She's Growing Up To Be AWESOME

They were five of the longest minutes of my life. It was three years ago that I stood in our yard carefully placing styrofoam tombstones while Alexis watched. "What are these?" she asked.

For those five minutes, I regretted reveling in the spooky side of Halloween. Cutesy Winnie the Pooh decorations certainly would have been easier to explain to a three-year old, but then again, where is the fun in easy? I found my way out of the conversation and quickly went running back to my love of spooky stuff.

Fortunately, Alexis joined me not long after. By the time kindergarten rolled around, she was ALL IN.

I'm sorry my kid is so cool. It's genetics at work.

As kindergarten Alexis prepared for her night as an evil vampire, she made a request. She wanted to make a complete witch's kitchen in our dining room. She had tons of ideas about how we could go about creating it, but the key point was that we needed bottles for witch ingredients. A year ago I asked the husband to save some empty bottles and a year ago I planned to decorate those bottles for the witch's kitchen.

Um, we painted the bottles with glittery paint this past weekend. They still aren't fully decorated (I have to make labels--the stickers I found at Target just aren't cutting it), but at least we started them! A year later!

And we took care of one other Alexis idea while we were at it.

There are no words for how proud I am of Alexis for thinking of ripping a doll to pieces and shoving it in a jar.

It's floating in clear hand soap, by the way. Oh, and a few drops of red food coloring. Alexis said there needed to be blood, so I obliged.

Halloween is going to be SO fun with Alexis around, especially now that she's old enough to enjoy the spooky stuff.

More Fairy Fun (And A Giveaway!)

If you haven't figured it out by now, perhaps now would be a good time to make it crystal clear: we take our fairies very seriously around these parts.

Exhibit A:

That's the original fairy garden, which has been joined by many more. In fact, there are at this very moment no less than six fairy houses in varying stages of magical fairieness. Alexis is OBSESSED. I'm absolutely 100% OK with that.

So, obviously, when we were given a chance to preview the new Tinkerbell movie, Secret of the Wings, I was all aboard the fairy train. Again. Toot toot!

The direct-to-video movie is the latest in the Disney Fairies franchise. It's coming out on Blu-ray and DVD October 23rd, but we got to watch it WAY early. The basic premise is that Tinker Bell wanders a bit too far from home and finds that her wings are sparkling like crazy. She can't handle not knowing why, so she goes on an adventure to the Winter Woods and eventually ends up discovering that she has a sister, Periwinkle. Periwinkle and Tinker Bell were apparently born of the same baby's laughter, but I think "Periwinkle" is named as a "wink" to what really happened.

Ahem.

Grown-ups will know what I'm talking about if they watch the movie. That's all I'm saying.

Alexis, of course, watched the movie completely enthralled with the new characters (who are gorgeous, by the way), the new scenery, and the new storyline. She fell in love with Periwinkle and quickly started brainstorming ways we can winterize our fairy gardens for the winter fairies who are surely preparing to move into our gardens. The first order of business is that I need to figure out how to make two matching winter coats and "pom pom boots" for the fairies. Alexis may not have a sister, but I guarantee if she did, she would insist on wearing matching clothes. She wants to live that fantasy through the magic of the fairy gardens.

I decided to ask Alexis a few questions about Secret of the Wings right after she finished watching it for the first time. Here’s what she had to say:

That's a thumbs up, just in case you were distracted by the ending and forgot what else she said.

If you would like a chance to win a "Flitterific Farries Blu-Ray™ Double Pack" (it's a Blue-Ray/DVD Combo), please leave a comment below telling me what you enjoy sharing with your sister if you have one, or what you would share with a sister if you don't. Alexis would absolutely vote for matching clothes. I'm so not kidding.

Rules:

No duplicate comments.

You may receive (2) total entries by selecting from the following entry methods:

a) Leave a comment in response to the sweepstakes prompt on this post

b) Tweet (public message) about this promotion; including exactly the
following unique term in your tweet message: #SweepstakesEntry; and leave the URL to that tweet in a comment on this post"

c) Blog about this promotion, including a disclosure that you are receiving a sweepstakes entry in exchange for writing the blog post, and leave the URL to that post in a comment on this post

d) For those with no Twitter or blog, read the official rules to learn about an alternate form of entry.

This giveaway is open to US Residents age 18 or older. Winners will be selected via random draw, and will be notified by e-mail. You have 72 hours to get back to me, otherwise a new winner will be selected.

The Official Rules are available here.

This sweepstakes runs from 10/8 to 10/31.

Be sure to visit the Secret of the Wings Reel Sisterhood brand page on BlogHer.com where you can read other bloggers’ reviews and find more chances to win!

Sugar-Free Crockpot Applesauce

If ever you've had the urge to make your house smell so good you started to consider eating the walls, I've got just the recipe for you.

Crockpot applesauce.

Applesauce is insanely easy to make. It's even more so when you just throw the apples in a crockpot and leave it all alone for a few hours.

This recipe isn't really what I'd call a recipe, but that's only because you're the boss, applesauce. Want it sweeter? Go ahead. Want it without cinnamon? That's fine. Want to use sweeter/tarter/cheaper apples? OK. It'll still turn out just fine.

To make up for this not really being a recipe, let me teach you a little trick I like to use. The first important fact is that you can freeze fresh applesauce. So, I use the small disposable Ziploc bowls and create my own portable applesauce cups. I pull one out of the freezer in the morning. It's thawed sufficiently by lunch time. If the container makes it back home, great. If not, that's fine as well.

For what it's worth, Alexis would like you to know that waiting for the applesauce to defrost is optional. She says frozen applesauce is AMAZING, especially when it's a little bit slushy.

Sugar-Free Crockpot Applesauce

8-10 large apples - cored, peeled, and cut into chunks
1/2 cup water
1 tablespoon lemon juice
3 cinnamon sticks
Honey, if desired

1. Throw the apples into a crockpot. A tip - when cooked down, the apples will take up about half as much space as they do when cut into chunks. I tend to fill my crockpot as much as possible while still getting the lid on it, knowing that I'll get half a crockpot of applesauce out of my efforts.

2. Add the water, lemon juice, and cinammon sticks.

3. Cover and cook on low 4-6 hours. (Time varies based on the type of apple. Softer apples cook faster, but you can't really overcook applesauce as far as I can tell.) (Let's just pretend I don't know that because I once left it in the crockpot for 9 hours.) (It was still fine, but I wouldn't recommend trying that yourself.) (I really like parenthesis. Can you tell?)

4. Stir thoroughly to break the apples up completely. You'll know it's done when stirring the apples turns them into applesauce without any effort.

5. Sweeten with honey, if necessary. (It depends on how sweet you like the applesauce and what kind of apples you use. I like to use a blend of 4-5 different kinds of apples and usually end up adding about 2 tablespoons of honey.) Stir, stir, stir.

6. Pull the cinnamon sticks out and throw them away.

7. Store in the fridge for up to a week or freeze the applesauce indefinitely.