chocolate chocolate chip peppermint cookies

(a combination and tweaking of some favorite cookie recipes... + candy canes!)

Ingredients:
1/2 cup softened butter (NOT melted)
1/2 cup shortening
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
2 eggs
1 package chocolate pudding mix (small box - 3.9 oz)
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 Tbs baking soda
2 1/2 - 3 cups flour (I used 3)
chocolate chips
candy canes (crushed to very small pieces)

Directions:
Preheat oven to 325 degrees
Beat together butter, shortening, and sugars until light and fluffy.
Add eggs and vanilla extract and again beat until light and fluffy.
Mix in pudding mix, salt, and baking soda until well combined.
Add flour 1/2 cup - 1 cup at a time until reached desired consistency. I like my cookies thick and chewy, so I make my batter very thick - hardly sticky at all.

Mix in a generous amount of chocolate chips (I used an entire standard bag).
I made my cookies into about 1.5 inch balls (but you can do bigger or smaller).
Place on cookie sheet.
Moisten the tops of the cookies with a little bit of water so the candy will stick (I used a spray bottle) and sprinkle crushed candy canes on top. My candy canes were basically a candy cane powder with a few larger chunks mixed in. No need to press candy into the cookie - it sticks really well and melts onto the cookie during baking.
Put in oven for 9-12 minutes depending on your oven. Mine were perfect at 10 minutes 30 seconds :).

Enjoy!!

 

DIVINE pumpkin chocolate chip muffins (healthy!)

Ok, not only are these suckers DELICIOUS, they are relatively healthy! Whole wheat, no butter or oil, and pure deliciousness. A perfect fall treat! Oh I love pumpkin. And chocolate chips! My cousin requested the recipe, so I thought I'd stick it on here in case any of you are craving the perfect (really, these are them!) pumpkin chocolate chip muffin.

Ingredients:

1 2/3 cups whole wheat flour
1 cup sugar
1 Tablespoon pumpkin pie spice (or cinnamon mixed with nutmeg)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
1 cup plain pumpkin
1/2 cup applesauce (or if you really want to, oil or butter - sometimes I do half applesauce, half butter)
1 cup chocolate chips (I like the mini ones)

Make 1 or 2 days ahead for the best flavor.
Heat oven to 350 degrees F. Mix dry ingredient sin large bowl. In another bowl whisk until well blended: eggs, pumpkin, and applesauce. Stir in chocolate chips. Pour over dry ingredients and fold in until just moistened. Grease muffin cups or use paper baking cups. Bake 20-25 minutes or until puffed and springy to touch.

Makes 12 regular or 48 miniature muffins.

ENJOY!

Happy Birthday! (lots of photos...)

Some say that the older you get, the less excited you get about your birthday. 

False.

Or, at least not around here. A birthday is a good reason to celebrate, see good friends, eat delicious food, and... get spoiled a little bit :).

Because I have managed to survive 25 years (truly miraculous when you consider I've been in Utah for the last 5 years or so around all of these crazy drivers...)... Brian decided that he wanted to celebrate the fact that I am now a quarter of a century old. So... he woke me up with this GIGANTIC pile of chocolate chocolate-chip pancakes cut into "quarter" pieces. Yum!

Please ignore the hair doo... I just woke up!

I found a pile of quarters in my car. I was informed that these are to be used on the vending machines at grocery stores so I can buy tattoos to my heart's content!

Later I was sent to the tennis courts ("quarts"), where we play tennis and had to find a little present he left for me there. After I got to plop down on a blanket and read a good book. I am definitely enjoying the extra time I've had to read some books that I actually want to read for a change... and I am absolutely in love with the weather lately. Sunshine!! (Sorry, no picture of the courts, just some of my favorite shoes!)

Next I came home to a quart of ice-cream! Ohhh how I love icecream.

We had a fun party that night and finally busted the piñata we've been hoarding for over a year. It was time for him to go...

