getting my act together

Ok, so once again I totally bombed the blog test - if there is one.
I am not giving up, though! There are so many fun things going on that I forget to stop by and do my bloggie ... well, maybe if I knew there were people sitting there, waiting for me to post I might be a bit better - ROFL!!

So today I am going to be totally random and share a recipe for some yummy pumpkin muffins. It started as a pan of bars recipe I found and have switched up a bit to put more good stuff in it and still keep it kid-yummy.
Here it is:
1-1/2 cups pumpkin pie filling
1 cup sugar
1-1/2 cups applesauce (unsweetened is best)
1/2 cup safflower oil (or a vegetable oil)
4 eggs
1-1/2 teaspoons vanilla
2 teaspoons (or to taste) cinnamon
2 cups wheat flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup chopped pecans *optional
1/4 cup white or vanilla frosting *optional
about 48 pieces of candy corn *optional and you may need more
orange food coloring *optional

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F and line 2 muffin tins with wrappers or lightly grease. I have only one good tin, so I have to do this in 2 batches, but they bake better when you only do 1 tin full at a time.
In a large mixing bowl, beat pumpkin, sugar, applesauce, oil, eggs, vanilla and cinnamon. Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a meduim to small bowl; gradually add to pumpkin and applesauce mixture and mix well. If adding pecans, stir in by hand after pumkin and flour mixtures are well mixed.
Fill muffin cups about 2/3 full. If you do 1/2 instead, you will end up with about 28-30 muffins, instead of 24, but I think the size is better for little ones.
Place, one pan at a time in preheated oven and bake for 18-22 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean from the center muffin. Cool while you bake second pan full.
** (optional part - helps to make the muffins more kid-appealing) While your last batch cools, combine frosting and food coloring in a small bowl. Place orange frosting into a small piping bag, or resealable ziplock and snip off a small tip on one end. Pipe small dots where you would place the eyes, then place candy corn over the frosting dots so they stick. Then, pipe funny pumpkin mouths onto the muffins. Serve for a snakc, breakfast of special treat.

These muffins could also be given a more Thanksgiving flare by making little turkey-type decorations of pilgrim hats on top. Or decorate for fall by piping a leaf shape on top. My son absolutely loves them and his classmates the past 2 years devoured them, too!

I will try and post a picture of the yummies tomorrow!