Going on a Walkabout

Some of the things I got to see while walking around in St. George and Santa Clara last October. We've been spending large chunks of time down there because we've been trying to restore our home there to some level of order and cleanliness after having rented the home out for the last three years. That was a mistake!

Other Happenings in October

I made an unexpected trip to California to attend the funeral of a dear friend of mine who lost the battle to cancer after six hard years of fighting. The up-side of being in California was visiting six adorable little people. Here they are.  

Nora

Tracy

Sara

Gary

Theo

Mia

The kids always want to be the photographer, so this is the result. 

We also went to the beach while I was there, and that was a blast! I sure love these kids! 

Building the mandatory sand castle

Gary was dragging seaweed around all day. His final pile was impressive. 

Theo fed more of his lunch to the seagulls than he fed to himself. 

Cuteness overload! 

Hello Again!

I didn't actually fall off the face of the earth, but it was a close call. I thought I'd start back with what's been happening since I last blogged nearly six months ago! 

In October we went to the Huntsman World Senior Games, as usual. Bud was surprised he did so well, but he always says that, so I'm not sure when to start believing him.  

He received one silver and four golds. His arch nemesis, Frank Piemme, beat him in the 50 meter backstroke by less than a half second. What comes around goes around and on the next race, Bud beat Frank by a little more than a half second! From then on, Bud increased his lead in every race, and finally won the last race by more than 20 seconds. 

Here's the hardware. 

This is our good friend, Don Baker. 

This is our dear friend, Biff Lowry, posing with the Wong sisters and Mama Wong. 

That's it for now- I need to ease back into the blogging world and not just jump into the deep end! 

Bliss in Every Bite

I made some cookies on Monday that are probably the most delicious chocolate peanut butter combination I have ever tasted before.

The recipe is the brain child of Lizzy Early from Your Cup of Cake. The only difference between hers and mine is that I added the extra drizzle, which is just leftover ganache that is also under the baby Reese's peanut butter cups. Lizzy suggests that you make a depression in the cookie before baking. I used the back of this measuring spoon (it's a tablespoon). 

Once the cookies are baked (and they are super fast and easy since they start with a cake mix), you fill them with a peanut butter frosting and then a peanut butter/chocolate ganache, topped with mini Reese's peanut butter cups. Not miniature Reese's, but mini Reese's. They are each about the size of my baby fingernail. As if that wasn't enough, I made this on the same day. It's from Six Sister's Stuff.

You can get the recipe for that right here.  But their recipe doesn't have that layer of peanut butter goo in it. For me, that's practically the best part of the fudge, so here's that peanut butter sauce recipe. 

Okay, the treats are ready! It's time for friends to come over. The set up in the back was for banana splits. 

Yummy! I made some hot fudge sauce and more peanut butter sauce for the splits, but I left my triple crock pot on high and the sauces overheated. We just dipped out of the very center and we survived. I thought the cookies were even better the next day. I couldn't stop eating them, so I had to give every last one of them away. 

S'morekies

A very long time ago, we tried a chocolate chip cookie/s'more cookie that was really delicious. I never blogged them and so I thought I'd better do it now so I won't forget them. These are adapted from a blog called Bakergirl.

I've decided to call these...S'more cookies, or S'morekies!

S'morekies

2/3 cup butter, softened

2/3 cup shortening (necessary to get the right amount of "melt" to the dough)

1 cup granulated sugar

2 cups packed brown sugar

4 eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
5 cups all purpose flour
12 oz chocolate chips (we prefer milk chocolate)
1/2 cup mini chocolate chips
2 cups mini marshmallows (plus a few extras)
6 regular sized Hershey bars, cut into 24 pieces per bar
2 boxes graham crackers (I've found ones already halved, labeled as S'mores sized- perfect!)

Preheat oven to 350°F. Line cookie sheet with parchment paper.
In a large mixing bowl, beat together the butter and shortening until light and creamy (about 3-4 minutes). Add both sugars and continue to beat until fluffy, then add eggs and vanilla and beat until combined.
Add the dry ingredients together and add to the butter/egg mixture. Blend slowly, just until combined. That's a lot of flour to add all at once, so watch out for exploding flour back in your face if you start your mixer up too quickly! Stir in chocolate chips (both sizes) and marshmallows (reserving the few extras).
Spread out your half-sized graham crackers onto the parchment paper. Place a golf ball sized scoop of cookie dough onto the graham cracker. Bake for 5 minutes, then remove the cookie sheet from the oven and add a couple of the reserved marshmallows and a couple of the Hershey bar pieces to each cookie. Work quickly! Return the cookies to the oven and bake for an additional 5 minutes.
These were devoured as soon as they were cool enough to handle. My grandchildren gave them two thumbs up as well.

It's the Pits

Laura came up with an ingenious way to pit cherries. I love it.

Hold the cherry with the stem end down (the stem has already been removed) over a frosting tip. Laura is using a Wilton #10. It's round and fairly large, but not so large that it takes out much more than just the pit. 

Press the cherry down onto the frosting tip and the pit comes right out. 

Take a look at how easy this is!