Month: October 2014

Five things (and a winner!)

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Raise your hand if you’re all ready for Halloween. I see a lotta hands out there! Usually we’re scrambling around at the last minute, but this year we’re nearly set. The decorations are up, the costumes are made, the treats are bought (and sampled) and we even have our pumpkins, ‘tho we won’t carve them ’til tomorrow afternoon. Here’s a peek at some of our prep, plus a few other pics from the past week. Oh! And I’ll announce the winner of my Fall faves contest. (Hugs if you read the post before scrolling down to see who won.)

If you trick-or-treat at our house you’ll see Frank, the monster hubby made out of cardboard and tissue paper a few years ago. We put him in the front window every year. Scary stuff!

I’m not dressing up this year (the kids are a vampire and a robot), but I did make these festive pumpkin hair clips to wear. The easy how-to is up on So Fawned, along with my tips for a safe and happy Halloween.

We even have a little Halloween decor in the bathroom! My guy took a bath after school one day this week with this adorable rubber duckie from Loblaws.

Okay, these are autumnal rather than Halloween, but they’re in our pumpkin-shaped cookie jar on the kitchen island.

And last week I submitted another entry for Urban Barn’s dining hack contest, this time suggesting books as pedestals to elevate serving trays and create visual interest to your table. The grand prize winner will be drawn next Wednesday. Cross your fingers for me, everybody!

And speaking of winners, a huge thanks to all of you who entered my Fall faves contest. I loved reading about your Fall faves and seeing all of your retweets (some of them daily!). I’ll pop the prize in the mail to the winner next week. Was it you? Click here to find out.

Happy Halloween, everybody. Wishing you more treats than tricks and a safe, fun night.

Pumpkin pudding

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So it’s the beginning of a new week and you’ve got a million things to do, but trust me when I say you’ll want to find some time to make this pumpkin pudding. It is ridiculous, mes amis.

The recipe’s from my dear friend Carolyn (check out her fab fashion blog!), who loves to curl up with a big bowl or two this time every year.

Make it for a get-together or a night at home with the fam. You’ll thank me. And Carolyn! It is that good.

Pumpkin pudding

Serves 6 to 8

Ingredients

1/2 cup + 1 tbsp of room temperature butter
1 cup (I use half a cup, it’s plenty!) + 1/3 cup of brown sugar
1 egg
2/3 cup of pure pumpkin
1 cup of flour
1 tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/8 tsp cloves (I use 1/2 tsp cinnamon plus 2 heaping tsps pumpkin spice instead of the nutmeg and cloves)
1/4 cup raisins
1 2/3 cup of boiling water
1/2 cup orange juice

Directions

Preheat oven to 325 F.

Grease a 2-quart baking dish.

Cream together 1/2 cup of butter and 1/3 cup of brown sugar. Beat in egg and pure pumpkin.

In a separate bowl, stir flour, baking powder, salt and spices. Gradually stir into the pumpkin mixture. Fold in the raisins.

Spoon batter into prepared baking dish . Sprinkle 1 cup of brown sugar over the mixture. (I use half a cup and it’s deelish!)

Combine 1 tbsp of butter, boiling water and orange juice in a bowl. Pour slowly and evenly over the entire mixture (this will look weird but it’s right).

Bake for 45 minutes.

Serve warm and top with whipped cream.

Five things

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Last week was exciting, mes amis! Starting with the grand opening of Ottawa’s first American Girl boutique in one of our favourite stores, Chapters! The Rideau Street location is one of just four specialty boutiques across Canada.

My daughter’s pored over the dolls and their accessories in the American Girl catalogues countless times, so she was enchanted to see and touch them in person. And bonus, a goodie bag for every visitor on opening day! Lily has been playing with her doll dining kit all week. (It was in the bag, along with a doll-sized t-shirt Lily put on another doll as soon as we got home.)

We completed another DIY for So Fawned, this DIY pumpkin bowling using toilet paper for pins and mini pumpkins and gourds for the bowling balls. Check out the easy how-to!

Somebody couldn’t keep her fingers out of her dad’s birthday cake. Those are Malteasers around the outside (aka Whoppers in the US).

Sunday the kids were at a playdate for most of the day, so I took some time to write some snail mail. Isn’t it so nice to get a letter in the mail?

And remember my gourd tea light holders? Last week they were featured on Urban Barn’s blog! I know, what? Hop on over and take a look! (Love Urban Barn!)

Hope you have a great week ahead, everybody.

(Mine aren’t normally this exciting but you know, we try to make our own fun.)

Win my Fall faves!

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Ahhh, Fall. The perfect time to curl up with a good book, a hot beverage and chocolate bar. Even if that’s just 20 minutes after the kids have finally fallen asleep and the dishes are done and the email’s answered and that sticky patch is scrubbed off the floor (what was that sticky patch?) and you can barely keep your eyes open but dammit, you’re going to get some time to yourself. And then maybe finding the book so good you stay up way too late reading and the morning comes too damn early and you curse yourself for not going to sleep earlier, knowing you’ll do it all over again. Maybe tonight. Maybe with some of my Fall faves!

That’s right everybody, it’s giveaway time! One lucky reader is going to win three of my favourite Fall luxuries: maple sugar DAVIDsTEA, a bar of Camino (fair-trade! organic! kosher! gluten free!) milk chocolate and the fantastic new sequel to The Rosie Project, Graeme Simsion’s The Rosie Effect.

You don’t need to read The Rosie Project to get The Rosie Effect, ‘tho it’ll help you understand and empathize with the main characters so you might want to start with that first. I wanted each page of The Rosie Effect to be a surprise so I never read a summary, but you can read one here from Chapters (where I ordered it for 50% off). If you could see the bags under my eyes you’d know I couldn’t put it down. I stayed up late several nights to finish it and miss the characters already.

The maple sugar tea is a recent discovery; it’s smooth and sweet (but not too sweet!) and smells divine. It goes great with the Camino milk chocolate (my all-time fave!) and the fair trade cancels out the calories, so enjoy it guilt free!

Now for the giveaway! To enter, leave a comment below telling my some of your Fall faves, then click on this link to indicate you did so and to obtain additional entries. (If I could, I’d put the form here so you wouldn’t have to click on an external link, but my blog isn’t self-hosted so I don’t have the capability.) The giveaway is open to Canadian and US residents and ends at midnight EST on October 30. Enter today, then come back and enter again!

Good luck everybody! Can’t wait to hear about some of your Fall faves!

This is not a sponsored post. I just wanted to share some of my favourite luxuries with you!