Posts for April, 2010
How to Roast Pumpkin Seeds
Halloween is upon us and with that comes pumpkins and with pumpkins comes roasted pumpkin seeds! So, how do you roast pumpkin seeds and make them taste great?
Besides giving you a basic recipe, I’ll also give you some great tips to guarantee a flavorful and healthy treat. Kids like them too!
Basic Recipe for Roasted Pumpkin Seeds:
What you’ll need:
- seeds from a recently carved pumpkin
- 1 Tbsp. of butter (melted)
- Salt or Garlic salt to taste
Once you’ve carved your pumpkins, don’t throw the gook away that you pull out of them. Separate the seeds from the pulp and set aside. Rinse the seeds in a colander and spread out on a flat surface to dry for 24 hours.
Tip: Drying the seeds overnight helps with the roasting. For some reason, I’ve found that the pumpkin seeds just roast better when they’ve been thoroughly dried. Also, drying the seeds help you to separate out any remaining pulp. At this point, it’s easy to do.
Pre-heat your oven to 300 degrees F.
Put your dried seeds in a bowl and pour the melted butter over them. Mix thoroughly. Salt the seeds to taste.
Now, take the seeds and spread them out on a cookie sheet, one layer thick. Place the pumpkin seeds in the oven and roast them for 45 minutes or until they turn golden brown and are crunchy.
Let the seeds cool for at least five minutes before you start nibbling. Then, put them in your scariest Halloween bowl and let the goblins munch. They will be gone before you know it. And if you do have left overs, simply store them in an airtight container.
Some additional things to do with roasted pumpkin seeds:
- Use them as a salad topping.
- Do you like peanut brittle? Try substituting roasted pumpkin seeds for the peanuts in your favorite brittle recipe.
- Instead of using salt, try using a sugar-cinnamon mixture to toss them with. They make a sweet treat!
Enjoy and have a happy and safe Halloween!
Perfect Birthday Party Ideas For Teen Girls
Throwing a birthday party for your teenage daughter can seem like a daunting task. You may feel like your daughter is outgrowing birthday parties, just like she outgrew her love of playing dress-up and having tea parties. So, you may want to look past a roller skate or bowling party, and delve a little deeper. Even though she may roll your eyes at you, and do her best to convince you that she is “way to old” for whatever you might have in mind. Even though this may be the case, every girl loves to feel special and every girl loves to get presents. So, by choosing a great birthday party theme that is unique and fun, you are guaranteed to do both…minus the eye roll.
1.) Perfect Make Over Party. This is a fabulous birthday party idea. Everyone knows someone who sells Mary Kay, Arbonne, or Avon make-up products. Enlist their help, and have them bring their goodies and host a how-to make-up party complete with facials and lessons on how to appropriately apply make-up. This is a great idea for younger teen girls who may be reaching that important make-up wearing milestone as a result of this birthday. You can usually hire a hair stylist for a few hours to come over and create some updo’s, but this is only worth the cost if it’s a smaller party and she will have plenty of time to do everyone. You can send out invitations that resemble a tube of lipstick or a compact, and you can go to a thrift store to find pretty robes and slippers (wash them, of course!) for the girls to get cozy in. You can also, serve healthy foods like cucumber finger sandwiches, green tea ice cream and this amazing green tea mixed drink (see recipe).
Green Tea With A Punch (Serves 4)
1 fresh pineapple – peeled, cored and cut into chunks2 large green apples, washed and sliced1 1/4 teaspoons chopped fresh ginger1 cup brewed green tea, chilled1 cup mango sorbet or crushed ice
Juice the pineapple, apples, and ginger in a juice machine. Mix the juice with the tea, and stir in the mango sorbet.
2.) A Costume Party. This is a great idea, even if it isn’t Halloween. To keep it from getting out of hand you might limit it to a certain type of costume party such as animal costumes or Renaissance costumes, whatever mirrors your daughter’s interests. If you throw a Renaissance costume party you could create really formal looking invitations, and get some classical music. You might even consider learning a few Renaissance dances and teaching them to the kids. If you have an animal themed costume party, your invitations could resemble zoo cages and you could decorate with a circus type theme. Be sure to provide lots of “doggie treats” and “cat nip” to keep everyone’s appetite at bay.
3.) A Hollywood Premier Party. This would be a great party idea, especially for large group. Your invitations could resemble movie ticket stubs, and you can have everyone dress to the nines in their formal gowns and tuxes from past school dances. You can rent a “red carpet” and have “photographers” on hand to snap shots of each couple and “TV personalities” to interview each guest. Be sure to get the interviews on video, because that would be a great gift for your daughter. You could create “swag” bags to give away as party favors, and maybe even arrange for your daughter’s favorite movie to play at a local theater.
