The Chirping Dog: Fall fun!

So...as all these pictures were uploading I realized that everything that has been going on lately starts with the letter 'p.' Plants, pretzels, pumpkins, pasta, and pies.

Happy Fall everyone!

This time of the year is so exciting to me. I love waking up and taking the dogs out and feeling the Fall breeze in the air. I love that you can still wear flip flops but order a hot latte at the same time.

School has been in full swing and I have been trying to do some fun things on the weekend to break up the crazy school days.

This past week we finished out science unit on plants. I wanted to end out unit with a fun celebration so my sweet room mom volunteered to bring in a yummy treat. You know the old school dirt in a cup right? Well...the trick still gets second graders. I told them that my room mom spend hours in her garden digging up soil for them to eat; it worked perfectly because they had learned that soil is full of water and nutrients so they thought they could eat it!

Look at that sweet face! He enjoyed his treat.

She used plant containers and stuffed them with a paper towel in the bottom and then baked a chocolate cupcake in brown parchment paper. Frosted it with brown frosting and used crushed up oreos for dirt. She topped them with gummy worms and leaves from sour candy. They turned out really cute!!

Days later I am still finding "dirt" crumbs all over my classroom....

For the first day of Fall I wanted to bring some treats to school for some teachers. Someone had been requesting my chocolate covered pretzels for days so I knew what I was going to make....

I found these cute little tags online and added brown paper to the back.

Each year I go to Burts Pumpkin Patch with a great friend.

We started going when we took our first grade classes on a field trip and now we go for ourselves!

This year was extra special because we got to bring her sweet baby boy to the patch and get lots of cute pictures.

This was just part of my pumpkin load....I tend to go overboard with pumpkins. I love decorating my house for Halloween and Thanksgiving with pumpkins all around!

No baby was harmed in this photo shoot, I promise. I could not grab any great pictures because the sun was right in his face and he was a bit overwhelmed, but still.....is he not a doll? I loved the outfit with the pumpkins!

Asher was just hanging out in the pumpkins, happy baby.

After our pumpkin outing I headed to the outlets and then home to take care of the pups.

Then I headed back up to my friends house so we could make a delicious dinner together.

We started off with baking some rolls. We were both so excited about this recipe but it didn't turn out how we had hoped.

Baby and mommy

The rolls were stuffed with fresh mozzarella pears and covered in cheese and butter.

Meatballs!

Homemade sauce

Sitting down with this big bowl of fresh pasta was amazing.

So....I am a sucker for a kitchen gadget. I want every tool out there. I have to remind myself daily of the difference between want and need. A few weeks ago Williams Sonoma had their pie maker on sale, big time! I, of course, immediately order it and the cook book to go along with it.