Pumpkin Bundt Cake

This is what I'm making for dessert right now. My house is a yummy blend of smells between this and the french dip that's cooking in the crock pot. I'm looking forward to dinner tonight!

* 5 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
* 4 tsp. ground cinnamon
* 1 tsp. ground ginger
* 1/2 tsp. ground cloves
* 1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg
* 4 tsp. baking powder
* 1 1/2 tsp. baking soda
* 1 tsp. salt

* 1 1/4 cups milk, at room temperature
* 1 can (15 oz.) pumpkin
* 1 tbsp. vanilla extract

* 1 cup (2 sticks) butter or margarine, at room temperature
* 1/2 cup vegetable oil
* 2 1/4 cups sugar
* 6 large eggs, at room temperature

Heat the oven to 350º and butter two 10-inch bundt cake pans. Sprinkle with flour, and dump excess flour out.

In a large bowl, stir together the flour, spices, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

In a medium bowl, stir together the milk, pumpkin, and vanilla extract until smooth.

In another large bowl, beat the butter or margarine and oil together with an electric mixer until combined. Next, beat in the sugar. Then beat in the eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Alternately beat in the milk/pumpkin mixture and the flour mixture until just combined. Divide the batter between the two prepared pans.

Bake for 50 to 60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cakes comes out clean. Cool the cakes in the pans for 15 minutes, then turn them out onto wire racks to cool completely.

For the icing, just use your favorite icing recipe, and use maple extract instead of vanilla.

(Makes 2 bundt cakes. You can cut the bottoms off the cakes, stack the flat sides together, then frost with orange frosting. Decorate to make look like a pumpkin. Or, you can take one to a party and keep one at home. Or freeze one - probably; I've never tried to freeze one, but I think it could work.)

Enjoy!

B's staples - with gross pictures

During our new flooring project at the beginning of April, B and his brothers were jumping, and Scott decided it would be fun to bounce B high as he jumped out of the tree. Instead of bouncing him high, it bounced him sideways right into the springs.

Horrendous screams, LOTS of blood, plenty of tears, and a MASSIVE headache later, and it became obvious we'd have to go to the InstaCare. There was no way I was taking four little kids to the InstaCare since Brandon was away at his Spanish class, so I called my neighbor and asked if she would watch the other kids for me.

While I was gone, Scott was so upset by the accident, feeling that he had caused it all and hurt his brother, that he just couldn't calm down. So, our wonderful neighbor gave him a blessing. And he calmed down . . . enough. (I'm so grateful for the priesthood, and for awesome neighbors that help out in times of need.) Anyway, my friend fed Connor dinner (which unfortunately was completely milk-based and caused some massively gross diapers in the days to come), but the other boys wouldn't eat. They were too upset about B.

Meanwhile, B & I were at the InstaCare. Since it was a head injury, they saw us pretty quickly. They irrigated the wound to clean it up, then put some numbing stuff on it. He was quite nervous about getting staples in his head, but he did great. He said that it didn't really hurt. He got a sucker and some stickers, and came home with four staples in his head. One staple in one cut, and three in the other.

He ate a little bit of dinner, then camped out on the couch so I could watch him and make sure he didn't pass out. We kept him pumped full of Ibuprofen and Tylenol to help with the headache, and kept my frozen corn bag on his head. Needless to say, we missed Scouts that night.

He was super embarrassed that he had to get staples (I think there's a trend here), and was glad it had happened over Spring Break, so he wouldn't have to tell all of his friends about it.

A week later, we went back to get the staples out, and that's when the tears fell. It hurt worse to get the staples out than it did to get them in. But, we asked the nurse if we could keep the staples and the staple remover. She looked at us kind of weird, but let us keep them, and B is SO proud to have those little mementos. Kind of funny.

And, a warning - the pictures are kind of gross.


The cut with one staple


Three staples


Both cuts, his hair still wet from irrigating the wound