Halloween 2008

At work, my department always dresses up in some type of theme. This year, we had a 70s theme. Here we are all decked out:

The kids were Wolverine and Yellow Power Ranger. Unfortunately, this is the best picture I got of the two of them.
When we got home from trick-or-treating at my office and attending the Halloween Party there, PM went to football practice and DQ dressed in my in some of my costume.

Weekend baking

I had a full weekend of baking. Saturday morning, the kids begged for Cinnamon Sugar Donut Muffins.
Recipe from Baked Perfection

Cinnamon Sugar Donut Muffins

2 cups flour (I used 1 cup all-purpose flour and 1 cup whole wheat flour)
1 Tbsp baking powder
½ tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
2 large eggs
1 cup low-fat vanilla yogurt
2/3 cup packed brown sugar
4 tbsp oil
1 tsp vanilla

Topping:
1/2 stick butter, melted
1/4 cup sugar
1 tsp cinnamon

Preheat oven to 400-degrees F. Line a standard muffin pan with paper cups.

Whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda salt, and cinnamon in a large bowl. In a separate bowl, whisk together eggs, yogurt, sugar, oil, and vanilla. Add flour mixture and mix with light strokes until the dry ingredients are just moistened. Do not overmix; batter will not be smooth.

Divide batter among the muffin cups and bake until a toothpick inserted in one or two of the muffins come out clean, 12-15 minutes.

While the muffins are baking, melt 1/2 stick butter and place in a bowl just large enough to hold a muffin. Combine ½ cup of sugar and 1 tsp. cinnamon in a small, shallow bowl. As soon as the muffing are done, dip them one at a time in the melted butter and then roll in the sugar mixture. Set on a rack to cool.

Yields 12 standard muffins.

Then, I made the dough and chilled it for the Candy Corn Cookies. Later, I cut them out. Here they are before going into the oven.
Just out of the oven cookies.
Then, I made Spiderweb cookies. Sorry, no pictures...

Sunday, I was in a baking mood again. So, yet another batch of Spiderweb cookies and Candy Corn Cookies were made.
Then, I decided to make Halloween Mud Bars too...
Recipe from Nestle

Ingredients:

• 1 cup plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 large egg
• 2 cups (12-oz. pkg.) Nestle Toll-House Semi-Sweet Chocolate Morsels, divided
  
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts
• Halloween candy corn

Directions:

PREHEAT oven to 375° F. Grease 9-inch-square baking pan.

COMBINE flour, baking soda and salt in small bowl. Beat sugar, butter and vanilla extract in large mixer bowl until creamy. Beat in egg; gradually beat in flour mixture. Stir in 1 1/4 cups morsels and nuts. Spread into prepared baking pan.

BAKE for 20 to 23 minutes. Remove pan to wire rack. Sprinkle with remaining morsels. Let stand for 5 minutes or until morsels are shiny; spread evenly. Top with candy corn. Cool completely in pan on wire rack. Refrigerate for 5 to 10 minutes or until chocolate is set. Cut into bars.

Yummy!

Halloween Cookies?

Last year, I made these Spiderweb Cookies. This year, I want something different I think. These Candy Corn Cookies are completely adorable and I think I am going to give them a try tonight! I'll update whenever I get a chance.

We'll be busy this weekend. Saturday alone, BD has inventory, so I'll be on my own with the kiddos. We have a Halloween party at noon, have to be at the football field at 2, game at 3:30, Halloween Bash downtown at 5 and a Halloween Dance at 7. Phew! Somewhere between Saturday and Sunday, we need to get a pumpkin or two and carve them...

DQ's first rose

For the cheer competition, the parents had the option of purchasing a flower for their girl. I gave DQ a rose. She loves it.

Lazy Friday

Here's a little something to tide you over until the next cute set of pictures...

Girly Girl

DQ has altered between tomboy and girly girl. For a while now though, she has leaned more towards tomboy. She flat out refuses to wear tights. The only way I can get her to wear a dress is to force her to on Sundays.

This past weekend, she went to a birthday party that is a big tea party. The girls had manners lessons, lunch and dressed up. Here's my tomboy:

Oh, and guess where she wants her birthday party now... Yep, girly girl tea party!

Beef Stroganoff

It has started to tease us with cooler weather here in the southeast. We will get a day here and there that actually feels like fall. I decided it was time to bust out the slow cooker and welcome fall. One of my families favorites in the crock-pot is Beef Stroganoff. Unfortunately, it is typically pretty high in calories, fat, well, everything! So, below is a recipe from Fix-It and Forget-It Lightly that I have used in the past.

