Pumpkin and Ghost Brownies

This week I saw a really cute recipe for Pumpkin colored brownies on The Frugal Girls.com. I posted the link to share with my Facebook friends. Some pointed out that that was a lot of added coloring! My Facebook friend, Lisa, over at Retro Housewive Goes Green said "Having asthma I can't do yellow dye #5 and I seem to have issues with blue dyes. Plus they are linked to all kinds of health issues (lots are banned in other countries). She gave me a link to find natural dyes over at the Natural Candy Store.

I do understand about all the dye. These homemade pumpkins really do look yummy?Again these belong to The Frugal Girls.com so click picture to visit!

My daughter and I decided for school that we would make some. We chose to do GHOST so not to use all the food coloring. She also wanted to make pumpkins and decided to just use the white butter cream frosting on them too!

Here is our quick recipe makeover:

*Make your favorite brownies into a 9 X 13 pan.

*When cooled use your cookie cutters. Try to fit each piece in tight to not waste any brownies! We were able to get 12 cut-outs.

*We made buttercream frosting. Do this while the brownies are cooling. You can also buy frosting.

*Once cooled and cut out then frost and EAT! We do not like gobs of frosting so we lightly frosted ours.

Wordless Wednesday

Need more Wordless Wednesday? Got to 5 Minutes for Mom or MomDot to link up!

CurrClick offers Online Guitar Lessons

Million Minute Family Challenge update

Are you in the Million Minute Family Challenge?
120,211 total minutes for the challenge! Our CrAzY gAmErS group has logged 3,025 minutes and in 10th place so far!

Million Minute Family Challenge is to provide a simple but fun way for family and friends to enjoy the benefits of board games. The challenge runs from Sept. 1st- December 31st. This is their 9th year! It isn't too late to join in the fun! Just go get your family/group registered! Every minute counts!

What do you need to do? Minimum they are wanting every team to commit to playing a game for at least 20 minutes between September and December and record their time on the website. How can we reach 1 million minutes? They figure if 1,000 families, groups or organizations X 50 states X 20 minutes of game play = 1 million minutes!



We play a lot of games! My husband is a huge player and keeps records and does reviews on Board Game Geek under the name Malacandra!
 

One of our favorite family games in September was FORMULA MOTOR RACING.  This game is known as one of the quickest-playing auto racing games.  I guess that is why I like this game. Within 15-20 minutes you can play one game.  As a family we usually play 3 in a row.  We love the bright multi-colored cars, awesome game board, 12-sided die and quick and easy rules.  The playing cards that you draw tell your move.  Each player gets two cars of the same color and control them for the game.  On your turn you play one card, draw one card.  This card can be used directly for your car to move up or use it to move, shift other cards forward and backward.  The really cool thing to do is move up another car with your car moving up with it.  


We've played this game with ages 8 and up. Fun and fast!


Here are some pictures of our games!

Can you Limerick?

Limerick
(This was posted on The Homeschool Messenger's : Language Diary)

In Caught ya! #29 William Waggish whispered another one of his inimitable limericks. We learned that limericks were invented in 12-century China as a marching ditty for the army.

The form is 5 lines. The first 2 lines and the last line are to have 8 syllables & rhyme and the 3 & 4 lines are to rhyme with 5 syllables. (Information and instructions from Caught Ya!).

We also learned through Wikipedia that the limerick was made popular by:

Edward Lear in his first Book of Nonsense (1845) and a later work (1872) on the same theme. Lear wrote 212 limericks, mostly nonsense verse. It was customary at the time for limericks to accompany an absurd illustration of the same subject, and for the final line of the limerick to be a kind of conclusion, usually a variant of the first line ending in the same word.

(Lear's limericks were often typeset in three or four lines, according to the space available under the accompanying picture.)

The girls got a chance to write their own limerick!
*******************************
My teacher said to write this trick,
But I never knew what to pick.
So I thought and thought,
Unsure what'd be taught
And now I have this limerick.
******************************
On this white canvas I shall paint,
With colors that will try to taint,
Colors I can say,
Will be used today,
While I use this canvas to paint.
*****************************
Thanks girls you did great!

Now it is your turn! Can you do it? Post one for fun! Teach it to your kiddos and come back here and post!