Happy Christmas

Here sums up my nephews thoughts on Christmas:

Jokes, we had a lovely day, despite his tiny grumpiness. It was a day of family, fun and then my tooth  falling out (yes, the same tooth that fell out of my mouth 2 weeks ago!) right before dinner. But we did get to Skype my sister in law, on her mission in China, so that was pretty sweet. Happy Christmas, everyone!

Merry Christmas Eve

Ok this is also sort of a Foto Friday, but on a Saturday. We went to my SIL's for Christmas Eve today, and watched Muppet Christmas Carol, one of the best movies. As we were chilling, she showed us a picture she found of Husband as a child. I died when I saw it, and posted it to Snapchat, with this sentence on it. Please to enjoy.

I hope that if we ever have kids, it'll get some good genes from both of us, because I know that I wasn't an attractive child. :D

Darth and Gecko

The kiddos are staying with their other inlaws now, and while I miss them, I do appreciate the clean house I get to have again. But I still get to hang out with their cuteness.

 This little tyke is so excited for Christmas and "Sinta"

 Draaaaamaaaaaaa

But still always cute.

Peppermint Patty Cupcakes

I had to make a dessert for my work lunch today, so I chose Peppermint Patty Cupcakes. Let's dive in.

      For the cupcakes
4 oz Dark chocolate chips
1 box Chocolate cake mix
3 Large eggs
1½ tsp Pure vanilla extract
¾ C Water
⅓ C Oil
½ C Sour cream
      For the frosting
1½ C (3 sticks) Unsalted butter at room temperature
12 peppermint patties
4 C Confectionary Sugar
3 tbsp Heavy whipping cream
1 tsp peppermint extract

Preheat oven to 350° In a microwave safe bowl, melt chocolate chips for 45-60 seconds or until melted. Stir until smooth and set aside. In a medium sized bowl, combine cake mix with remaining ingredients and mix until combined. Add melted dark chocolate last and mix into batter.
Line a cupcake pan with cupcake liners and fill each liner ⅔ full of batter.
Bake at 350° for 12-15 minutes. Check for doneness by inserting a toothpick in the middle of the cupcake. If the toothpick comes out clean, your cupcakes are done.
Allow cupcakes to cool for five minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool them completely.
For the frosting:
Allow butter to come to room temperature. Remove peppermint patties from wrappers and use a knife to chop into small pieces. Using the wire whisk attachment on your mixer, whip butter for several minutes until light and fluffy.  Slowly add powered sugar one cup at a time. Alternate one cup of powdered sugar with one tablespoon of heavy whipping cream. After adding the 4th cup of powdered sugar, increase speed to medium high and beat for another 3-4 minutes. Then add in the extract.  Add peppermint patties last and mix until combined.

So when I did the original recipe, the girl didn't have the extract in her recipe, and her frosting literally tasted like nothing. It just tasted like sweet butter, and not in a good way. So I added the extract myself, and it improved it greatly.

Delicious! (I cut a peppermint patty in half and put it on top for decoration)

Christmas Snowman

So I looked long and hard for a neighbor gift, and came up with this gem. We had a million mason jars hanging around, so I was looking for something to do with them. I filled them with mints, hot glued on some buttons, and then hot glued a jaunty scarf on here as well. I printed a print from Pinterest, and here is where we found ourselves.

It says "This is Mint to wish you a Merry Christmas" and I just thought it was so dashing. I need to be better prepared next year, so that I don't have to be cramming all this in in a few days, so wish me luck with that ha ha.

Foto Friday

We got Cookie a haircut today, and then Husband bought her a sweater, in case she gets cold.

What a great dog.

Darth and Gecko

 Darth sort of understands 'cheese'. He says cheese, but then he doesn't know that you're supposed to hold it for the pic, he just says it and goes back. Luckily I snapped this mid'cheese'.

 This guy is just so happy and cute in the morning, he makes me so happy.

He definitely has some model moves.

Miscellaneous Monday

It's here. The week of finals. I had my first one today, my calculus final. Did I do well? Time will tell. We don't learn our grades until the 22nd, and I feel like it'll be a really hard waiting period! I'll try and distract myself until then. Luckily, I only have 3 finals to take. I have taken one already, and then one of my double-finals was cancelled, so I only have to take one final for this class instead of two. I'm remaining very positive about things, and hoping for the best.