Beef Stroganoff
Fix-It and Forget-It Lightly
1.5 lbs lean beef stewing meat, trimmed of fat
1 onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp black pepper
1 lb fresh mushrooms
10 3/4 oz can 98% fat-free cream of mushroom soup
1 cup water
1 cup fat-free sour cream
Egg Noodles

1. Combine chopped onion, garlic, salt, black pepper and soup in slow cooker
   
2. Add water, and then stir together, looks like a science project now.
   
3. Add mushrooms and meat
   
4. Stir together
   
5. Cook on low for 6-8 hours. Mine cooked for 8, then my slow cooker switched to "Warm" for me.
   
6. Then, add sour cream and stir. About 2.5 hours after it switched to "Warm", and I added the sour cream, this is what it looked like.
   
7. Bring water to a boil and cook egg noodles (here I am using the No-Yolks kind, but I prefer the wheat, BD bought the wrong ones) according to package directions.
   
8. When finished, add noodles to slow cooker and stir all together.
   Yummy, doesn't this look great on a fall day!
   Ok, last one...
   
9. Serve with a vegetable and, if you like, some type of bread. All I had was a can of corn, no fresh beans or anything! So, that's what the family got.
   

Oh, and you may be wondering about this perfect looking biscuit?
Let me say that looks are deceiving. I followed a recipe in a very old cookbook I had. These were awful. DQ ate hers, but it's carbs and bread, so unless I filled it with spinach, she would eat it. PM took a bite and said (and I quote), "Ewww, disgusting!" Nice, just what every mother wants to hear. So, no, you won't be getting the recipe for those! I'll have to find a nice, yummy, quick biscuit or dinner roll recipe, otherwise, it will be Pillsbury Grands from now on!

Nutritional Info
Per Serving (6 servings, doesn't include noodle info)
240 calories (70 calories from fat)
7g total fat (2.5g saturated, 0.5g trans)
75mg cholesterol
800mg sodium
15g total carbohydrate (1g fiber, 6g sugar)
27g protein

Sizes

So, as you already know, I have lost weight over the last years. I went from a perfect size 8 to a 2. Last winter, I bought about 5 pair of size 2 dress slacks for work. At the end of the winter, I had them dry cleaned and put them away for this year. While I thought I have stayed the same size from last winter to this winter, I just pulled them out to wear and am highly disappointed.

They are too big! ARGH!!! How can that be? I am not a size 0. I am not! Now, before you bash me for whining about being tiny, forget the actual number. Instead, just focus on the fact that my pants are too big again. I had to pin the side today. This just sucks. I really don't want to buy new pants again. But, I may just have too...

What to do?

We just got word that due to this:
All football games have been canceled for tomorrow. That fact, along with the gas issues we are experiencing, brings up the question, what to do over the weekend? We do have a benefit to go to Saturday night, outside, without the kids. But, if it rains, I don't know if it will still happen. Other than that, I just need to do a few quick things for my 2nd grade class Sunday morning.

So, what to do? I need to take pictures for stuff to put on eBay. I have lots of it! If it stops raining, we need to clean out the garage. We need to paint the hallway. The kids will, of course, need to be entertained!

Ideas? Let me know!

Third Football Game

PM got to be a team captain and go out for the coin toss (remember he is #66)
He also got to run with the ball a few times. Here he is getting tackled:
Gotta love this shot of DQ doing a jump. I think we need to enroll her in some gymnastics classes...
They did their dance for the first time. On the high school football field to the music of Hannah Montana's Rockstar, she loved it!

Gas, gas, gas, and not the free kind...

you get by eating too much chili! ARGH! I could pull my hair out and shoot some news stations around here! Since the hurricane, supply has been lower and many gas stations ran out early of the premium and mid-grade. Now, many are running low on regular as well. Well, what does the news media do (again) start a panic! People are filling up their cars and all of their gas cans. I knew nothing about this and had planned to get gas this evening while DQ was at choir practice. Of the three stations I went to, only one was completely out, but the other three had lines out the wazoo! I am talking 15 cars or more in lines in the roads! I called a friend who said every station between our town and Charlotte on the road we take to work every day was out this evening too. So, I had 1/4 tank and figured, maybe I would either try to ride the bus the next two days or just work from home one day, if it came down to it. It is hard to catch the bus, due to the time I can drop the kids off at the school, so I haven't been riding. I can't really get there in time.

Luckily, as I was coming home, I remembered a small Texaco station just past our neighborhood and figured I would just check it out. Luckily, they had gas and there weren't any long lines! So, while the people up the road were wasting theirs, just sitting in line, I pulled up, filled up and went home...

