Baking Fever

What was yesterday? Oh, Monday, that's right. Sadly I didn't make anything new, but I made a favorite that I really like. We had a birthday shindig at work today, so I made some treats for that. We were having ice cream sundaes, so I made brownies, and Chelle was in charge of bringing cookie bars. I made two batches of brownies. The first was good for sundaes, just plain brownies, perfect to be paired with ice cream and whatever else you wanted. The second ones were Oreo Brownies, the oldie but goodie. I took a pic of them side by side. I made the plain brownies more fudgey, so they'd be super good, and I made the Oreo ones more plain, so that it wouldn't be too rich or anything with the added sweets.

 Yum! Then after they cooled (it took forever it seemed!) I added the frosting and Oreo's.

And of course, I needed to make something for dinner. I was thinking that I needed to do something with hot dogs - I had a package of them I had opened a week prior, and the package says that they're best by date of: 1 week after you open them, which was yesterday. As I was sitting there, contemplating what to make, I got a text from Chelle, who was asking me some questions about the pizza rolls I made a bit ago. As I was telling her the directions, I realized they sounded delicious, but I didn't have any pepperoni left. You know what I did have, though? Hot dogs and crescent rolls.

So, I did like I did with the pepperoni ones, and just wrapped the hot dogs in the rolls. Some I cut in half, and some I left whole. (and yes, you do spy a rogue pepperoni in there - turns out we had like, 6 pepperoni's in the house, so we made just one, ha.) Cooked them for the same amount of time, and when they were done...

Delicious! I dipped them into some mustard, and some ketchup and they were simply divine. I recommend them to everyone. My bakings took me late into the night (10:10!) but I think it was all worth it in the end - I think everything turned out pretty well.

A Weekend of Birthday-ness

This past weekend was PJ’s birthday, and we set aside a whole weekend for it. The actual birthday was on Sunday, so we did the things that cost money on Saturday and some other things on Sunday. So on Saturday, we kicked things off in the afternoon with a movie – Step Up 4: Revolution. It’s no secret that I enjoy all dance/cheerleady/etc movies. I like all the Step Ups, I enjoy all the Bring it On’s, and all the miscellaneous ones that aren’t part of a series (yet). So of course, I enjoyed this movie. The thing about seeing the sequels to a movie that already won’t be a masterpiece is to realize, the acting is going to suck. The storyline will be practically nonexistent, you’re just there to enjoy the dancing and whatever until the movie is over. Thank goodness I know this, and will always like these movies.

Saturday night, we went to Taggerts for dinner. Haven’t heard of Taggerts, you say? Well that’s ok, not many have. It’s a restaurant up in Morgan, UT. Yes, Morgan, which is north, up past Ogden. To get to this restaurant, you have to drive about 90ish minutes from here in Orem. Needless to say, I don’t go there very often, because I just don’t want to drive that far. So, up we drove, waited for about 45 minutes (the first time EVER in my life I’ve had to wait for a table there) and ate a delicious meal, and took home a whole lot of desserts. Most of the reasons I go there is for the desserts. They are awesome, and I take home at least 2. This time was a brownie, a cookie (that I ate on the way home) and a small cheesecake, for PJ’s birthday cake the following day.

Sunday, we went on a hike. Specifically, the Fort Creek river hike. I’m not sure if I’ve blogged about it before, but it is a fun hike. It’s about 80% you just fording the river, like the game Oregon Trail. When I’ve hiked it previously, I stayed out of the water as often as I could. I would hike in it if needed, but otherwise, I hugged the shore and stayed dry, but this time was different. I think the only time we got out of the water to hike up the mountain was if we couldn’t physically make it up the river at that part, and I think it only happened maybe twice. The weather was nice and warm though, so the river felt pretty good. We finished it in about half the time, not getting out of the water. When we were done and were about to get out back at the beginning, PJ full-on fell in the water. Whole body slam into it, I laughed so hard, checked to make sure she was ok, and laughed again. When we got out of the river finally, we checked ourselves over, and we had a lot of bruises and scrapes from the rocks, trees, etc. I had a bruised shin, a cut heel and a cut leg, with some scrapes on the arm. PJ had a cut in her leg that went almost to the bone (not really, but it seemed like it). We limped back to the car, and went home.

