A Halloween Trick or Treat?

 Dead Mans Float

Happy Friday Everyone!! I thought you might enjoy trying a new twist on the coke float. My son, Nicholas and I scared up this treat together. We decided to have a late night snack and ended up having so much fun creating this Halloween treat.

  

It's important that you use the very best ice cream....That's right, Blue Bell Homemade Vanilla! If you don't have Blue Bell Ice Cream in your area.......then we need to have a moment of silence for you. Just kidding!!! Any ice cream will work. You are going to soak it in so much oooey gooeyness it will not matter.

It's fun to use a glass with flare, but no matter which glass you use, be sure it is a tall one. It looks best with a clear glass so that you can see all the yummy goodness in it. We used 2 scoops of vanilla ice cream. We had to push it gently down into this glass, that's why it does not look very attractive in this picture.

Next, we poured coke in the glass almost to the top, making sure to leave room for our toppings. You can use diet or regular coke.  Ahhh, now it's looking pretty.

These are the condiments we used for our "Dead Mans Float". You can also use chocolate sprinkles to make it look like his eyes are popping out of the dirt. We used green sprinkles for grass. We sprayed our whipped topping on top of the ice cream & coke. Use as much as you like. Then we squeezed some chocolate syrup on top of the whipped cream. Next, the strawberry syrup.

I think the chocolate and the strawberry syrup looks cool, the way it runs down the ice cream. It looks like blood and dirt!! Fabulous!! Last, we put the green sprinkles on and added the eyeballs...

I forgot to take a picture of the eyeballs. They are called "bouncy eyeball mania eyeballs". We purchased them at Target. They come in a bag of 30 and are in the Halloween section. They cost $4.00 per bag. We will keep a few sets and put the rest in the candy bucket for Halloween.

Enjoy!!



Fall Tablescape

Now that you know how to make a Fall centerpiece you can add on to your look. I wanted you to see what the whole picture will look like. Its amazing what a centerpiece can add to a table.

Once you add your place mats, charges and plate settings it really completes the look.

You can keep it casual and festive or you can dress it up by adding a fall table cloth.

I hope this gives you some good ideas not only for fall, but for Thanksgiving.

Someone pass the turkey....

If this post gave you some great ideas, I would love to hear from you.

Decorating Tips for Fall/Halloween

I mentioned in my post the other day that I got some really cute decorations from The Scarecrow Festival in Chappell Hill. This is what I got from Texas Trash and Treasure. How precious is this Jack-o-lantern? He is made of tin, hand-painted and if you look close, you can see that the handle is made out of barbed-wire. I had to have him!! He is adorable and how creative??

This is a section of my front porch. Originally, I had a ceramic plant pot on this table. For Halloween I decided to set him on the table outside and put a votive candle in the middle. I will light him up at night and he will be cute and scary! I didn't think it was possible to be both but here we are.....cute and scary....Eddie Munster was cute and scary so that is my final answer.

This little guy is made of tin also. I think he has so much character!  I love, love the florescent colors splattered on both of them. If you look close, he has a hanger on top. You can hang something like this pretty much anywhere, door, trees out in your front yard. You can even add him to a fall wreath. Get creative. I purchased several from the Festival and hung them along my iron gate.

Dont you just love this sign?!?!? This is hung on my walk through gate outside. You can also hang signs like this one on your front door or place it on a table next to a festive bowl of Halloween candy. My favorite part of the sign is the red fingernail.

Now its time to show you what I got from the Farmers Market. Lets take a moment to admire them.......

They are lovely. The gourds have great curved stems on them. Perfect for Halloween and Fall decorating.

No, I did not get him from the Farmers Market. I have had this pumpkin for a few years now.  I think its perfectly fine to use what you have and mix in something new to freshen it up.

I am going to show you how I made my centerpiece for fall in the dinning room so that you can get in the Fall spirit too. First I am starting with a big tray I already have. You can use a bowl, serving platter or anything else you have (remember be creative and use what you already have).

