Mixing Up Mondays

I'll never complain about it being October (it's my favorite month) but, where did the year go?!  I cannot believe that we're in the 10th month of the year already!  Goodness.  Before you know it, we'll be talking about Thanksgiving and Christmas.  Walmart has skipped Halloween and Thanksgiving and already has their Christmas stuff out.  Really?!

This weekend, we spent all day Saturday on the lawn and garden.  The day included two trips to Walmart and Home Depot, oh the horror joy!  It was time to mulch to the flower bed, replace grass from a certain incident that happened a few weeks ago and get a little festive for fall.  Oh, and plant a garden!  I'm excited for fresh veggies!  Thankfully, the weather was perfect for spending some time outside...and that really got me in the mood for fall goodies!

Pumpkin recipes anyone??

My first favorite pumpkin recipe is from Joy the Baker.

These pumpkin cookies are now a fall staple at our house.  I make myself wait to bake them until a little further into October because once I start baking them, we eat the whole batch and then I bake more and we eat more and it becomes a vicious cycle...until I loathe the thought of eating one more cookie.  I think they're that good (so does John).  They're the consistency of muffin tops (win!) and are so yummy.  Joy recommends butterscotch chips, which are good, but I experimented with white chocolate chips and like that much better!

Pumpkin bread is another favorite.  I'm going to share a family recipe with you for this one.  My grandma has been making this bread forever and it's yummy!

Ingredients:
1 cup oil
3 cups sugar
4 eggs, beaten
1 can pumpkin
2/3 cup of water
3-1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 teaspoon nuts
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon cloves
1 teaspoon nutmeg

Cream together oil and sugar.  Add all remaining ingredients, mix well.  Add batter to greased loaf pan and bake at 350 for 1 hour.  Yields 4 loaves.

I hope you enjoy the recipes!  They're two of my favorites for fall!