Addicted to eBay - Autumn Decorations

My local post man commented to me yesterday that he never used to get parcels to deliver on my road…as he handed over 5 parcels to me!! Hmm, I may have developed a bit of an eBay addiction. Although, actually, three of yesterday’s parcels were not bought by me, so they don't count right?!

There were some delicious baked treats and other gifts from Maria, as a thank you for sponsoring her for the Great North Run…

Love the PB Crispy Squares – so delicious. After gobbling down two almost immediately yesterday, I put the rest in the freezer (as I do with most of my baked good) – out of sight, partly out of mind (?!) – although as I discovered this morning, they are just as tasty frozen too!

Thanks again Maria!

I was also sent some tasty bread to review, I used to love fruit loaf when I was younger, hadn’t had any for years.

And also some Truvia, I’m interested to see how this compares to the Stevia I usually buy from iHerb – it would be much cheaper and more convenient if I could use this instead.

Then there were my purchases... Let me pre-empt this by saying that I have serious “fall decor” envy from all the US blogs…why don’t we celebrate Autumn over here in the same way?! Even the UK eBay doesn’t have a comparable selection, but I did manage to find some cute things.

Yankee candle holders with cinnamon candles and frosted pumpkin candles…

(These were from two different sellers so counted as parcels #4 and #5) I have the frosted pumpkin candles in at the moment, smell so good!

I also couldn’t resist buying a few things in Waitrose on Tuesday – I seemingly have a thing about orange candles at the moment...

I need to find something to put the little pumpkin candles in…any suggestions? I used to have a glass bowl that would have probably worked (as they seem to float, short term at least, from my quick test yesterday!) but Toby smashed that a few months ago

This morning, another couple of eBay purchases arrived. I made the dangerous discovery that Essie nail polishes are a lot cheaper on eBay, even still brand new…

So pretty! These mini ones are perfect as I don't think I've ever run out of a nail polish - they always dry out before I finish the bottle, so this is definitely a more economical option. I’ve also started buying blue mugs – to match our kitchen! We do have all our mugs on display, as we run out of cupboard space so they live on shelves – for every blue mug I buy, I can give a non-blue one away…haha, I’ll take a photo once the shelves are full of blue mugs only!!

My final parcel is my absolute favourite – I recommend that all UK bloggers buy some too! Gorgeous fabric pumpkins:

I absolutely love these! Great service too – it said that they might take up to a week to make, but she sent them out two days after I ordered them. My mantelpiece isn’t quite “Autumn ready” yet, but here’s what it looks like so far to give you an idea of the size of the pumpkins (for some reason I can't read measurements had it in my head that they'd be bigger, but they fit in better being this size so I'm happy!)…

So adorable, I can’t wait to show them to Izzy when she gets home from school – I think Liam thinks I’ve gone slightly mad (!!), but Izzy appreciates pretty things!

Right, and after looking at all that, I really must stop spending money…!!

Do you buy things from eBay? Or decorate your house depending on the season? I’ve always liked Christmas decorations – we started the tradition a few years back of each of us buying a new tree decoration each year. But obviously you can only really have the Christmas decorations up for a limited amount of time. I love the warm colours of the pumpkins and leaf decorations too, perfect for cold nights cuddled up in front of our (fake) fire  I've also already got my eye on a few "spring decorations" on eBay too, aaah, definitely addictive!!

Start of September…Back to Pumpkin

Am I ready for the end of Summer – both the school holidays and the sunny weather? No.

Am I, nevertheless, starting to look forward to Autumn? Maybe.

I was doing a bit of online window shopping last night and, instead of bikinis or cute summer dresses, I found myself lusting after hoodies and chunky jumpers.

And I may have opened one of my (many) tins of pumpkin that has been lurking in my larder since last Autumn. I actually opened it on the 31st August, but shhh, we’ll keep pretending that my taste buds are super in tune with the seasons!!

So on Friday I made a Oh She Glow’s pumpkin gingerbread smoothie – one of my favourites from last year.

