Double Chocolate Chunk Cookies

I must share these wonderful cookies with you.

No picture can possibly capture their deliciousness.

No matter how hard I try.

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Chalkboard Pumpkin Countdown

Fourteen days until Halloween! I have a snowman that countsdown to Christmas but nothing else. And my kids love to know exactly how many days are left until a special event. This year I created a chalkboard pumpkin to countdown the days until Halloween. Each day we wipe off the number and write the new one with chalk. After Halloween I'll change it to read Days Until Thanksgiving.

Just start with a good sized pumpkin. This one had a rounded front shown here and a nice flattened back that worked perfect for the countdown.

Apply a few coats of chalk board paint. And you're done.

Huge added perk to this simple craftiness is the kids can use the chalk to create different Jack-o-Lantern faces on the other side.

Happy Halloween!

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Butter Pecan Pumpkin Cake...The One Fall Cake You Need To Make

If you make no other Fall sweet treat with pumpkin, you need it to be this one. If you're not a baker you can still do this very simple three ingredient cake. I promise. You can even eat it without frosting. It's incredibly moist and delicious. The pumpkin flavor is subtle; it just tastes like you're eating Fall.

Here's all you need for the cake: Betty Crocker Butter Pecan cake mix, canned pumpkin and three eggs.

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Easy Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

The cookies are entirely too simple, perfect for fall and completely adaptable to your tastes. They can be made with only a handful of ingredients...ingredients you very well may have lurking in your pantry right now. Great for Halloween or Thanksgiving get-togethers or just for this afternoon.

All you need is cake mix, canned pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling), chocolate chips, cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger. I'm a big fan of Betty Crocker cake mixes. I always stock up when they're on sale.

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Snake Wreath

This is another creation credited to Pinterest. I'd seen a snake wreath pop up there a month ago, a snake wreath created by none other than Martha Stewart. I had to make the wreath with my family's snake history including the copperhead that bit our dog last year and the rat snake somehow discovered in my son's room; we needed a snake wreath for Halloween.

I found a plethora of rubber snakes at the Dollar Tree and dollar spot section at Target.

I also needed a wreath. I wanted a large grapevine wreath and I found this one on half price day at my favorite thrift store.

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Jellyfish in a Bottle

I saw this idea on Pinterest from a blog in Thailand. I knew I wanted to make it with my kids.

You'll need an empty plastic bottle, preferably a smooth one. Mine is a Smartwater bottle. A clear plastic bag. In the Thai blog, she used a clear shopping bag but I don't have a single store near me that uses clear shopping bags. They're all white or yellow. However, the thinner produce bags are clear so I used one of those and hoped it would work.

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The Secret to Brushing Tangled Children's Hair

Once upon a time I hated American Girl Dolls. This time was very, very recent. And truth is I still dislike their massive commercial nature. We have an American Doll Store in my town and it is insane to walk in there. I'd hoped to keep Princess Fierce away from them forever but she was lured in a few months ago. Fortunately she has her momma's thrifty streak and even at five could not fathom the need for a $100 dollar doll when a very similar one was available at Tuesday Morning for less than $20. And the Tuesday Morning doll, from the Target line, looks like her.

She scored that bargain doll for her birthday. Here she is with it the very weekend after her birthday taking Remember on a hike to see waterfalls. But do you see the back of Remember's ponytail? That's a plastic hair rat nest and the doll is only days old. Uh-oh. Princess Fierce was not happy with how fast her hair was tangling.

A quick turn to the Interwebs and I found a solution. A wig brush and a mist of water. Whatever you do don't dare touch their tresses with the plastic toy brushes sold with the dolls. We headed off to our local Sally's Beauty Supply to score an inexpensive wig brush. Only $3.99. A quick mist with water and strokes of the right brush and Remember's hair was smooth and ready for a braid.

But this post is not about how to brush a doll's hair. Nope, this is about a bigger problem.

My own daughter's hair. This is what I'm dealing with when Princess Fierce wakes up. And guess what? She HATES me brushing her hair. She also hates brushing it herself. She also is not a fan of headbands or barrettes and will tolerate a pony tail on rare occasions. Rare! So this means daily we battle over just trying to brush her hair. Regarding style, it just hangs free and wild...like her spirit. I will even confess some days I don't have the fight in me so we just skip brushing and this is her hair for the entire day. Bad mommy!

