october recap

Every month at the end of the month, I recap my monthly activities/goals and link to various personal blog posts. See all of 2014's monthly recaps here. Usually I do it on the last day of the month, but tomorrow is Friday and I insist on sharing 5 links with you for "5 on Friday." ;)

We celebrate a variety of birthdays every month around here (we come from big families and I have a big family). We're constantly trying to come up with what we consider to be fun birthday themes. This month I shared a sock hop birthday party idea:

a pretty birthday brunch idea:

and a birthday picnic idea:

Also: doughnut cakes!

Speaking of celebrating, my cousin Marta had a baby in late September. Her baby is so beautiful! I started the series "Dear Marta," in which I share some of what I've learned about being a mother and raising babies. The first post is here. More of that to come.

Marta and I were paired for my whimsy jar swap. She made this beautiful whimsy jar for me:

I made this baby themed whimsy jar for her:

This month I worked on "cleaning every nook and cranny of my workspace" as it was one of my goals for October. I shared a few pictures of my progress for Workspace Wednesday.  I also discussed creating vs spending seeing as how I've accumulated too much.

In other news, I added 3 sandwiches to my 52 sandwiches project:
#46: buffalo chicken grilled cheese on jalapeno cheddar bread

#47: grilled turkey, cheese, pickle, and jalapeño chips on multigrain bread

#48: tuna salad (revisited)

Not necessarily in that order, but look! I can count.
I also blogged about considering sandwich construction after reading an article on NPR with Dan Pashman from The Sporkful as a guest (am obsessed with the podcast). I also added 5 of my recent sandwiches to my favorites. (I had listed my first 10 favorites here).

As far as my goals for October, this is how I did.

★Clean every nook and cranny of my workspace
Yeah I did. :)
★Take evening walks with each of my daughters 
We took a few family walks. No individual mom/daughter time, but that's ok.  I couldn't say no.
★Try a new hot beverage per Sarah's advice, which I originally blogged about here.
I tried Oprah's chai tea latte at Starbucks. It was okay, but it wasn't my favorite. Ah well.

I did all that I wanted to do this month! Ta da. :)

See this year's monthly recaps here.