Pumpkin Cake

Ephesians 2:10

Being creative always seems to come easier for some than others. It is amazing what a master craftsman can do with something that others might view as useless.

That is also how God works in our lives. He is the greatest Master Craftsman of all, taking the wasted pieces and broken shards of our lives and restoring them to worth and meaning.

No matter what messes we have made of our lives, God can remold us into vessels that are good in His eyes. 
That is the only way for the pieces of our brokenness to be made whole and good once again.

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.
-Ephesians 2:10

Halloween Drink Ideas (4)

Zombie Eyeballs

Edible Chocolate Pumpkin Bowls

Candy to make candy cups that could be used to hold other Halloween candy? Did I just blow your mind, or what?

Edible Pumpkin Candy Chocolate Cups 

Ingredients:
12 oz orange melting chocolate wafers
Small round water balloons
1/4 cup milk melting chocolate wafers
5 cups assorted Halloween candy

Directions:
Place the orange melting wafers in a microwave-safe bowl. Microwave them in 30-second increments, stirring after every 30 seconds, until melted and smooth. The texture should be on the thinner side–it should flow nicely from a spoon. If it seems thick or clumpy, stir in a spoonful or two of shortening, and mix until it melts and the coating flows freely. Set aside to cool until it is barely warm. (If you try to make these candy cups when the melted wafers are hot, the balloons will explode and it will be a huge mess!)

While you wait for the melted wafers to cool, blow up the balloons until they’re the size you want your candy cups to be, and tie them off.

When the coating is still fluid but no longer very warm to the touch, hold a balloon by the knot and dip it in the melted coating until it comes halfway up the sides of the balloon. Rotate it around so that the sides are evenly coated. Remove the balloon from the coating and let the excess drip back into the bowl.

Place the dipped balloon on a baking sheet covered in parchment or waxed paper. Repeat with the remaining coating and balloons. Once all the balloons are dipped, refrigerate the tray to set the coating, for about 20 minutes.

To remove the balloons from the candy shell, hold the balloon tightly right below the knot. Cut a small hole above your fingers, and carefully loosen your grip so that a small amount of air can escape.

Gently let the air out of the balloon slowly and steadily. Use your other hand to help press the balloon inward and detach it from the side of the candy as it deflates. You’ll be most successful if you take this step very slowly.

When most of the air has left the balloon, very gently peel it away from the bottom of the candy. Repeat until all of the balloons are removed from the candy cups.

If you’d like, you can use a paring knife to level the tops of the cups and remove any uneven edges. You can also just run your finger along the top to smooth any ridges down. Do this step carefully and gently, since the cup edges are thin and delicate.

Melt the chocolate melting wafers. Pour them into a plastic bag and snip a very small hole in the corner, or use a parchment paper cone. Draw simple pumpkin faces on the side of your candy cups. (Alternately, you can use food markers specifically designed for candy–they are commonly available at craft stores like Michaels.)

Fill the candy cups with a mix of your favorite Halloween candy, and enjoy.

Candy Corn Cookie Pizza

This cookie pizza would be such a fun Halloween party dessert.

Candy Corn Cookie Pizza

Ingredients:
Cookie dough of your choice
White frosting
Yellow and orange food coloring
Black Decorating Gel
Candy eyes

Directions:
Mix cookie dough and plop it onto the middle of the round pan. Use your hands to pat the dough into a big circle. Bake according to directions on box or recipe. Make sure it is cooked through. Allow cookie to cool and keep on pan. Tint some of the frosting orange, and some yellow. Keep a small amount white for the middle circle.
Put some of the white, untinted frosting in the middle of the cookie and spread with a small, offset spatula or knife, into a circle.
Spread the next portion of the cookie round with the orange icing.
Spread the yellow frosting around the outer edge of the cookie. Decorate the face with gel and candy eyes.

Starch Floating Ghost

Oreo Reeses Bats

Here are cute Halloween bat treats to make for the kids. They are pretty easy and will surely get a 

laugh out of the kids.