Yes, that is definitely a frying pan...

Inspired by one of the best movies ever!

We also had the option of using one of Brian's old crutches or a broomstick.

Hannah finally killed it!

Brian made me the coolest cake! I found it on Pinterest a while ago and told him I wanted it for my birthday. I couldn't believe he remembered!

Check out the colors! It's a rainbow cake!

Lots of things happened last year... got married, graduated, got a job... we'll see what age 25 brings!

Halloweeny

Unfortunately I had to spend most of my Halloween writing a research paper... but we still found some time to celebrate! Just some fun Halloweeny things I found on Pinterest.... we bought the stuff to make the adorable Frankensteins (never got a chance, but we're going to do it after Halloween anyway!), made those INCREDIBLE pumpkin donut holes (baked - if you want the recipe, let me know!), made the cute little mummy hotdogs, and saw lots of cute costumes! 

I made Brian promise me that next year we could really celebrate Halloween and not study all night. Mostly I made him promise because I'll be graduated and he'll still be on the road to lovely dental school! He is doing so so well in his classes this semester and I am seriously proud of him! He went from all business classes to almost all sciences (chem 105, physiology, biology, pre-dental, and a personal finance class) - crazy busy and he is rocking them! 

Hmmm... what else is new since my last post?

• I am still loving working in the NICU. I put an IV in a little 2 pound baby!
• Kelly aka Sister Campbell, stayed with us for the weekend before she entered the MTC yesterday! It was so great to see her and reminisce about how I felt right before I entered the MTC - full of excitement, nerves, and the spirit! Yeah!
• My primary class was so well behaved on Sunday. I just love them. We learned about Moroni. I am already excited to see them again this next week
• memorable things from the lesson:the kids decided they want to call us fruit names. I think I'm Strawberry and Katie is Pineapple
• they were really excited about Halloween (one was postiive he had met the real spiderman at the trunk or treat. adorable.)
• I convinced them to sing in sharing time (hurray! seriously an accomplishment for the little boys)
• It's freezing here! 27 degrees. 
• We went country dancing with Ryan and Andrea on Saturday night. SEriously so much fun... and a great workout.
• Hannah and Chris came over on Sunday night for games and treats. We played Monopoly in a card-game style and it was so fun. Waaaay better than normal monopoly. 

Anyway, happy November! I can't believe how fast this year is going by!

make-up free!

It's a make-up free day.... and, I must say, it's rather refreshing! I think I've put on make-up almost every single day of my life since I was at least 16 years old... that's kind of sick! Why am I so afraid to just be me? So, today I decided to wash my face reaalllly good (get all of the mascara off) and go all day without painting my face. So far so good. I like it. Granted, I don't have class today... so maybe I should try this on a day I have class. I know a girl who very bravely gave up make-up for Lent. Forty days make-up free! Now that is a feat. If only I had that much guts.

I think it's important to feel beautiful without all the extra "stuff." It's hard, but I think it's possible.

Ok, what else?

I taught my first full CTR 5 class yesterday! Those kids are ca-razy! I don't know what they eat for breakfast, but I'm 99% positive it is loaded with sugar. At least we had some girls this week to help calm the little dudes a bit. We learned about how to be righteous and pure and about the prophet Mormon. It went prettttty good. I just have to learn how to control a small room full of 5-year olds better. Any suggestions?!

Brian and I made the most adorable owl cupcakes yesterday! They have a surprise cream cheese/chocolate chip filling. Love! I just love Fall. Unfortunately Brian and I are also only eating desserts on Sundays, so now we have a whole bunch of cupcakes sitting around - I guess it's time to give them out!

These are the pictures that gave me the inspiration, not the picture of our actual cupcakes - but ours looked pretty much exactly the same! SO CUTE!

Oh, and I had a really great scripture study today in Alma 36 :)

Well, off to write a research paper! Have a great day!

best chocolate chip cookies ever

fresh out of the oven!

we added raisins for my dear mom - she loves them!

