Happy Halloween!!

Have a safe and Happy Halloween everyone!!!!

Halloween is Coming!

Halloween is just around the corner! This year, as we have moved to a warmer area,  I am hoping that there will be no need to bundle the kids up under their costumes with winter jackets and snow pants!

I have been asking the kids what they wanted to dress up as to trick-or-treating and so far pirate has taken the spot light. Mostly with Amelia. She loves pirates! Yo ho ho, matey! Thats what she says when she sees a boat or anything nautical related. Logan has said Raph form TMNT as well as a banana. That boy has an imagination I tell you!

I think pirates! That may be what I will make them both (and mommy too!) to go out for halloween. I love dressing up too with the kids! You are never too old!

Here are a few ideas that I have come across as idea references for costume ideas.

What are you dressing your little ones up (or yourself!) as for All Hallows Eve this year?

Share a photo or idea with us on our Facebook page! 

By Mommy Melissa

Rockets Frosted Cookies

Halloween passed a few months ago and there is still a large bag of candy in a drawer in my room. In that bag there were rolls of Rockets candy. Seemed like it must have been on sale in this area at the time because there were a lot. And I mean A LOT! 

I decided that they would be made into something else, not just plain ol' candy to crunch on. But what? Then it hit me. If icing sugar is used in making icing, then what if I transformed the Rockets back into a powder format and replaced the icing sugar with it? It was worth a shot!

First I had to do the grueling task of unrolling all of the packets and placing them into a bowl. Once they were all having a colourful rainbow party in the bowl, they needed to be sorted into batches by colour/flavour. Be sure to taste as many as you would like at this point! My favourite was the orange!

Once the batches were sorted I broke out my Magic Bullet Blender and threw a single colour, starting with white to darkest, in at a time and blended it into a super fine powder. Then repeated it with the remaining colours, knocking off any remaining powder from the last batch.

(I used a simple sugar dough recipe from a cook book. Similar to this one here )

To make the frosting, I used a simple icing sugar frosting replacing the sugar with the powdered Rockets. 

(1 cup powdered sugar, 1 tbs melted butter, 1 tbs milk)

Mix all the ingredients together flavour by flavour. The icing is super sweet. Very, very sweet! 

Now ice you cookies with your new rockets flavoured icing and enjoy!

I cannot stress enough about how sweet these cookies are. You may get cavities after eating just one! 

Good Luck :)

By Mommy Melissa

Super Easy Caramel Apples!

Nothing says Fall like fresh apples. And nothing says YUM like dipping those apples in melted, gooey caramel. Every year I make treats to send in for the kids classmates on Halloween, and this year I decided on caramel apples. But I'm a little lot short on time and already had a box to paint to look like a Minecraft zombie head, so I didn't want to make the caramel from scratch (although I do have a very good caramel recipe written down somewhere). This recipe is super simple and virtually fool proof. Here it is!

 

Start with your apples. I had to use 47 of them.

 

After I took this picture, I twisted off every stem and inserted popsicle sticks. After doing about 10 of them I started stabbing them with a knife and then putting the sticks in. Much easier.

 

I'll apologize in advance because I forgot to take any pictures until I was done. I made these at about 2am and really just wanted to go to bed.

 

Now for the caramel. I used 9 180g bags of those individually wrapped chewy caramel squares. 3 bags did 12-15 apples. If you have kids making these with you, get them to unwrap the caramel. It's tedious and boring and I swear they glue those suckers closed.

 

Once you have your 3 bags unwrapped, dump them into a microwave safe bowl, along with 2 tbsp of water. Microwave for one minute; stir. Microwave another minute; stir. Do that one more time, and you should be all melted and ready to go!

 

Now you just swirl away! You could roll in virtually any toppings you want at this point, but I decided to skip it for the sake of getting at least a few hours of sleep. I like sleep. After coating each apple, scrape the bottom with a spoon (a lot of caramel will pool here) and place it on a square of wax paper. I found the paper made it a lot easier to put the apples into cellophane bags.

 

If you are bagging them, do not put them in the fridge! They will weep and we don't want that. Bagged up at room temperature, they should keep about a week depending on the freshness of the apple. Roughly the same time in the fridge, too.

 

There you go! These really couldn't be any easier... or yummier! Enjoy :)

 

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

It's finally here! And I must say I have been snacking on junk all day long, and the day is only have way through! I can't wait until tonight to see Noah go trick-or-treating for the first time, last night I threw a little Halloween party for him- I'm pretty sure he had the time of his life. Here are just some pictures from our evening, the costumes were great!!!