4.) A Karaoke Party. This is a fun, relaxing party for girls who just want to have fun. Keep everything laid back as possible, or you can go all-out and set up a stage and couple of café tables in your backyard. You can usually rent karaoke equipment or you could consider hiring a DJ with karaoke equipment for your event. Be sure to provide plenty of room for dancing, and your invitations could look like old records or a microphone. You can serve pizza or wings whatever relaxing, fun foods suits your event.
These are just a few ideas, but whatever you decide to do, be sure to get your daughter involved in whatever you decide to do. After all it is her birthday, and the more involved she is, the more likely she is to not only cooperate, but also have a great time. Every girl deserves to have a fun, memorable birthday party, and with a little bit of creativity you can make that happen.
Halloween Cake Conjures Up A Witch's Brew!
Just as the little ones thrill to the ultimate night of make-believe, it’s a thrill for us to see our Halloween cakes inspire looks of such surprise and delight on their faces.
This cauldron cake, a design we created as a spin off from the volcano cake, lends itself well to a cake decorator’s imagination. And if you’re not sure what to add to the brew, ask the kids. Then as a surprise, just before serving, add a little dry ice for magical steam.
Cauldron Halloween Cake
· Bundt pan or large, glass oven-safe bowl
· Dry ice: Check your Yellow Pages for a distributor. Follow all safety precautions given to you. You can read them now at wrh.noaa.gov/vef/kids/dryice.php
· Sturdy, round cake board
· Orange or red foil gift-wrap to cover cake board and miniature red and/orange lights (optional)
Bake a firm cake (such as butter, pound or pumpkin) inside the greased and floured pan or bowl. If using glass, lower oven temperature by 25°.
To make the removal of your cake from its pan easier, here’s one of the secrets guarded by the pros:
Professional Baker’s Grease
Mix together equal parts flour, vegetable shortening and vegetable oil. First cream shortening, and then add vegetable oil and flour. Mix until well blended.
You will have a bowl of greasy paste that is especially helpful with difficult pans such as bundt pans with their deep crevices and indentations.
This delightfuly greasy tip comes straight from
Why Do We Celebrate Halloween? Find Out Right Here!
In the mad frenzy of dressing up, decorating the house, throwing a party, the reason why do we celebrate Halloween has somehow got pushed to the background. Costumes and candy, tricks and treats, terrifying decorations take up all our energy and perhaps, most of us do not even know what Halloween actually signifies.
Halloween goes back nearly 2000 years when it first began to be celebrated by the Celts who had their homes in Ireland, UK and the northern parts of France. The Celts celebrated their New Year on the first of November and the origins of Halloween go back to this time in the Celtic festival of Samhain. Samhain was celebrated the night before the New Year.
The Celts believed that the New Year marked the end of the summer. The end of summer was significant to the Celts because they were pastoral people as opposed to agricultural people; and the end of summer meant a radically different style of life in the winter months.
Cattle were brought down from the hills and people got together in houses for long winter nights of handicrafts and telling of stories. These dark, winter months were associated with death by the Celts. On October 31st, Samhain was celebrated by the Celts and they believed that this was the day when the ghosts of the dead returned to earth. This happened because of the blurring of the boundaries between the living world and the deceased.
The ‘trick or treat’ probably originated in the English All Souls’ Day parades when the poor would plead for food from the wealthier people. The wealthy families gave them pastries called ‘soul cakes’ and asked the poor to pray for their relatives who were no longer living. This morphed into people giving candies to children who came to their house dressed up as witches or ghosts and if someone refused to give candy (treat), a practical joke (trick) would probably be played upon him. Another theory is of people leaving food outside their homes so that the wandering ghosts would not enter their homes.
The Celts felt winter to be a frightening time and chances of running short of food were always there and herein lies another reason for celebrating Halloween by dressing up. It can be traced back to the Celtic tradition of covering themselves in masks and costumes so that the wandering ghosts would not recognize them if the Celts happened to be out of their homes in search of food.
The Celts carved faces on potatoes in Ireland but when they migrated to America, they found pumpkins to be more plentiful and hence, the system of carved pumpkins took shape. In America, Halloween is the second biggest commercial holiday and people have made a religion of dressing up in scary costumes and decorating their homes to make it look haunted. All the real ‘eeriness’ of the festival has actually got removed to be replaced by a sense of community spirit and the scariness is done out of fun and not actual fear.