Oreo Reeses Bats

Ingredients:
Reeses peanut butter cups
Candy eyes
Frosting/white chocolate
Oreos

Directions:
Twist off the top of an oreo and cut it in half. Put a dot of frosting or white chocolate on the peanut butter cup and stick them to it like wings. After they are dry put the candy eyes on.

Psalms 63:8

As a part of life everyone endures loss at sometime and during those tough times, we can become so preoccupied with our role in “clinging to God” that we forget about His promised protection. It’s not our fingernails that sustain us—it’s His loving, upholding hand.

My soul followeth hard after thee: thy right hand upholdeth me. -Psalms 63:8

Halloween Drink Ideas (3)

Spider Web Cupcakes

Halloween Egg Carton Bats and Leaf Ghosts

Halloween Egg Carton Bats and Leaf Ghosts

Materials for Bats:
Egg carton
Scissors
Black paint
Paintbrush
Googly eyes
Glue
Ribbon

Materials for Ghosts:
Artificial leaves
White paint
Paintbrush
Black marker
Glue
Ribbon

Directions:
Bats:
Cut out 3 cups from an egg carton. Then cut the bottoms of the 2 outside cups to resemble bat wings. Paint them black. We painted one coat. Glue on the googly eyes after the paint is dry. Glued ribbon to the top of each bat to hang them.

Ghosts:
Paint the leaves white on both sides. The leaves needed 2 coats of paint. Draw on ghostly eyes and mouths. Glue on ribbon to hang.

Two-Ingredient Pumpkin Cake with Apple Cider Glaze

 Two-Ingredient Pumpkin Cake with Apple Cider Glaze

Ingredients:
For the Cake:
1 Yellow Cake Mix
1 can (15 oz) pumpkin puree

For the Glaze:
1-1/2 cups powdered sugar
3 Tablespoons apple cider
3/4 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice

Directions:
Empty the contents of the boxed cake mix and pumpkin puree into a large bowl. Using a hand-mixer or stand mixer beat until well incorporated. The batter will be very thick, but will come together nicely. Pour batter into a greased 7 x 11 X 2 pan. This is the small, rectangular-sized pan from your Pyrex set. You know, the set you had to have when you got married and rarely ever used all the pieces. Finally, you have a use for it. Bake at 350 degrees for 28 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Do not overbake.
Let cool for 5-10 minutes in the pan, then flip onto a platter. Make the glaze while you're waiting. Combine powdered sugar, apple cider and pumpkin pie spice. Glaze should be thick but pourable. Add more sugar or cider if needed. Pour over the cake while still warm. Reserve some to pour over each slice when served.
Serve warm or room temperature.

Yarn Pumpkins

These yarn pumpkins are such a fun fall craft idea! They’d make a beautiful centerpiece or mantle decoration, or you could even use them to decorate for Halloween.

Yarn Pumpkins

Materials :
21 pieces of orange yarn, cut to 36 inch lengths
2 ounces of white glue
1 balloon (12 inch size), blown up half full
1 brown pipe cleaner and 1 green pipe cleaner

Instructions:
Blow up 12″ balloons about half full. Cut out about 21 pieces of yarn about 36 inches long.
Tie one of the pieces of yarn to the end of the balloon. Hang the balloon someplace workable and put something to catch the mess underneath.

Pour the glue into a small bowl. It takes about one full 2 ounce bottle of glue per pumpkin.

Dunk one of the pieces of yarn into the bowl of glue, and swirl it around gently with a plastic fork to get it completely covered with glue. Hold the end of the piece of yarn with your fingers, then gently run it between the tines of a fork to remove the excess glue.

Take the glue covered yarn strand and press the end down somewhere and wind it around the balloon, making sure the press down the ends of the yarn to secure them when they’re in place. Repeat with the remaining pieces of yarn.

When you’re done, find somewhere to hang the yarn covered balloons to dry.
It took a full 24 hours for them to dry. But when they did, I was really happy with how firm they were.