Delicious, but too strongly spiced for Toby, and perhaps a bit too fall-like for me just yet.

So this morning I cut out the spices and molasses, added in the all important peanut butter (!), and made a mellowed down pumpkin smoothie that is perfect for adult and children taste buds alike!

Peanut Pumpkin Smoothie
(makes 2 large portions)

• half a tin of pumpkin (200g)
• 2 frozen bananas, chopped before freezing
• 500ml milk (I used organic cows but you could use non-dairy if you want this to be vegan)
• 50g oats
• one huge heaping tbsp smooth peanut butter (prob about 60g?)

1. Put the milk, oats and pumpkin into the blender jar, and leave in the fridge for a few hours/overnight. This isn't essential, but will help you get a smoother result.
2. Add the bananas and peanut butter when you are ready to eat, and blend until smooth and creamy.

I prepped this first thing this morning and put it in the fridge whilst Izzy and I went swimming. Exactly what we wanted when we got home a few hours later

Thumbs up from Izzy (despite the face, ha, I think she still had a mouth full of smoothie!!)…

And Toby gave it his version of a thumbs up too…

Divine. I think I possibly even prefer this version to the spiced one – it has a lighter flavour whilst still being super thick and creamy. Definitely more “appropriate” while the sun is still shining…the perfect transition into pumpkin season!!

Are you ready for Summer to be over yet? Thought about eating pumpkin? I love summer, especially the recent (for England) heat we’ve been having – beach, iced lattes, sunbathing etc are my idea of bliss. I’m also sad that schools start back next week, however it is never too early to start eating pumpkin!! I’m pretty sure I was still eating it into Spring this year, but I have seemingly now had a long enough break from it to start wanting it again! I might stick to this smoothie for now though – pumpkin oats can start happening when the weather gets cooler again, which wont be long I’m sure!

Three Tins Of Pumpkin In One Week!

Yep, that's right, I have been eating a lot of pumpkin this week! I must phone/visit Waitrose soon to check they've got pumpkin back in stock - I've only got one tin left in the cupboard now! Has anyone seen tinned pumpkin in their Waitrose yet?

I used two of the tins of pumpkin right at the start of the week, to make Oh She Glow's Pumpkin Butter. This recipe seemed really simple, and indeed turned out great. The only thing I would say, though, is make sure you've got enough time to spend the whole cooking time in the kitchen. I started making it about an hour before I had to go out on Monday. The recipe said 35-45 minutes cooking time so I thought this would be fine - I figured I could get myself and Toby ready in between stirring it, and then leave it to cool while we were out. The recipe does say that it needs stirring "frequently", but what it really means is "constantly" - it turned into a 'volcano', making a huge mess over the oven, when it wasn't being stirred. I find that passata acts like this when heated too, strange. Anyway, the pumpkin butter was worth the stirring time, it is so versatile - I have spent most of the week eating it!

I used two standard size tins of Libby's pumpkin to make this (the recipe calls for 1 29oz tin, but when I converted that into grams I realised that was actually two of our tins) and it made one very full jar for me, plus some for my Mum to try (she didn't want too much) and a little, unpictured, amount for my Grandma...

This is really tasty just from the spoon - sweet but not too sweet. On Tuesday morning I decided to have some on a bagel, but first I opened a third tin of pumpkin to make Musings of a Violet Monkey's Spiced Pumpkin Cream Cheese to go with it.

Yes, I did buy that mini pumpkin just for these photos/decoration - I've been envious of all the American bloggers' decorations!!

I love this. The only downside was that Lidl don't sell Philadelphia cream cheese so I had to use own brand, which was a bit runnier. The flavours were still amazing though, and lesson learnt that next time I'll walk a bit further to buy the decent cream cheese!

So some uses of my pumpkin products...

• A cinnamon raisin bagel with pumpkin cream cheese and pumpkin butter:

I loved the combination of the pumpkin cream cheese and the pumpkin butter - winner!

• Yoghurt (in this case Rachel's coconut) with pumpkin butter and granola:

Loved this. The pumpkin butter works as well with cold foods as it does with hot. It added a really nice lightly sweet and spicy flavour to the yoghurt.

