Bake Me a Halloween Cupcake 2019

Miss V, Mr C, Zak, and Nicole A H Porter as cupcakes and bakers

Miss V told us she wanted to be a cupcake for Halloween, so I asked Mr C if he wanted to be a donut or another treat. He likes to do what his big sister does, so he wanted to be a cupcake, too. With a puppy on top.  With a dragon tail.  I told him, "Let's stick with the first two for now." We found dog ears and mittens, and got some face paint for a nose, if he decides to actually go with the "puppy decoration on top of the cupcake" costume on Halloween night.

I decided to be a baker to go along with their costumes. Zak thought for a moment about the baker look and wanted to go with The Muppet's Swedish Chef. That is, until he tried on the fake eyebrows and mustache I bought for him and he started inhaling fake wafts of hair. Just bakers.

I found small laundry baskets at the dollar store, and bought flannel solid fabric to pleat for the wrapper. They had some really soft non-pilling white fleece, so I chose that for the frosting. The kids helped me cut some felt strips for the sprinkles. I used some of the extra strips of white fleece to make suspenders attached to the laundry baskets, and then hand-stitched the white fleece onto the top. I sewed the top of the frosting, leaving holes for heads and arms. They do have to slip into the costumes from the top, but I'm glad they are outerwear-friendly costumes this year, because we will be wearing lots of layers as we trudge through snow from house to house. They'll earn their candy this year. Mwhahaha.

Thanks, Brother Todd Glad, for taking professional level pictures at our neighborhood Halloween party. They are fantastic!

Puppy dog nose

Our Swedish Chef. For about 3 minutes.

Muir Beaver Reunion

A couple of  Muir families left Scotland, came to America, headed west to be with the rest of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints members, and were called to Cedar City to work. After a while some of them headed north to Beaver, Utah, where they lived for a few generations before spreading out in northern Utah. Because of this, some of the descendants of James and Hannah Elizabeth Orton Muir met up for Beaver Pioneer Days and our reunion.


Can I just say, Dad's cousin Lesa is AMAZING! She organized everything, made arrangements and back-up arrangements, and researched pretty much every ancestor in the family. Thanks, Lesa. The photo scavenger hunt added an extra element of excitement and fun. 2nd place! Oh yeah!

Zak stayed home to work, since the reunion was mid-week, so my parents offered to drive the kiddos and me, as well as my brother, Aaron. My favorite part was going over the photos in the slideshow Lesa's family prepared, and hearing the older generations reminisce about their childhoods. When the date was in question, males and females showed how their brains worked. Women recalled ages of children, and men recalled ages of vehicles. I learned about Uncle Dennis accidentally catching Aunt Susan's dress on fire with a sparkler, and Dad melting part of Grandpa Calvin Hooper's soft car top with another sparkler. I loved seeing Grandpa Calvin Hooper's boyhood pictures with his mom in Beaver. We even got to drive by the house where he was born, along with several other relatives. The black rock and pink rock quarried nearby to use for local houses really gave that part of town an identity.