The Kitsap Kittens

We had two of the cutest ever kittens in Kitsap County the other night for Halloween. Angelica and Emma wore costumes that my Meme (their Great Meme) made for me and my sister when we were little...so special. I will have to try and find a picture of me to compare. The girls were so excited to go trick or treating and came back with a ton of candy which they were eager to dump out, inspect and devour! Emma loved saying Meow and Angelica informed me that she said thank you to everyone. Now to ration out the candy over the next several weeks...it does come in handy for some bribery when necessary! Thanks Meme for the costumes...maybe next year they can be the bees or cabbage patch kids!

Decorating Disaster?

Start with a nice clean table and clean supplies....give some cookies, icing and candy and end up with black-fingered, icing crusted mouths but very HAPPY kiddies. They loved decorating their Halloween cookies and I think their strategy was...decorate some, eat some, play some and repeat. I used this Royal Icing recipe again for the second year and love it!!! If anyone wants a cookie....stop by!

My Little Cookie Helper

For the second year now, I have used this recipe (Brown Sugar Cutouts) to make our Halloween cookies. It is very easy and quite tasty!! Angelica loves to "help" in the kitchen and this year she actually did all the cookie shapes herself and even tried to help roll out the dough...although she did enjoy some nibbles along the way!

Pumpkin Time

This year we had three pumpkins to carve....the girls painted their little pumpkins. We decided to let Angelica help draw face ideas on her doodle board for two of the pumpkins and then we used the pro-life template from American Life League to do the third carving of the unborn baby. Appropriate for the month of October and for us as we eagerly await the arrival of our little one. So while Jason did most of the work, Angelica enjoyed using the little tools to carve her pieces as well...and loved the finished products. Emma slept and woke up excited to see pumpkins lit up and carved!!

Harvesting the Seeds

The girls had a really fun time this year helping scrape the pumpkins out and harvest all the seeds for cooking. Emma wasn't wild about the "squishy stuff" but did a good job helping. Even with as much work as it is, we LOVE eating the pumpkin seeds every year and I was shocked that both the girls like them too...and they are so healthy for you! I have put together my own recipe and it is a huge hit!! YUMMERS. Note to self: when you are drying the seeds though after rinsing before cooking, do not put on paper towels as they will stick and not be fun to pry apart! Recipe I use now: Separate and rinse seeds as clean from pulp as possible, let dry. Preheat oven to 350. Spray pan. Depending on how many seeds you have you adjust recipe to taste, sorry no real measurements. This year we had 3 pumpkins. I melted couple TBs of butter, bit of Worcestershire sauce, Season Salt, garlic powder and TB or so of brown sugar. Mix and then pour over seeds in bowl and coat. Then spread on pan and bake for at least 40 minutes or so, stirring occasionally and checking to see when they look nice and brown. Then I put on wax paper to dry and then snack all week long!! Enjoy.