Rainy Fall Weekend

This weekend was a busy one. My guy was a groomsman in a wedding on Friday so we took the day off and were there to celebrate with friends Todd and Joanne as they celebrated their special day. It was a lovely wedding and my guy looked very handsome in his tux. Will try to get some pictures up soon, they are on my guy's camera.

About the same time as we were at the wedding my grandparents, K's parents, Marg and Ken, were arriving from Alberta for a visit. So on Saturday afternoon I headed up to Aurora to visit with them and my mom and K. It was K's mom's birthday on Saturday so we had a lovely dinner and relaxed. We started on a Thanksgiving craft which I will show you at the end of this post. It was a very involved 2-day crafting event, but the results are cute enough to make up for it.

Sunday, we had big plans to go to a local apple orchard and go for a long walk. Unfortunately, when we woke up the weather was cold, rainy and just generally crummy. So we decided to stay home and to warm up we had this yummy breakfast. This is one of my favourite breakfasts I remember from my childhood. Red River cereal with brown sugar, fruit and milk, mmmm! On Sunday we had the biggest blackberries I have ever seen, which got mixed in with the last local strawberries of the year.

Another great way to keep warm was cuddling with Alfie, my parents adorable, but wild, orange cat. Alf is an outdoor beast, it's rare that he is indoors and will tolerate a bit of cuddling and attention. But on this rainy afternoon he consented to me taking some photos and to giving him a good ear rub.

I love his stripey tail the most. Always flickering, even in the deepest of sleeps.

Dirty paws from gallivanting in the mud.

"Ok, you can rub my ears. I don't mind. Ahhhh....."

We also went to Costco to pass some time. My grandparents have a membership and we always make a trip when they come to visit. K gets really excited about the biggest block of Asiago and a gallon jug of maple syrup. I got a couple of new cookbooks, one about quinoa that I have had my eye on for a while and another Canadian Living collection. Looking forward to trying out some of these recipes soon. For supper, my guy headed up to Aurora and we all went to my Aunt and Uncle's place for an amazing dinner including my favourite Mulligatawny soup and a Mario Batali chicken that is to die for. 

So for our big Thanksgiving craft we decided to make Pom Pom Toms from Martha Stewart. I found the pattern through craftgawker and just had to make them. I bought all of the supplies last week and carted them up to Aurora so that Marg, Mom and I could craft together. They are quite involved with many steps. First, you need to make the pom poms.

Much labour and love went into making these pom poms.

This may seem simple enough, but I never realized how much work it is to make a pom pom. Martha has a fancy pom pom maker that she uses, but I was unwilling to spend the $15 to buy one. So I made home made pom pom makers. This is how you can do this:
1) Draw a circle of the required diameter on a piece of cardboard and then cut it out. Then draw a smaller circle within that one, I leave about 1/3" of cardboard and then cut the inner circle out. You also cut out a wedge shape so that the finished product will look like a "C". Make 2 of these.
2) Once you have 2 C's, snip a piece of yarn (about 8 " will do) and sandwich this between the cardboard C's. Make sure the ends hang loose below the tips of the C shape.
3) Use the yarn from the ball to wrap around the pom pom maker several times until it is even and completely covered. The more you wrap the fuller your pom pom will be. I continued wrapping until the middle of the C-shape was almost completely full.
4) Now take the two ends that have been hanging down and tie them together as tight as you can at least twice.
5) Slip the tip of your scissors under the yarn and between the two pieces of cardboard and snip the yarn all the way around. Remove the cardboard C's. Tie your loose ends a few more times to make sure they are really secure.
6) Fluff up your pom pom and give it a haircut all the way around. The more you trim your pom pom the denser it will be!

The next step in the process is to download the templates and cut out the tail feathers. We used red, brown, white and golden yellow felt.

Tail feathers waiting to be joined to turkey bodies.

There are a few more steps which are detailed on the website linked above. You make the wings and eyes by sewing different colour yarn through the body and head. This makes a contrasting colour patch that looks really neat. You may need to do this in multiple steps to fill in any areas that you miss on the first round. Finishing touches of some eyes, beak, waddle and legs and you have a Pom Pom Tom!

My first Pom Pom Tom

A turkey line up!

They are so super cute. We are hosting a big thanksgiving dinner next weekend so I am going to use them as place card holders. 5 down, only 5 more to go! I would recommend if you are making them to have helpers because 4 hands are faster than 2!

msi.