Roller

Great Pumpkin

Eliza's Stories

I meant to post these long ago, and I don't think I ever did. I just found them again.




Eliza's latest story, filled with sorrow:


Long ago there was a fairy, lost.
She snuck into a castle, and then she got dead.
And then an ant eat her up for his dinner. And she didn't be alive ever again; she was in the ant's tummy.
The End.

Another story:

Once upon a time there was a girl. Her name is Anya.
Anya was a good little girl. And when she growed up she was nice. But when she was a little girl she was mean. But she got bigger and bigger and bigger.
And then she got even more bigger.
That's a little story.

A Good Recipe (I hope)

Pumpkin Cream Cheese Cookies

Ingredients:

• 1 package (8 oz) lite cream cheese, softened
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 3/4 cups packed brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 cup canned solid pack pumpkin (or homemade puree)
• 1 egg
• Red, Yellow and Green food colors, optional
• 2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips, 12 oz package
• 3 cups flour
• 1 tablespoon pumpkin pie spice
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 cup powdered sugar
• 3 tablespoons flour

Method:

Beat together softened butter, white sugar and packed brown sugar. Stir in vanilla, pumpkin, egg and a couple drops each red and yellow food color (enough to make cookie dough orange); stir in chocolate chips. Add 3 cups flour, pumpkin pie spice, salt and baking powder; stir to thoroughly mix. Remove approximately 1/2 to 2/3 cup cookie dough and set aside. Roll remaining cookie dough out between two sheets of lightly floured wax paper or parchment paper into a 12x15x1/4 inch rectangle. Freeze dough while preparing cream cheese filling.

Knead a couple drops green food color into reserved 1/2-cup cookie dough. Roll dough into approximately 36 small marble size balls, refrigerate/freeze until ready to use.

Beat cream cheese until smooth; add powdered sugar and 3 tablespoons of flour; beat until smooth and creamy. Remove cookie dough from freezer; peel off top parchment paper; spread prepared cream cheese over 2/3 the width of the rectangle (keep cream cheese on one side of dough and spread out to both ends). Using the parchment paper to carefully lift, roll cookie into a log, starting on the long cream cheese side (jelly roll fashion with cream cheese in center). Wrap log in parchment, return to freezer for 2-3 hours, preferable overnight (or until stiff).

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Spray cookie sheet with non-stick spray or line cookie sheet with parchment paper. Remove cookie dough from freezer, remove parchment wrap, cut into 1/4 to 3/8-inch thick slices; place on prepared baking sheet. Place a green marble size piece of dough at the top of each cookie and slightly flatten to form a stem. Bake about 12-13 minutes or until lightly browned. Cool cookies on rack. Enjoy with a glass of cold milk.

Makes approximately 3 dozen cookies

* NOTE: Pumpkin Pie spice may be replaced with mixture of 1 teaspoon cinnamon, 1/2 teaspoon ginger, 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg, 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves.

This is a recipe I saw on a Talk-type show on KSL Friday (I didn't have school that day.) I told Steve about it and he wanted the recipe, so I thought others might like it as well. I want to try making a gluten-free version with our left-over Halloween pumpkins.

Sam Katz NOT for Mayor 1

Mischief

I was in the kitchen cooking. Things got quiet. Too quiet. This is what I found in the living room when I went to see what the girl was up to.

I asked Eliza to make a face that showed how she felt about the mess she made. This is her face:

Pretty sly.
I made her clean it up.

Some Photos

Watching a movie with all her inanimate friends.

Eliza likes to request that I make pop ups for her. They are tricky to improvise, but here they are from the other day.

And here she is passed out on the floor after school a couple weeks ago.