Creative month of October spills into November

The season here still feels creative. Here Porter is painting his pumpkin...

Karl has been cooking up a storm... I love that! Here was last Sunday's breakfast... Yum

Then proceeded to make his traditional Sunday lunch. He always seasons everything so good, I don't know his secret, but I figure I would rather not know it, I just want to be there to eat it.

I was asked to do the bulletin board for Kaden's classroom for November. It's a lot harder then it looks. I have a whole new appreciation for teachers bulletin boards all over the world now! :)
Here is what I came up with....

Ava even helped me make those little monsters...

Kaden took my leftover paper and made crowns for Ava...


What have you created lately?

Pumpkin Cupcakes

Pumpkins just make me Happy! I don't know why, the color the shape the season they represent. I'm not sure, but they do- Pumpkins make me feel great! I know weird, right!

So at the beginning of the summer Karl took these award winning pumpkin seeds that we got from the Pumpkin Growers of America and passed them out with instructions on how to grow an award winning pumpkin to all of our neighbors. We were to have a friendly pumpkin growing contest. Well the sad story goes, no one had much luck. The growing season was so short this year, all the crops struggled. Karl had two pumpkins that started to grow and then for no apparent reason rotted. But he went to clean up his garden a few days ago and look what he found.....

He told me it was a pumpkin so I guess I believe him. :)
Anyways we invited all of our friends and neighbors to come sit around a cozy fire, drinking hot cocoa....

Ethan and friends...


and everyone brought some kind of pumpkin treat.


It was a delightful evening. Here is what I took.....
Pumpkin Cupcakes
(this recipe is from Nova Scotia out of the Taste of Home cook book)
* It's actually pumpkin bread that I just made into cupcakes*
1- 1/2 Cups Sugar
1 cup canned pumpkin
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 eggs
1 2/3 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 cup chopped walnuts ( or instead I use chocolate chips)

*Combine the sugar, pumpkin, oil,water and eggs. Combine the dry ingredients; gradually add to pumpkin mixture and mix well. Stir in nuts or chocolate chips.
* Pour into greased bread pans or cupcake liners and bake at 350 degrees. Bread will take about 50 min. cupcakes about 10 min.



And then I topped them with my new favorite Whipped Cream Cheese Frosting....

Whipped Cream Cheese Frosting from AllRecipes.com
Ingredients

* 1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese
* 1 cup white sugar
* 1/8 teaspoon salt
* 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
* 1 1/2 cups heavy whipping cream

Directions

1. In a small bowl beat whipping cream until stiff peaks form; set aside.
2. In a large bowl combine cream cheese, sugar, salt and vanilla. Beat until smooth, then fold in whipped cream.

This was so much fun we will have to have another pumpkin growing contest next year!

Sugar Cookies

At Halloween and Christmas its the Law you have to make Sugar Cookies. Even if it means you will gain 5 pounds.
I had my good little kitchen helper assisting me in making a double batch of big soft sugar cookies for Halloween.



I got the recipe from Allrecipes.com
original Recipe Yield 4 1/2 dozen

Ingredients

* 2/3 cup shortening
* 2/3 cup butter
* 1 1/2 cups white sugar
* 2 eggs
* 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
* 3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
* 2 teaspoons baking powder
* 1 teaspoon salt
* 1/3 cup granulated sugar for decoration

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
2. In a medium bowl, cream together the butter, shortening and sugar. Stir in the eggs and vanilla. Combine the flour, baking powder and salt, stir into the creamed mixture until dough comes together. Roll dough into walnut sized balls and roll the balls in sugar. Place them on an unprepared cookie sheet about 2 inches apart.
3. Bake cookies 10 to 12 minutes in the preheated oven, until bottom is light brown. Remove from baking sheets to cool on wire racks.



You know how when a cat is happy it purrs? Well when Porter is happy and content he hums. I love he hums all the time. I worried that it would be a problem at school, but so far his teacher said he is doing good. Here is a short video of Porter working and Humming. Once he noticed I was back in the room he stopped. He had been humming for about 5 min straight before I grabbed the camera.

(OK, it's not letting me download the video for some reason, I'll try again later, just trust me it was cute though!)


Here is what our cooked cookies came out looking like.

Here is Ethan helping frost our yummy cookies.

What a fun family tradition my mom did with us and now I get to do with my kids.
Thanks Mom!

Beauty Nature Walk

Porter Ava and I headed out for a Nature Walk taking in the last few nice days of fall.

I then handed Porter the camera and told him to take pictures of things he thought were beautiful.























































Then I took a picture of what I thought was beautiful! My sweet kids!

A Baby Brings the Family Together

My mother-in-law always says, "don;t you just love how a new baby brings the family closer together"? She is right. This little Ava Marie is so loved and adored. I think she is the most kissed on baby there ever was. Ava and I spend a lot of time out on our new porch swing. But we are never there too long until one of the brothers finds us and joins us.

Trying to take pictures of just Ava is impossible.... Porter has to be right there next to her.


"Wait guys not without me...!"

"OK, I'm Ready!"

This is where you will find the boys in the mornings. The minute they hear one little peep out of Ava they all go running....




Ava fell asleep on the couch next to Ethan and he was so fascinated by her, he took this video.


Our baby Ava has sure brought a special spirit into our home.

Flowers

Here are some flowers that my neighbor has been teaching me how to make...

Sweater Flower....

Wired Ribbon Flower...


Lace flowers...


Scrap material Flowers......


Real flowers from another neighbor, after they rescued me off a mountain... an embarrassing story for another time. :)

October the month to Create!

This October has been much nicer weather vs. last year. I do love the fall it is such a creative month don't you agree. It is also a time when I love to bake a lot....

Porter's favorite - Chocolate Minty's he calls them...


2 Cups sugar
1 Cup Brown Sugar
2 Cups Shortening
(Creme together)
4 eggs
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 cup cooking cocoa
(Mix all ingredients together well)
4-5 cups flour (until cookie doughish :)
3/4 bag of Andies Mint chips, found by chocolate chips
Bake at 325 degrees until done about 7 min.

Kaden's creativity has been going strong this month as well....
Here he has made a mask for Karl and insisted he wear it...

Here Karl is making us Sunday breakfast. yum!
Kaden made this beautiful crown for Ava.

Karl, Ethan and Wayne are making more rocking horses this month.

And look what I made... A beautiful Ava.. OK with a little help!

It's time... go Create!

5K

This past April I signed the boys up for a 5K at the school. It is a fundraiser they do every year.

I for obvious reasons did not participate...

I was impressed at how well they all did, especially without ant training.


OK- well Porter lasted about half a mile and most of that was on Karl's shoulders. I followed in the car expecting he wouldn't last long. Kaden and Ethan though pretty much ran the whole way.... good job boys.

So our little town had another 5K fundraiser to help a little girl in our stake that has cancer. Karl and his sister Ashley decided to run in it this past week.

Go Karl....

Go Ashley...

Most races offer only free water...

At this race they truly understood that the key to getting a lot of participants in a 5K is to offer free massages after the race. Table set up at the finish line. Karl said that was the highlight of the race.

Good Job Guys! I'm a great Cheerleader! :)(Hey someone has to do it)