Another night of Trick or Treating is done. We had 271 Trick or Treaters tonight. I had the black light, fog machine and spooky music on as usual.

I wore my Princess Leia costume which was interesting because A) most kids don't know who she is... only characters from the last three movies released B) the black light made my gown glow and that scared the boogers out of a lot of kids.

Heh heh.

We handed out foam pumpkins at the office and everyone decorated/carved them for a Halloween Pumpkins on Parade event.

I made mine a Puking Pumpkin with seeds, elmers glue, sand and food coloring. Pleasantly disgusting.

Tonight was my Halloween Pie Party. I took pictures, but totally forgot to take a picture of the pie table! How terrible.

We had... apple, pumpkin, peach, peanut butter, chocolate cream, banana cream, lemon meringue, pumpkin cream cheese, pecan and grape. You can sort of see the pies in these party pics. Yay for pie.

I have a whole new respect for my mom and all those costumes she made for me when I was growing up. Peter Pan, Scarlet O'Hara, bengal tiger... I was a demanding little kid.

I was up late Wednesday night sewing my Princess Leia gown and braiding yarn into a mundo bun wig.

Aaron's Darth Vader cape was a lot easier.

We are all set for Halloween. May the force be with you.

I have bowlfuls of pumpkin seeds left over from last weekends pumpkin carving party.

I found this recipe for Pumpkin Seed Brittle and am tempted to try it. If I do I will report back on how it was.

Unfortunately I will not be reporting on how the Jones Carmel Apple soda was, because we left it at my parents house in PA. Drat.

I have been noticing some products have online apps where you can customize a character to look like you and then do something cool with it. The Gap has Watch Me Change, where your character does a strip tease out of their frumpy clothes and changes into an outfit you selected.

Cheerios has Cheerioke... you call in and record yourself singing a song, then the character you build sings it. What that has to do with Cheerios, I am not sure, but it is funny!

The challenge for me is trying to get the character to look as much like me as possible. Too much time has been spent scrolling through selections of noses.

Don't get me wrong... I love my apple-corer-slicer-peeler. (hey look! it does potatoes too!) Aaron and I bicker over who uses it next.

But check out this apple slicer in the MoMA store. It looks so simple. It also looks like it might be hard to twist, but it has one cool feature. If you don't want the whole apple, leave it twisted into it and it "will not dry out or turn brown". Cool!

Mr. Lobster,

I am so sorry for what we did to you. But you were delicious.

Sincerely,
Jenny

PS. I am also sorry my dog barked at you for fifteen minutes.

($6 a pound lobster special at Wegmans!)

It was a soggy day for poking around a pumpkin patch, but everyone was a trooper and braved the elements.

Back at the house we carved the suckers up and enjoyed some pie. It was my SEVENTH Annual Pumpkin Carving Party!

Pictures in My Gallery.

Today was Carrie's first birthday party. I had a gift theme... dogs. I got her a doggie flashlight, a dog board book and made her a tote bag with her and her own two pooches, Murphy and Molly.

You can imagine how pleased I was when her mom held it up and she pointed at herself.

Last weekend, I gathered nuts with my grandma, mom and sister. One of the kinds were hickory nuts. They are found growing wild, rarely in stores. I was picking them up like crazy with visions of nut filled cookies and brownies... free! free nuts! Then my grandma showed me how hard it is to bust them open.

Equally dangerous are the chestnuts that fell from my Dad's chestnut trees. The burs they come in are like mini porcupines.

When we were home last weekend, Oscar got some quality time with Wally.

Route 15 is a popular way to drive from NY to Southern PA. Perched at the top of a windey, curvy section of Route 15, there is the Fry Bros. Turkey Ranch Restaurant.

Aaron and I consider it a hazard to eat there. Is it such a good idea for road travelers to load up on tryptophan laden turkey? But it seems to be popular, even Niagara Falls tour buses stop there.

On our last drive to my parents, we couldn't avoid it any longer. We stopped and partook of the huge plates of turkey, filling, mashed potatoes and corn. Even my "Baby Turkey" dinner was huge.

Aaron drank three cups of coffee to stay awake.

Three snacky jacks from the pumpkin patch and one straggler from my garden were ruthlessly carved for their yummy seeds. The results are sitting out on my front porch.

For those of you that have not heard my rantings about snack jack pumpkins (I call them snacky), they have hulless, nutty, delectable seeds for roasting. If you ever run into one at your local pumpkin patch, buy it, roast the seeds and relish the deliciousness.

Tina has this picture of me taped to her computer with this fortune cookie fortune. I don't know if it means that I am making a surprising friend... or if I am the surprising friend.