This is CRITICAL. You need to make sure you press your fingers down under the yarn to detach the glue from the balloon – around the entire surface of the balloon, if you don’t the balloon will pull the yarn to the inside as it deflates and it may ruin the shape of your pumpkin.

Make a very small hole in the balloon close to where the knot is (it won’t pop if you cut it near the knot). You want the air to leak slowly so you can detach any yarn that you might have missed as it shrinks.

Then pull the deflated balloon out through one of the openings in the yarn.

Make the pipe cleaner stem and vine by wrapping the pipe cleaners around your baby finger. The stem is just a spiral, tuck into the end of the pipe cleaner into the yarn. I didn’t glue it on.

Pumpkin Spice Blossoms

Pumpkin Spice Blossoms

Ingredients:
1 Spice Cake Mix
14 oz can Libby’s Pumkin
½ Cup sanding sugar
1 bag Hershey’s Pumpkin Spice Kisses

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350° Mix and pumpkin until well combined. Scoop dough and roll top half in sanding sugar and place onto a parchment lined baking sheet. Bake for 11-13 minutes, or until cooked through. Quickly transfer to a cooling rack and immediately press kisses into the center of each cookie. I immediately place cooling rack into the fridge for 15 minutes so the kisses don’t melt.

Psalms 107:9

Everyone feels that "empty" feeling at sometimes in their lives. It is an emptiness that friendship, love, sex, money, power, popularity, or success can never assuage. A longing for something indefinable.

As Christians we were made for God, and in the end, nothing less will satisfy us. Without Him, we are all empty. He alone can fill the emptiness with good things


For he satisfieth the longing soul, and filleth the hungry soul with goodness. -Psalms 107:9

Halloween Drink Ideas (2)

Pumpkin Pie Ice Cream

Spider Lolly Pops

These make great party favours or a fantastic treat to send to school on Halloween.

Spider Lolly Pop Favors

Materials:
1 round lolly pop
2 googly eyes
2 black pipe cleaners
hot glue

Instructions:
Take two black pipe cleaners, and cut them in half.

Line up the four pipe cleaner pieces beside each other and center them as best you can. It’s okay if the lengths aren’t perfectly even – you can bend them afterwards to make up for it.

Place the lolly pop on top of the pipe cleaners, about 1/3 of the way in from one side.

Wrap the long side around the lolly pop and loop it around.

Bend the legs into little L’s. They don’t have to be perfect, just do your best to shape them into little legs. Bend the pipe cleaners slightly sideways too so you have equal spacing between all the legs.

Put a small dab of hot glue on the back side of the googly eyes. You can use white glue if you really need to, but hot glue works sooooooooooo much better. It’s pretty much instant AND they won’t fall off.

Place the eyes towards the front of the pipe cleaner spider’s body.

You want the eyes about 1/3 of the way over the body. Not the middle. Not the edge.

Banana Ghosts

DIY Skull Candle Holder

Mummy Cupcakes

Leviticus 26:6

Scripture indicates that God’s ideal condition for His children is peace, but too often in our immaturity we get into trouble and cause conflict. God desires for us to become weary of wrongdoing and to rest in the safety and contentment of His loving ways.

And I will give peace in the land, and ye shall lie down, and none shall make you afraid: and I will rid evil beasts out of the land, neither shall the sword go through your land.
-Leviticus 26:6

Halloween Drink Ideas (1)

Pumpkin Crockpot Bread

Pumpkin Crockpot Bread

Ingredients:
8 cups day old bread cubes
½ cup toasted pecans, chopped
½ cup cinnamon chips
4 eggs
1 cup canned pumpkin
1 cup half n half
½ cup brown sugar, packed
½ cup butter, melted
1 tsp vanilla
1 tbsp pumpkin pie spice
Vanilla ice cream, optional
Caramel ice cream topping, optional

Directions:
Cut slices of day-old bread into cubes. Cut enough bread for 8 cups. Put the cubed bread into a greased Crock Pot along with cinnamon chips and chopped pecans. Whisk together eggs, pumpkin, half-n-half, brown sugar, melted butter, vanilla and spice. Pour over the cubed bread and gently stir to coat. Cover and cook on low for 3-4 hours or until a knife inserted in the center comes out clean. Serve warm topped it with vanilla ice cream and caramel ice cream topping.