• Pumpkin porridge with pumpkin butter and Justin's chocolate peanut butter:

I adored this. How could I not? For the porridge I just used oats, milk, pumpkin and vanilla stevia, as the spices were coming from the pumpkin butter. The chocolate peanut butter was a great addition too - pumpkin + chocolate is always fantastic!

• Apple slices dipped in pumpkin cream cheese:

Izzy and I shared this as an after-school snack. A yummy alternative to peanut butter, although Toby didn't like the mess it made on his fingers!

I still have some pumpkin butter and pumpkin cream cheese left for when I get back from Bath, but they will be good to use for a while yet. I wanted to use the last of the third tin of pumpkin before we went away though, so yesterday (Friday) afternoon I made these...

I'll blog this recipe sometime next week as this post is getting long already. These are really tasty though - Toby and I shared two of them and then I put the rest in the freezer before they disappeared too!! Now I know that I can give Izzy cake in her lunchbox, these will make a great option for an occasional treat as I can just take one out of the freezer the night before I want to give it to her.

What are your favourite seasonal recipes at the moment? Do you find yourself doing more baking at certain times of the year? The blog world seems to be awash with pumpkin recipes at the moment! And apple, that's another ingredient I love to use. I'd like to start making more savoury recipes though as Liam doesn't eat any of my fruity baking so I end up eating a lot more of it myself than I probably should!!! In winter I do find myself doing a lot more baking though, it's a good way to warm myself up aside from anything else! I'm planning to make a lot of foodie treats to give as Christmas presents this year also, but I'll discuss that in another post nearer the time!

Pumpkin's Back!

Well, nearly. Before Liam stopped working at Waitrose (last shift today, whoop whoop!!) I asked him to find out something very important. Are they going to start selling Libby's tinned pumpkin again soon? The answer is YES! Apparently my local store is going to start stocking it again in a few weeks...I hope it's the same for other stores as I know some of you have also been having trouble buying it.

This means I can start using up the tins of pumpkin I've had stored in my cupboard since last winter - I didn't want to use them up too quickly until I knew I'd be able to replace my stash!

When I saw the rain pouring down this morning, one thing came to mind - Pumpkin Spice Lattes!

This was great, I loved having a different flavour to regular coffee, and it was less sweet than I was expecting from the recipe. As Averie suggests, I made a double batch of the pumpkin milk so I'd have more for coffee refills later...haha, yeah right!

I'd tried the pumpkin milk on its own as well and it was delicious, so I decided to pour some out to share with the children...

Needless to say, once the children tried this, I didn't get a look in!

As you might be able to tell from the above photos, Izzy didn't exactly get her fair share of the pumpkin milk either - Toby was very possessive of the glass/straw!!

So once Toby had gone for his morning nap, I used the last of the pumpkin milk to make Izzy and I some drinks - chocolatified! I'd left the pumpkin milk in the blender jug, so I re-blended it with cocoa powder and some agave nectar (plus a random splash of gingerbread syrup I had lying around) to make chocolate pumpkin smoothies...

I think I even preferred this to the coffee version...chocolate anything is usually a success!

Thanks for your well wishes for Izzy on my last post. She wasn't right at all on Friday - she even took herself off for a nap rather than having lunch which is definitely unusual for her! But she woke up on Saturday morning back to her normal self, and is now looking forward to going back to school tomorrow :) I don't know what caused it - she was only sick first thing in the morning, then just had a tummy ache all day - but I'm glad she's better now - I'll take bouncy, full of energy Izzy over quiet, poorly Izzy any day!

What are your favourite pumpkin recipes? Are there any other seasonal items you look forward to coming back into the shops? Next on my list for pumpkin recipes is pumpkin butter. I don't think I've ever tried any fruit butters before, but this recipe looks great, and pretty easy too. I do also love all the gingerbread type treats that Lidl seems to stock near Christmas. I noticed the other day that they've already started selling chocolate Santas, but I'm not ready for Christmas foods quite yet!