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[photo: Halloween 2005]

Happy Halloween! Alas, our darling kitten is not this small and delightful anymore, though he is still quite fluffy and sweet and cute. I have parent teacher conferences today, so the celebrating will have to wait until eveningtime.

We are having our 6 nieces and nephews over as we do every year, though this will be the first Halloween in our new home. I am looking forward to it! We will make hotdog mummies and cheesy crescent roll ghosts, and I baked up a heap of Chex mix. Simple food, but yum.

Have a happy night! Be safe!

This is a photo I took of Prince William Sound when R and I were in Valdez, Alaska 2 years ago. It is featured in this arcticle at Matador Travel. Check their site out, there is a wealth of information and a community of people to share ideas and questions about travel. Neat!

I get up before R on weekdays, and while she's still sleeping I make her a fresh pot of tea in this beautiful teapot. She drinks all varieties of green tea (sushi tea especially), and these handmade teacups are her two very favorites. They were made by a potter friend of ours who makes lovely majolica pottery. We keep the them out on the counter all the time, and they never fail to make me smile.

I wish there were more beautiful handmade things like these in our lives. I think it's a shame that beautiful and handmade is the exception to cheap, mass-produced plastic, rather than the other way around. I like handmade things not just because they are beautiful, but because I enjoy the connection to other people through their handiwork.

The next step– more handiwork of my own! I've been missing creation in my life lately. As much as I create with my students (and we do a lot of creating), my own projects have been on the back burner for some time. Maybe I need to dedicate an evening a week to personal projects? Or maybe I need to dedicate fewer evenings to grading papers…

It's a hectic time of year for us. The 1st quarter ended last week, and I've been busy writing report cards and getting ready for conferences. Class time is filled with Halloween projects and activities, and in the midst of this I am trying to get some assessments done to show at conferences. I was just about to start a math assessment when I saw one of my kiddos look out the window and gasp. I must admit, my first thought was, "Why are you interrupting us? We need to start this test." But I swallowed that thought and asked the kids if they'd like to go to the window and watch.

They were completely mesmerised by the mama moose and two babies outside. And, silly me, it made no difference at all that we missed 5 minutes from out math test time. They're still talking about those moose– some are even researching what the moose were eating and why moose come into the city more in the winter. Lesson learned.

[Ed: Yes, that is a white sheet of snow. It's here to stay until springtime!]

I made this amazing salted butter caramel sauce (found at smitten kitchen). Wow. I made it specifically for hot caramel apple cider, and it works wonderfully. It is also perfect with a honeycrisp apple. Mmmm.

Even though I am not a candy maker, (or much of a baker, really,) I found this recipe easy enough to do. You begin by melting the sugar, which was equal parts scary and fascinating. At first it seems like nothing's happening at all, then you see bits of liquified sugar. Then everything gets quite clumpy and frightening-looking, but with enough stirring and heat it all came together into beautiful, buttery deliciousness. Must experiment by putting this on more foods. Really, what wouldn't it taste good on?

The cold weather these past few weeks has brought out the nesting instinct in me, and I've been baking and simmering up a storm. Alas, it has been winter already in Fairbanks for a good month. It's going to be a long one. But with recipes like this, I just might make it.