Vintage German Halloween – Vintage Halloween Memorabilia From Germany
For Halloween memorabilia collectors, German vintage Halloween items dating from the period between the two World Wars are the most highly sought after. According to Mark Ledenbach, the author of Vintage Halloween Collectibles, the prime years were 1919 to 1935.
Halloween isn’t traditionally celebrated in Germany. The German holiday, Walpurgis
Vintage German Halloween – Vintage Halloween Memorabilia From Germany
How to Make Your House Into a Haunted Mansion For Halloween
Halloween is coming and your kids are begging you to turn your home into a haunted house. The only problem is, you don’t know where to start. With today’s great Halloween decorations, a few black trash bags and a lot of imagination, anyone can create a haunted house to die for. Here are some tips that will help get you there:
Outside
The experience should begin before your visitors step foot into the house. Start by blacking out your windows. Hang black trash bags on the inside of them. Hang some strings of Halloween lights on your railings or lay them in the bushes. Replace any porch lights with colored bulbs. A black light on your porch shining on some glow-in-the-dark creatures also creates an eerie effect.
If you have a porch, put some fake spider webs in the corners. You can also lay some in the bushes in front of the house. Be sure to hang fake spiders around to go with the webs! Black cats and jack-o-lanterns can also add to the ambiance of a haunted house.
Your plain old door won’t work – decorate it to look like a coffin. Buy some Styrofoam gravestones to put on your lawn or make them out of spare plywood or lumber and gray paint. Get a recording of scary sounds and scary music and play it.
Inside
Set the tone for your haunted house right as the visitors step into the front door. Take some old pants and an old shirt and stuff them. Top them off with a head made from a bleach bottle and an old hat. Hang the “body” from a nearby light fixture. Place several plastic spiders and fake webs throughout the entryway to keep him company.
Close off rooms that aren’t being used. Decorate the doors like coffins or cover with black trash bags. Try to secure some crime scene tape and drape across the doors. If you want to add to the horror, place someone behind the closed doors and have them jump out periodically and scare your guests.
Place a wide variety of Halloween decorations in corners throughout the house. Buy or make some gruesome props and put them throughout the rooms. Dry ice can create some great fog, but be careful to place it where it can’t be touched as it can burn the skin if touched.
Hang things from the ceilings that will brush against your visitors as they walk through the house. Yarn that has been dampened can feel pretty creepy when it brushes against someone’s face. If you’re using black lights in the house, be sure to use black thread instead of fishing line to hang things. The fishing line will react to black lights.
Create a laboratory by filling bowls with gross-feeling food items that will represent body innards. Have someone who has a great Dr. Frankenstein voice lead blindfolded visitors through the laboratory, encouraging them to touch the different items with their hands. Expect to hear a lot of “Yuk” and “Ooh, gross!”
Once you have your haunted house set up, walk through it as though you were a visitor. Check out the Halloween Decorations and if you are 100% convinced that it is as scary and haunting as you can make it, then relax. It’s sure to be a huge success!
Easy Halloween Costumes
Making your own easy Halloween costumes is a great way save money, while having a lot of fun at the same time. With just a little imagination and a few simple supplies that you probably already have on hand, you can be sure you’ll have a one of a kind masterpiece this Halloween.
For either kids or adults, try the simple, but cute devilled egg costume. Using a pair of plastic “devil horns,” an easy to make pitchfork, a few pieces of felt, and a red sweat suit, you can have a fun costume that doesn’t cost a lot of money or a great deal of time to make.
The basics you’ll need are:
White and yellow felt, or heavy colored paper
Devil horns and pitchfork
Instead of buying them, you can always make your own horns using construction paper, a regular hair band, and some glue. It’s also rather easy to make a pitchfork using a cardboard tube from a roll of wrapping paper and covering it with either black electrical tape or aluminium foil. The fork part can be made from either the aluminium, or from cardboard or construction paper.
Red construction paper
Aluminium foil or electrical tape
Simply cut out the white and yellow felt or paper into the shape of an egg, and affix it on the front of the red shirt using the double-sided tape or fabric glue if you’re using felt. Accessorize with red pants, the horns and pitchfork and you’ve got a devilled egg.
Green and yellow acrylic or other non-toxic paint
Make-up or face paint
Attach the craft foam or cardboard to the yarn or ribbon after painting yellow and cutting into petal shaped pieces. Yellow petals can also be made out of construction paper and easily wrapped around the yarn, although they will need to be smaller than if you were using craft foam.
