This weekend, my mom and I glittered and gilded pumpkins. LOTS and lots of pumpkins.

Aren’t they pretty? To gild a pumpkin, pick up Rub n’ Buff from Michaels — in the paint aisle, near the gold leaf. It’s this paint-paste stuff that I just smear all over the pumpkin with a paper towel, and then go over the top with the opposite shade (if the pumpkin is gold, I accent with silver, and vice versa). My mom added glitter on top. Butternut squash and acorn squash are also excellent makeover  candidates.

And this  is Tyson’s birthday pie: chocolate mousse.

Filling recipe here — I doubled it, and had extra. Crust is, um, two store-bought oreo crusts I dumped into a springform pan, along with a tablespoon f melted butter, and pressed into the pan carefully so as to achieve the appearance of homemade work. Hee.

I felt slightly ashamed, but I was in a rush. Bakerella — the patron saint of internet cookery — would never fake a crust. She makes things like this — so adorable, but the idea of replicating them kind of gives me hives.