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Soundtrack for today's post:

Coming home - My little brother came home this week from Afghanistan.  It's good to have him home again.  This was his second deployment.  Last time he was in Iraq, and I was living in India for a good portion of that deployment, so it was nice to be in the states for this deployment.  I was able to send him dried fruits and baked goods and occasional summer sausages. Of course, he flew home to the other side of the state, so I wasn't able to make the  6 hour drive to see him land.  But, I was able to take down the star from the window.

Home year round - We're getting ready for another long winter. Window quilts are going up, plastic on the outside, the whole nine yards.  We've got the heater on, but just barely.  I think it's at like 69  right now. The basement is nice and cool and has a good selection of potatoes, onions and garlic.   With my free apple tree not producing this summer, I don't have any apples stored. But, I'm feeling like we're pretty prepared for winter.
 The summer bounty is all canned and pickled. Yay for being done with the canner for the year! lol I have 3 butternuts, and dozens of pumpkins from my winter squash vines.  Awesome!  The Swiss Chard, kohlrabi and the turnips are still unperturbed by the frosty mornings, so I'm continuing to harvest fresh food.

Home for the holidays - We'll have much loved guests for Yule this year, so we've already started planning for that.  What food we want to cook, what presents we want to make.  What we want for decorations. I've fallen behind on my sew along for the Tree Pants, but it's ok.  I'm still plugging along, and I fell behind to make Rowen the cutest costume.  I went to my local fabric store and bought 1 yard of red cotton, a quarter yard of white, and I free handed a big circle and a little 'm'.  I backed the red circles with some fleece so he stays warm enough after the sun goes down, plus it helps to keep the shape.  Rowen was so happy with his M&M costume, and he got lots of complements during it's inaugural run last weekend.   We all went out to the Trick or Treating at the local county park.  It was a great night and we had a blast.

My first star!

Anyway, here's a shot of the first star I completed.  I didn't like it 100%, so I went to the fabric store and bought some cream to mix in with the cream/flower print.  Those stars look awesome. I have several of those done, I'll try and snap a picture of those this weekend.  (While I'm frantically trying to catch up with the other sewers ... lol)
It's not to late to join in the sew along.  You can follow the action at the Happy Zombie blog. Or at Sew Mama Sew.

Home for one more - I'm finishing up my 10th week with the tadpole.  Basil is still a no go, but the nausea in general is slowly starting to decrease. We're moving on the eating-every-three-hours stage. :-D Dave took some pictures of me this last weekend, but we'll keep this post family friendly. :-D  You're welcome mother.  We'll snap some PG ones soon and I'll share some belly bump.
Here's a candid shot of the tadpole.