For her birthday dinner, PJ wanted ratatouille. I don’t know who’s seen the movie, Ratatouille, but we’ve liked the dish since we saw that. I’ve made it several times, but this is the first time I did it like the movie’s recipe, when you have everything in slices and you swirl them in a dish. Here’s what it looked like before baking it:

I forgot to get a picture after it came out of the oven. It was delicious though. And the cheesecake from Taggert’s was good as well. And that was it. The birthday weekend came to a close. Good times were had, bodies were beat up, but we continued on, and lived to tell the tale.

A Mission for Softer Feet

A long time ago, I saw a thing on Pinterest (where else?) that promised to heal the cracks in the heels of my feet, and fill them in forever, leaving me with soft feet. Since I wear only flip flops, usually, I have the worst cracked and dry feet, so I've been looking forward to doing this. It took me a long time to finally get to it, but this week, I had some free time on my hands, so I got to do it. It seemed simple enough. In a large bowl or sink, combine equal parts of warm water with Listerine mouthwash. Myself, I used 2 cups of each, seemed to work just fine. Then soak a hand towel in the water mixture, getting it all kinds of soaked. Then coat your feet in shaving cream. With your feet still coated, wrap them in the hand towel. Just hang out there, feet wrapped, for 30 minutes. After the 30 minutes is over, use the towel to wipe off all the shaving cream, then dry them completely (I dried and waited for about 5 minutes or so, to allow ample time for them to be dry) then apply a good amount of lotion to your feet. Voila! The end.

Now, before we begin, here’s what my feet looked like before I did anything:

So, I did all this. I coated, I soaked, as evidenced by this,

 I waited, I dried, and I lotioned, and…my feet were almost exactly the same, and here’s what they looked like afterwards: (its a little blurry, oops)

 I can maybe feel a bit of softness that wasn’t there before, but the cracks were still there, and there was still some roughness. Bonus though, my feet now smelled minty fresh (as did entire rest of my house, after letting the Listerine towel sit in the laundry hamper overnight) But, it didn’t work like it promised me at all. I of course, tweeted out what I was doing, and then when it didn’t work, and I got a reply from a friend who had done it before, and she said that it had taken her two times of doing this before it worked. So now, I have to wait a week, and then do it again. Apparently, it takes off layers of your skin, so to do it more than once a week would damage your feet. Good to know, I have no problems waiting a week for this. So now, I know that you guys are on pins and needles, waiting to see what happens, as I am. So in a week’s time, I’ll try again, and let you know if it worked. I also got some tips from people, like, using two washcloths instead of just the one that it asked for, etc. I hope it works, because otherwise, I’ll feel pretty silly soaking my feet in Listerine for no reason.

Sour Patch Fairy

As many know, my kid sister Rory moved to Cali with her husband about 4 months ago. We still keep in touch pretty much every day, via texting. Best thing ever, the invention of texting. A few months ago, I sent her some Sour Patch Kids. She told me that she couldn't find any in her town, and she'd tried pretty much every store near her. So, being a kind soul, I logged onto the ol' Amazon, and sent her 2 1.9 lb bags of them.

It was pretty cheap, plus the 2 day shipping was free, so it was easy on my part, I didn't actually have to do much work. So yesterday, she sent me a picture text, showing me that she was almost out of the Sour Patch Kids and how sad she would be. Well, I already had sent her these bags, so I wasn't really thinking of sending anymore, so I just said "Well, maybe the Sour Patch Fairy will visit you." And she asked if she should put the last Kid under her pillow. I said yes, please do, and take a picture to show me, and then we changed the conversation, and I'll admit, I forgot about it. 

Until this morning, when she sent me the following picture:

I DIED laughing at this. I got it during the day, at work, and I laughed hysterically for like, 30 minutes. Of course, I shared with those around me, who also got a good chuckle, methinks. I could never be this clever, I would never even think of it! So, on points of cleverness, I logged onto the ol' Amazon yet again, and have sent her 2 more bags. I haven't told her, though, they'll be a surprise to her when they just show up on her door, and I think that's one of the greatest things, to be surprised with a treat like that. This just goes to show you, if you're clever enough, I'll buy you things. 

Lemon Bars

Well, it was Monday yesterday, which means it was treat-making day. I picked something really easy and relatively soft, since I will still be without my eating teeth for another few months. (That sounds really weird when you put it like that. Huh.) I found the recipe on Pinterest, naturally, and it’s literally the easiest thing ever.

