e pluribus unum

e pluribus unum means "out of many, one." check out these pics i took today in my yard. there is a big tree and i saw one spot of red on it from the window. i went outside to look at it and low and behold, there is a huge tree with thousands of leaves and one of them has changed colors. one.

the whole scenario epitomizes myself. how great to be an individual with my own style, my own tastes, my own opinions...to stand out from a tree full of a thousand other leaves.

whoa...deep.

martha moments: fried apple pies

now and then i have these moments that i like to call "martha moments." you see as much as i despise martha stewart, i have these instances when i go completely domestic. a real life betty crocker in the flesh.

so i decided that once a week i'll post about my martha moments. today's comes as a result of visiting my MeMa in the nursing home the other night (that visit is a whole other post in itself...let's just say that she's a mess!). anyway, in sitting and talking to her, she told me that Tim Sheriff had come by to see her. Tim is our old preacher and is also the one who married us. she said that Tim was talking about me and said that i made the best fried pies he's ever had.

funny.

i've never made a fried pie before.

and i doubt that Tim Sheriff said that. see MeMa has these moments where she is completely "there" and then these brief instances when she has no idea what she's talking about. i think this was one of those times.

anyway, she asked me the next time i came if i would bring some of my good fried pies. well, seeing as how i can't let my 85 year old MeMa down, i've educated myself this morning on how to make some fried pies like my Grandmama Betty makes 'em.

let me just tell you that my Grandmama Betty knows cooking. better than anyone. she can bring HER fried pies to the apple festival and once word gets out that she has some, people are trying to offer her money for them. i know this because it happened a couple of weeks ago....

anyway, i found this great video on youtube of this little lady showing you how to make fried apple pies the southern way. (note: this is NOT my grandmama betty, but it did give me the idea that i should go video her showing me things like this...)

you're gonna love listening to how she talks!

so rather than posting a recipe today for my 1st martha moment, i'm gonna leave it to Miss Edith Bradley: ("get ye a lil flire and ye board...")

what i am....

1. I'm so disappointed in my gamecocks right now. C'mon now!
2. I'm very thankful that my mom had a successful gallbladder removal surgery this week. Poor thing has my crazy dad there to care for her.
3. I'm ready for our vacation to New England & Canada.
4. I'm loving the new fall fashions, especially the fact that leggings and flats will still be "in."
5. I'm realizing that sometimes we do more for others than we do for ourselves and we need to cut ourselves some slack and treat ourselves every now and then.
6. I'm wanting a new camera and cannot decide between two.
7. I'm deeply disturbed by the name of this cereal. Is that weird that it bothers me?
8. I'm learning that if I continue to clean a little bit every night, I won't have to "major" clean on Saturday. (thanks, fly lady...)
9. I'm getting more worried by the day about the economy and I hate being a grown up and having to worry about it in the first place.
10. I'm glad that Starbucks now has a protein plate for those of us who try not to eat pastries for breakfast. Smart move, marketing people!
11. I'm sick and tired of rude people who have chosen a career in customer service.
12. I'm officially addicted to Queen.
13. I'm slowly starting to read "Twilight" and am delightfully surprised at how much I like it.
14. I'm not embarrassed to tell you that I think the new New Kids cd is actually pretty decent.
15. I'm glad tomorrow's Friday. :-)

what would i have looked like in 1952?

when you have an hour of your life to waste, you must go to www.yearbookyourself.com and see what you would have looked like through the decades.

here's more below. totally useless, i know, but so, so amusing and entertaining to do when you have a million other things you SHOULD be doing...

things i love: the college football edition

things i love:

1. the sc chant at games that goes something like this:

(really ominous sounding) "dumm dumm dum dum.....U-S-C...gooooooooooooooo COCKS!"

2. the giddyness of waking up on saturdays (or in this week's case, thursday) and planning the entire day around the game.

3. the trash talking. love it.

4. jeff getting up at 4 a.m. and starting the smoker with something really good in it--and it being ready just in time for kickoff.

5. going to some of the games and doing the whole tailgating thing. even though it's a lot of work to get it all together, it sure is fun. even the rotten smell of the farmer's market makes me smile.

6. ryan succop--love this kid and i'm glad he's here one more year.

7. the making of new household names--even though i've already started missing cory boyd terribly, i'm looking forward to seeing how some of the newer names prove themselves--smelly, beecher, garcia, and taylor rank.

8. watching my hubby being lit up like a firecracker all week because it's game week. he is literally radiating excitement.

9. the fact that the espn commentators have plenty more to talk about now that it's football season. i mean, they covered a spelling bee this year.....is that really a sport??

