Tag Archives: pumpkins

Spooky Snacks & Crafts For Halloween

21 Oct

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My girls couldn’t be more excited for Halloween.  This year we were unable to get our decorations from where we store them so we have been busy making our own to decorate the house.  While we decorate it’s always fun to have Halloween Themed snacks (these could also be a fun afternoon craft activity with food).  Below are some of the activities we have done together and snacks you can make for your halloween play dates, parties or bake sales:

Spider Hands with Web: A simple activity you can do with almost anything you have in your house.  Have your child trace both hands on black construction paper or use computer paper and have them color in their hands after traced.  Cut out hands and glue together.  Have your child make the eyes or you can use google eyes if you have any available.  On a piece of white paper, draw a web and then cut it out. Hang somewhere around the house.

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Creatology Foam Pumpkin Kit:  This kit is available at Michaels.  It’s perfect for making signs and Halloween pictures to hang around the house.  It comes with foam stickers for eyes, ears, nose, black cats, and spiders as well as google eyes to glue on.   We also made a Halloween mobile out of them by punching holes in the stems and hanging them from a hanger.  (use can also punch holes in the hand spiders mentioned above and hang them as well on the mobile).

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The Sparkly Pumpkin:  The easiest craft to keep busy.  All you need is miniture pumpkins and crayola glitter glue. To give it a little spooky touch, add rubber rats or spiders.  A great decoration for around the house.

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GoGoSqueez-enstein: I made these for a snack when my girls came home from school one day.  I made one on the computer and the other I made with construction paper, glitter glue and a black marker.  My oldest thought they were so cute, she went and made a bunch to bring to her friends Halloween party.

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There Was A Little Girl Who Swallowed A Spider:  My girls love the series There Was An Old Lady Who Swallowed….A Fly, A Bat and so on.  The other day I made these snacks for a Halloween craft play date.  We started joking around about The Little Girls Who Swallowed a Spider.  These snacks are simple to make.  All you need are brownie bites from Whole Foods (note that they are made in a facility that also processes peanuts and tree nuts).  UTZ Halloween Pretzels, edible Eyes, and Wilton Gel Writers.  Break the wings off the pretzel bats and push them into the Brownie to make the legs,

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The Haunted House : We made this house last year and will continue making haunted houses with some of our favorite halloween candy.  See my previous post to see how you can make them.

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Happy Decorating and Crafting this Halloween!

 

 

 

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A Halloween Birthday Bash For Daddy

23 Oct

Yesterday was my husbands birthday. Since Halloween is next week, my oldest daughter wanted to have a Halloween themed party for my husband and his twin brother.  My daughter placed paper balloons she decorated around the apartment.  We baked cupcakes and she insisted we have “twin” Jack-o-lantern cakes for my husband and brother-in-law.  I started thinking about how I could create this idea for her with what we had at home. This is what we came up with:

I don’t have a round cake pan and I only had 1 box of cake mix.  I realized that our Oogga bowls are oven safe and the perfect size for personal size cakes. See my past Oogaa post.  We made the cake mix according to the package and then filled the two bowls.  We used the remaining mix to make twelve cupcakes for the guests.  I added green food coloring to the end of the batter to make one green cupcake for the stem (do not ice this cupcake when done baking).

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We only had a container of hot pink funfetti icing. We put a little pink icing to the side because both of my girls wanted a pink cupcake and started talking about how we could turn it orange.   My daughter did a color mixing unit at school last year and she pipped up, “we can mix yellow and red to make orange”.   I pulled out the food coloring and we started with yellow.  As we were mixing, it turned bright orange and she realized we didn’t need red.

Once the cakes and cupcakes were done baking, we started icing.  After we  finished icing both cakes, we cut the green cupcake in half and cut one end off.  We added it to the top of the cake.  We always keep chocolate chips handy because my oldest loves them. We decided they would be good to use for the eyes and mouth of the jack-o-lantern.  She insisted I put them on for her.  The “twin jack-o-lantern” cakes were ready.

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My oldest had so much fun she asked if we could make them again. There is a Halloween bake sale at her school next week so we plan to make a few to sell.  Leave the Jack-o-lantern face off for a great Thanksgiving dessert.

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Disclaimer:  I was not compensated for this post.  All photos, ideas, and opinions expressed are my own.

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Sweet Snacking: Cinnamon and Chocolate Covered Pumpkin Seeds

16 Oct

Sweet Snacking!

I LOVE pumpkins! Once fall and pumpkin season are here I crave eating and drinking anything with pumpkin or pumpkin flavor. Last week I made a Lentil and Pumpkin Soup (I will post the recipe later this week) and decided to save the seeds from the sugar pie pumpkin so the girls could try them. When it was time to bake them, my older daughter asked if we could make them chocolate covered. I had never had chocolate covered pumpkin seeds but since she has a nut allergy and always asks for the chocolate covered nuts at the store, I thought why not give it a try because it could be a good alternative and a great activity to do together. The girls LOVED them and we had a lot of fun making them.

Directions:

Seeds:

Clean and save seeds from one sugar pie pumpkin.

Soak the seeds in water, drain and place on baking sheet.

Sprinkle sea salt over the seeds.

Bake at 300 for 30-45 minutes or until seeds are golden.

Put wax paper on top of plate and put seeds on top.

Chocolate:

Add 1/3 cup milk (or alternative for dairy allergy) and 3/4 cup chocolate chips (we used Enjoy Life) and heat on low, stirring occasionally until melted.

Mix in cinnamon when melted (to taste).

Once heated put a small amount in a bowl and let kids drizzle it on with a spoon or you can use a measuring cup to drizzle (or pour like my girls did) the chocolate onto the seeds.

**We had chocolate remaining and put it into two cupcake liners to make a home made chocolate bar for dessert later.

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