Toadstools are Small.

And they grow in my courtyard. Take a look:

It turns out that these are fly Amanitae, which = psychoactive and potentially poisonous. So, probably won’t be eating those. However, my Sweetie and I noticed a load of other mushrooms a-sprouting around the yard, not all of them spotty. What’s more, last weekend, I saw our neighbor and his main squeeze trolling the grass like truffle pigs and snapping up toadies left and right.

If that’s not living Small, I don’t know what is. Foraging in the backyard for foodstuffs? Totally fly! Any recommendations for ID’ing these funky fungi?

Day of the DIY: Red Riding Hood + Wolf

Okay, okay, so Halloween was yesterday, but I nevertheless wanted to share our DIY get-ups.

The best part: We sourced almost everything from our own closet (I’m not kidding; I do own a vermillion crinoline), and handmade the rest — riding hood, wolf mask, tail — out of craft store supplies.

Did you dress up? Did you DIY? Let’s see it.

I’m JACK, the Pumpkin King!

Here is a list of things that get me high on Halloween:

1. Costumes. Duh. Homemade ones are the best, like when my mom made that cranberry-colored velvet dress and pink faux fur stole so I could be a Rich Lady in first grade. High five, Mom! What’s your fave costume, now or gone?
2. Candy pumpkins. I like to pretend I’m the giant from The Brave Little Tailor, who picks up a horsecart-ful of pumpkins and dumps them in his mouth. Remember that?
3. Thriller. Word, MJ. I will dance like that herd of zombies, maybe in my next life.
4. It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. The wisdom of The Brown: “Never jump into a pile of leaves with a wet sucker.”
5. Jack-o’-lanterns. For more, see Figs. 1 & 2.

Despite the non-Smallishness of buying a farm-fed squash raised especially for slicing, Mr. LS and I hosted a carving festival with a few friends, some butternut squash & pear soup + hand-twisted soft pretzels (yes, I married an incredible man-chef), and some pumpkin cookies from my friend Jill.

But, in the spirit of Small living, both the man-chef and I tried to recycle pieces of our pumpkins as artistic additions to our jackies.

Fig. 1: Mister’s Devil.

Fig. 2: My Dead Prom Queen.

In both cases, we reused the mouth cutouts as embellishments, affixed with toothpicks: Mister chopped his in half for horns; I flipped and fastened mine for a clever little crown.

Tell me about your Great Pumpkins. Classic? Unconventional? Kooky?

Etsy Love: comfy, cozy, acorn, apple

Fall has fallen, oh yes, with rain and red leaves. And with fall comes wool (not mothy wool; good, warm, snuggly wool), and with wool comes Etsy. Two new Etsy loves, from me to you.

Needle felted acorns for scattering at Small House, by truLuxe:

And this crocheted apple cozy for keeping my Galas bruise-free, from Unravel Me:

Yarn. Moth. Bad.

This is disgusting.

My yarn stash. Infested. Moths, little larval wormy white things. Barf city.

Serves me right, I guess, for overstashing — even in Le Petit Maison. Just desserts, I suppose, for storing my piles of chunky Manos del Uruguay wool and the last of the Rowan Tweed Mouse lot saved for my mister’s Mister Rogers cardi and the bunny-soft worsted alpaca hand-spun and hand-dyed from the hair of this. very. beasty:

out in the open, where the burrowing parasites could spin their vile tents and lay their maggoty eggs. (This is disgusting.)

The point: I want to be Small; I want to keep my yarn, not toss and replace because of some bugs. But can I?

Any advice from the other knitters out there? Can I keep? Must I chuck?