So, I've made A LOT of chocolate chip cookies in my lifetime and I know what a good cookie tastes like! But, I decided to branch out and try a new recipe and I am SO GLAD I did - these cookies are soooo good. I ate so many....

Anyway, special thanks to Penniesonaplatter!

Perfectly Puffy Chocolate Chip Cookies

Printable Recipe

Yield: 3 dozen medium-sized cookies

3/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup butter flavored Crisco stick
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 (3.4 oz) package vanilla instant pudding mix
1/2 tsp salt
1 Tbsp baking soda
2 1/2 to 3 cups flour (I use 3 cups)
12 oz package semi-sweet miniature chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350˚F.

In a large mixing bowl, combine the sugars, butter and Crisco.  Mix with the paddle attachment until thoroughly combined.  Beat in the eggs and vanilla.  Add pudding mix; stir until incorporated.

In a small bowl, combine 1 cup of the flour with the baking soda and salt.  Blend into the egg mixture.

Add additional flour 1/2 to 1 cup at a time until reaching desired consistency. I use a total of 3 cups flour.

Stir in chocolate chips.

Drop spoonfuls of dough on cookie sheet.  (To achieve a more round, cleaner look, roll the balls of cookie dough in your hand instead of just dropping on the cookie sheet.)  Bake exactly 10 minutes.  The cookies may not look done, but that is the trick to keeping them puffy and soft.  Let cookies cool on the cookie sheet on top of cooling racks for 5 minutes.  Remove from cookie sheets and cool completely on the cooling racks.

April showers bring May flowers and what do May flowers bring...?

PILGRIMS! Anyway... sorry for the lame joke.

So, I haven't done a regular post in quite some time... Pretty much just been posting engagement photos lately! There are still more of those to come (as soon as I get them), but I thought that I would give the world a little update on life!

• We signed for our apartment today! (photos to follow...). One bedroom, new carpet, nice paint, big and open, storage space, underground parking... and about the cheapest deal we could find! (minus the $500 scary basement apartment that felt like someone had been murdered there :/ - no gracias!)
• 51 more days until the BIG DAY!... and so much to do still! Ahhhh!
• I started spring term! I am taking Global Nursing, Marriage Prep, and Wedding Prep (my own personal course that I am trying to fit in somewhere ;) ). I like my classes lots so far!
• Brian got 2 internships for this spring/summer - one with Aflac and the other one with Sears corporate. He'll be busy practicing those business skills! We are so happy that the Sears one is paid and he'll get 40 hours a week starting June 6th!
• I have 2 new roommates and they are super sweet!
• Easter was fun :) Brian and I cooked dinner and invited friends over, we made tasty chick cupcakes (not as cute as the Martha Steward photo from which I received my inspiration, but what can you do?), broke LENT - yes, we had dessert for the first time in FORTY DAYS - heaven! Don't worry, we didn't overdo the lent thing though... we only had pie, shakes, cupcakes, ice-cream, and chocolate ... not too bad, right? Hehe.

He's so great to support me in my wild cupcake baking schemes! Or maybe he just wanted to eat some...

sort of cute... sort of creepy. We accidentally bought HUMONGOUS chocolate chips... we were supposed to get the little cute ones for the eyes and chopping up the big ones just didn't quite have the same "cute" effect as the little ones would've. Maybe next year.

I'm feeling very domestic

I came home from school today and all I wanted to do was domesticy things! Now this may or may not be a result of my lack of desire to do homework, but it also stemmed from walking into a... less than clean welcoming apartment. Let me tell you... one and a half hours later, decluttering galore, the smell of fresh-baked lemon poppy seed muffins and I am FEELING GOOD! Oh, and I am also doing laundry and have the dishwasher going. Oh yeah. Domestic

I just sat here on the couch, looked around, and gave a big sigh of relief. Too bad I don't feel this way more often.