Happy Halloween

Still very unmotivated to get into the whole trick-or-treat thing with infants, our girls missed out on Halloween 2009. We were rescued from handing out candy from our un-Halloween house by having dinner with friends. But not without being totally humiliated by having to explain to an early round of trick-or-treaters that we don't have any candy to hand out because we had plans to eat dinner at a friend's house. (I'm sure those kids - our neighbors, in fact - totally understood our complicated dilemma.)

We did have ourselves a festive family bake-off though. We were in charge of bringing dessert for our Halloween get together, and it was the perfect excuse to make the pumpkin cupcakes with cream cheese frosting I've been dying to make. Shortly after, Ryan decided he wanted to make his mom's Cinnamon Roll Tea Ring. I lovingly explained to him I already took care of dessert in a "get-out-of-the-kitchen" tone of voice. And ladies and gentlemen, that's when we had ourselves a bake-off:

Let me tell you, having your husband bake and cook is so sweet. Until he starts to compete with you. He even stole my fair-weather helper. We told our friends about our bake-off once we arrived (we didn't have a choice, as an explanation was necessary as to why we brought enough dessert to feed an army). Here was the end result:

(His on the left vs. mine on the right). I lost. Everybody raved about his "cinnies". Some ate my cupcakes out of pity. I even brought mini treats for the little ones. And still lost:

Only two got eaten. How can you go wrong with cream cheese frosting?! Lesson learned: DON'T compete with cinnamon rolls. Ever. The leftover cupcakes were a hit as treats the next week though.

Here's the baby crew (guess who's girls were too cool for school?):

There was even an after dinner slow dance:

We were able to have some Halloween dress up fun with Alexia. As a source of entertainment, we stuffed her into a newborn costume. Here's our red hot chili pepper:

And then Ty, Jenna, Ryan and I ridiculed her some more:

Hope you had a Happy Halloween, too!