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Custom Ribbons for Pennies

My neighbor and I volunteered to handle the neighborhood Independence Day parade and picnic this year. One of the items handed out at each parade is a ribbon for the parade participants. In the past these have been purchased from the dollar or party stores at around a dollar a piece. I thought I could surely beat that cost.

I made these for pennies a piece. 

And the best part is mine could be worn by the parade participants and not just looped on to the handle bars of their decorated bikes.

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Boba Fett Pizza and Darth Vader Brownies

I'm woefully behind on blog postings. I have photos upon photos taunting me to publish them with black and white words surrounding them on this blog but alas that part of blogging takes time I've not been giving it. Many things seem out of place to post after such a long time and give me more hesitation. Then last night I had an epiphany that I shouldn't care! I should just share. If it's a Christmas post in July so be it. After all don't we often find blogs and scroll through them out of time? And with the beauty that is Pinterest we can now pin those things we want to recall in the proper season. Are you a Pinterest addict? I'm in love. You can see my pins here and if you need an invitation to join the fun send me a message.

So without further ado I'll get the ball rolling with the Star Wars Day, May the Fourth Be with You! This one seems mildly appropriate to post today since my city is a buzz with DragonCon this weekend. I first became aware of Star Wars day only last year thanks to facebook.

In 2010 I  whipped up a Han Solo in white chocolate carbonite, three Yoda colored vanilla lollipops and a large Darth Vader shaped rice crispy treat. Darth isn't chocolate rice crispies. He's the regular with added food coloring for the dark lord. This year I couldn't repeat my goodies so I decide to use my Vader pan to make brownies!

But not any brownies, Double Choclate Oreo Brownies! If we're going on the dark side we need to go all the way. I gathered the above ingredients and got cracking.

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The Wizarding Week of Harry Potter

My oldest son loves Harry Potter. This is him decked out in his Quidditch robe at Dragon*Con last year. He's loved Harry since he was barely two years old. His early affection can be blamed on HBO's constant running of The Sorcerer's Stone. It captivated him. We took him to see The Chamber of Secrets in the theater and it may very well have been his first movie theater experience. When Hagrid returns to the dining room cheers in the final scene my little boy stood up and cried because he knew the movie was ending.

Fast forward five years when Thing One is 8 years old he began reading the Harry Potter books. He had never seen any movies beyond those first two in all the years between. When he began the books his Harry Pottter love was reborn with an unquenching thirst. He voraciously read the books from the library. And soon wanted to own them all. 

Here he is with one of his favorite birthday presents on his ninth birthday, the remaining six books he could keep. Once he had completed reading the series we rented the Prisoner of Azkabam through the Half-Blood Prince for him to watch. He already knew disappointment from a book converted to film but was satisfied with the adaptation of Harry Potter.

The second Harry Potter Thing One ever saw in a movie theater was the first he actually remembers: The Deathly Hallows, Part One. He was over joyed and immediately a year long conversation began about seeing the final film. And during this year his Harry Potter love manifested in new ways.


His closet shrine for instance.

With a shelf dedicated to all thing Harry Potter.

His painted pumpkin for last Halloween was an homage to Harry Potter.

His Halloween costume last year even came with a request to cut his shaggy locks shorter and spray his hair dark.

And more recently our Museum of Natural History hosted a Wizards and Witches Weekend and he committed again to a costume as a Hogwarts student.

So as the date grew close for the end of Harry Potter in cinema we discussed the idea of a Harry Potter viewing party complete with Harry Potter snacks. I made a grave error in this discussion forgetting each film is approximately two and a half hours long. No one would come to a party to watch over 21 hours of videos. Oy! How would I tell my dear boy his party could not happen? Then I had another idea I pitched first to my man. A Wizarding Week of Harry Potter! We'd determine what day his father would be taking him to see the new movie then count back seven days and show one movie and serve one themed snack per day. My man was on board and I presented it to Thing One. He was sold!

Well, today is the day my man takes my biggest little man to see the end of Harry Potter. I imagine this may be a tad bitttersweet for him but I'm glad to have wrapped the event around some fabulous memories. Here's how his Wizarding Week went....

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