Troy and Vanessa's First Home: The weather is changing, leaves are falling....

Well, not really. At least not in Roseville, CA! But nonetheless, fall is just around the corner and we're excited to get our fall decorations out and get ready for Halloween! Since we moved in pretty close to Halloween last year, we didn't have time to decorate as much as we would have liked. So this year, we'll be in full gear with the Halloween decor. While I'm out always looking for new things to put around the house, Troy has picked up on the excitement and has even surprised me with Halloween things he has found while he's been out and about shopping! And I must say he knows what I like and has done a good job!

While I was perusing MarthaStewart.com looking for decorating ideas while on my morning break at work a few weeks ago, I came across a project that I thought would be so fun to make and would look great in front of the house. It was a life-size Witch and 2 cat cut-outs made of wood that would stand on their own. I quickly emailed Troy and asked the following question, "What is a jigsaw and can I use one?" He quickly replied with a picture and replied with confidence that I would be able to use one! Well of course, we don't own tools so we asked Troy's cousin for some help and asked if we could borrow some tools and away we went!

I must say, I'm pretty proud of our progress! It took about 5 ours total (many snack and goofing off breaks) but we got the job done and I'm very pleased with everything! Garet showed me how to use the Dremel drill (he told me it would have been really difficult using a jigsaw that was recommended to get all the detail), gave me some earplugs, gloves and away I went! (the guys wouldn't have the patience to cut everything out! :) As I cute everything out, Garet sanded, then Troy painted. Here are some pictures of the progress!

Here is the starting point. I printed out the template, taped all the pieces together. Here is the witch....