Next, tie the ribbon or yarn with the attached leaves around the face, which should be painted a reddish brown color using face paints or simple make-up. Then pencil in black dots using an eye pencil for the appearance of “seeds.” Also attach large green leaves made from the craft foam on the top of both shoulders and around the neck.
Some other Halloween costumes that are easy to make are:
- A Bunch of Grapes: Wear a green hat, use either purple or dark red balloons stuck to a large garbage bag that has a hole cut out of the bottom for a quick bunch of grapes.
- Scarecrow: Scarecrows are always fun and easy to make for Halloween using an old pair of jeans, a flannel shirt, scraps of fabric, pieces of raffia, and a straw hat.
- Pirate: Use a black sweat suit, a piece of red fabric for a sash, a bandanna, a sword made from cardboard and aluminium foil, along with a stuffed parrot and you’ve got a quick, but cute pirate costume. For extra effect, draw on a stubbly beard using an eye liner pencil, and don’t forget the black eye patch!
Remember, you’re only limited by your own creativity when it comes to making easy Halloween costumes for everyone right at home!
A Fun Kid Halloween Party Idea is a Haunted House Theme
A fun kid Halloween party idea is to turn the party into a haunted house! Kids love Halloween parties and Haunted Houses so why not combine the two? This Haunted Halloween party idea can be set up a family room, garage, or backyard.
Make announcements shaped like a haunted house with black paper, and white or yellow markers. Let everyone know what day, time and location of your haunted house Halloween party. Let the kids and guests know to dress up as ghosts, ghouls, a mad scientist, and monsters.
Once you decide on the location for the party, look at the room or yard to locate any safety concerns, any off-limit areas of the room or yard, and where to place decorations. Ideas for decorations and supplies include:
- White sheets, tablecloths or fabric to drape over furniture
- Black fabric or tablecloth to cover any bright areas
- String twinkle lights, flashlights and litesticks
- Dry ice or fog machine with adult supervision
- Lots of spider webbing and creepy creatures
- Scary looking jack-o-lanterns
- Assorted large clear jars for a scientist lab area
- Make tombstones from cardboard or foam blocks
- Haunted sounds and eerie music
Cover any furniture or large items with white sheets or cloth. Place or hang scary decorations such as spiders, bats and rats around the room or yard. Lots of jack-o-lanterns piled in corners really adds to the effect. Make a graveyard with cardboard tombstones and plastic skeleton bones. Set up a table covered with a sheet for the mad scientist’s laboratory. Large jars with green tinted water can display a cauliflower brain, green olives in a ball of mozzarella cheese looks like an eyeball, and lots of creepy bugs.
Lighting really adds to the effect of your haunted house Halloween party. Cover any really bright areas with black or dark cloth and hang twinkle, clip-on black and strobe lights in key locations. Look for areas that might become hazardous if too dark and add more lights. String up lots of spider webbing all around the room. Use dry ice with adult supervision or a fog machine to add to the spooky effect.
Serve Halloween party finger foods such as:
- Bite-size pizzas (an olive in the center looks like an eye)
- Fried-ravioli (looks like knuckles) with red pizza sauce
- Chicken wings (tell the kids they are bat wings)
- Frog-eye salad (ambrosia with green grapes)
- Bubbly brew (punch)
- Cocoa Cat Cookies (chocolate cookies cut into cat shapes)
Play spooky music and use a strobe light to play kids games such as Musical Jack-O-Lanterns (use pumpkins instead of chairs), Pin the Hat on the Witch, or Freeze Tag if you are using the backyard. Send everyone home with a treat bag full of goodies!
Pumpkin Cookies & Mini Painted Pumpkins Make an Appetizing …
Why is it we don’t usually think about whipping up a batch of pumpkin cookies until Halloween? I guess that’s when the pumpkins are ripe for the picking. The enticing aroma of freshly baked cookies fills your home with a warmth and coziness unlike anything else.
Here’s a great tasting recipe for Pumpkin Cookies that is ideal for all the pumpkin pie lovers in your life:
Ingredients:
1/2 Cup softened margarine3/4 Cup brown sugar1 Egg1 tsp. Vanilla extract1 Cup canned pumpkin2 Cups all purpose flour1 tsp. Baking soda1 tsp. Ground Cinnamon1/2 tsp. Nutmeg1/2 tsp. Ginger1 Cup raisins (optional)
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. / Yield: About 3 dozen cookies
In a large bowl beat margarine and sugar until smooth. Beat in the egg, vanilla and pumpkin until creamy. Add dry ingredients and mix just until blended. Do not over-beat.
