In your mixer beat sugar and butter for about 3-5 minutes until light and fluffy, scrapping down the bowl frequently .
Add In Pumpkin and all the rest of the ingredients, except the eggs. Mix just until blended. Do not over blend.
Add in the Eggs, one at a time just until blended.
Divide batter equally into your 3 prepared cake pans on top of the nut/cookie mixture, smooth it out and make it as even as possible in the pan.
Place remaining crunch mixture in a 4th cake pan or pie dish and allow to bake for the same amount of time as the cakes.
Bake in a 350 degree oven for about 25-30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. If you use 2 racks to bake on in the oven, at the halfway mark rotate the pans .
Allow pans to cool about 10 minutes, then turn them out onto a wire racks and allow to completely cool. DO NOT LET THE CAKES COOL IN THE PANS. This is important because the crunch mixture will stick to the pans and you'll be scraping it out. I made this mistake and ended up scraping much of the crumb mixture off the pans and piecing it back together on top of the cake layers. This was almost a Pinterest FAIL! Luckily I fixed it all in the frosting stage of the cake.
Break up the extra crunch mix to very small bits to use to decorate the cake with.
While your cakes are baking prepare a Cream Cheese Frosting.