10. this:

11. tim friggin' tebow. period.

time for the apple festival!

the sc apple festival is coming up--faster than i would like! it's a great little festival in my hometown of westminster and has become more of a homecoming to me than a festival in the last few years. it seems like a lot of people come back from wherever they've moved off to to come to the apple festival.

every year, i try to do a booth with my arts and crafts. seeing as how i sold off most of my goods in a yard sale last month, i have very little to take this year.

but i am still going and i have a plan for what i'm going to sell. if you want to know, you will just have to come see!

the festival runs the weekend of september 5-6 and there are all kinds of events that go on, not just the arts festival. there is also the big IPRA sanctioned rodeo and bakeoffs, road races, etc. etc. etc. i really wanted to do the road race but never can because i have to "man my booth" on friday, which is when the race always is.

so there's my shameless plug for the sc apple festival. come on down!

here's a sample of one of my wooden signs (these sell out every year!) interested in one? shoot me an email....lindsaystovall@bellsouth.net

they do make great gifts, if i do say so myself....

bring on the fall

i was so happy this morning to open the front door and be greeted by the cool morning air. cool being the key word. we here in sc have been hammered with a brutally hot summer with very little rain. we're in a severe drought and the grass is crunchy. (but to jeff's advantage, with the lack of rain, he didn't have to cut it very much this summer...)

in the past month, the humidity was so bad that i just let my flat iron take a sabbatical and i let the natural waves in my hair just enjoy themselves and hang loose. there's no use to straighten and style when the humidity is 100% because frizz takes over and you've wasted a half hour of your life each day with your CHI.

so it was literally a breath of fresh air this morning to feel a breeze and get a sneak preview to fall. fall is by far my favorite season. i love the colors, the smells, everything.

there's lots to look forward to this fall--

1. college football. need i say more? i seriously have ants in my pants waiting for the kickoff in a couple of weeks.

2. that wonderful, wonderful day that you realize you can drive without the A/C on, and so you roll your windows down, only to find you need to turn the heat on low. that moment is pure bliss. even the weird smell that comes with turning on heat for the first time in months.

3. gevalia's flavored coffees are always great in the fall. usually creme brulee and pecan torte. mmm.

4. the apple festival (which my next blog will be about, stay tuned.)

5. euphoria, the new wine/music festival started by edwin mccain in downtown greenville. the kickoff is the chris isaak concert, which we're going to!

6. our vacation to new england and canada in october. literally. cannot. wait.

7. WICKED IS COMING TO ATLANTA AND BUBLE'S COMING TO GREENVILLE. yeeah!

8. the colors around the upstate truly epitomize the term "this is God's country." when you look out and see the trees and the leaves, you can't help but wonder how anyone doesn't believe in God.

9. Thanksgiving dinner's just a few months away! I'm definitely doing a another turkey cake (see photo below of last year's)

AND......

10. ......CHRISTMAS is 134 days from today! Start your shopping lists!!

so, i say bring on the fall! i can't wait.

this is where it all happens...

....my work, that is! the office is finally finished (well, finished enough for me to take a picture of it...)

there's still a couple of things that need to be done, but all in all it is complete. i still have to add more books to the bookshelves and i need a rug and i'm planning to put a white sofa (for when i just MUST have a break) on the empty wall facing the desk. i have the whole thing visioned out, i just have to go back to atlanta for the missing items.

we just needed a good paddlin'

so we are back and at 'em after our long weekend with the welch's (minus jackson). what an awesome time to kick back, not have good cell phone service and just relax.

when we plan any trip to the mountains (especially if we are staying in a cabin), I always envision this wonderfully primitive trip, where we cook everything over a fire pit, there is no television or phone and i am forced to paint or draw or read multiple books in a rocking chair on a porch.

this never happens.

the first thing i do is find outlet malls. then we all figure out which restaurants to hit up. and then there's the wii and guitar hero. to say that it's addicting is quite the understatement.

nonetheless, playing "dream police" over and over and over again was fun. i finally have mastered the easy level and now medium is seriously kicking my butt!!

we did get back to nature a bit---we got in a good paddlin' with zaloo's canoes on the new river. we packed a panini lunch (yep, still obsessed with them) and had the best time canoeing with our canoes tied together. we also went fishing and lindsay w. caught her first fish EVER. baby got bass. too bad we didn't even have a camera to take a picture of this life changing event!!

all in all, it's trips like this that make you sit back and be particularly thankful for the friendships we have in our lives.

the two amigos

the strange forces of nature and gravity at mystery hill

river rats!

lindsay w. looking for the darn brown barn! (it was likely the spot that was missing on the map)

the 1st day of the last year of my 20's

....in other words, the start of my 29th year. wow. time flies.

birthdays were much more fun when we were all NINE and having parties at holland's rollerama. but the years creep on and here i sit one year before my 30th birthday. (i'm internally screaming right now).

this year's birthday was great. jeff's been off for a couple of weeks so we got to hang out together, which we never take for granted because some years he gets to celebrate on my birthday, some years we have to celebrate a few days before or after because of his work schedule. we really didn't do much of anything, which was nice! my parents treated the family to dinner at paesano's (my fave) which was impeccable from start to finish. our favorite waiter, billy, created a special dessert just for my birthday which was incredible.

then the next day jeff taught me a little more on the golf course. i've been trying to learn the game and am almost to the point of buying some hot pink clubs/irons/wedges. i seriously knocked the crap outta the ball yesterday and i think it even shocked jeff how far i can drive it. bring it, tiger. bring it.

hopefully the weather will hold out tomorrow for us to go canoeing. we are headed up to paris mountain for the day.

one last note--i am officially hereby boycotting the oconee county wal-mart in seneca. it is filthy and disgusting and to go there on a friday night is like going to the circus. they should charge admission. everytime we go in there, i get in a bad mood and tonight was no different. so there, i said it. i hate the seneca wal-mart. dollar general of six mile, here i come!!