nightmare Before Christmas, or trying a new to us one- Double Double Toil and Trouble. Was anyone else Mary-Kate and Ashley fans back in the day?!

On Saturday, both girls have soccer games, then we are having our friends over for football watching and a bonfire. Georgia takes on Auburn! I’m going to make a charcuterie board for the adults and perhaps a fun one for the kids, like I did last year.

I’m hoping Sunday we can get in a hike of some sort. The cooler weather has me itching to get outside and get away, so we’ll see. Maybe a hike in the morning and an afternoon of food and school prep for the week? That would pretty much sum up my favorite kind of fall weekend- ha! Ok, moving on… here are my five on a Friday!

1- Trader Joe’s seasonal goodies – I don’t mention Trader Joe’s often because we don’t have one nearby. The closest one is 38 minutes away, so I rarely go. However, the girls and I are feeling the fall vibes and wanted to stock our pantry with some seasonal goods, so we made the drive this past week and came home with some items we’re excited about: pumpkin ale, pumpkin-shaped pasta, pumpkin cranberry crisps, Halloween Joe Joe’s, a pumpkin curry sauce, pumpkin spice cookies, and chocolate-covered espresso beans. Fall-themed snack plates, here I come!

 

2- Sourdough Bagels – these sourdough bagels from Baking Sense were high on my fall food list, but looked a little intimidating. Like a lot of breads, they take multiple rises and overnight as well. I had the time earlier this week so I just went for it. What a mess that started out being. My dough was so sticky it was hard to handle. They didn’t seem to rise like I wanted them to and looked pretty flat when I went to boil them in the morning. But I persevered. And y’all…. this must be the most forgiving recipe of all time because they totally did turn out!

Could they all could have risen more? Sure. Could they all have come out better shaped? Of course. But they were chewy and delicious and I was floored that somehow my mess I made of the dough turned out edible.  

3- Halloween in the house – I’m usually a fall decorator, but the girls are so excited about Halloween this year (even if we don’t know exactly what that might look like yet), so I’ve embraced it and have been decorating our homeschool nook for the occasion. I grabbed a few things at Home Goods to start the process until we can pick up our decor bins from my in-laws house (where we stored it all when we thought we were moving). I also bought these bats on Amazon for the wall. They’re great! They come with five packs of bats and are easy to stick on the wall. It was a lot of festive bang for our buck!

4- Reeling in the food budget – I’ve been a little all over the place with our meals lately. Planning while I’m hungry, choosing whatever sounds delicious, and not taking the short cuts I know I can to cut food costs. So I’m reeling things in a little for October. I need to restock the pantry, so I’m planning on making a trip to Aldi or Food Lion to stock up on quality staples, then meal plan more carefully (making sure to stick a meatless night or two in each week), and bulk buying meat again from Evans Family Farm. I love a good challenge and look forward to seeing what I can do in this category. Bonus: it’s fall now so I can go all out on delicious soups and stews!

5- Pumpkin Potion! I just wanted to share this super simple activity with you because a $2.99 pie pumpkin can keep them busy for several hours. First they carve off the top and scrape out the insides. That takes a solid 45 minutes itself. Then fill the pumpkin up about halfway with vinegar. Add a squirt of dish soap and food coloring for fun. Then let your child pour in a heaping tablespoon of baking soda and viola! Pumpkin potion. After we do this (outside of course), they empty out the pumpkins and run around the yard making witches brew from all the random things that can find. It’s so simple and yet, so fun!

Looking for more pumpkin fun for kids? Check out my kindergarten homeschool unit study on pumpkins!

And that’s it from around here! I have a podcast interview I’m recording today and the one I did two weeks ago with Christy from Colugo is up! If you want to hear us chatting about homeschooling, click here to listen to the episode on Apple podcasts.

What kind of fall fun are you getting into lately? Baking anything fun? Any great experiments?