I left some wine corks in the tray for filler. You can add fall leaves for filler or just simply add miniature pumpkins. I place my "faux" pumpkin in the center.

I set the gourds out on the table so that you can get a good look at how big and chunky they are. Fabulous, I just love looking at them!

I started with the bigger gourds placing them in random places. So they can take up most of the space first. You can move them around until you like what you see.

Here I added the medium gourds, paying attention to tilt them and set at different angles. You do not want them all slanting in the same direction. This adds depth to your centerpiece.

Then I added in the rest of the smaller gourds putting them in from largest to smallest. Placing them at angles or stacking them.

If you like a lot of depth you can add some miniture pumpkins in your centerpiece as well. 



Next stop is the kitchen. I like to have subtle touches of fall throughout the house. Words to live by......."less is more", unless you are cooking with butter of course! 

These little cuties are going in the kitchen. Doesnt this make you want some pumpkin bread, or pumpkin pie?? When you decide to decorate with them you need to make sure you use an odd number of items. Here I used 7 pumpkins. There are so many different colors and styles of pumpkins. Try and use different variations so it doesnt look like, just a pile of pumpkins but more like a pretty picture.

I am going to take this cake plate, that I already had and use it as my centerpiece for my kitchen table. I think anything with a pedastool bottom would work beautifully. You absolutely do not have to place this at the table. You can place it on your kitchen counter if you like.

I arranged the pumpkins so that they werent sitting directly on top of one another, facing straight up to the ceiling. That may look boring. If you tilt them just a little on their sides and some straight it will add depth to your arrangement.

 Simple and pretty. Happy Fall.

Farmers Market



pictures taken from cell phone



I think you should never go to a Farmers Market alone. It is so much more fun to go with a friend or family member! My friend Valerie and I laughed so much our stomach and cheeks ached and I was in tears! I love when that happens. 

We stopped at Dilorio's Farmers Market on our way back from the Scarecrow Festival. Dilorio's is off of Highway 290 and Highway 6. 

I think the pictures speak for themselves. All of the produce was beautiful, fresh and colorful. It really made me want to buy everything in the place. They even sell pottery.

They have the most fabulous gourds I think I have ever seen!!

Looking at all these pumpkins really got me in the Fall/Halloween spirit. I used the pumpkins and gourds I purchased to decorate my home for the Fall season. I cant wait to share those with you tomorrow.

Scarecrow Festival, Chappell Hill, Texas

Hello everyone and welcome to my blog!! This is my very first post, so thank you for being a part of it. I am extremely excited to be able to share Cypress, Texas and its surrounding areas with you. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

I went to the Scarecrow Festival this weekend. It was absolutely fabulous!! This is an annual festival held in Chappell Hill, Texas. Chappell Hill is located right down 290 from Cypress. Every year the festival has more and more vendors attend, which creates better shopping opportunities for Cypress.

Consuela Tote Bags are a great accessory here in Cypress. They are stylish, bright and lots of fun. All the tote bags are made of vinyl fabrics and embellished with Mexican embroidery. I love them because they are durable and water resistant. The Consuela bag is great for the beach, lake, shopping or a stylish book bag.

I fell in love with these bright, colorful Paisley Nomad Rain boots. They are fun and stylish. You can find them in lots of prints and colors and who says you have to have just one pair???.....Well, probably your husband!

So, as you can see they have everything from the floor to the ceiling. What great ideas for planting all those great new fall flowers or maybe even adding to the flower beds you have now. Get creative!!

This was a great booth!! These Holiday signs and decorations are made of tin and hand painted. This really made me get in the spirit of Halloween. I cant wait to show you what I got from here....but that will be another day. I will show you what I bought and how I used it to decorate for Halloween. I hope you are as excited as I am!!!

These velvet pumpkins with natural stems are very popular this season. You can find them in beautiful fall colors.

As you can see there was a lot of great shopping!! Next we are headed to the Farmers Market. I cant wait to show you what we found there!! Thanks for stopping by.