All you have to do to be a mom...

is marry a boy! That's according to DQ. And, all you have to do to be a husband, is marry a mom. Kids are so cute! Tonight, after a long day at school, which included me being there the whole day to help run a Walk-A-Thon to raise money for the PTO, then an afternoon of running errands, dinner out and a new game of battleship, DQ was very insightful. First, she told me "you are the funnest mom ever!". Right after that, she very seriously asked, "Are you glad you had kids? Grandma said when you were little you just wanted to live on a ranch and not have kids.". How sweet! I almost cried. I told her of course I was glad I had kids! Her comment was, "I know why, so you can keep playing games!" So cute!

Second Football Game

Well, once again, it was a scorcher. Their game was at 2:30 in the afternoon, and boy was it hot! Here they are getting ready to run through the banner:

Here's DQ running to the sidelines:

Put me in coach, I'm ready to play:

This is what's hard to watch. Yes, he is in a head-lock!
They don't officially keep score, but his team scored 5 touchdowns, and the other team 0. Yes, that is five to zip/zero!

I think a girl has a crush on PM!

She was in his class last year. At their FairyTale Ball, she wanted to dance with him, but he would have nothing of it. I have this picture, which makes me think of them at a dance when they are older and her wistfully leaning on the wall trying to get him to dance or them having an argument and him walking away...

Anyway, we were at his football game this past Saturday and she was there. She came up and asked me where he was, and I pointed right behind her to the group of boys sitting on the ground waiting. I told her his number. She went over and said hi and he just kind of grunted. She came back over to chat with me for a minute. I tried to get her to go give him a hug or talk to him or something, as he was looking so embarrassed already, but she was too shy to. It was cute how she stood there talking to me and kept looking at him. He kept looking away, trying not to smile. We are in trouble when they get older!!!

Oh, and I can't remember if I already told you about this or not... Anyway, he had an assignment at school to do that said "My favorite color is __________ because ______________________________" Well after he filled it in like this "My favorite color is gold because it reminds me of money." Yes, he definitely takes after BD!

First Real Football Game - Ever

This past weekend marked PM's first real football game - ever. DQ had already cheered at the high school game, so we couldn't say this was her first, but it was her first full game. The boys had to be there 1.5 hours early, it was rough keeping them from killing each other while sitting and being good. Then, even though the coaches kept telling them they could wait to put on their shoulder pads so they could stay cooler longer, they all put them on. ARGH!
Here he is right before going to warm up:
Then, the cheerleaders held the banner, while the boys ran through it. I thought it was really cute how the older football players and cheerleaders that had just finished their game stood to cheer as they ran through. DQ is holding the banner on the left in this shot:
Here is DQ cheering:
One of PM playing: (sorry for the blur)
And, a final of DQ cheering:
The neatest thing about the game was hearing their names called out they though. DQ thought it was pretty cool when they announced each cheerleader and they got to do some type of jump as their name was announced. PM's name was announced each time he made a good tackle. He was over the moon with that (as was his mom and dad!). Can't wait until next week!

Pep Rally

Due to the impending tropical storm Hannah, everything for football was moved up one night. That meant, our pep rally was Wednesday instead of Thursday. DQ had to cheer.

Here she is practicing:
Here's the whole group warming up:
Getting all lined up properly:
Cheering:
More cheering "This is Raider Territory!"
Lastly, PM after practice. I am a sucker for this little boy in his football gear. I just want to hug and squeeze my little man!!

High School Football

I grew up at a school where high school football was the focus of the entire community. Every season, that was all anyone talked about. When it snowed, study hall classes were taken to the football field to roll the snow into giant snowballs and push them off the field. The quarterback was allowed to cheat off me during Biology, because he was just that, the quarterback of our team. (not that I minded, he was pretty cute!) But, all of that led to a state championship my senior year of high school.

Fast forward 16 years and here I am, living in a community where high school football is regarded just as highly. Our school is a smaller town school, just like the one where I grew up. I am less than 2 miles from the high school and can hear the cheers on game nights. You know what? I still love it.

DQ did a cheer clinic with the high school cheerleaders over the summer. All of those that did the clinic got the opportunity to cheer at the first home game with the high school cheerleaders during a quarter. K-2 grades were during the second quarter.

Both kids were very excited to get to the game. PM's football team had handed out game jerseys that week, just so the boys could wear them to the high school game:

She seemed a little shy/nervous at first:

But, she then perked up:


And, what do we have here? Some future high school football players!