Halloween On Sunday!

 

It's October! It's going to be Halloween Time! I'm getting excited for Fall.

Although we haven't Boo'd anyone yet, I do have the Boo Bag ready to go. I'm going to wait until a little closer to Halloween this year. Since we are in a campground this year, I am only doing one Boo Bag. (If you are wondering why we are in a campground this year, check out our family trip website at Tepe Travels). 

We are still floating easy costume ideas, decorate, and need to find a local pumpkin patch. Although the RV kitchen can be challenging, I think we will probably still be able to roast the seeds. I did find some easy decorations at the local dollar store and now need to figure out how to put them up.

I know COVID may change a lot of Halloween plans around the country. If Halloween is cancelled, we can still make it fun for the kids: maybe by booing the neighbors or friends/family, trick or treating within your tribe, or having a movie night and decorating cookies. Some of my past Halloween posts would be good for staying home Halloween fun.
 
ACTIVITIES:

• It's Time To Boo! (Boo Bags). Also has non-food ideas which are great for The Teal Pumpkin Project!
• Halloween Tic Tac Toe.
• Feed The Monster Game (also a craft).
• Spooky Storytimes. Many local libraries and bookstores have Halloween themed story times! The link has some of my favorite Halloween books so you can make your own story time too!
• Scare Up Some Cookies. We had a friend over to decorate Halloween cookies. It was lots of fun.
• It's A Spooky Glow Party. Halloween cookies that glow in the dark!
• Halloween Bingo. Great for when you are the one stuck at home handing out the candy!
• Pumpkin Patch and Pumpkin Picking. Every year we go with friends to the pumpkin patch and let the kids pick out a pumpkin. We usually end up at the farm's store eating apple fritters or apple cider donuts. It's a great time! (See Food below for my apple cider donuts recipe!) 
• Haunted Gingerbread House. Why should Christmas have all the fun?
• Halloween Scavenger Hunt.
• Halloween Crossword Puzzle. 
• Word Finds: 
• Halloween Word Find.
• Pumpkin Shaped Halloween Word Find.

• Halloween Mazes:

• Candy Time
• Monster Time
• Pumpkin
• Maze

• Coloring Page.
• Pumpkin Soccer or Bowling. Use a small pie pumpkin as the ball. 
• Soccer: Split into two teams and create goals (small plastic cones work well). Have kids spider walk (aka crab walk) and kick the pumpkin soccer ball with their feet.
• Bowling: Make pins from rolls of toilet paper.
• Ghost pins: Decorate rolls with black paper eyes and mouth.
• Mummy: Wrap a piece of toilet paper around a roll and add eyes.
• Witch: Wrap in green tissue paper, add construction paper eyes/nose/mouth, and top with paper hat.
• Vampire: Add fangs/mouth/eyes, and a black paper cape.
•  Frankenstein: Wrap in green tissue paper, draw with sharpie or add black paper stitch marks/scars. Add eyes/nose/mouth.

FOOD:

• SNACKS & DESSERTS:
• Apple Cider Donuts.
• Witchy Pretzels.
• Ghost Pretzels. 
• Spider and Eyes Sugar Cookies. 
• Pumpkin Oreo Cookies.
• Candy Corn Jello.
• Ghost Brownies.
• Jello Worms.
• Cookies and Monster Donuts. (Frankenstein, Eyes, and Spider cookies)
• Candy Corn Brownies.
• Roasted Pumpkin Seeds. We roast the seeds every year after carving the pumpkins. The kids love eating them!
• Frankenstein Cups. Super cute Frankenstein snack holders made from green ice cream cones, pretzels and candy!
• Rice Cereal Ghosts, Frankensteins, and Mummies! Great if you love Halloween and Rice Cereal Treats!
• Haunted Parfaits.
• Monster Apples. These are a great snack! For an extra sweet tooth, add a fruit roll-up or fruit leather tongue. You could also dip in chocolate and add candy eyes. (TIP: slice apples, soak in lemon water for a few minutes, dry off really well. Dip in chocolate, place on wax paper to let chocolate set. If you are going to store them in the refrigerator, let them set up in the fridge as the chocolate will harden faster.
• Caramel Apples.
• Jack O'Fruit Bowls.
• Pumpkin Dip. Great at Thanksgiving, but works well with pumpkin theme at Halloween too!
• Rainbow Cupcakes. We made these for St. Patrick's Day, but they will work great for a Candy Corn Halloween cupcake too! Use a white cake mix/recipe. Divide batter into 3 bowls. Color 1/3 of batter yellow, 1/3 orange, leave 1/3 white. Layer the different colors in the cupcake pan and bake according to box/recipe directions. (Link to post has more detailed directions.)
• Spider Suckers.
• Monster Eggs.
• Orange and Pepper Pumpkins.
• Candy Corn Spiral Cookies. See my Christmas Swirl Cookies post for directions. Instead of using red coloring or Christmas, use orange or yellow food coloring in half the dough. If you are really ambitious, divide the dough in thirds and color 1/3 yellow, 1/3 orange, and leave 1/3 white. Or use fun colors like purple, lime green, black, and orange and make Tie Dye cookies.
• Dog Treats: Peanut Butter Pumpkin Dog Treats (It might be fun to have a water bowl and a bowl of dog treats out for any dogs that are walking around during Trick-Or-Treating too!)
• Dog Yum: Roasted Pumpkin. I take the freshly cleaned out pumpkin guts (minus the seeds) and roast/puree them for J. She loves getting pumpkin on her dog food.

