It's the shoes, Man.

Belle made her first basket ever in a basketball game today. So stinkin' exciting for her mama. In fact, she got the ball through the hoop not once... not twice... but THREE times in game one. That's six points.

I would like to attribute her talent to my excellent basketball pointers and maybe a little genetics, too.

But Belle's explanation for her mad skills on the court today is much simpler.

Apparently, her new basketball shoes from Gigi and G-Pops made her faster and all-around better. Nothing to do with Mommy.

It's the shoes.

Kisses of Kahlua Giveaway Winners.

Thank you to EVERYONE who entered the giveaway. It hurts me not to give a cake to every single one of you. The winners (selected by random number generator) are:

1.) The Turnipseeds
2.) gina
3.) Gretchen

Congratulations to the winners! I am so excited for you to try these cakes. And if you did not win, don't fret. Kisses of Kahlua is baking for the holidays! Order your awesome cake today, slap it on one of your nice plates, and politely thank people when they tell you it's the best cake they've ever eaten. (A little holiday deception never hurt anybody? Right? Right?)

Another day with Jeb....

I thought the front of Jeb's undies looked a little... ummm.... full.

When I questioned him about it, he acted as though he had no idea what I was talking about. I knew there was a story there. Camera, please.

When questioned a second time, he flashed me this smile. I'll give it to ya', Kid. You're cute. But Mommy knows when you're hiding something... in your crotch.

So, he started digging around....

... and pulls out one of the girls' favorite toys.

Thanks just sick, Son. But wait.... There's more.

Poor toys. Poor unsuspecting Slaughter sisters.

All in all, the excavation uncovered four of Belle and E Dru's favorite Pet Shops.

I do not understand the male psyche. Who carries around toys in their underwear? When asked, my son faked a hand injury and said, "Hand hurts." Ohhhhh. Well, now, that explains everything. How else is a boy supposed to transport his toys with an injured hand?

But seriously... who could stay mad at this beautiful little face? Well... excluding Belle and E Dru, that is. They were less than happy when they saw these pictures.

Today, the Pet Shops are under lock and key. I don't blame you, Girls. I don't blame you.

THE GIVEAWAY WILL CLOSE VERY SOON! IF YOU HAVEN'T ENTERED, BETTER HURRY! I'LL POST THE WINNERS THIS AFTERNOON!

Funniest Jeb Video Ever

{Don't forget to enter our Thanksgiving Giveaway for a cake from Kisses of Kahlua. The giveaway closes tomorrow (Friday) at noon, so there isn't much time left! Enter away!}

Bit of background before viewing: Faulkner the Cat has his bluff in on all the Slaughter children. He may go months without an unforeseen, yet ruthless attack, but when he finally has enough of their antics and decides to exact his revenge, Slaughter child beware. He comes flying out of the shadows with his clawless paws and scares the living daylights out of them. All my kids have a healthy fear of Faulkner the Cat. And rightly so.

Jeb clearly remembers his last run-in with Faulkner. I believe it had something to do with a jumprope. Faulkner didn't want to play. Jeb thought he should and forced the issue. Faulkner waited a few days, then took a flying leap onto Jeb's head from out of the laundry room. Traumatic. Very traumatic.

So when I asked Jeb to remove the cat from the bed so I could make it, he was less than confident. I thought maybe I might be able to get a Faulkner attack on video. (I know. Worst mother ever.) But I got this instead, and to me, it is quite possibly the funniest Jeb video to date.

Apple Pie Contest: The Results Post

{Don't forget to enter the Thanksgiving Giveaway. You don't want to miss out. Click HERE to enter.}

As I was saying yesterday...

Belle woke up very excited about entering her pie in the 2nd Grade Apple Pie Baking Contest. In fact, I only had to tell her to get out of bed once.... as opposed to four or five times on most days, along with lots of poking and prodding.

When we arrived at the school, I was shocked to see over thirty pies waiting for judging. I was expecting maybe ten. I was wrong. Here's a shot of Belle and her adorable little friends while they waited for the contest to begin.

The pies were kept "anonymous" for judging. There we are. Y13.

I felt so sorry for the distinguished panel of judges. Can you IMAGINE sampling over thirty pies, some more than once? And all at 8 in the morning? Ugh. Makes me nauseous just thinking about it.

But when all was said and done, Belle Slaughter took home the SECOND PLACE PRIZE! And that little girl was over the moon excited. She is still talking about it, and I think it has even made her excited about baking in the future. She keeps asking what we can do together next. Here she is getting her prizes.

Yes, I spent an entire Sunday afternoon helping her bake those pies. But this smile made it all worth it, even the Sunday nap I missed.

She even made the Shiloh blog. Click here to see. (It's totally irrelevant that her daddy does that blog, right? I mean, there is absolutely no favoritism there. That's just crazy talk.)

So if you see my girl, congratulate her for a job well done. I promise, you'll see that smile.

Belle's Apple Pie

Remember my apple pie post? Well... it came back to bite me. (No pun intended.)

