Can it be holiday season yet?

With a birthday and Halloween still 3 weeks away, followed by Thanksgiving and Christmas, and New Years, I am ready to start my holiday preparations.  I AWLAYS seem to bite of more than I can chew.  There is so much fun stuff to do, as well as the actual work, like winterizing the house, and getting everything cleaned up outside.  The past week has been busy, between popcorn sales for Scouts, canning blackberry jam, working on the Halloween projects.  The good news is boys are making good progress on their popcorn goals, I shouldn't have to buy jam for awhile and, I am almost ready to break out the the Thanksgiving stuff!  

These are my finished sewing projects from last week.  Three out of five table mats done.  One is for me, one is for a silent auction/drawing basket, and one is for etsy.  I'll probably finish the other two today and tomorrow.  Then I only have 4 more Halloween projects to finish.   I think.

Here is a close up of one of them.  the thing I really liked was how 1) I have no more Halloween fabric to use. (YAY!!! New fabric next year!) and 2) even though they use the same fabrics, some are brighter and some are darker, depending on fabric placement. My favorite fabric is the black and white "cartoon" fabric.  It reminds me of some of the book illustrations when I was younger.  

We canned 25 jars of blackberry jam, and the kids are hoping for more.  We'll see if we get more berries.  They are coming really late this year, so I might be able to get at least 2 more batches done.  We also have green beans to make dilly beans with.  Half the family loves them, and the other half not so much.  My sewing goals are all over the place.  I have so much I want to do and only so much time!!