Pumpkins, apples & more pumpkins!

Two weekends ago we were able to go to a small local pumpkin patch. We got to pick out a couple little pumpkins and handpick some yummy apples. I also bought a sugar or pumpkin from Safeway to make a pumpkin pie from scratch. I've never made a pumpkin pie from scratch before.

So this weekend (the 17th-19th) we got to play with all our goodies.

It was a good, relaxed family weekend.

We decided that we would try making homemade apple cider with all of our apples.

It turned out really good! In fact I don't think the kids actually got any, Matt and I drank it up pretty fast, we also didn't get any pictures of the finished product. 

We juiced our apples then put the juice in the crock pot with some orange slices, cinnamon sticks, cinnamon, cloves & some nutmeg. I can't wait to go back to the apple orchard to pick some more apples! I'd like to make more cider and some applesauce for the kids.

Every year we let the kids paint pumpkins while Matt carves our family pumpkin. The kids have so much fun. It's so cool to watch Ava as she is getting to the point where her artwork is actually becoming recognizable. She means to draw/paint something and so she does.

After we picked out the spider template for our pumpkin and Matt had already started carving we realized we should have done the WSU cougar logo... Oh well, next year!

My little pie pumpkin baking at 375 degrees for 1 hour.

Love his little kissy face.

Ava, hard at work on her pumpkin.

The baked pumpkin has such a pretty color.

It was so easy to peel off the skin to get to the pumpkin.

Making the puree went very smoothly.

I think I got about 5 cups of pumpkin puree from my little pumpkin. It was so easy to make the pumpkin puree that I am excited to make more for some other fun recipes like Matt's pumpkin waffles!

We had enough seeds from both the pumpkin Matt carved and my pie pumpkin to make two batches of roasted pumpkin seeds to snack on.

We like making these little videos when we do our pumpkin carving. We ran out of batteries and memory while recording but it's still fun. Normally we'd do a little family dance at the end when we'd finish our pumpkins, so just imagine us all dancing and waving our pumpkins around in your head.