Happy Halloween

Today was wonderful... lazy... restful.. peaceful.. and just great. I did not make anything spooky for dinner... in fact we did not even have dinner yet ( 9 pm ) and I think we will be skipping it since we had a late lunch. We slept in late and then spent the day cleaning... turned on some good tunes and got to work....... all of the stuff that we brought home from my MIL's has now been sorted and put away. All the floors were cleaned and the kitchen got a good going through.. the kind where everything comes off the counter and gets cleaned good. Daughter and I were just going to clean up a little and one thing led to another and things that had been piling up or getting pushed aside have now been put away or thrown out. While we were out working in the kitchen and living room it turns out Dave was back in the bedroom getting the master bath all cleaned up and the bedroom cleaned up. He also got my new computer all loaded up with windows 7 and some other things... tomorrow I need to get the new office for it and a couple of other things and then hopefully by tomorrow night I will be working on the new system. We did end up putting up a few decorations in the yard for halloween... some pumpkin lights and strobe lights that make a witchy scream... we went through a 4 lb bag of candy... most of it was even given to trick or treaters. I have to say... I really want to start to decorating for christmas... but am going to try so hard to wait until after thanksgiving...am going to try to stick to the fall theme until then. lol I already know I am not going to make it. When do you decorate for christmas? Start listening to christmas music? Have all your shopping done?

Gross Halloween Dinner Idea

*photo from www.notmarth.org* click there for more of the ideas on that site. Click here for the recipe and how to for the hand.

I was stumbling around today online and came across this great idea for dinner on Halloween night. I am going to let my daughter invite her boyfriend over to hang out on Saturday and watch scary movies and pass out candy to the neighborhood kids...was thinking we would just get a couple of pizzas but am now thinking I might make a scary gross dinner for them... think I am going to try making them individual size so that I can dish up a plate for each of them and then serve them up.

pictures of mine to follow in an update after I have tried this.

*update 10/13/10* I did not end up making this last year... but... I am once again going to try to plan to make it this year :)

Pumpkin Cookies

Old fashioned soft pumpkin cookie recipe. I have been making these at least once a year for as long as I can remember and they are a super easy cookie that everyone seems to love. They are soft almost like a pumpkin bread. We love to eat them with a dab of coolwhip to dip them in.

Mix together and set aside

2.5 cups of flour
1tsp baking soda
1tsp baking powder
1tsp cinnamon
.5 tsp nutmeg
.5 tsp salt


Mix in a large bowl

1.5 cups sugar
.5 cup of butter ( 1 stick )
1 cup pumpkin
1 large egg
1tsp of vanilla

Mix dry ingredidants into wet and stir well... drop by teaspoons onto cookie sheet and bake about 15-18 minutes at 350 degrees.

I always make at least a double batch and most the time I triple it.

Stronger Woman

I love this song..Stronger Woman by Jewel... and think it says so much for moms.. not only moms with daughters but all moms... we need to be the women we want our daughters to be.. or our sons to marry. We can tell them all we want.. but it is what we do that they will learn from.

"Well tonight, I'm going to be
The kind of woman I'd want my daughter to be, oh.."

"I'm gonna love myself more than anyone else
Believe in me, even if someone can't see
The stronger woman in me"

Chocolate Covered Cake Balls

These equal heaven... saw a link to a website called Bakerella and as soon as the page opened I fell in love... so many things I want to try from that site. She has Great photos and explains how to do things wonderfully... lots of fun to read through the comments and get some hints and hear how everyones attempts turn out. The first thing my daughter and I have tried making are the cake balls... and everyone loves them... so we decided to try a few more and make each batch a bit different... first ones were just chocolate cake and chocolate frosting.. next batch I made using mint brownies... they were good.. but not Great... moved on to chocolate cake with peanut butter dipped in chocolate... oh wow.. those are my all time favorites right now...(neighbor boy says they taste like the reese peanut butter cups) Next we did a batch with chocolate cake and very strong coffee... these just got finished today and they are a very close second if not a tie for the peanut butter ones... Neighbor has suggest using coconut in a batch and I want to do a batch with a walnut in the middle....you can also use white cake and white chocolate to dip in..so many possiblities.. endless really! (family and close friends dont read this next part) We are planning on making a bunch of these up for christmas presents.. buy some cute candy boxes and little paper cups... each type of cakeball will have a different sprinkle on top... it is a great mother daughter type project.. and the guys and neighbors have loved being the sample tasters :) Be sure to check out the great website where I found this wonderful, fun, super easy recipe... you can get there by clicking right here Bakerella Cakeballs Don't forget to look around once you are there... so many wonderful things.