Cake Mix Cookies - one of my new favorite things.

Who doesn't love a simple homemade dessert? I know they are my go-to recipes when I want something sweet. I have recently discovered (thanks to Pinterest) the wonderfulness of what a cake mix can do. Personally, I don't love cake. Don't get me wrong, I do like it and if it's offered to me the answer is always yes, but it's just not my favorite dessert. I love cake flavors, but I think it's just the texture. Box cake mixes always make really fluffy, airy cakes. If I'm going to eat cake, I want it to be a good, moist, dense cake. I've never made a cake from scratch, though... maybe that will be my next adventure...

Ok, done ranting about cake.

Back to cake mixes. They have SO many uses I never would have thought of if it had not been for Pinterest. I've made cake batter puppy chow (and it's deeee-licious! I'm making some soon to take on vacation... I'll try to post about that later), cake batter "fudge", cake bars, but my favorite is cake mix cookies.

I love cookies and can honestly say that there aren't many things better than a warm cookie right out of the oven with a glass of milk (cookie dough might be one thing better than a warm cookie). Cake mix cookies are great for those times when you really want fresh baked cookies, but don't have (or want to get out) all of the ingredients to make them from scratch. Here's the recipe:

1 box cake mix

1/4 c water

1/4 c vegetable oil

1 T applesauce (or 1 egg, I prefer applesauce)

Preheat oven to 350. 

Mix all ingredients together. 

Drop spoonfuls onto greased cookie sheet. 

(I have one of those nifty little cookie dough scoops that I use) 

Bake for 15 minutes. 

Cool on wire racks. 

Eat.

It's so simple! The thing I love most about these cookies is that the options are endless! I've made them with funfetti cake, lemon cake, red velvet cake (with homemade cream cheese icing... mmm), and my most recent ones were made with yellow cake and I added mini chocolate chips and a dash of coconut flakes. Yumm-o! 

AND-- the greatest thing about this mix: no eggs (if you choose)! So you can eat as much dough as you want and not feel one bit guilty about it! Does any one else out there eat so much cookie dough that you almost (and I did say almost) don't want any cookies after they're baked? I do. All the time. Anyway, the original recipe I found for these cookies called for an egg, but I was out of eggs and really wanted to make cookies that night. So I looked up egg substitutes and found out that I could use applesauce. I did use egg once, but using egg made the cookies fluffier--and going back to my rant about cake, the more dense, the better. So I decided that applesauce was the better option for me (and my love of eating cookie dough). But you can try both ways and decide which way you prefer. 

Final thoughts: there are infinite combinations that you could do with these cookies. Use your imagination, experiment, come up with something new and delicious and share your recipe with me! I hope you all try these delicious little desserts and love them as much as I do! 

Spice Cake Bars... a delicious (pre)fall treat!

I was on my way home from work last Wednesday when I had the desire to go home and bake something yummy. This happens from time to time, usually on days when I know I'm going home to an empty apartment because Matt is working late. I'm not sure why I like to bake when I'm home alone, but I do. Maybe it's the fun of surprising Matt when he gets home with something yummy. Anyway, on this particular day it was feeling just a tiny bit like fall, so I wanted to make something that reminded me of fall... something pumpkin or cinnamon-spicey or something like that. I remembered that I have a recipe for cake bars that uses a cake mix and is essentially just really dense cake. So then it came to me-- what if I made those using a spice cake mix???

So off to Publix I went. They had cake mixes buy one get one free, so I got Duncan Hines mixes for $.93 each. It would have been better if I had a coupon, like I did for some razors I bought. I have to tell you about this deal-- Publix also had Bic Soliel 3-pack razors buy one get one. They were originally $5.79 per pack, so they were on sale for $2.90 each. I had two coupons (that may or may not have been expired... If the self check-out machine takes expired coupons, it's their problem) and one was for $3 off one pack and the other was $2 off one pack. Grand total: $.79 for TWO packs of razors!

Back to the cake bars.

I bought my cake mix and went home.

After making myself some dinner and vegging on the couch for an hour or so, it was time to get up and try out this idea. So I went into the kitchen and gathered my supplies.

