Leftover Halloween Candy Cookies

I decided to make cookies for a coworker the other day using my leftover Halloween candy!
Believe it or not, I had some candy left after the holiday so I whipped up some yummy baked goods. I think these tasty little cookies could use any mish-mosh of candies, but I happened to have some M&Ms on hand so that's what I used!
Everything else that this recipe called for happened to be in my pantry or 'fridge- how easy is that?
I started by creaming the butter with two different kinds of sugar.
After beating in the eggs...
I tossed in the dry ingredients...
Before adding the M&Ms. (Note: if you make these for yourself, I would recommend NOT opening the candy until it's ready to be added to the batter- otherwise it's really hard not to snack the whole time you're preparing the dough.)
After a few minutes in a hot oven...
I had a whole tray of delicious cookies!
If you'd like to try this recipe for yourself, here you go:

Leftover Halloween Candy Cookies

Ingredients:
1 cup Butter, Softened
1 cup Brown Sugar
1 cup White Sugar
2 whole Eggs
2 teaspoons Vanilla
2 cups Flour
¾ cups Cocoa Powder
1 teaspoon Baking Soda
½ teaspoons Salt

Leftover candy (I used a bag of M&Ms)Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and prepare cookies sheet(s) with parchment paper. Cream together butter and sugars until fluffy, then add eggs and vanilla. The add the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt. Add candy until combined. Drop by spoonful onto the baking sheets and bake cookies 8-12 minutes (do NOT over-bake, they should be slightly chewy) and place on a rack to cool.

They're very tasty: extremely chocolatey and the perfect way to use up any extra candy lying about!
Thank you for visiting- I hope you have a great day!

Trick or TREAT!

I saw a ghostly sight when I arrived at work yesterday morning...
That's right- this cute little treat was perched among my gourds and pumpkins!
You see, there's a Farmer's market on the Upper West Side some days...
And they sell all sorts of produce and baked goods.
My colleague knows how much I love these little ghosties, and surprised me with one!
It was the perfect way to enter Halloween weekend- so tasty!
I hope you have a spook-tacular weekend! Thanks for stopping by!

Practice makes perfect

I want to become a better painter!
It's true- I'm not very good at the moment! Both of my parents can paint beautifully and I desperately want to learn that skill. But there's no way I'm going to improve without a little practice, right? So the other day I picked up some supplies and applied the old adage: practice makes perfect!
Now, I know myself well enough to know that I accomplish a lot more with a project in mind. So I grabbed some coasters at my local dollar store with the idea that I could make my living room a little more festive for the coming holiday.
And a short while later, I had a nice little stack of Halloween-themed coasters for my end table. (Though I would like to point out that there were six coasters in the package and only four are photographed below- the other two did not warrant a permanent place on the internet!)
After that practice, I wanted to try painting on fabric. So I picked up a package of these cute little bags and got to work.
See? (Oh- and have you picked up on my "trick"? I like to paint a portion of an object, because I don't have to contend with symmetry problems and there's way less room for error!)
Want to see the finished product? I painted these little bags for the newest members of our family.
And while I have a lot to improve upon in terms of painting skill, I sure am having fun during the learning process!
Thank you for stopping by- I hope you have a great weekend!

Spooky Surprise Cupcakes

Joanne over at ReadySetCraft and her friend at MegaCrafty are hosting their first cupcake link party and when I found out that the theme was Halloween, I just knew I had to play along. So I whipped up these Spooky Surprise Cupcakes! Nothing like a cute little ghosty to welcome the haunting season!
But you know what makes these tasty treats even better? They have a yummy little surprise hidden inside!
These cupcakes were extremely easy to make- let me show you!
I started with box-cake batter...
And then I added the "surprise"- York Peppermint Patties!
See? I just plopped them in the cupcake liners full of batter.
And after a few minutes in the oven these babies were ready to decorate.
To make the little ghosties, I took the wrapper off a cupcake, flipped it upside down and balanced a marshmallow on top...
Before squirting icing all around the marshmallow.
Then I turned my attention to the fondant- I rolled it out extra thin and used a plate to cut a lovely little circle.
Then I smoothed it over the top of the cupcake (sorry I don't have an action shot of that- it took two hands to handle the fondant). After I liked the shape of the ghost, I added some eyes and a mouth using food coloring.
Thank you for visiting- I hope you have time to check out the other link party participants!

When ghosts and goblins by the score, ring the bell on your front door...

Remember when SFS and I went to pick out our pumpkins? We waited until this week to carve them, which might have been a mistake. SFS' pumpkin rotted, while I left mine too close to the radiator, and the side got a little roasted. Wooops, right? But don't worry, at least one side of the pumpkin looked okay.

I made the first cut...
And since SFS' pumpkin didn't survive, he helped me clean out mine.
We made quick work of the gourd, and took a few pictures along the way.
We saved the seeds, because what's more delicious than fresh roasted pumpkin seeds?
After SFS cleaned them, he spread them on a pan, and added some salt and pepper.
Here's a closer look:
A little while later, this is what we got to enjoy.
Let me tell you- they were delicious! A salty, crunchy bite of yumminess!
Oh yeah- while SFS was roasting, I got to design and carve the pumpkin.
But you probably would have figured that out even if I didn't tell you, right?
I hope you have a wonderful Halloween weekend!!

*I couldn't resist using a lyric from an old Disney movie in my title. In full it goes: When ghosts and goblins by the score / ring the bell on your front door / you better not be stingy or / your nightmares will come true. Thanks for visiting my blog!