Boo to You!

Happy Halloween from our family to yours!

Carving Pumpkins

Happy Halloween!

I hope you all had a great weekend!

I've got some big posts coming this week, so stay tuned!  The wine cellar is finally done!



Bloody Finger Cookies

Happy Halloween!

These bloody fingers have become a tradition in our home for Halloween.  I saw the idea in a magazine a couple of years ago and decided to make them with Henry when he was first interested in helping in the kitchen.  We love this shortbread recipe for our Christmas cookies, so I decided to use our own recipe instead of the one from the magazine.  I had two little monsters help me this year.

For this recipe you will need:

1/2 lb. butter (2 sticks) room temperature

1 cup powdered sugar

2 1/2 cups flour

1 tablespoon milk

1 teaspoon vanilla

To decorate the cookies you will need:

Red icing or gel

1/2 cup sliced almonds

Cream together the butter and sugar.

Add the flour in small amounts.  Add the milk and vanilla last.  Mix well.  The dough may be a little crumbly at first.  Be patient!  The dough should look like this when you are finished.

Turn out onto a well floured surface and knead about 1 minute.

Pinch off about a tablespoon of dough and roll into a ball.  Shape the balls into "fingers."  To make an indentation for each fingernail, use the flat end of a table knife.  Using the same knife, make slashes on the finger for knuckles.

The boys were very excited to use their own knives for this!  Oh, and sorry about the blurry pictures and wonky colors.  One doesn't have time to play with the settings on your camera when one is baking with impatient boys!

Here are the boys' fingers.

Bake in a 325 degree oven for 13-15 minutes, watching closely.  The cookies should almost be white when ready to remove from the oven.  Allow the cookies to cool completely before decorating.

To make the fingers appear "bloody" add some red icing to the end of each nail bed.  Press a sliced almond over the icing for a fingernail. 

Creepy and delicious!

Oh, and a happy Reformation to all my Lutheran friends out there!  ;)



Our Spoooooky Table

This is my "I wish I had a fireplace mantel to decorate but, alas, I do not" table.  Maybe in our next house we'll have one.  I'm putting that on top of the ol' priority list for our next home.  Not that we're moving anytime soon, because we're not.  I'm just sayin' I want a fireplace.

Anyway, I have never really decorated for Halloween before.  Then I had two little boys who adore things like mice, spiders, and all things spooky.  I guess that nursery rhyme about snails and puppy dog tales is true.  So, to please my boys, I bought some Martha skulls from Michaels and some spiders and webs from Target.  I added those things to my crows from Pottery Barn and Michaels and went to town on this table in our dining room.

Can you see the reflection of my pants in this picture?  Yes, those are white sweatpants.

Henry and I made those bats together the other day upon his request.  We hung some from the ceiling, taped some to the wall, and taped one to the mirror.  He was pretty pleased with his contribution.

I hope you enjoyed a peek at our first go at a spooky table! 

I'm linking up to:

Home Stories A to Z

one of my most favorite blogs!



Halloween Mice

Hello and happy Tuesday!

I've got a somewhat creepy project to show you today.  Get ready.

Are they not disgusting?  Living with little boys means that you must incorporate things like mice and spiders into your fall decor.  These mice will be a little bit more appropriate towards Halloween but the boys have been playing with them and didn't want me to put them away.  So, I changed them up a little bit.  Not that I minded looking at their red, possessed eyes...  Oh wait, I did.



I spray painted them black in hopes that they would resemble the ones Pottery Barn is currently selling.  They're not quite as classy, but they'll do!

Not too shabby, eh?  He's almost cute without those red eyes.

 

In case you're wondering, I bought the varmints from a hardware store called Menards for around $3.00.

Oh, and they squeak, which pleases my boys to no end!  I'm pretty pleased too, as long as I don't find them in my bed or in the basement laundry room.

See you all tomorrow!