Simple supplies that almost everyone has on hand.

First, mix together the cake mix, 1 egg, and 1/4 cup oil. It will be very thick. Slowly add in 1/3 to 1/2 cup of milk to keep the mix good and dense. Spray your baking dish--I used either an 8x8 or 9x9 glass dish (clearly I have no idea what size this thing is, but it worked)--with cooking spray and dump the batter into it. It looks like this:

I did a really poor job of mixing and there were still chunks
of cake mix that didn't get thoroughly mixed...
if yours looks like this, it's ok, it doesn't affect the taste.

Then pop it into a 350 degree oven for 25 minutes. It comes out looking oh so yummy and smelling delicious! You're going to want to cut into this immediately, but it'll still be a little gooey in the middle, so wait. I know it's hard, but you can do it! I think I let mine sit 15-20 minutes. It was still warm and just gooey enough.

Mmmm.

As I was waiting for the cake bars to cool, I was trying to decide what to pair with them. I had some cream cheese in the fridge and thought about making cream cheese icing--which probably would have been delicious on these--but I think that would have made this dessert just a little more rich than I wanted it to be. As I was scanning my cupboards and fridge for an idea, I found some heavy cream that I had used for a recipe earlier in the week. Bingo! Whipped cream! I had never made homemade whipped cream before, so I consulted Google for a recipe, and came across this one. Sounded good to me!

Being as I had never made this before, I did what the recipe said and just started whipping the ingredients together with a whisk. I whipped and I whipped and I whipped... but the cream didn't. Time to bust out the big guns. I put that stuff in my Kitchenaid mixer, put on the whisk attachment, turned it on somewhere between medium and high speed, and watched it work it's magic.

I didn't register for this fantastic machine when we
got married because I thought I didn't need one.
Thankfully, Matt's grandma knew what was up
and bought us one anyway.
Thank you, Grandma Tsilimos! 

So, after the whipped cream was ready and the bars were cooled (mostly) this was the finished product:

Ok, so I took a bit before remembering to take a picture.
I couldn't wait.

Final thoughts: This was delicious! I'm definitely adding it to my list of regular desserts. And the great thing about this recipe is that you can use any kind of cake mix you want, you could add things into it like chocolate chips, nuts, coconut, sprinkles, etc., and you could do any kind of icing to make it your own. There are infinite options out there! (Here's where I got my original inspiration for this recipe.)

Happy baking, everyone! 

Owl City!

So, this may be almost a week late... but I've been busy.

Last Thursday, Matt and I went to Center Stage Theater (here in Atlanta) to see Owl City! It was a fantastic show! So great, that I would gladly go see the same show again, given the chance. Ever since I first heard his music a couple years ago, he has been one of my favorite artists.

We took the Marta train to the station closest to the venue (luckily it was probably less than half a mile away) to avoid downtown traffic and parking. As we were walking up to the line waiting to get in, I got my camera out to snap a picture--the camera that I haven't used in a very long time--and found out that the battery was dead. No worries! I had an extra! ... it was dead, too. Guess I should have checked that the night before... Luckily I had my phone with me! ... the battery had just gone from green to yellow. Geez, I was not having any luck! So what do I do? Put my phone on airplane mode, and hope that the battery lasts! (in case you're wondering, it did... I think I ended the night with 5-10% battery life. whew.)

So we went into the concert venue, and were strangely excited to see that there was standing room on the floor, and then stadium/theater seating (whatever it's called) behind that. The strange part is because we were excited about the seating. Typically, I'm a push-your-way-to-the-front-of-the-crowd kind of concert-goer, but this particular Thursday, I. was. tired. Yes, I realize this categorizes me as "an old fogie" but I had been up since 6:00 am, chased around 6 babies all day (harder than it sounds), drove home from work, made dinner, and then gone back out at 6:30 pm--the time I'm usually settling into the couch on a week day. So, to the seats we went! We found great seats straight back from center stage, about 6 or so rows up.

The concert started with an opening band, Action Item (who I saw open for Honor Society last summer at The Masquerade.) As they start playing, this is my view:

(And I was even leaning over on Matt at this point.)