Have a safe night everyone :)

POST BY MOMMY OLIVIA

Last Halloween

Since last year was Amelia's first and Logan's second Halloween, we only went to the shopping mall where they hand out candies at the shops to the children. Along with my nieces, Annabelle and Madison, as well as my nephew Jaxson, we had a good time. Our children were too young for candy, so mommy and daddy got to eat it!

Here are the children all decked out in their Halloween attire!

By Mommy Melissa

Pinterest Challenge - Slow Cooker Apple Crisp

After going apple picking a few weeks back, I am still looking for ideas to use my never ending crisper drawer full of apples. Since baking is quite stressful with the kids pulling at me, breaking things, spilling things, fighting, etc. I loved the idea of just throwing everything into a crock-pot and letting that do the work for me! I substituted pumpkin pie spice for the nutmeg in hopes that it would give it more of a fall taste.
After about an hour of it cooking, my home smelled wonderful! Like fresh apple pies had been baking in my house all day!

Here is how it is done. 

(full recipe at bottom)

You prepare a flour/oat mixture as well as an apple/sugar mix.

Apples go in, then flour mix, then butter on top.

Bake for 3-4 hours on high.

There are a few things that I would change the next time I make this. One being to not use my little slow cooker. The crisp part on top ended up being too thick. Using the larger slow cooker would thin it out, giving it a better crisp. The other would be to lower the cooking time to about 2-3 hours. Other than those minor things, it tasted wonderful! This was a Pin Win! 

Here is the full recipe (or click here to go to the original pin)

6 cups of apples. Peeled, cored and sliced

1/2 cup sugar

1 tbs cinnamon

1/2 tsp nutmeg (I used pumpkin pie spice)

1 1/4 cup flour

1 cup oats

1 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup chopped pecans or walnut pieces (I had none)

1 stick of butter, sliced.

1. Grease your slow cooker.

2. Mix apples with sugar and spices. Put into crock pot.

3. In another bowl, combine the flour, oats brown sugar and nuts if you are using them. Pour onto apples.

4. Place the slices of butter on top of the flour and oat mixture.

5. Cook on high for 3-4 hours. Remove lid for the last 15-20 minutes to let the top crisp.

What is your best fall recipe to use apples in? We would love to hear. 

By Mommy Melissa 

Candy Corn Quesadillas

I saw this idea on Pinterest HERE when I was trying to look for a fun Halloween themed dinner. These turned out great and they were delicious!

What you will need:
1 rotisserie chicken, cut up
1 jar (16 ounces) salsa
1 cup frozen corn, thawed
1/4 cup barbecue sauce
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 cup butter, melted
8 flour tortillas (10 inches)
1 jar (15-1/2 ounces) salsa con queso dip, warmed
4 cups (16 ounces) shredded Mexican cheese blend
2-2/3 cups crushed nacho-flavored tortilla chips
1/2 cup sour cream

1, In a pot, combine the first five ingredients; heat through, stirring occasionally. Brush butter over one side of each tortilla. 

2. Place one tortilla in a large skillet, buttered side down. Spread with 1 cup chicken mixture; top with another tortilla, buttered side up. Cook over medium heat 1-2 minutes or until bottom is lightly browned. Turn quesadilla.

3. Spread 1/2 cup queso dip over quesadilla; carefully sprinkle cheese along outer edge. Cook, covered, 1-2 minutes or until cheese begins to melt.

4. Remove to a cutting board. Sprinkle crushed chips over queso dip. Cut quesadilla into six wedges. Place a small dollop of sour cream at the point of each wedge. Repeat with remaining ingredients. Yield: 2 dozen.

YUM!

What are some of your favourite Halloween dinner ideas?

Candy Corn Cupcakes

This recipe idea came from Pinterest of course. But it's so easy to do. You can either use a store bought cake mix or homemade... whichever you choose just make sure it's white cake mix!

What you will need:
- White cake batter (store bought or homemade)
- orange and yellow food colouring



Make the batter from the directions on the box, once done separate into 2 bowls, add orange food colouring to one and bright yellow to the other. Now you want to make sure your colors stand out so make sure there nice and bright- may need a couple extra drops of colouring!

Line your cupcake tins with cupcake liners, then first add a scoop of the yellow batter, then plop the orange on top of it, fill about half way or 3/4. then bake with the directions on the box, once you take a bite it will look just like a candy corn! Be sure to use white icing to complete the look :)

Definitely a crowd pleaser, perfect for Halloween!!!