Shopkin World Vacation DVD Review #ShopkinsWorldVacation

Perfect rainy afternoon. Can you guess Emma's favorite travel destination? @shopkins_world #ad

A post shared by Heather (@heathgiff) on Oct 14, 2017 at 11:59am PDT

Few things are loved in our house more right now than Shopkins. They are everywhere. Our house has Shopkins coloring books, tshirts, pajamas, figures, streaming shows, and now, a DVD! Emmalee was beyond thrilled to receive the new Shopkins World Vacation movie in the mail!

The DVD says "Kooky Cookie win the trip of a lifetime to London, but it’s not long before plans start going awry… soon Kooky Cookie and her pals are hopping from Paris to New York to Tokyo. But with the mischievous Biscuit Bandits on the loose, can the Shopkins and Shoppies save the day?"

We knew it was going to be great, especially since we loved Shopkins: Chef Club last year! We had a rainy day yesterday so we grabbed our passports, some popcorn, and cozy blankets and piled up on the couch.

I knew my girl would love it, but I was surpirsed by how much my 3 year old loved it! He kept asking us to go back to when they meet Pinkie Cola and he loved the "bad guys"- they're just as funny as bad, but still made me kids nervous about what would happen next!

The movie is full of adventures and laughs, and even a few icon scenes that you may recognize!

Emmalee loved the movie and since watching it has requested every single one of the Shopkins World Vacation Dolls and the Season 8 Plane so she can take them all on adventures! Obviously one of the first playsets on my list is the Oh La La Macaron Cafe-- France is Emma's favorite!

You can pick up your own copy of Shopkins: World Vacation as a digital copy (available now!) or the DVD version (available the 17th!) from Amazon.

xo, Heather

Easy Halloween Brownies

Did you know that in addition to coffee and mac and cheese, Halloween is another one of those things that everyone else seems to love and I just don't?
I mean... there were stages of my life where I really enjoyed it, but I've never liked scary things...
I don't do haunted houses... I don't even like walking from my car to the house in the dark...
I don't watch scary movies...

Literally, my ideal Halloween now is taking my kids Trunk or Treating somewhere lit, where we're not walking on dark roads, and then coming home to watch It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown and Hocus Pocus while having a glass of wine and enjoying the candy I bought for the trick or treaters we never get.

I will admit though that my children love the idea of Halloween. Costumes, treats... they love it! They spent most of Saturday morning in their Halloween costumes and kept pretending to trick or treat around the house. I figured a good distraction was cooking or baking something since they love being in the kitchen.

I've been hankering for brownies lately so a quick boxed mix and the extra ingredients was an easy fix.  I used a shallow 13x9 pan and baked according to the directions. After letting them completely cool, we used our amazing circle cutter set (the same one we use for making our own Uncrustable sandwiches!) to make smaller circle brownies.

Last week, we picked up some ghost and pumpkin shaped marshmallows, as well as some candy eyes, so we knew they'd be the perfect decorations!

Simple food dye to some frosting gave us some color and the kids enjoyed adding the marshmallow toppers.

For the mummies, we frosted them with white, added 2 eyes, and then (using a sanwich bag with a hole cut in the corner) we added some lines to look like the gauze!

Frankenstein was easy as well: green frosting, 2 eye candies, and black decorating icing for the hair and mouth.  We even added two candy corn for his bolts!

I think they're adorable and were so easy to make!

Which design is your favorite?

xo, Heather

Apple Picking at Tougas Family Farm

I love apples. They get skipped over a lot by pumpkin, but I like to give apples the whole fall to be wonderful. My favorite thing is apple picking.  We've gone every year with the kids and it's just a great day, followed by great baking.  This year we ventured to Tougas Farms in Northborough.

We met up with my mom and sisters to go picking for the morning. Tougas Farm has you pay for the bag ahead of time.  The smaller bag, a Peck - about 10 pounds, is $30 and admits up to 4 people into the orchard. The larger bag is a 1/2 Bushel ~ 20 pounds. At $40 it admits up to 6 people into the orchard. We grabbed a larger bag and hopped on the hayride to the orchards (included in price). When you get off the wagon, they give a quick overview of what apples are where and then you're off. 

I love a good crunchy Honey Crisp apple so I loaded up on those! After we were done picking, we made our way over to the playground.

And checked out some wildlife...

Our trip wouldn't be complete without some cider donuts (gone before pictures could be taken- whoops!) and a few pumpkins!

It's a gorgeous farm that is well taken care of and we had such fun for the morning!

Where do you go apple picking? I'm always looking for new places to check out!

xo, Heather