They were the ONLY two people in the seats that were standing. 

And they were directly in front of me. 

Awesome.

I was pretty angry. I mean, seriously. Who chooses seats, and then stands up!? There was no reason, at all, for that. 

Moving on. 

Action Item finished, and those girls scurried on their way to wherever, and I could see the stage again (now that it was unoccupied). 

Finally Owl City started. He played every song from his new album, along with about ten songs from the previous two. We could just barely see the set list from our seats, and I tried to take a picture of it, but with my awesome cell phone camera, it turned out like this:

unreadable. 

(is that a word?)

Overall, the concert was a lot of fun! If you know anything about Adam Young, you know he describes himself as being introverted. I can definitely agree with him. You know how at most concerts, the artist will talk a lot between songs? Well, he didn't do that. Maybe a few words here and there. No cute personal stories or anything like that. He definitely came across as socially awkward. But let's be honest, all the cool people are. So, with that, I will share a few pictures from the concert. Sadly, they are all of poor quality, but they're better than nothing.

Before the concert started. Pretty small venue. I liked it.

Action Item.

Seats. Awesome.

Us, being, well, us. 

Far more people moved to the front after Action Item finished.

OWL CITY!!!

"'cause what you got is go-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-old!" 

Crappy picture, but I was walking.

I love that building when it's all lit up.

Waiting for the train.

I'm pretty sure he was saying "stop taking pictures of me." 

Shoes.

I was bored. 

And it was only a 3 minute wait. 

Final thought: Wonder what the girls that stood up for the entire Action Item set did during the Owl City set? ... They sat down and played on their phones. Which I was COMPLETELY ok with! But seriously, who goes to a concert JUST to see the opening band!?

I'll never understand people...

A tale of two kitties.

What a week!

I think my lazy weekend has caught up to me. Matt was at Dragoncon all weekend, so I was home alone, and did practically nothing all weekend. Including cooking. Which seemed to set the tone for this week. I think making a grilled cheese sandwich Monday night was the extent of my cooking. It's been sad. But, it's already been one heck of a week.

On Saturday I got a call from the vet that there was a cancellation and Eve and Nala (my 10 month old kitties) could come in and get fixed. They were scheduled for October 4th, so this was a month early! (if any of you have ever had a cat in heat, you understand my excitement.)

So we lured them into their crates yesterday morning and Matt took them off to the vet at 7:30am.

Fast forward a couple hours.

I get a text from Matt on my lunch break that our poor baby Nala's heart actually stopped during the procedure, but they revived her and finished the surgery and she was waking up by the time they had called him. By the time I got home from work (around 5pm) it was advised to us to take her to an emergency vet for over night observation and to get a sonogram done on her heart to see what's wrong.

This was starting to sound very expensive.

So we went to pick up the kitties and grabbed a quick dinner on the way (Subway, yum). When we got there we found out that the kitties have on cones (more on that hilariousness in a bit) and that they were ready to go home. We called an emergency vet and found out that it would cost us $130 just to watch her! Seriously... $130 just to come in and sit in a cage? I mean, I know it's good if something were to happen, but that's a lot of money after just paying a pretty penny for surgery. So we opted against that and just brought her home. The vet told us what signs to watch for in her.

When we got home we let them out of their crates. Eve stumbled right out of hers, but Nala was in the wrong way and we had to take the top off to get her out. Once they were both out we laughed for a while. The anesthesia was still wearing off, so they couldn't walk in a straight line, and their little cones were bumping into everything because they're so used to fitting into tight spaces. And I mean everything. Walls, chairs, food bowls, the litter box, each other, etc... Oh, that was a good time. It went on all evening.

Fast forward again now to today.

They're both doing fine. Nala is more lethargic than usual, but I think she's going to be ok. We're still trying to decide if it's worth the money to get a sonogram done on her heart, though. As for the cones, they've gotten a little more used to them, but it's still pretty funny to watch them run into things (is that mean?).

This is Eve. 

(she's typically the trouble maker of the two)

And this is pitiful little Nala.

The calm one.

Her eyes were so dilated (I don't know why) that she walked around squinting all night.