Pet Ghosts

Happy Halloween: Easy Edible Pet Ghosts

The most adorable treat for a class Halloween party, trick or treaters or any Halloween themed party.

Pet Ghosts

Materials:
Ghost peeps
Candy corn or other small treats
mini graham cracker pie crust
meltable chocolate
Clear plastic cups in appropriate size
Printable labels
embellishments

Instructions:
Melt chocolate according to directions. I used light cocoa but orange or yellow would be fun too.
Spoon into crusts and insert ghosts (Be sure they are standing up straight) and add extra candies of your choice. Let cool and harden completely. Top with a plastic cup (these can be taped on if transporting) and add label if desired
Or top with a bat ring and bead for an impromptu handle.

Ginger Pumpkin Pie Bites

I have a deep fondness for pumpkin pie and ginger. This recipe combines my adoration of both to produce a delicious, and much deserved, love. 

Gingerbread Pumpkin Pie Bites

Ingredients:
1 pkg gingerbread cookie dough mix, prepared per package directions
1 can purée pumpkin
1 can sweetened condensed milk
2 eggs
2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1/4 teaspoon ginger

Directions:
Press gingerbread cookie dough into the bottom of a 9"x9" parchment lined cake pan. In a bowl combine pumpkin, sweetened condensed milk, eggs, cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger. Beat with an electric mixer until smooth. Pour pumpkin pie mix over gingerbread cookie dough and bake
on center rack at 350° for one hour.
Allow to cool for 20 minutes, then cut and serve.

DIY Halloween Candy Jar

Perfect for decorating and displaying your favorite Halloween treats.

DIY Halloween Candy Jar

Supplies:
6 inch terra cotta pot
Terra cotta saucer
Glass fish bowl
Wooden knob
Paint
Ribbon
Stickers, vinyl, etc. for decorating

Instructions:

Paint outside of the terra cotta pot, saucer and knob. You can use regular craft paint or spray paint. Make sure you don’t paint the inside of the lid. Your candy will be exposed to the bottom of the lid so keep it safe by taping it off if necessary. Make sure paint is completely dry.

Glue the fish bowl to the terra cotta pot using a glue gun. Place a heavy book on top and let dry for at least 8 hours. Glue the knob to the saucer using hot glue.

Fill your jar with candy and decorate with ribbon.

Peanut Butter Pumpkin Cookies

Peanut Butter Pumpkin Cookies

Ingredients:
1 roll Peanut Butter cookies
1 egg yolk
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/3 cup orange sugar crystals
14 twisted pretzels, broken in half

Directions:
Heat oven to 350°. Spray cookie sheets with cooking spray. In medium bowl, stir cookie dough, egg yolk and flour until well mixed.

Pour sugar crystals into small bowl. Shape dough into 28 balls; roll in sugar crystals. Insert 1 pretzel piece into each ball for pumpkin stem. Using toothpick or tip of teaspoon, make lines around sides for pumpkin ridges. Place balls 2 inches apart on cookie sheets.

Bake 9 to 11 minutes or just until set in center when touched with fingertip. Cool 2 minutes; remove from cookie sheets to cooling racks. Cool completely, about 10 minutes.

Psalms 5:3

Several aspects in our lives require maintenance to keep them viable and in good working order.

Maintenance is also important in our spiritual lives. Taking time each day to read the Bible, pray, and listen to God is a key element in avoiding a spiritual breakdown.

My voice shalt thou hear in the morning, O Lord; in the morning will I direct my prayer unto thee, and will look up. ~Psalm 5:3

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