Bite-Sized Carmel Apples with Arequipe!

This deli little mordisco is something I associate with typically being a Fall treat, especially Octubre and although anteayer was the last day of the month, this beauty is too good to not enjoy in Noviembre too!

 Use a melon-baller to scoop out little tart apple balls from Granny Smith apples.

Soak the balls in 7-Up to prevent browning.

Poke candy sticks in the balls and allow the juice to flow out before immersing in the Arequipe.

Bueno…..Arequipe is a wee bit costoso here, so I settled for Nestle’s Dulce de Leche.

Heat the arequipe and stir until smooth and flowing.

Generously dip the apples; spin and swirl until covered completely.  Ideally one would have something to cool the apple sticks upright.  I didn’t, so I used small plastic shot glasses.  That way if the arequipe dripped off, it had somewhere to collect and the person eating has some extra to scoop out!

Immediately cool in refrigerator until set.
¡Buen Provecho!

Sofía’s Halloween Disfraces from 2009 to Presente

Look at how my Gatita has changed over three años!

Tigger 2009 

 

 Jirafa 2010

 

Campanita 2011 

 

 

Princesa and Astronauta 2012

Yes….Sofía had two disfraces this Día de las Brujas!  The Princesa disfraz was for our inside festivities.  The Astronauta was for Trick-or-Treating outside in the cold!   We didn’t want this to happen again this year!

Papi dressed up as Pelé.  (I can’t even write this with a straight face!)  But Sofía does know who Pelé is because he wrote a super chévere book!

¡Feliz Día de las Brujas!

 

Disecando Las Calabazas

Our end result is tres different decorated calabazas.  For Señor Calabaza, we used a drill and THAT was super fun!  For the felt sticker Calabaza, Sofía got to do it ALL BY HERSELF and so of course, that was a whole new kind of entertainment.  So when it came to actually carve the last calabaza, Sofía wasn’t too interested until she saw what was inside the calabaza. 

Sofía helped her Papi scrape out the insides and use pinzas to remove all the innards.

The seeds MUST be stirred once in a bowl!

 

  Wow… “¡Mira Mami!”  The pinzas double as a musical instrumento!

Papi shows Sofía how to draw the face before cutting it out.  “¡Hey!  Papi, ese no es cara de princesa!”  He tried to explain why it wasn’t.

She didn't like his answer, so she drew her own cara de princesa on the back!

Halloween Playdate and Parade in the Barrio

The first play date we ever hosted was Sofía’s first Octubre. We are lucky that our barrio has a group of girls all born in 2009 and they are amigas and we try to get together often. The next Octubre, we added costumes to our play date and we have tried to make it be an annual event since then. This year at the Halloween Playdate, Sofía dressed as a Princesa (her newest obsession!)

 

Sofía dressed as Tigger on her first Halloween.

This year we decided to add a Toddler Halloween Parade to our barrio play date.  We decorated our wagon for the event and let the neighbors know we would be out making noise with instrumentos musicales.

The parade was a big hit!  It was nice for the niños to cruise around the barrio in NICE weather (No Huracán Sandy in sight!) and in daylight!  The parade will definitely be an annual event!
And I almost forgot!  One of our neighbors brought a paper crown-making kit for the adults to wear since we are all Royalty!  That was a super idea that certainly needs to be repeated next year too!

El Día de las Brujas

El Día de las Brujas, Halloween, was strange this year in all aspects. 

Sofía dressed up as Campanita.  Here she is visiting Papi’s office.  

Our other fotos of Campanita got erased and since Papi went out of town, we didn’t get many other good fotos before we went pidiendo dulces (by ourselves—still a little bitter!). It snowed, yes, SNOWED, the day before Halloween in Northern Virginia. 

We had to make adjustments to the Campanita costume. 

Next year, I’m making a costume to go over the Winter coat.