roasted pumpkin seeds

The perfect post-carving snack!

Wash & dry pumpkin seeds. Spread out on a rimmed cookie sheet. Bake for 10 minutes at 350*.

Take out of the oven and pour 1/4 cup veg oil over the seeds to lightly coat.

Then mix in toppings. Last year we tried garlic salt plus cayenne pepper. This year we used cinnamon and sugar. Mix in about 2 tsp. of whatever type of toppings you choose.

Once you've mixed in the toppings, spread back out on the cookie sheet and bake at 300*. My recipe said 30 minutes but I took them out after 15 and that seemed plenty (last year I burned them).

Delish. (Note: these are pretty high-calorie. But healthy, so long as you don't smother them in sugar, I guess!)

almost Halloween!

Is anyone still here?? I'm going to make an effort to update this blog more frequently, so be patient with me - I'll be better!

Let's see... here are a few things we have been up to! (Although most of these photos have been posted on Facebook already, so if you are there this will probably be boring to you. Sorry.)

Anna is getting to be such a big girl! Her hair is finally long enough for pigtails, so I have been learning the fine art of wrestling a toddler in order to do her hair. Actually, she's come to really enjoy having her hair brushed and put into pigtails. It's like she knows she is cute.

October has been a very busy month. We enjoyed a visit to the pumpkin patch (Wagner Farms in Corrales).


The following week, I had Columbus Day off from work. I'm not really a fan of Columbus Day but I am a fan of free days off! We went to Taos for the day and had a great time - lunch at the Adobe Bar in the historic Taos Inn, walked around the plaza for a while, then stopped at the Vivac Winery for a tasting on our way back. The weather was perfect and the leaves were gorgeous.


We carved a pumpkin last night, of which I will try to upload photos soon. Anna didn't think it was all that exciting, apparently, although she was interested in the pumpkin seeds I roasted.

Anna is amazing us every day - she is starting to string some words together into sentences and is suddenly very interested in babies, carting her doll (a Christmas gift that she hadn't been too attached to until this week) around with her, pushing her in the doll stroller, etc. We think she must be very excited about the impending birth of her "cousin," the son/daughter (don't know yet!) of our dear friends Em & Brett. Little K is over a week overdue and we are keeping on high alert!

Our last news is that I was diagnosed with gallstones after a middle-of-the-night visit to the ER last week! I'd been having stomach trouble since May, but hadn't had symptoms since July, so I was cautiously optimistic that whatever I had was healed (I thought it might have been an ulcer). No such luck - I will have to have my gallbladder removed sometime soon. I have a surgery consult on November 11 and we'll try to schedule the surgery sometime soon after that. I have heard the surgery itself is pretty minor and I should be back to normal soon - although I might not be able to eat fatty foods any more! I don't really eat them now, but... no french fries? Ever? Oh, well, there are worse things...

Thanks for all the good wishes - I really appreciate them! We are feeling very fortunate to be near my parents, who came over to our house in the middle of the night to watch Anna so we wouldn't have to take her to the ER with us. Thanks for taking such good care of us, Mom and Dad!

Stay tuned for Halloween pictures... I think they'll be worth the wait... :)