• DRINKS:
• Have your Cider and eat the cup too! Use an apple to create an edible cup!
• Mommy's Little Helper. WARNING: This is an alcoholic drink. BONUS: It looks super spooky with dry ice!
• Witches Potion.
• Eyeball Ice Cubes.
•  MEAL IDEAS:
• Breakfast: 
• Ghostly Toast. Check out my Egg in Toast post, but use egg whites instead of a regular egg. Use a ghost cookie cutter to cut out the shape to make it Halloween themed! If you don't have a ghost cutter, scramble an egg, and use a pumpkin cookie cutter!
• Pumpkin Face Pancakes. Easy Halloween themed breakfast: decorate pancakes with whipped cream, berries, and candy corn.
• Pumpkin Face Oatmeal. Easy Halloween themed breakfast: Add banana slices and blueberries for eyes, candy corn for teeth.
• Pumpkin Muffins
  
•  If you don't feel like making breakfast, IHOP has a Mummy Face pancake through 11/2 for $3.99. I am not sure if they are doing the free pancake on 10/31 this year.
• Lunch or Dinner:
• Haunted Shepherd's Pie.
• Ghoul Burgers.
• Mummified Hot Dogs.
• What's For Dinner Mummy? Mummy meatloaf, with recipe.
• Mummy Mini Pizzas. Super easy to make with English Muffins!
• The Not So Spooky Lunch. You can carve a jack o' lantern face into almost anything (apple halves, radishes). If you have a ton of extra time, cut large carrot into round slices. Trim the top to form a pumpkin with a stem.
• Pumpkin Soup.
• Attack of the Monster Veggies.
• Pumpkin Sloppy Joes.

CRAFTS:

• Venus Fly Trap Costume. 
• Pirate Trick Or Treat Bag.
  
• Erasable Pumpkin (Chalkboard Paint).
• Feed The Monster Game.
• Spider Web Placemats.
• Toilet Paper Witches Boot.
• Attack of The Play-Doh Spiders. A little time consuming, but a bit hit. Great for school parties or Halloween goodie bags!
• Ghosts and Spiders using egg cartons.
• Pumpkin Pots. Easy pumpkin decorations using a clay pot and a sharpie. If you have green pipe cleaners, it just adds to the fun!
• Pumpkin Stained Glass. Easy craft with tissue paper and contact paper.
• Ghostly Handprints. Great for a craft or a card to send to family!
• Pumpkin cards.
• Pumpkin Boats. We made these for Talk Like a Pirate Day, but they work for Halloween too!
• Pumpkin Carving Alternatives.
• Sweep Your Way Into A Snack. Broomstick bags: great for decorations or goodie bags!
• Gourd Lighting (a pumpkin candle holder).
• Toilet Paper Roll Monster.
• Pumpkin Toilet Paper Roll.
• Monster Time Craft.
• Homemade Tombstones. I am not good at cutting out shapes from wood, so I used cardboard. These are not waterproof though!
• Spooky Bushes! Cut eye shapes in the side of an empty toilet paper roll. Cover one open end completely with a dark tape to keep the light from escaping out the sides. Duct tape works great. Insert activated glow stick. Tape open end closed. Place in yard for Halloween spooky effects. Last year I placed in the bushes and by the gravestones. TIP: Use the thicker glow sticks to get the most light. I used a few glow bracelets and they did not work as well.
• Easy Halloween Luminaries (stencils included). 
• Killer Venus Fly Trap
• Easy Trick-or-Treating Pumpkin for suckers/lollipops
• Ping Pong Eyeballs
• Wreaths
• Eyeball wreath
• Halloween themed wreath

TIPS:

• My list of Best and Worst Halloween Treats.
• Trick or Treat, Halloween Safety.
• For an easy Halloween treat, push suckers into a pumpkin (or drill holes into a craft pumpkin to reuse again). Kids can take the one they want and you simply refill when it gets low.

Some of my Fall Fun links work great for Halloween too!

OTHER FUN LINKS: (Links are external links, not to DailyMesses.)

• Pumpkin Stencils from PicMonkey.
• Edible Jack O'Lantern Ice Cream Bowls. (I really want to try these!)
• Marble Mini Pumpkins (with nail polish)
• Spider Webs (made from black trash bags!) 

What are some of your fun ideas/traditions for Halloween? Share in Comments!

 

 

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Roasted Pumpkin (For The Dog!)

