Halloween Food and Treats

I am not at all a "pinterest mom".  In fact, I'm pretty far from it.  However, I love being crafty and creative.  I also love celebrating all the Holidays around here.  Basically, any excuse to celebrate and be festive.  Charlotte is very into them too so I really enjoy spending time with her making crafts and various foods!  She is quite the little sous chef and likes to boss me around in the kitchen.

This week, we picked up a Ghost Cookie cutter.  We already had a cute little pumpkin cookie cutter but just haven't used it yet.  Now that I had both cookie cutters, I figured what better way to add a little more chaos into our lives by making homemade sugar cookies with royal icing! 😑
I made the sugar cooker batter one night after I put the girls to bed.  The batter has to chill overnight and Cliff is gone on Monday nights for "beer school" so it is the perfect time to whip up something sweet so he won't eat it all! 😏

We used this recipe and while they aren't my "favorite",  I find that this recipe is the best for decorating!  The key to letting your toddler "help" you, is to give them their very own dough to work with.  That way if they sneeze on it or drop it and continue to use it, you're not giving that dough to anyone.  I secretly toss it!  I also pulled out her small play-doh cutters for her because they're easier for her to use.

I used this recipe for the Royal Icing.  I don't think I did it correctly but I tried and I am going to blame my poor decorating skills on Charlotte.  Haha, jk, I'll take the blame.  I felt rushed because Claire had woken up at this point.  I buy the cellophane bags from the dollar tree and then tie them up with ribbon from my craft stash.  We then give them to friends and neighbors.  Charlotte loves playing delivery girl!

If you aren't using parchment paper......you should be!  I can't believe that I was being so cheap and held out until this last year.  It is a GAME CHANGER!

This is also an easy and fun Halloween dinner idea!  It just so happens that the Orange bell peppers went on sale this week at our commissary for .99 cents!  SCORE!

I didn't feel like having ground beef because we had just had chili so I threw some chicken breast in the crock pot with chicken broth, pepper, cumin, garlic salt, and a little chili powder.  We usually add more "hot spices" after we have already spooned out the kid's dinner.

After cooking that all afternoon, I shredded the chicken and added it to a bowl of cooked rice, cheddar cheese, and blackbeans.  I mixed it all up and set it to the side for a minute while we "carved" our peppers.  Cliff was home from work at this point so we of course competed with each other about who could carve the better pumpkin. Charlotte judged of course and let's just say I kiss better than I cook.....or carve! 😉

 I then stuffed the peppers, topped with more cheese, and cooked them in the oven on 350 for like 20 minutes.

Tadaaaa!  I thought they were a hit!  Both girls ate the chicken stuffing of course and Claire ate a little bell pepper.  We couldn't get Charlotte to even try it but she thought they were cool and we had fun making them!

That face!!! 😂