Happy Halloween

We have been so busy the last few days. Thankfully everybody is healthy again! The kids are sooo excited for trick-or-treating tonight! We had a few Halloween parties to go to over the weekend so they've gotten good use out of the costumes. Actually I have a feeling they will keep wearing them for dress-up long after Halloween has passed. That's how it usually works around here. Gentry still digs out and tries to put on his Superman costume from 2 years ago. And McKay turns into Harry Potter every now and again even though most of the costume is now way too small (except the glasses and the cape...which is all you really need anyway, right?)

On Sunday I took the kids to the L.A. Zoo for "Boo at the zoo". It was crowded, which didn't thrill me. But, every hour or so they would have "chomp and stomp" which meant that they would give pumpkins to some of the animals to play with. It was really cute to watch them explore these new orange toys, especially when the monkeys figured out that they could throw them and they would break open!. The lion cubs were adorable. They had also put together some "fun houses" which were mostly just a few little games and a some people handing out candy...but of course the kids loved it. They did each win passes to see the Bee Movie which I can't complain about!

We've been to the pumpkin patch twice, once a few weeks ago and again last night. The pumpkins we picked the first time would never have lasted if we carved them so the kids painted the first bunch then we carved the newer ones last night. They had a blast. They did most of the design and carving with little assistance, so the final product is iffy but they love them anyway.

After pumpkin carving, I had to make cupcakes for McKays school bake sale. It was a busy night but things were running fairly smoothly until I put the first 12 cupcakes into the oven and about 5 minutes later heard a horrible noise coming from the kitchen. It was that unsettling buzzing/zapping sound that you hear when something is being electrocuted. I ran in to check it out, the oven was brightly lit and smelled horrible. Apparently the heating element malfunctioned and was on fire! Not good. Especially because I needed to get the cupcakes by morning. It was a little late to be knocking on neighbors doors asking to use their oven while I baked endless amounts of cupcakes...so I had no choice but to laugh it off.

Then for good measure (and purely for the fun of it) I decided to see how a microwaved cupcake would turn out. Hey, I had a huge bowl of batter and you can only eat so much before you want to puke. It turns out that you actually can microwave a cupcake! The only real problem was that since I couldn't put the cupcake pan in, I just put five on a plate and there was nothing supporting the paper cups. They all sort of flattened out and joined together in the middle of the plate, creating an interesting cupcake/flower creation.

So, I took a picture.
and then we ate them.

Needless to say, we were up extra early so we could get some good ol' fashioned store bought cupcakes!

Now...a new oven...

Aw, memories.