We Are Still Here

So, having a toddler and an infant apparently make it harder to blog consistently. That's what I'm telling myself, anyway. And then I remembered that a post doesn't have to be long or involved or eloquent or interesting, though that last one helps, I suppose.

It doesn't have to be timely, either, which is why I'm posting some pics from mid October, from our annual trip to the Avila Valley Barn pumpkin patch with the Rookses. We've been getting pumpkins there every year since there were just four of us. Now there are eight, and it's so fun to see the girls rummaging through the leaves, searching for pumpkins to take home. (You can see more colorful results at Hattie's blog.)

Is more blogging more frequently on the horizon? Yeah, sure. Believe what you want.

Ghoulish Dinner

In our excitement to finally live in a house where we might get trick-or-treaters we stayed home and invited friends over for Halloween this year. While we only had two knocks at the door all night, I had a wonderful time preparing a spooky dinner.


Ryan and I have long established Halloween as a gift-giving holiday (I think we just like excuses to get each other presents). This year, Ryan gave me my gift a little early so that I would have time to figure out how to prepare it. My gift was squid ink pasta. It looks and tastes like regular spaghetti, but it is made black using squid ink. Inspired by his gift, I gave myself the culinary challenge of creating an all-black meal. It was quite a success!

Here was our menu:
Appetizers (in the photo above): black grapes, porter soaked cheddar cheese with pumpernickel toasts, spiderweb eggs (below), and pumpkin seeds.


Dinner: Squid ink pasta with pesto, prosciutto, and mozarella-and-olive "eyeballs," salad, bread, and a blood-red black currant and brandy cocktail (I tried desperately to find black vodka for the occasion, but apparently it is on back order at the two stores in town that carry it).


Dessert: Pumpkin oatmeal chocolate chip cookies (my first baking from scratch since before I was pregnant with Hattie), and Trader Joe's ice cream sandwiches rolled in mini-chocolate chips. I probably could have done better creating a black dessert, but I was more focused on the dinner foods.

The evening was rounded out by watching the original Night of the Living Dead, in black and white, of course!

Adventures in Pumpkin Carving

Last night around 9:30 we realized we had yet to carve our pumpkins for Halloween. We decided to start carving even though we would be up late. Ryan covered our kitchen table in an old newspaper, made me a cup of tea, and started designing his pumpkin. My favorite task is picking the seeds out of the pumpkin guts and roasting them, I was able to do that for about 3 minutes before Hattie needed to nurse, but after awhile she decide to help. Here are some pictures of our first jack-o-lantern carving as a family of three...

Hattie playing with pumpkin guts- she is her mother's daughter!

Hattie is the Great Pumpkin!

Ryan's Masterpiece

Sarah's Masterpiece