It’s the night before October 1st and I can’t wait any longer! Time to decorate for Halloween!! Heading home from work I picked up a hot apple caramel cider and I am all set to be in full Halloween mode! With our new fireplace I had to change things up a little bit, but it came out better than ever before. I used black web lace I bought at the craft store years ago and cut along the webbing to cut in half. The other half was used for my kitchen window.  I bought lots of fun pumpkins last year that I started to decorate and sadly never got to finish, but they still worked perfectly. After putting all of the cute decorations with the pumpkins, I placed a large plastic cauldron that I use every year as our candy dish in the fireplace. Looks like this witch is cooking up something fun at this house!

This was another apron that I have wanted to do for years and knew it was time to make it so I could enter it into the fair. I saw a similar apron at Pier-1 years ago and thought it was cute, but it I knew I could make it cuter! I decided since my favorite holiday is just around the corner that it was time to pull the fabric out of the project bin to complete. The bodice was created the same way as the Fourth of July Apron, but instead of a sweetheart neck I wanted more square. After pinning and sewing the orange ribbon in place between the bodice pieces I sewed on the web fabric belt and started working on the skirt. The skirt layers were created with a ½ a yard of each print being cut into ½ a circle. Next I used a triangle I cut out of a piece of paper to cut out the fabric. I didn’t want the triangles to directly lay on each other so it took a little maneuvering, but finally got it perfect. To be completely honest the skirt was that hardest part of this apron. It took a long time to sew all of triangles for each layer. Once all of the skirt layers were sewn, I pinned them to the belt, layering each section over another and sewed in place. The last step was to sew on the ribbon for the neck and ties. The apron was a long time in the making the finished project didn’t disappoint; it even got Honorable Mention at the fair. I can’t wait to wear it for Halloween!

I’m so excited to reveal the new logo for Oak Tree Junction!!! This took a lot of time to design and figure out just the right look I wanted, but I couldn’t be happier for the end results. I used the website Fivrr off of a friend’s recommendation and put in a request. Within a few hours I had several offer and just picked up the one I liked the best. After a few tries and tweaks I got the perfect logo. Hopefully this logo will be seen on more than just this site in the future! 

This week Jack and I received our paid off in full letters for the student loan and car loan! I was so excited to see these letters in the mail; it was like it was finally official: we were debt free! With this month almost over we have almost all of the France trip saved up for and then we will be able to move on to the next Baby Steps. It’s funny how creating a budget, usually something that makes you feel restricted, can create the feeling of such freedom. Each month we did a budget, we fought less and communicated more. That’s real freedom. Dave Ramsey truly believes that creating a budget and telling your money where to go instead of wondering where it went is the most important thing you can do, that he created a completely free budgeting tool called Every Dollar for free. It is a great tool and I encourage you to try using it for a few months…who knows before too long you could be getting your own paid off in full letters!

Its Fair time again and that means the decorated cake contest. The last two years I did an adaptation of art, this year I decided to test my fondant skills. 

Can you figure out what’s going on in this picture? This is a sneak peak of what will be coming soon to Oak Tree Junction! I don’t want to give too much away, but I am hoping this will lead to more exciting things in the future. Keep an eye out for what’s coming soon!