Halloween Candy Garland

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This is one of those fun, fast, easy and REALLY cute little crafty things that you can whip up while the kids are at school.

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Grab up some twisty wrapped Halloween candy—taffy, Tootsie rolls, Jolly Ranchers–whatever. I liked the looks of the Candy Corn and peanut butter taffies…a bit more Halloweenish to me.

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Using black, orange or whatever color string or yarn—chain 10 and join in a circle–this will be the loop you can hang your candy chain with when you are all finished. Now, just continue to chain about 15 more stitches.

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Take your hook out of the last chain and wrap it around one end of the candy.

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Pull the stitch to hold the candy tight.

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Now, wrap the string around the other end of the candy–twice should do it.

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Put your hook under the string across the candy. Grab the yarn and pull it under.

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Continue to chain 15 more stitches. Keep adding candy until you are buried in candy garland. What a way to go!

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It will be a lovely thing—that could wrap clear around the house if you’d like. Just depends on how much candy you have and how long you sit there stitching.

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As I said, fun, fast, easy and sooooo cute. You’ll be crowned “Super Mom” for sure.

There’s only one teeny tiny problem that I can see…

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Neighborhood Spooks

Let’s just say…

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that you made a fabulous treat…

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and you actually had enough to share…

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…with the sweet neighbor who fed your cat while you were in Yellowstone last month. Here, my friends–is a lovely way to do it and spread the joy all over the neighborhood.

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We showed this last year, but it bears repeating. It’s always fun to get spooked around Halloween time—especially when it’s with something sweet! The idea of this easy neighborhood game is to leave a treat on the porch of a friend–along with sign–like this– for their door. Try to be sneaky about it–don’t get caught. It used to be fun to keep your identity a secret, but these days you just can’t feed your family anything unless you know where it came from. So be sure to sign the ghost picture–tape it lightly to their door and run. Then, they  take a treat to another friend or neighbor–if they’d like to and so on. This can keep the fun going until Halloween night.

Note: I always send along 5 or 6 copies of the Ghost door sign– to save them the trouble of having to copy more for their neighbors. Be sure to click on the word “spooked” to print the ghost sign.

Happy Haunting!

Halloween Cupcakes–SPOOKY!

We started out with two cake mixes–one chocolate and one vanilla, white melting chocolate, one package each of Nutter Butters, Milano cookies, Autumn Mix candy, Red Vines, Halloween Jellies, two tubs of frosting and a variety of sprinkles. Here’s where that went…

Believe me, it didn’t take as long to eat them as it did to make them….yum!

Marvelous Pumpkin Bread

I’m about to say something that may be shocking to you, so be brave. I’m taking a deep breath…letting it out. Here goes.

I don’t actually like pumpkin pie.

I know, weird. I do like a lot of other stuff made with pumpkin, but the pie doesn’t do it for me. I love the look of it and the smell of it, but alas–it tastes raw, so I skip it. It must be because after some serious research, we found–to my dismay–that my family is pretty much the only one in America whose forefathers did NOT come over on the Mayflower. I figure it screwed up the pumpkin pie enjoyment microchip in my brain. At any rate, in order to keep the scent of cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg wafting through the house at this time of year–as it should–we make pumpkin bread. It is a fabulous replacement for pumpkin pie and P.S…it doesn’t taste raw.

Word to the wiser-than-me…Don’t double this batch. It comes way too close to sloshing over the side.

One more thing…

I usually make a bunch of little loaves, rather than 2 huge ones. For two reasons–First, I think it feels more like a delicacy to have tiny bites of something special.

Second, whenever I use 5 or 6 smaller pans, I put them all on one cookie sheet–because it’s easier to get them in and out of the oven. But what I’ve found is that the loaves are so much more moist when baked this way. I haven’t tried the cookie sheet thing with the bigger pans, but it works perfectly for the little ones.

Pretty dang good exchange for the aforementioned undesirable pie.

Heh, heh.

 

 

Pumpkin Bread

1 (15 ounce) can pumpkin puree

4 eggs

1 cup vegetable oil

2/3 cup water

3 cups white sugar

3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking soda

1- 1/2 teaspoons salt

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/2 teaspoon ground cloves

1/4 teaspoon ground ginger

DIRECTIONS

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease three 7×3 inch loaf pans. Shake cinnamon sugar into pan and coat all sides.

In a large bowl, mix together pumpkin, eggs, oil, water and sugar and blend well. Whisk together the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and ginger. Stir the dry ingredients into the pumpkin mixture until just blended. Pour into the prepared pans.

Bake for about 50 minutes in the preheated oven. Loaves are done when toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.

Marvelous Pumpkin Bread
 
Ingredients
  • 1 (15 ounce) can pumpkin puree
  • 4 eggs
  • 1 cup vegetable oil
  • ⅔ cup water
  • 3 cups white sugar
  • 3½ cups all-purpose flour
  • 2 teaspoons baking soda
  • 1- ½ teaspoons salt
  • 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
  • 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
  • ½ teaspoon ground cloves
  • ¼ teaspoon ground ginger
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
  2. Grease three 7x3 inch loaf pans.
  3. Shake cinnamon sugar into pan and coat all sides.
  4. In a large bowl, mix together pumpkin, eggs, oil, water and sugar blend well.
  5. Whisk together the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and ginger.
  6. Stir the dry ingredients into the pumpkin mixture until just blended.
  7. Pour into the prepared pans.
  8. Bake for about 50 minutes in the preheated oven.
  9. Loaves are done when toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.

Molasses Crinkles…

…cause what we need right now is more SUGAR!! I know, I know. But there is one recipe that this time of year doesn’t work without…Molasses Crinkles. No, I mean it. Just the smell of these coming out your door–will bring the kids in.

But then, you don’t have to share.  :]

Molasses Crinkles

1 cup sugar

3/4 cup butter

1/4 cup molasses

1 egg

Cream together, then add:

2 cups flour

1/4 tsp. salt

1 tsp. cinnamon

1 tsp. cloves

1 tsp. ginger

2 tsp. baking soda

Roll 1 inch dough balls in sugar and place on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake at 350 for 8-10 minutes. Leave on pan a few minutes before moving to cooling rack.

Molasses Crinkles...
 
Ingredients
  • 1 cup sugar
  • ¾ cup butter
  • ¼ cup molasses
  • 1 egg
  • 2 cups flour
  • ¼ tsp. salt
  • 1 tsp. cinnamon
  • 1 tsp. cloves
  • 1 tsp. ginger
  • 2 tsp. baking soda
Instructions
  1. Cream together the first four ingredients, then add all the rest of the dry ingredients.
  2. Roll 1 inch dough balls in sugar and place on ungreased cookie sheet.
  3. Bake at 350 for 8-10 minutes.
  4. Leave on pan a few minutes before moving to cooling rack.