Recipe:

1 can (15.75 oz) Lemon Pie filling

1 box (18.75ish oz) Angel Food cake mix

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Mix the 2 ingredients by hand until combined. Pour into a greased 9x13 pan, and bake for 20 minutes, until the top is goldeny brown. While the bars are cooling, sprinkle powdered sugar on them. Let cool completely before cutting in and enjoying.

Now, when I first put the pie filling into the bowl with the cake mix, this is what it looked like:

Of course, it concerned me, because I couldn’t figure out how it would work. Then as I started mixing them together, a little poof of white cake powder went up in the air and I inhaled some, which made me pretty sure I would get some kind of lung disease from it. Cake-lungs, that’s gotta be a thing. Luckily, I haven’t felt any ill effects from it as of yet.

That’s it. And it produces these delicious bars of awesomeness that have the texture of angel food cake, but it’s all lemony delicious. This is what they looked like out of the oven:

Mmm so good these were, I recommend them to everyone, especially since they take no time at all to make.

Miscellaneous Monday

If there's anything I can teach you guys, it's that when someone tells you to go to the kitchen to get them a sandwich, you should go to the kitchen and get them a sandwich.

All spousal abuse jokes aside, this bloody nose of mine was actually not a big deal. We were driving home, I was checking something on my phone, and all of a sudden, it just started bleeding. Sadly, we didn't have any tissues...napkins...anything in the car, so I just held my hand up there, and waited for the ride to be over. As we were nearing the house, I realized a golden photo op, and snapped myself. Good news, it was pretty much done by the time we got home.

Usually I do the dishes in my house. It's not that Husband is lazy or anything, its that my threshold of how many dishes can be in the sink is much lower than his, so I get annoyed at a few in there, and he can let both sides of the sink fill up and still not really care. So when I do the dishes, as soon as they're finished, I like to have the dishwasher clean. I know, I'm a weirdo, but it's how I am. So it's kind of fun when Husband does them and puts them away, because he's not really sure where things go, so I find things in wrong places, or just shoved in a place I'm sure he thinks makes sense. This happened tonight, when I was looking for a 9x13 pan, and instead found a pizza pan there. Helpful.

Husband has left me today for a week. He's camping/hiking with the scouts in our ward until Friday/Saturday. (I'm not sure of the actual day back, it seemed to change) I don't really like to be left all alone (who does?!) but so far, I think I have things planned pretty well. Today, I helped Chelle with some organizing and cleaning, but I don't think I helped as much as I wanted, plus I don't know how much good I did. I gave it a go, though. And I made some treats (blog entry to come later!), and cleaned a little, and now, I'm trying to get this all done before my eyes shut out of exhaustedness. I've planned some things for the rest of the week, it's mostly my own to-do list of cleaning and organizing things. Now, this week should be pretty fun, provided I don't die of a stranger breaking in, or a heart attack after thinking that the wind on the door is a stranger breaking in. Hey, it's possible.

Twitter. My Fun Collossal Waste of Time

I'm on Twitter. There, I said it. I love it. It's fun. It's a fun way of communicating with people that you know, or even people that you don't know. That being said, I know Twitter is stupid. It is, it's a stupid waste of time, following people, most of whom I don't know in real life, and wouldn't know who I was if we passed in the street. It's dumb, sending out messages to people who honestly could probably care less, and would most likely not need to know most of what I tweet out. I tweet out ridiculous nonsense, and I know this. I even blogged about Twitter on here, like, forever ago. But I still love it, so there it is.
Anyhoo, this evening, I was sitting here eating dinner, reading my book. (Sometimes I like to read when I eat alone, it makes me feel like I'm doing something). Anyway, I got a text from a friend who told me that she's friends with Chris Wingert on Facebook. In case someone doesn't know who Chris Wingert is:

Anyway, she was telling me that he recently uploaded some fan pics onto his FB page, and one of the pics was the one that he had taken with me and PJ like, 2 years ago. I immediately got on there, and saw it, and of course, it made me smile. Here it is, in case you wanted to see:

So, for funsies, I tweeted about it, and mentioned Chris by his twitter name (which in case you wondered, alerts him to the tweet talking about him.) In my tweet, I said that he had posted a pic of the three of us, and said that because of this, we must be best friends. After 20 minutes or so, after a chuckle, I got a reply tweet from him saying "You know it! :)" and I squealed a little in happiness. I know that he doesn't know who I am. I know that he could care less of what some fan says, but that he took just a few minutes to joke and reply back just made me happy.
Now, will this change anything in my life? No. But is it something cool that happened on an otherwise boring Wednesday? Heck yes.