checking in

Since Pumpkin Week drug on ad-nauseum, you faithful blog-readers missed out on a few important things!  Like Thanksgiving.  And this little party we threw my parents.

Pumpkin Week: Pumpkin Pancakes

And now, it's (finally) time for the (not-so) grand finale of pumpkin week.

Here's the recipe: Pumpkin Pancakes

This recipe was straightforward  simple, the perfect batch size, and delicious.  Of course you could be traditional and serve them with maple syrup, but I preferred to go the pumpkin dip route.  Which was a great call.  And since you're making pumpkin dip, you may as well make molasses cookies.  This recipe is perfection, of course, because it's Laura's.  So good, guys.  So good.


The real reason I brought you here today was because I wanted to share some quotes from the past few days, but I realized I hadn't finished pumpkin week (do you realize I started it 3 weeks ago?!) and I have this weird things where I don't let myself do something else until I have finished one thing.  I know that this might make me sound disciplined or something, but really I just never get around to finishing what I was doing... and I don't do anything else either.  Also, it has led to a lot of leg crossing, when I use a bathroom break as my reward for finishing a project.  Really, I could focus a lot more and finish the project if I would just go to the bathroom when I first  need to, but for some reason I voluntarily torture myself.

Too much information?  Sorry.  Rest assured this was not my incentive to finish Pumpkin Week....that would be painful.

onward...

Saturday I was hanging out with my friends Kaden (6) and Jordyn (2), and Jordyn looked over at me and said 

"My Daddy...is my  Daddy."  
(You know, because sometimes I get confused and think her Daddy is my Daddy.) 
 "Yep, Jordyn!  That's right.  My Daddy is my Daddy, too." 
(Confused look from Jordyn)
"Where is your Daddy?"
"My Daddy is far away...he's in Ohio."
---
Yesterday we were practicing our skit for our mission trip to Honduras.  Sam has a role where he is supposed to be chasing someone, and he's supposed to be dark and menacing.  The trouble is, he's anything but and he runs in a hopping/leaping fashion (at least when he's acting).  We were telling him he needed to look much scarier, and that he looked like the Easter Bunny.

Sam:  Well, I've never seen the Easter Bunny, so I didn't know I looked like him.
Me: Well I have, and trust me... you're twins.
Sam: (with a smirk) "Well then, he must be a pretty good-looking bunny."

I wanted  to say "Yeah, but his ears are smaller than yours."  But I thought that would be taking things too far.

Pray for us...

---

Today at work, our HR director (who works across the hall) had her door shut because she was trying to get benefit enrollments finished up.  She came out for air and told me and Mindy..."That's it!  We're no longer offering benefits!  I can't take it."  She went downstairs and came back up a little later.  "Ok, there was chocolate downstairs... we can have benefits for at least another year."  Maybe if I bring her cookies I can get a raise?

Well, that's it for pumpkin week.  Sorry it dragged our for so long, but you really should try the recipes.  I hope your holiday season is merry and bright so far!.

Pumpkin Week: Pumpkin Gingerbread

Hi Kids!  I'm back, and I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving like I did.  I was talking to my coworker today and said it was the best turkey dinner I had ever had.  She said it was the same case with her.  I wonder why that is... did they feed the turkeys something different this year?  I don't know, but everything was AMAZING.

Friday and Saturday me and my family (but mostly my family) worked our tails off to throw a 30th anniversary party for my parents.  Everything turned out well, and it was a great party.

Now...back to Pumpkin Week.  You know... that thing I started two weeks ago?  SOMEDAY I will finish this bugger up.  Here's the latest (and maybe my favorite) installment.

Pumpkin Gingerbread is wonderful, and amazing, and cozy, and delicious, and really pretty easy to make.  But it seems impressive.  But its easy.

Pumpkin Week: Pumpkin Bread Pudding

So this one time two years ago, Mandy came to visit and run a race with me and Sapphire and Leah and Lalaiana.  After the race we cooked up a storm to celebrate Sapphire's birthday, including donut cheeseburgers (cheeseburgers with donuts as the buns).  Then we did the Holiday Stroll really quickly because we had to get back and watch PW's Thanksgiving Throwdown with Bobby Flay.

It was quite a day.   I was very tired.  And full.

Pumpkin Week: Pumpkin Soup

There are some things that make me feel like super-productive, efficient person.  Not that these things have any relation to productivity or efficiency, I just like being on top of these things, or having them happen.  For example:

• Laying out my clothes the night before.
• Having pickles in the refrigerator.  Not that this means I have been productive and industrious by making pickles... just buying them at the store makes me feel good!  And its not like we eat a lot of pickles!  I just like having them there.  It gives me peace of mind.
• Running a pen out of ink.  Like when it actually runs out of ink.  Not dries up so the ballpoint won't roll anymore... I mean run it out of ink.  So productive.  Productive people write so much with thier pen that it runs out of ink.
• Getting up when its still dark out.  Even if that's just because the sun doesn't rise until 9 am, and I get up at 8:45.  At least I can still say to myself, "Yeah, I'm That Person that gets up before sunrise."  Never mind that everyone else is That Person too.
• Scheduling blogs posts to post, because I am so on top of things that I wrote them all ahead of time...

That's what was going to happen for pumpkin week.  I had several of the recipes typed in here way back in the first part of October.  I had the pictures taken by halfway through October.  The plan was to post every day about my new things in October (ha!)  meanwhile, behind the scenes, I would be working ahead and getting the Pumpkin Week posts lined up and scheduled to post.

I live in a dreamworld.

Pumpkin Week: Pumpkin Bars

It's no secret that I'm a disorganized mess that can't get things done on time.  So is anyone surprised that the pumpkin week that I promised last Friday is just starting now... on Tuesday night?

You know how it's the easiest recipes that you make that people love the most and ask for the recipe most often?  Like Macaroni & Cheese and Santa Fe Cheese Soup. That's what these pumpkin bars are.  This is definitely my most-requested dessert recipe.  But maybe that's because I make it frequently, because they're so easy.  And delicious!

Friday Night

I don't know what a typical Friday night looks like at your house, but ours started out relatively normal.  6 teen-aged guys (The Guys) coming over to play X-Box.

Things really kicked up a notch when Tim executed a pre-meditated project.  And by pre-meditated, I mean he thought about the fact that it could get done.  Not so much the particulars of how it would get done.