What up, Hallowee-nays? Sunday was a super-duper domestic day for me. We had delightful house guests leave on Saturday, my husband finished up and emailed off a book manuscript and I got a case of last-minute pumpkin fever.
My Halloween was celebrated at my friend Katie's costume wedding a week ago, so there were no weekend parties for us or anything, and I'm completely only bringing it up so I can show you this picture of Mike's black metal costume from the wedding with corpse paint applied by yours truly (check out the vintage gift wrap, I'm a wrapping maniac and will have to do some posts about that as we approach the holidays):
So. Pumpkins.
Two of those suckers had been sitting around my apartment waiting for go-time and Sunday was it. I decided on the Hannah and Jane stencils for my personal xoJane-O-Lanterns. I printed them up, trimmed them down, and attached the stencils with double-sided tape because I really don't know a thing about carving pumpkins and it seemed like a good idea.
Oh oh oh! First, I cut the tops into lids and pulled out all the guts and seeds. I love pumpkin seeds so I Googled up some roasting instructions. Here's what I ultimately went with:
1. Rinse seeds, put in a bowl
2. Add a tsp of olive oil & cheap-ass pre-mixed "Cajun Spice" and stir that sh*t up
3. Spread in a thin layer on a cookie sheet
4. Cook at 250˚ for 1 hour, mixing and flipping them around every 20 minutes
You see some kind of muffins in that pic, too, right? I accidently ran into a recipe on Pinterest for two-ingredient pumpkin muffins that I HAD to try. All you do is add a 15 oz can of pumpkin to any regular old box of yellow cake mix. No oil, no eggs; truly just mix the pumpkin right into the cake mix and follow the baking directions on the box.
I'm am terrible at directions and naturally added cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and a teeny bit of natural apple sauce, and of course they are crazy delicious, but also, my house smells like the best-case-scenario of a Yankee Candle factory. Dying.
Remember when Jane expressed repulsion and panic regarding the xoJane-O-Lantern stencil featuring her beautiful face and Emily maintained that it's Halloween and it should look scary? Well, uh, I think Jane's going to hate this thing that is coming up (but I TOTALLY love it).
But first.....HANNAH-O-LANTERN!
Alright, here goes nuttin. Jane, please don't hate me. Think of it as a seasonally-appropriate volcano of wicked awesomeness.
What do you think, everybody-except-Jane-who-is-erasing-me-from-the-system-and-all-of-your-memories-right-now?
Did you party down over the weekend? What was the best costume you saw? Anyone still have actual plans tonight?
*Email me at rachel@xoJane.com to send me your extra candy
