Pumpkin Everything: Pumpkin Butter

With the intense fall heat we've been having, and given our experience with getting pumpkins too early in the month, we decided to hold off on all pumpkin-ing until the week of Halloween.

First stop, the pumpkin patch!

We still have the rule that you can't get a pumpkin that you can't carry.  And my kids couldn't be more different about that.  Thatbaby likes little ones, veering away from anything that even looks heavy.

Thatkid, on the other hand, is always going for broke, trying to get the largest pumpkin he can physically hold.  Thatboy even tried to institute a new rule that you had to make it all the way to the wheelbarrow with your pumpkin, but Thatkid was up on that game too.

Once we had our pumpkins, we headed to the other things the patch has to offer.  We skipped the hay ride this year, because it was already hot and sticky.  We didn't want to sit in the hot sun, getting even hotter, and getting stuck by straw.

We did get lost in the corn maze.

And Thatbaby always loves the petting zoo portion of the pumpkin patch.

This year they even opened up the sunflower for "u-cut" sunflowers at $1 a stem.

Monday night, we got to work turning our pumpkins into works of art.

And then Tuesday night we headed to Plan 9 for their annual pumpkin carving contest.  As usual, Thatboy and Thatkid collaborated on the idea.  Thatkid came up with the idea, and Thatboy worked on different designs, until they both agreed.  Then Thatboy did the actual carving.

This year however, we invited Thatkid's friends and Thatkid helped his friend with his design.

Then Thatkid cheered his heart out so that his friend ended up taking second place!  Poor Thatboy.

With all that pumpkin fun, I really wanted to use the pumpkins to make pumpkin butter.  It's fairly well known about my love of all things pumpkin flavored, and in fact, my friends teased me for not picking up pumpkin butter with my annual Trader Joes pumpkin haul.  But pumpkin butter is one of those things that's so easy to make.  And while I didn't get around to making it with real pumpkin this year, canned pumpkin puree is one of the reasons this is so easy!  I love it thrown on top of toast, bagels, or english muffins, used in a turkey sandwich, and it works great as a cinnamon roll filler!

Pumpkin Butter

1 cup canned pumpkin puree

1/4 cup sugar

1/4 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup apple cider

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1/2 tsp ginger

1/4 tsp cloves

juice of 1/2 lemon

1. Combine all the ingredients in a saucepan over medium heat.  Bring to a simmer, and let simmer for about 35 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool completely before using.