Drop cookie dough by rounded teaspoonfuls onto lightly greased cookie sheet about 1 inch apart and bake for 15 minutes. Remove from cookie sheet and cool on rack.
With Halloween, of course, comes the decorating of pumpkins. You can chose to either carve your pumpkin into a traditional jack-o-lantern or Halloween design, or you can opt for the more modern technique of painted pumpkins. There are many styles and designs from which to choose.
Select the most uniform shaped mini pumpkins for your design. Be sure the pumpkins are washed, dried and free of any substance that would hinder your painted design. Make a pattern and trace it onto the pumpkins’ surface with permanent markers. If you prefer, draw your pattern on the pumpkin free hand. If you’re unsure of what to paint and don’t wish to paint only jack-o-lantern faces you could try painting bats, witches’ hats or perhaps spiders on each mini pumpkin. Fill in the design with acrylic paints and additional colored permanent magic markers.
On your serving table scatter straw over the entire tabletop. Arrange miniature hay bales on top of the straw, creating different height levels. Place the painted pumpkins strategically across the tabletop, as well as on top of the hay bales, to give it more dimension. Your pumpkin cookies can be showcased enticingly on one end of the table, while your beverage of choice, perhaps a pumpkin punch, can be arranged at the other end, along with a bowl filled with of Halloween Candy or “treats”, making an appealing and appetizing display of artistic Halloween creations for your guests to enjoy.
Whatever you decide, be sure to give pumpkin painting a try. You won’t be disappointed. For Halloween, even the “not so perfect” ones will work great! Don’t try for perfection. Just have some good old fashioned fun.
Pumpkin Cookies & Mini Painted Pumpkins Make an Appetizing …
3 Activities For the Kids on Mothers Day – Mother's Day Crafts For …
Most Mother’s day gifts from kids are likely to be made at home with mom or dad supervising or at school with a teacher’s help. While these hand made crafts are one of the most cherished possessions for any mother there are two things that might spoil the surprise, one that mom has to help make them and that adds up to a big mess of glue to wash out of your hair. Two; being that moms shouldn’t have to help the kids make presents for them to begin with, at least not on mother’s day. On any other holiday, crafts are a mom’s turf.
A pretty obvious solution to this would be for all dads to trade in their tools belts for a crafting kit and get down to helping the kids with their Mother’s day crafts and while a lot of men will say that there are tons of things stopping them from doing this, the only real thing that prevents dads from crafting with the kids is the absence of crafting skills. A lot of men think that while they are handy around the house, they just don’t have what it takes to sprinkle glitter or glue ribbon on a piece of construction paper. Here is a list of easy crafting activities that dads can do with the kids to make mother’s day memorabilia that moms will cherish.
1. Certificate of excellence in Motherhood
This one is pretty simple, all you need to do is find some hard card and cut it in an A4 size (or whichever size your printer is set to). Find some nice certificate designs online and print it out after editing the title to read ‘The World’s Greatest Mom’. Instead of signing it or stamping it, have the kids make handprints. Instead of putting a card on mother’s day gifts, the kids can put the certificate on it. Dads can make a similar one and write “The Greatest Mother My Kids Could Ever Have’ and put it on your mother’s day gift for your wife.
2. Mother’s Day Cards
A really easy way to make a card is to make one featuring pictures of your kids. Moms go nuts over towels with handprints and mugs with baby pictures so these cards are a good option. All dad needs to do is help with the cutting and the scissors while the kids pick out their favorite pictures and choose a color theme.
3. Real Mother’s Day Gifts
Admittedly paper cut outs aren’t a real gift so dads will still need to help the kids with something to give mom on Mother’s day (and remember to buy a Mother’s day gift for the wife themselves). Since guys are more of a hardware home improvement project type, they can work with the kids to make stepping stones or paperweights from cement. They can be adorned with handprints, messages, birth dates etc. Moulds are easily available in stores at good prices.
These are some easy craft projects that dads can do with the kids while giving moms a craft free holiday but always remember that kids learn by your example so take a stroll down to the mall or browse online for mother’s day gifts for your wife. For dads there is a wide selection of things out there, try avoiding any workout equipment and gardening tools. Go for something simple and sweet like fruit bouquets. They come in nice keepsake containers that you can use next year when you help the kids craft something new for mother’s day gifts.
3 Activities For the Kids on Mothers Day – Mother's Day Crafts For …