Painting, Food, and Food For Thought

I think I finally redeemed myself from my beach towel/ conch shell painting fiasco last night at Quench Your Palette.  My sister and I were the only ones in the class so we got the instructor's attention completely to ourselves.  It was so much fun!

They really should put better lights in there so that when people pose with their paintings, they don't look so washed out.  Oh well...

Maybe the painting went better as a result of the yummy dinner we consumed prior to the class....

I changed up my original plan a bit and made black bean-smothered sweet potato fries instead of using the whole potato.  It was my attempt to speed the baking process along and it worked.  The boys even ate their broccoli last night too.  Of course their sweet potato fries were smothered in ketchup, not black bean salsa, but they did devour their side of seasoned black beans...also dipped in ketchup of course.  

Speaking of food, that apple butter turned out to be delicious.  I could eat it by the spoonful!  Yum!

I found some other interesting things in the blogging world this morning too...

I like this idea of making your home a haven during the holidays.  I definitely want to try out her tips.

The challenge starts off with lighting a large candle in your home every day.  I'm never sorry I lit a candle, especially a festively scented one.  I think this is a challenge I can handle.

I also found this post from Tina to be quite interesting, especially in light of some comments I've heard from people lately.  She explains how we ALL have motivation.  

Source 

I think you probably need to figure out what your dreams are first, which should be easy but I always struggle with that question, then figure out what drives you to those dreams, but I agree that it's within all of our abilities to achieve our dreams.  We just have to channel our energies in the right direction.  

Just some food for thought...

Anyways, today looks like it's going to be another beautiful day.  We're hoping to fit in a bike ride to the bagel shop, a trip to the park, a best body fitness boot camp workout, sriracha corn chowder (don't worry friends that are joining us for dinner, we're going easy on the Sriracha and have sour cream to cut the heat if its still too spicy), trick-or-treating with friends, hopefully a quick little run, and DEFINITELY lots of giggles and snuggles. 

Can't wait to see what our little superheroes think of trick-or-treating!  I hope they have as much fun collecting candy as they had eating it the other night.  Did you know you can face paint with M&Ms?

Blue streaks compliments of that blue M&M he's holding.  That's right friends, they do melt in your hands if you hold on to them long enough.

Colton didn't get quite as crazy but he sure did have a good time eating the M&Ms.  Happy Halloween!