Weekend Recap: Halloween Edition:)

Hope you guys had a great weekend and a great Halloween!! 

We got our festivities started early on Friday night with a little pumpkin carving fun....didn't they come cute??

And for dinner, I made another (HUGE) batch of Pumpkin Peanut Butter pasta...and a new dish:  French Onion Mac & Cheese (made with vegetable broth for my vegetarian folks)!  I let the onions cook a good 15-20 minutes to get a nice golden color before dropping them in the glorious Gruyere cheese sauce....YUM!

Confession:  Scott is NOT a fan of Mac & Cheese at ALL!  Weird, I know...but I actually may have converted him with this recipe:)  He even had leftovers for lunch on Sunday afternoon.  Ding, Ding, Ding...we have a winner here:)

We also made our favorite ""Green Goblin" Garlic Bread...which is never very pretty, but tastes AWESOME!  We couldn't believe everyone polished off both loaves:)

For desserts I made some (unphotogenic:) Ellie Krieger Pumpkin Pie Rice Pudding (made with arborio rice and baked in the oven...easy peasy!)  Annnnddddddddddddddd....my favorite of the night:  Caramel Apple Whoopie Pies!! :)

I made an apple cookie following this recipe (nixing the walnuts & raisins) and made a caramel buttercream using butter, powdered sugar, marshmallow fluff & caramel sauce.  I have to tweak the recipe a bit because they did need a LOT of caramel to compensate for the SPICE of the apple cookie...but these were pretty darn good, if I do say so myself:)

We kept the spirit all throughout the weekend with some sliced apples and caramel drizzle for a Halloween snack....complete with "The Ring" :)

And of course, our traditional Halloween dinner of slow cooker Chili!  This year we made a turkey chili with half a jar of BBQ sauce, mixed with a 28 oz. can of tomato sauce and a can of tomato paste gave just enough of all of the flavors without anything being too overwhelming....SO GOOD!

Hope you guys celebrated in style as well!!!

Well...I must admit, as much fun as October was...it was completely insane with 2 trips PLUS the holiday.  So I am COMPLETELY ready to get back on a NORMAL eating & working out schedule!  I did the best I could all month while still enjoying myself, but now I'm just ready to buckle down these next few weeks before we get into the BIGGGGGGG celebrations! :) hahahhahahaha....so probably the most terrifying part of yesterday was breakin out my Bob Harper DVD after a few week hiatus and having him totally kick my ass in Yoga 1:)  I was SHAKING like a leaf...let me tell ya:)  But it was a necessary and WELCOME return:)  Hope you guys have a great "back to normal" Monday:) 

Happy November!