I picked this Sweet Potato Butter up in Tennessee. I like apple butter, so I was curious. It was pretty good on toast. I brought back a jar of pumpkin butter for Tina. They also had strawberry butter and peach butter.

I guess you can make just about any fruit into butter, but it must be noted that there is no actual butter included. I think we are going to make some apple butter next week. I like the idea of this crockpot apple butter recipe. Anything I can throw into a crockpot, I am down with.

This is what Aaron and I would look like if we were peanuts.

I left them on Tina's desk and she commented... " I always knew you two were a couple of nuts."

Aaron and I made an apple pie to take home this weekend. My dad loves his apple pie. The recipe called for four pounds of apples and we were suspicious having made applesauce with three pounds of apples the previous evening. We knew what three pounds of apples looked like and couldn't imagine them fitting in a pie pan. So we used two pounds and it turned out just fine. I made a fancy shmancy pie crust decoration of a tree with two birds sitting in it. This will make it harder to cut into.

We go apple picking every year, but we normally just eat them as is. This year Aaron and I decided to do something with the apples so we could enjoy them later on. Last night we made applesauce.

It was an opportunity to use the apple-corer-slicer-peeler. I love how it works and using it never gets old for me. We were jostling for turns using it. We also got to break out the chinois my grandma gave me. It gave the applesauce a great texture... but I am wondering if a food mill would have been quicker.

I made an applesauce project page.

By looking at my kitchen counter, you can probably tell what has been occupying my mind lately.

I love fall!

Besides ripping out innocent bushes, Aaron also ate the elderberry pie we got at the Finger Lakes last weekend.

As way of apology he picked up a mini cherry pie at Baker Street Bakery. He even set up the table with my Halloween table cloth and plates, because he knows how much I love setting up a holiday scene.

The pie was very good.

When I came home from the airport, the bushes that used to be in front of the house... were now laying on the curb waiting for garbage pickup. Aaron had taken a fit and ripped them out. I believe a pick axe was involved.

He did replace the bushes with some really nice flowers... daisies and mums, so I won't complain. But it just goes to show what can happen when you leave someone home alone for a week.

So I am back from Tennessee. The stories we created in the workshop were great (I enjoyed seeing everyone's work) and the festival was way better than expected.

Most of the storytellers were hilarious and some were really moving. It was like sitting and listening to a live performance of NPR all day. I even bought CD's of two of the tellers, Kevin Kling and Donald Davis. Aaron and I are driving home this weekend and I can't wait to listen to them.

I posted pictures from my week in My Gallery and my favorites are on Flickr.

Yeah, not the best picture. I am at the ghost story telling. Boo!

I am here at the story tellers festival listening to stories, yarns, tales, and lore.

Well, there is no Jamba Juice here... the usual treat when I travel. But I did find a Keva Juice, which came pretty close!

One of the best things about Rochester in the fall is apple picking. Fresh crunchy apples right off the tree. We went last Sunday. I picked a whole bunch of mini apples... so cute. All the pictures are in My Gallery and the best ones in Flickr.

Even though I knew going to Tennessee would be interesting, I didn't want to leave my house full of apples, cider, candy apples, grapes and elderberry pie. I hope Aaron left some for me when I get back.

This past Saturday we went down to the Finger Lakes to look at another lake front property. In reality, it was actually another excuse to go down and get grape pie.

We stopped at the blue dog barn again, got an elderberry pie and had tacos at a roadside stand. The property turned out to be a murkey swampy mess... but that's okay... it was a great day for a drive.

All the pictures are in my Gallery and my favorites are in Flickr.

Update from Johnson City TN: I was bummed out to discover as I boarded the plane that I didn't have my cell phone, but my outlook brightened considerably when I stumbled upon a Jamba Juice at the airport on my layover. A "Strawberries Wild" can make one feel much better. (Aaron... ship me my phone! call me at the hotel! wah! )

I am leaving today for a week in Tennessee. My office is sending me to a three day digital storytelling workshop and three day storytelling festival.

I am sure I will have a story to tell when I get back.

Oscar completed another successful Barktober Fest Walk! We raised 202 dollars!

Thanks again to everyone who sponsored us... I emailed out your pictures.

We had a beautiful day and there were so many dogs I was in seventh heaven. Oscar loved haning out with Buddy, Molly and Murphy. All the pictures of the day are on my Gallery and my favorites are in Flickr.

Yesterday was Aaron's 29th birthday and I surprised him with a two hour Wild Hearts Catamaran sunset cruise on Lake Ontario. Chuck and Tina went too... Chuck's birthday was last week, so they get combo bday surprises.

Afterwards, Aaron ate a one pound burger at Cheeburger Cheeburger and got his picture up on the wall. He also got an iPod Nano and a collapsed chocolate cake. The whole story is on my Gallery and favorite pics at Flickr.