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Monday, October 23, 2006

Fall Family Fun Day 2006

Fall is my favorite season.
I like to pretend that we have a fall.
There may not be any changing color of leaves,
but we might get the occasional sweatshirt weather cool front,
and that makes me all too happy!
With fall, comes the annual Fall Family Fun Day!
Mock us if you must, but we Bacaks love our little traditions.
On FFFD, (which we conveniently had the week we studied the letter F) we get to
pick out our pumpkins. Everyone gets to pick one, but there is a spending limit.
I like to pick one of the so-ugly-they're-pretty gourds, with funky colors and warts
all over them. Rusty seriously makes fun of me for this.
We carve our jack-o-lantern, and by "we" I mean Rusty. I am not fond of touching
pumpkin guts, and neither are my children really. So I stand back and unwrap the
caramels. This is the heavenly part. We make caramel apples with nuts and toffee
bits and all! This is way too messy to make on a regular basis, but WAY TOO GOOD
to not make once a year for the FFFD! My children were covered from head to toe
in caramel. It was on their feet, in their hair (with the exception of Rusty and Jax
because they don't have hair), on every sticky finger, leaving a trail of stickiness wherever
they thought about touching. But still, so worth it for the FFFD.
Our cutey jack-o-lantern is positioned proudly on the front porch now, and Justus keeps pointing
to the other pumpkins and then to the knives, waiting for us to butcher the others. Not going to
happen. One is enough. But who doesn't love the Fall Family Fun? Who?

5 comments:

Kathryn, Michael and Alex said...

Yum...the caramel apples sound great. If they are anything like the bananas Foster I am in...that was just fun to watch.

You have to bake the pumpkin seeds. They are really good with cayenne pepper on them.

Jennifer Bacak said...

I know, I like to do the pumpkin seeds, but I'm the only one. My husband makes gagging noises, and my kids echo it. This is the first year I didn't do it. I'm just giving it up. It's a lot of work for just me.
jenn

Lisa Smith said...

Andrew wants ne to do the pumpkin seeds...how??? I've never heard of this and so how???

Ya'll can have some of mine if you want!

Caramel apples...do you just melt it in a pot? The microwave? How???

Really, I guess I've never had fall fun...good time to start but how?

Thanks for all the advice (in advance)

Jennifer Bacak said...

Okay, here are the Fall Fun instructions Lisa!

You just unwrap a lot of those caramel candies and melt them in a bowl in the microwave with about 2 T of water. You can adjust this according to the consistency of your sauce. (depending on how many caramels you use.) You need to stir it every so often. You can buy some bags of caramel with instructions and popsicle sticks included. I'm cheap so I saved popsicle sticks.

After you dip your apples, either whole or cut in sections, you can roll them in bowls with toppings. We use Heath bar topping, and I like pecan bits also. Prepare yourself for the stickiness!

As for the seeds- you just sort through the pumpkin guts until you get to the seeds, and then wash them in a colander. Try to get all the goo off. Pat them dry a bit, and then put them on a cookie sheet under the broiler for a few minutes. I usually put salt on them first, but Kathryn had a good idea with the cayenne pepper.

We should share recipes more often in the blog world!!!

Happy Fall Fun!
jenn

Anonymous said...

I love traditions! (Have you read "Treasuring God in our Traditions" by Noel Piper?)

And I love Yummy Caramel Apples!

I know it's not halloween we're talking about here...but Jon and I are beginning to make decisions about traditions in our family. What are your thoughts on halloween and how we, as believers, celebrate it? If we do, are we modeling ourselves after the world? Isn't halloween just a celebration of fear and death? ...things that we, through Christ, have been liberated from?

Let me know your thoughts.