I believe it was the very next week, Belle came home telling me that her second grade class was having an apple pie baking contest. I laughed. Out loud. Totally figures. BUT... we were not deterred by the fact that we couldn't procure Grandma's recipe. Instead, we set out in search of our own awesome, unique apple pie recipe.

On Sunday after church, we baked all afternoon. And I do mean 'we.' Belle does not tend to volunteer in the kitchen, but on Sunday, she was all over baking with Mommy. I found a similar recipe on two separate websites and tweaked them into a recipe Belle named, "Belle's Apple Pie."

We used a roll out, refrigerated crust. (Lazy, I know, but it worked great.) I let Belle 'crimp' the edges.

Next I cut up four large Granny Smith apples and sliced them in thin slices. To them, Belle added:

1/2 cup sugar
3 1/2 tablespoons flour
a dash of salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon and 1/2 teaspoon allspice

Then, Belle mixed it all together. She found this process to be quite disgusting. I love the look on her face in this picture. (Umm, excuse me, Matt? Could you please be more considerate with your comings and goings in your own house? Trying to get good blog pictures here.)

Then Belle dumped her apples into the pie crust.

Next, we made the crumb topping. Belle put together in separate bowl:

1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup quick-cooking rolled oats
1/2 cup butter

If we would have had a pastry cutter, we would have used it to integrate the butter, but since we didn't, we used our hands and mixed it all together until it resembled small crumbles. (Waaay more fun that way.) Then we sprinkled our crumb mixture evenly on top of the apples.

We covered the edges of our pie with foil so the crust wouldn't get too brown and baked at 375 degrees for 35 minutes. After the 35 minutes were up, we removed the pie, got rid of the foil, and baked another 20 minutes.

While our pie was baking, we put 1/2 cup whole pecans and 1/2 cup Heath brickle into a plastic baggie and crushed them together. Again.. if I had a food processor, we'd have used it. Since we didn't, we used Daddy's hammer. (Again... waaay more fun.) This is what it looked like when we were finished.

We covered the top of our pie with the pecan and brickle mixture. But wait... still not done.

The recipes we found said, "Top with caramel topping." But the Slaughter girls don't do well with store-bought. Sooo.... we made our own caramel sauce. It's a Pioneer Woman recipe, and you can find it here.( This sauce is amazing and multi-purpose. Last night, I had a bunch of girls over to my house, and we used it to top our hot chocolate and coffees. Yum.)

Now does that not look dreamy?

The contest was yesterday (Monday) morning, and my girl woke up super excited to enter her pie.

How did she do? Since this post is already novel length, I'll save the surprise until tomorrow. (Just call me Ryan Seacrest.)

Kisses of Kahlua Thanksgiving Giveaway!

I am EXTREMELY excited to announce a Slaughterhouse Rules THANKSGIVING GIVEAWAY!!

My friend, Pam, local baker and owner of Kisses of Kahlua, has GRACIOUSLY donated THREE of HER LARGE CAKES to THREE LUCKY WINNERS!! Yeah, I said THREE. Because that's how we do it. Three people. Three prizes.

A few months ago, I won a little contest on the Kisses of Kahlua Facebook page and received a sample package of all the different kahlua cake flavors Pam offers. I was just super excited to win something. And then I got my hands on the cakes. OH. MY. GOSH. I'm gonna be honest. I'm not a cake person. I don't even do cake on my birthday, but these cakes, y'all.... I'm dramatic by nature, but I have a REASON to be dramatic over these cakes. They are absolutely, deliciously, amazingly amazing. I don't know how she does it, but they are the moistest (Is that a word, moistest? Doesn't sound right. Oh well. My blog.) thing I have ever put in my mouth. Simply awesome.

To enter your name once in the giveaway, this is what you must first to do:

* Go to the Kisses of Kahlua site and take a look around. Check out the flavor selection, then come back and leave me a comment telling me, if you won, which flavor of cake you would prefer. (I'm partial to the lemon flavor, but that's just me. Not trying to sway you. Sway. Sway.) This step is a MUST for giveaway entry. For more entries, read on.

For additional entries (ONE EACH): You may:

* Get the word out about the giveaway via word of mouth, tweet, Facebook, email, blog post, etc. Just leave me a SEPARATE comment and let me know how you did it.

AND/OR

* Go to the Kisses of Kahlua Facebook page and "like it." Then come back here and leave me a SEPARATE comment, telling me you "liked" it.

That is THREE opportunities to enter per person. Wow. Three is a theme today.

I have sent these cakes out of gifts, I have devoured them all by myself in my kitchen in the middle of the night, I have dreamed about them in my sleep. They're that good. And I am THRILLED to have the opportunity to introduce you to Pam and her heavenly cakes. You will not want to miss out on these, Friends.

So enter now. Go on. Hurry up! You only have until Friday at noon. HOPEFULLY, the winners will receive their cakes in time to be on the Thanksgiving table. They will be shipped on Monday, but please don't yell at me if they're a little late. We'll do our very very best, but I promise, they'll be worth the wait no matter when they arrive.

(No international entries, please.)