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If you are carving pumpkins this holiday season, hold on to those pumpkin seeds and make a batch of these tasty Sugar & Spice Roasted Pumpkin Seeds. I was able to make a double batch from two medium sized pumpkins. While the prep work does take some time, get the family together to lend a hand to make the process faster.

I adapted two recipes I found online to come up with this method. As a rule I detest recipes that have you hovering by the stove constantly checking on whatever is baking. So to cut down on that, these pumpkin seeds are boiled for 10 minutes and then having a short baking time compared to other recipes, which would have you sitting and stirring for an hour. I appreciate the time saver and the flavor of these seeds was wonderful.

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This is the chocolate cake recipe we have made for probably decades. It is made for birthdays, holidays, or just because someone has a craving. For the frosting, we have tried different recipes here and there, but the one we are using now from Tasty Kitchen is by far the best.

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I went with an orange sherbet punch for Halloween with only 3 ingredients. It was delicious and the punch bowl was empty at the end of the night, so I would call it a success. I think subbing out the orange juice concentrate for pineapple juice would also be delicious.

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What the kids dressed up as: Finn and Fionna from Adventure Time.

Jack - Finn with a Jake plushie.
Violet - Fionna with a cake plushie.

We spray painted Violet's sword pink and bought black shoes with a strap from Children's Place. The plushies and other details were from Amazon. The other kids attending were a jedi and a storm trooper.

Menu:

• Pepperoni Puff Pastry Mummy Braids
• BBQ & Cheese Jack-o-lantern Biscuit Puffs
• Italian Deli Pasta Salad
• Broccoli Grape Bacon Salad (skipped the almonds)
• Wings (BBQ and Salt & Vinegar)
• Orange Sherbet Punch
• Moist Chocolate Skeleton Cake / Cupcakes with cooked flour vanilla frosting
• Goodie bags filled with Halloween Oreo Popcorn + regular candy goodie bags

The room:


Violet updated her play garden to have a spooky Halloween theme.


I didn't get any great pictures of the table setting but it was very cute. It is hard to see but we used a gauzy black table cloth. We did a quick craft for sucker ghosts, shown above on the green platter.








Happy Halloween!

I love this cute little mummy braid. You can use crescent dough if you like but I greatly prefer puff pastry for both taste and texture. I have learned that I detest reheated crescent dough as well, so puff pastry is the way I go if I plan on having any leftovers. Check below to see how I cut the dough.

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We've been having a lot of Halloween treats courtesy of the recipes at Plain Chicken the past few weeks. Many, many thanks to Stephanie for these wonderful ideas. We are serving the pepperoni mummy braids and these halloweenie pockets at our party today and they look great.

My pockets turned out quite goofy looking but the kids still love them. If I made these again, I would go with using puff pastry as I find it is much easier to work with and I prefer the taste. If you chill the puff pastry well before cutting the face shapes, it should work worlds easier than the biscuit dough.

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Recently I posted a recipe for this tasty Halloween Oreo Popcorn over at Mom Spark. Head on over to check it out!