Recipe: Pumpkin Mousse Pie

Tis the season for delicious pumpkin pie. I love seasonal foods! Tonight I made a pie that was so easy and tastes so good and creamy. It's a lighter version (you can pretty much always expect that from me since I'm a Weight Watcher's girl for life) but personally I think it's better than the real thing. Here it is:

Pumpkin Mousse Pie

1 1/4 cup skim milk
1 package (4 serving size) sugar free/fat free vanilla instant pudding
1 T pumpkin pie spice*
1 cup canned pumpkin
1 8oz tub fat free whipped topping
1 reduced fat graham cracker crust

Mix first 4 ingredients together until blended well. Fold in half of the whipped topping. Pour into crust, top with remaining whipped topping. Refrigerate for about 2 hours before serving.

Serves 8 - Calories 210, Fat 4g, Fiber 1.5g = 4 points/slice

*If you don't have pumpkin pie spice you can use 1 1/2 t. cinnamon, 3/4 t. ground ginger and 1/4 t. ground cloves instead.
Just in case: Courtesy of Keebler

I'm behind on blogging. I still need to update on the last couple weekends so stay tuned! We just took SOOO many pictures that it takes very long to weed through them and then edit them. We always take way more than we need to. Anyway, I want to have them done before blogging.

Why you should be using RSS Feeds...

Ok don't ignore this post just because it seems boring and you think you won't understand it. I'm simply trying to make your life easier!

RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication. If you have Internet Explorer 7 or above there is a REALLY easy way to set up an RSS Feed and I highly recommend doing it. To put it simply, let's say you check this blog on a daily basis only to find that it's not updated. Well instead of wasting the time checking it, you can subscribe to an RSS Feed on this blog. Then you go to your "favorites" tab (yellow star in upper left hand corner) and click on Feeds. All of the feeds you're subscribed to are listed and the feeds that are bold have new information, therefore you know not to check the others. This works well for news sites, blogs and almost anything else you check regularly. To subscribe to a feed you just need to click on the little orange button right in between the "home" and "print" buttons on Internet Explorer. Then just click subscribe and it will be in your "favorites" tab as I mentioned above. If the little orange button isn't orange, it means there is no feed on that site. You can click here to create your own feed on ANY site if there isn't one. Some of you may already know about this but I just discovered it myself and am loving it. Shoot, it also means I'll get less hits :)

Here's a screen shot, I've circled RSS stuff in yellow. Unfortunately none of my feeds are new so none are bold but this just shows what everything looks like. Click on the pic to see it closer.

For Laura and Darren

My sister and her husband are in Europe celebrating their 5 year anniversary (check out their blog). My mom and dad have been watching Abby and Ryan (their kids) this past week but we had them last weekend. Our house is totally not ready for kids but we made it work and they had a great time. Believe it or not we still really want kids (we're just not ready for a 2 and 3 yr old). I was just going to put together a few clips for them from the weekend but ended up making a 6 minute long video with music. The first song doesn't necessarily fit but it sounded so good and I couldn't find another song. It's hard finding a song that matches perfectly!! The second one is better. So anyway, although I produce videos for real estate this is a lot different but it was also a lot of fun! I think I will play around with the software we have and try more things. I've embedded it here but it's also on YouTube (in case it doesn't work for you here).

Guests from Illinois

Ok I'm a little behind...time to catch up...

Sue (Scott's mom) and Linda (Scott's aunt) came to visit us over Columbus Day weekend. I think this is becoming a tradition for them to come up every year at this time. It's such a great time to come because I love the fall and it's so fun doing things outside. This particular weekend was actually pretty warm for this time of year and unfortunately the leaves just aren't as pretty and bold as they have been in the past. Nevertheless, it was a good time.

Saturday Sue wasn't feeling so well so she stayed home with Gus (a very nice co-pilot when you're sick...he sleeps with you ALL day). Linda, Scott and I went up to Mall of America. We roamed around there for a few hours and then came back home to the delicious smell of pulled pork that had been cooking in the slow cooker all day. We then watched the Illini/Wisconsin football game while we ate our dinner. I think by this time we were pretty much tuckered out and decided to go to bed.

Sunday we got up early for church. After church we headed to Lake City and my mom joined us too. In Lake City they were celebrating Johnny Appleseed Days (only we didn't see anything related to JA). We took advantage of the bus system that was provided for the event and went from craft shows to parks to the apple orchard to an art festival. It was perfect! I think my favorite part was the yummy Honey Crisp apples we enjoyed from Pepin Heights. After Lake City we headed to Wabasha to go to the National Eagle Center. I had never been here before (it's brand new). We enjoyed looking at the three live eagles they have in the center and we saw three eagles outside too from a distance. What a beautiful area and gorgeous little town. Definitely worth a visit. Sunday evening we enjoyed dinner and harvest stuffed apples for dessert while playing Euchre. Hmmm I can't remember who won but I'm going to say it was me and Linda :) We make a good team. Monday morning they headed back to Illinois. They are such easy guests and we really really enjoy when they come here. We create wonderful memories and it's a nice break from our everyday life.

Wild Wings Festival, Lake City

Scott's "harvest" pic

Lots of picture-taking

National Eagle Center

Inside

The donor wall...this will only be funny to those who watch Curb your Enthusiasm


Yes this is an eagle eating a rat...pretty gross


Doesn't even look real...beautiful

There's the eagle! Maybe it's time for me to get a new lens...

Through the eyes of a 3 year old...

We gave our nephew Spencer our old camera (that we never used) and he is apparently just having a blast taking pictures of, well, everything. He even left the cutest message on our machine thanking us for the camera. It was funny, Jay (his dad) was telling him what to say and he said "say I love you" and Spence goes "I love you too" We just love these pics, this stuff is worth documenting in his eyes...they're important parts of his life.



I hope this was just a spill












Actually not a bad pic, wonder if he posed "baby" like that










Gotta love it!

Abigail Grace turns 2!

Happy Birthday Abby! Abby is the youngest one on my side of the family. She's just so adorable and I get to see her tomorrow...yay! Maybe she will read this someday...love her so much.

Through the years...

October 11th, 2005


October 11th, 2006




You can see why her nickname is "trouble"

Autumn in Stewartville

Scott went out a couple weeks ago just to take some pictures of our little town.

Happy Birthday Mom!

Yay, it's my mom's birthday today! My mom is the best, I'm so blessed that we are close and can literally talk about anything. Sometimes we talk a little too much and I should be in the office working. I've learned a lot from my mom over the years and know that I have so much more to learn when we start having kids too. I'm so excited for that time. Thanks for all you do, mom. I love you!

A beautiful picture taken before any of us were born


She's been celebrating birthdays for a few years now...love my dad's 'stache


A talent show in MA...a fun time for my parents, an embarrassing moment for us kids


In Washington DC

Which view?

Which view would you rather have at your house?

These two views are from different homes on the SAME street! The good thing is, that second shot leads to many creative experiments in Photoshop:

Happy (belated) Birthday Suzanne!

It was Suzanne's birthday yesterday and I didn't have a lot of time to post. We met Suzanne at our small group about 3 years ago. Since then we've become great friends, we're even going swimming later tonight together because we're in the very early stages of training for a triathlon we'll do next July. This is such a great picture!!! I think her husband Nate took it. It's her "after" picture because she lost over 40lbs with Weight Watchers!! I'm so proud of her, seriously she was VERY committed to losing weight it came off so quickly. She was much more dedicated than most people I see at the meetings. I'm so lucky to have such a wonderful, caring and motivating friend in my life. Hope you had a great day yesterday!