Last night, there was a giant long power outage here. It started at 5:00 - right as we were starting to prepare dinner. Literally, we had just cut up all the veggies, and just put the pot of water on the stove when BOOM it went out. Tiny Darth screamed like a girl when they went out, and had to be comforted, but he was fine. I called the power company who told me that it would be out until 8:30, oy! We tried to stay busy and entertained, but man, it got boring after a while with the kiddos. Then we got a call near 8:00 saying it would be back on at 11:30! Gah! Finally, near 9:30, we just went to bed because we were bored. Then...right as we were going to sleep...the power came back on. Of course.

I can't believe how quickly this month has gone by, and how it's almost Christmas at this point. What an insane month this has been! It's mostly been spent doing school stuff like studying and whatnot, and oy vey, I am ready for that to be over. But now, I have so many Christmas crafts that I'm making, I feel like there just isn't enough time! I'm hoping to get it all done next week when I have no school, but it seems so overwhelming!

Ginger Cookies

Its that time of year when I feel like peppermint and gingerbread are everywhere, so I decided to try making some soft ginger cookies. I like how they turned out.

1 ½ cups butter, softened to room temperature
2 cups granulated sugar
½ cup molasses
2 eggs
4 cups all-purpose flour
4 teaspoons baking soda
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
2 teaspoons ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cloves
1 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 375°F.

In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, soda, cinnamon, cloves, ginger and salt. Set aside.
In the bowl of an electric stand mixer, beat together butter and sugar on medium speed for 2 minutes until light and fluffy, scraping down the bowl if need be.  Mix in the eggs and molasses, and beat until each is combined. Gradually add in the dry ingredient mixture and beat until combined.
Place a sheet of plastic wrap directly on top of the dough to cover it.  Then refrigerate dough for 30-60 minutes, until it is completely chilled.
Roll the dough into small balls, about 1-inch in diameter. Fill a small bowl with sugar, and roll each ball in the sugar until it is completely coated. Place on cookie sheet at least 1 inch apart, then bake for about 8-10 minutes, until the cookies begin to slightly crack on top. Remove from the oven and let cool for a minute or two. Then transfer the cookies to wire racks to cool completely.

These were pretty good. I find I don't really care for gingerbread as much as I want to, but that's all right, these were tasty.

Darth and Gecko

Having these guys here gives me access to so many pics right now! Here are some good ones.

 He has such draaaaamaaaaa when he gets his pajamas on at night, this is him, post-tears.

 We just laid down my massive amazing blanket, and he luckily kept sleeping, what a cutie.

He's crying and throwing a tantrum here because I dared to offer him some chocolate. The nerve!

Pumpkin Spice Truffles

You guys, I have found a delicious new recipe that tastes amazing. Let's waste no time getting into it.

2 ounces cream cheese, softened to room temperature
2 Tablespoons powdered sugar
1/3 cup pumpkin puree
12 full sheets of graham cracker crumbs
1/2 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
4 ounces white chocolate, melted

Topping: melting chocolate (you can use white, dark, or milk chocolate) and more graham crumbs.

Beat the cream cheese and sugar together in a large bowl until creamy - about 2 minutes. Add the pumpkin and beat on high until combined. Add the graham cracker crumbs, pumpkin pie spice, cinnamon, and melted chocolate. Beat until everything is combined. The mixture is supposed to be soft and thick. Cover mixture tightly and refrigerate for 1 hour or up to 24 hours. You gotta chill it. Will it make it harder to work with later? Yes but it's totally needed.

After the chilling period, roll the mixture into balls. The original blog got like, 35 out of hers, but I did small small ones and only got like, 30, so I guess, just be prepared for something around there. Then you melt your chocolate, either in the microwave (using 30 second intervals) or a saucepan. Dip the truffles into the chocolate, and then place on a piece of prepared parchment paper on a cookie sheet. Sprinkle some graham cracker crumbs on top. Refrigerate again, until set. These do need to be kept in the fridge, of course.

These are dang delicious and weren't as hard to make as I originally had thought they were. I recommend them, and I'm thinking of making them again, to see if I can get them to look just a little better next time. Enjoy!

Darth and Gecko

All right I have a load of great baby pics with these jokers staying here, and here are a few.

 Being a casual fella.

 Can you imagine if we adults slept like this? We'd wake up in so much pain!

I just love his face here, so so much.