Each year at Halloween we carve our pumpkins, collect the seeds to roast, and throw out everything we have scraped and cut out of the pumpkin. I had been buying canned pumpkin to add to J's dog food (she LOVES pumpkin). After doing a little research and talking to other dog owners, I made our own pumpkin puree for her. Not only is it pretty easy to make, but she loves it and it is a healthy addition to her dog food.

It's really easy to do. Simply scrape out/trim the inside of your pumpkin. I removed the larger seeds since we roast them for us to eat. The stringy stuff and any of the meaty parts of the pumpkin are fair game. If there are a few of the small flimsy seeds, I left those in, but it's up to you. NOTE: I would only do this on a pumpkin that hasn't been carved yet and is in good shape. After it has carved, it can start to mold and could make your dog sick.

Line a large baking sheet or dish with parchment paper or aluminum foil. You want to use something that has sides since the pumpkin will release water as it bakes!

Place the pumpkin bits on the covered sheet and roast at 375 degrees F for about 30 minutes, until softened. Let cool. Place in a blender or food processor to puree. Make sure to get all the strings and any little seeds pureed.

After it is a nice mushy texture, I place it in ice cube trays and freeze. Once they are frozen, I pop them out of the trays and store in a gallon freezer bag. She gets 1 cube at dinner time. She loves them frozen in the summer, but I do sometimes heat them up in the winter.

If you are interested in reading more about the benefits of pumpkin for your dog, here are a few resources:

• AKC
• Pet MD
• Cesar's Way
• Of course, Google or your vet will be a great source of information as well!

Peanut Butter Pumpkin Dog Biscuits

About 7 months ago, we adopted a retired greyhound. She is an amazing dog. She fits in with our family so well. The boys love playing fetch with her and teaching her new tricks. She motivates me to take walks everyday.

I wanted to try my hand at making dog treats because, well...she's a little spoiled. I wanted to try making something fun for her and also so I control the ingredients of her treats. Some of the store bought treats had recalls, some had additives that weren't really good for her, and the grain free treats are more expensive.

Why grain free treats? Before we adopted her, I did some research on what the best diet/food was for a greyhound. While there were a lot of options, wheat/corn free seemed to be the main consensus (other than continue eating raw). Although diet restrictions aren't completely new to us (our bridge girl could only tolerate eating Iams or she had massive stomach issues), raw was not the way for us to go (for a lot of reasons). So, we decided to go with a mostly wheat/corn free diet. Although her food is grain free, she does occasionally gets treats that are made with flour.

After playing around with a few different recipes, I created a peanut butter and pumpkin dog biscuit. It is definitely one of her favorite treats. The recipe is made with brown rice flour, although I have made the recipe with half whole wheat flour and half brown rice flour. I think you could also use all whole wheat flour. They store really well in the freezer (I layer and cover in wax paper in a plastic container). As soon as she hears the freezer open, she now comes running!

Because she loved them so much, we made extra batches at Christmas and gave them out to our friends with dogs!
 

PEANUT BUTTER PUMPKIN DOG BISCUITS

www.DailyMesses.com

You will need:

• 2 1/2 cups brown rice flour
• 1 tablespoon flax seed
• 5 to 6 tablespoons water
• 1/4 cup creamy peanut butter (NO Xylitol, it's fatal to dogs!)
• 1/2 cup pumpkin puree (not sweetened or seasoned). You can add another 1 teaspoon if the dough is too dry.

Directions:

1. Mix ingredients together. Start with 5 tablespoons water. It is a dry dough. However, if you can't get the dough to stick together, add either 1 tablespoon of water or another 1 teaspoon of pumpkin puree. I found the best way to work with the dough was to mix dry ingredients together with a fork, then add in the peanut butter, pumpkin and water. Mix with fork, then switch to mixing and pushing the dough together with your hands. It comes together better using your hands to mix/squish the dough together than just using a fork. (The top of the picture below shows what just mixing the dough with a fork looks like (crumbly), bottom of picture shows when mix/squish together with your hands.)
   
   
2. Roll out. I found it easiest to shape dough into a ball and then roll out on parchment paper.
3. Cut out shapes and place on a cookie sheet. I used all kinds of cookie cutters to make the shapes (rabbit, squirrel, dog bone, heart for Valentine's Day, pumpkin for Halloween/Thanksgiving, star and mini tree for Christmas, oval for Easter eggs, mini flowers for Spring or Easter).
4. Bake at 350 degrees F for 20 minutes. Flip over. Bake another 5-10 minutes or until dry.
5. Cool completely. Store in an airtight container.  I like to keep a few out and then freeze the rest. She likes them frozen as well.

Optional:

• You can decorate these with carob (while it looks like chocolate, it is not toxic like chocolate is) or yogurt chips.
•  These make cute gifts! I stamped names into the treats before they baked. I also decorated a few with carob. I placed in baggies and gave them out at Christmas.

Click here for a PDF printable recipe!
NOTE: I'm trying out adding a link for the PDF to make printing easier. Please let me know if it doesn't work and I can try something else!

*If you buy an item using the links, I may receive a small commission for the referral. It does not affect your cost at all! If you want, you can read my Disclosure page for a little more information.