Finding Fall: Spider Stew and Witches Hats

One of the biggest things to get used to when we moved to the desert was the fact that we only have 3 seasons, Soarching Hot, Hot, and Not so Hot so naturally the first year we moved here I wasn’t sure what to do with myself.  Moving from the state with “the greatest snow on earth” to a place where snow doesn’t exist was a huge adjustment.

As a kid, one of my favorite fall memories was putting on our jackets and spending the day outside raking leaves into a huge pile and then jumping off our porch into the pile.  We would do it over and over again.  There is just something about Fall that I love and miss so much.  There is a tangible feeling in the air when the seasons start to change.  I love the smells, the cool air and brisk nights, pulling out the sweaters and boot and preparing for nights sitting by the fire.   But, we don’t get much of that here.  Trust me, I’ve tried pulling out the boots and sweaters(or at least long sleeves)  this time of year because it just seems like it should be cool, but then the 100 degree heat hits as I walk out the door and it’s back to  shorts and flip flops.  My kids really don’t understand that there are places on the Earth where you can’t wear shorts and flip flops all year round.  🙂

So since we don’t have much of a fall and our leaves don’t change colors or fall off (until sometime in January when the first overnight freeze will hit and they turn brown and gross overnight), I try to recreate Fall in my home through lots of decorating and yummy fall food.  I love making different types of soup, even though we may all sit around the table sweating while we eat it.

Last night to kind of kick off the Fall/Halloween season we had Spider Stew and Witches Hats.

Both of these were really easy to do.  For the Spider Stew I made our favorite Chili recipe and added a ball of cheese in the middle for the spider body, olives for the eyes and Frito corn chips for the legs.  Of course, you could make this with any type of stew/soup.

For the witches hats, I used refrigerator crescent rolls and only rolled them up half way.  Then I cut out stars and moons out of pepperoni and baked them according to the package, which was 375°  for 10-12 mins.

I love being able to take something we would normally be eating and turn it into something fun for the boys.

Now if we can just get a break from our HOT weather, maybe, just maybe, it can start to feel like fall around here.

For more easy Halloween ideas check out Easy Haunted House Cake, Spider cake and cupcakes and Easy Halloween crafts/decorations.