And to top off her pitiful-ness, she was bandaged up from getting an IV... or something. (I should listen when my husband rattles off medical things...)  

So that was the excitement. Too much excitement for me. But at least that's over with. To add to the laziness of this week, a coworker and I went out for lunch... to Cinnabon. Oh it was so good... but so bad. AND THEN Matt and I went to Stevi B's (pizza buffet) for dinner. AND ON TOP OF THAT, one of my student's parents gave me a triple chocolate cake today. Whew. I think I gained a few more pounds just thinking about that again. Maybe I'll go get on the treadmill tomorrow... hahaha!

This all leads to why I am now laying in bed, and have been for an hour. I'm now giving in to the sugar-crash that's been happening all day. Call me a grandma, but I. am. tired.

Final note-- I'm going to see Owl City tomorrow night! I'll try to post on that this weekend. Look for pictures soon!

Project 1: The No-Sew Drape Vest

After setting this whole thing up yesterday, I went out to do some shopping and visited one of my favorite stores: Hobby Lobby. I loooove Hobby Lobby. I could spend all day (and my whole paycheck) in there, but no worries--I was probably only in there for an hour and very minimal money was spent.

While I was browsing the store, I came across a rack of solid colored t-shirts and remembered a project I had seen on Pinterest. Someone used a large men's t-shirt and made some cuts and it magically became a cute women's vest. Best of all, it requires NO sewing! The only sewing that I do is sewing a button or stitching up a hole in something. So anyway, I saw that these t-shirts were only $3.99 and thought that was cheap enough that if I fail, I won't feel bad about spending the money. I got really excited when I got up to the register and it was 30% off! So my $4 project was reduced to $2.79. Score!

I got home and got right to work. Here's how it went down: (Please excuse the picture quality. I know I said I was going to dig out my digital camera, but I didn't. So I just used my cell phone. and I recently got a new laptop and have no photo editing software... or if I do, I don't know where it is...)

Step 1: find a t-shirt. 

The original site said to use an XL, but they didn't have an XL in brown, so I got a L. It seemed to work ok. I think it just needs to be a couple sizes bigger than what you would wear. (and yes, I am using my ironing board for a table.)

Step 2: cut off the sleeves. 

Step 3: cut off the collar in a half circle. 

You can see that my cutting skills are fantastic (not). 

(the pink blob in the background is a towel that one of my cats likes to lay on. long story. don't ask.)

Step 4: cut straight up the sides so that it opens like this. 

Step 5: put on your vest. 

So, this is what it looks like. The hole from where you cut the collar is where your arms go through.

The back looks like this.

I think it turned out pretty well. It'll be cute to layer over a long-sleeve t-shirt with jeans and boots this fall! (no I did not wear it with my sun dress.)

Final thoughts: this was SO simple. My only concern is what's going to happen to it when I wash it since the portions that I cut have not been hemmed (or whatever the correct sewing term is). Maybe I'll just be reeeeeally careful when I wear it so I never have to wash it... 

Anyway, I'm adding a link to the original one that I saw. She includes a video that shows exactly how to do it. Click here to watch. 

On a completely unrelated note, the time stamp on here is 3 hours behind. Does anybody know how to fix it??? 

Let's do this!

So, this whole blogging idea thing all started when I decided that our meal routine needed a little spicing up (you can only eat pizza and pasta so many times a week before wanting something new). I went to Pinterest (click here to visit my boards) to get some new ideas of things to cook and started reading many of the blogs out there. 

As I would cook (or in some cases, attempt to cook) the recipes, I thought to myself, "I could blog about my adventures in cooking, too, but do I really want to take the time to do that...?" 

Well...

Here I am. Ready to dig out the ol' digital camera and share some of my adventures with you. Whoever you are. If you're even out there. Maybe this will be more of a journal for myself, but whatever the case, here I am. Blogging. 

And I'm not limiting this to cooking. It will probably be all sorts of random things, which can include, but are not limited to: cooking, baking, crafts, scrapbooking (my long lost love  that I will get into again... someday... when I have more free time...), shopping, couponing, and life in general. 

Who knows when my first project post will be. I'm feeling accomplished just getting this thing up and running!