Trick or Treat Cookies

 

     I mentioned in my last post that I try to put things I eat through the "worth it" test. Is it worth the fat, calories and extra exercise necessary if I indulge. Well, these cookies are absolutely WORTH IT! They are a little scary looking (after all-they are for Halloween) but they taste so good!

 

Ingredients:

 

3 sticks of unsalted butter

1 1/2 cups brown sugar, packed

1 cup white sugar

2 eggs

2 tsp. vanilla (I only use real vanilla)

scant tsp. of salt

1 tsp. baking soda

4 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (I use Hershey's)

4 cups of chopped Snickers , Reese's Peanut Butter Cups and M & M's (I used peanut)

1 cup broken pretzels

orange food coloring

 

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees

 

Cream together butter, brown sugar and white sugar.

Add the eggs and vanilla and beat until fluffy.

Mix salt and baking soda with flour and slowly

mix into butter mixture. Beat until dough forms.

 

Split the dough in half and place in separate bowls.

 

Stir cocoa powder into one half of the dough.

You can see a few "white spots" in mine, it

doesn't hurt anything.

 

Add orange food coloring to the other half of

the dough. This step is not necessary if you

want a black/white cookie. If that is the case, use

 the "white" dough as is without adding any food coloring.

 

Into each bowl of colored dough, fold

in 1 1/2 cups of the mixed candy (not the pretzels).

 

Roll the chocolate dough and the orange

dough into balls. Cut the balls in half and press

a half of each color together to

form a cookie. Place on cookie

sheet and slightly flatten.

 

     Press remaining 1 cup of mixed candy and the broken pretzels into the flattened cookie tops. Bake approx. 12 minutes, until slightly brown around the edges. Allow to cool on cookie sheet a few minutes and remove to wire racks to finish cooling. These cookies break easily when warm. Allow them to cool enough before removing. I left my pretzel pieces fairly large because I wanted "scary looking" cookies for Halloween. You could certainly have a prettier cookie if the pretzel pieces were smaller. The melted snicker bars (yum) may ooze out a bit while baking. With the edge of a knife or spatula, push the melted snicker back to the edge of the cookie while very warm. 

 

I am joining Michael @ Rattlebridge Farm for Foodie Friday.

Bits and Pieces-Halloween Edition

 

     Halloween is my favorite time of the year to host parties. Having a birthday very close to Halloween, I grew up having parties this time of year and old habits are hard to break. I have gotten so lazy about committing to company, but I was so glad that I decided to have a few friends over Saturday night for a casual evening. I didn't do a tablescape, I simply covered the table with black fabric, put my current centerpiece back on it and lit a couple candles. The dishes were stacked, the food was self-serve and simple, it was a no-stress evening for everyone. You don't always have to prepare a sit down feast for your guests. I made a pot of chili, the grilled cheese/tomato soup casserole I recently posted and two kinds of cookies (recipes soon). One friend brought a pie and another brought apple slices and dip. I had s'mores to make over the fire pit, but we were all too full to eat them! I had a great time and it reminded me just how much I really do love to entertain.

 

 

     While I'm showing you the little touches of Halloween that I added to my fall decorations, I want to show you my dining room table. We bought the table at a furniture store tent sale and have used it the past two years with a few scratches on it. It seemed to be getting more and more scratches and chips and my husband just refinished it. I think he did a beautiful job. We put a glossy, waterproof coating on it so I can just wipe it off.

 

This year I didn't really take down my fall things,

I just added a few Halloween items here and there.

     We are actually having a chilly week. I even turned on the fireplace this morning after taking Zoe out in the rain. We were cold. I haven't turned on the heat, or needed to...but the air finally went off yesterday, although I am certain I will have it back on again. This is the kind of day that I'd like to bake (and then eat it all).

 

     I've been asked to keep updating the progress in our family healthy eating/living plan. My daughter recently ran her first 5k since high school (10 years). She is wearing a size 6 and feels great. She would like to lose another 10 pounds or so, but her attitude is that it will happen when it happens. Keeping her calories around 1200 a day and exercising most days is still the norm for her. She said that she started crying about half way through the race because it dawned on her how far she had come in 10 months. I'm very proud of her. She also just started another new project at Disney, which meant that her trip home that was cancelled because of work in August and moved to November, has also been cancelled. I will go 8 months without seeing her, the longest we have ever gone. Her job is so exciting, but very hard on her mother!!

 

     I have dropped my exercising from 6 days a week to 4 or 5, I am still eating healthy 90% of the time and we both still live by the "is it worth it" rule for eating fattening foods. Some things are worth it! Some simply aren't. I am right where I want to be and maintaining it so far, but I know that I can never get lazy about it or I will gain it all back very quickly. We just live it now, we don't really think about it much like we did in the beginning.

 

     Speaking of foods that are "worth it"...coming soon, Trick or Treat Cookies.

 

 

I am joining Marty @ A Stroll Thru Life

for Inspire Me Tuesdays

and

Kim @ Savvy Southern Style

for Wow Us Wednesdays

  

Fall Porch

 

     Fall roared in to Central Illinois over the weekend dropping more than 2 inches of rain in about an hour and taking the temperature from almost 90, down to the 50's! We were out running errands on Saturday and we got drenched. We really needed the rain, and the blue jean weather feels so good. It isn't here to stay, but I am enjoying a few days without air-conditioning or heat!

 

     The front porch has been decked out for fall for a little while now. I actually added Halloween touches after taking these pictures.

 

My porch is so small that I am very limited in

what I can do. I envy those of you with big front

porches. Maybe in the next house!

 

 

     We found our pumpkins and mums at a farm on the way home from French Lick. The prices were great and the variety of pumpkin choices was so much fun. We had to have white ones, and heirloom pumpkins to stack and bumpy ones...I literally had to stop myself. Our most expensive pumpkin was the bottom of the pumpkin stack, $5!

 

 

     I spotted this little toad on a hibiscus leaf several days ago. I have never seen a frog/toad in my yard before! I just let him sit and enjoy the sunshine. The leaves in my neighborhood are still green. I love it when the leaves are glowing red, yellow and orange...soon!

Getting Ready for Fall-Wreath Tutorial

 

 

     The seashells have been put away around my house and it is beginning to look more like fall. Of course, with temperatures pushing 100 degrees this week...I feel a little silly switching my things, but I was ready for a change. I won't put out Halloween things until October, but I did want to make a new indoor wreath for the season. I saw something in a catalog that I loved, but it was $359! I was inspired to make something that was equally as unique and I love the result...I always like things to be slightly "odd"!



 

     My goal, as always, was to use things I had at home and spend as little money as possible. I put a sheet on the living room floor and got busy stripping old flowers and ribbon off of a grapevine wreath. This wreath is approx. 25" in size. I also had 3 different fall ribbons and 3 different black and white ribbons for this project.

 

     To begin, make 6 or 7 bows (I made 2 loop bows, much smaller than a bow for a traditional wreath or package) of each of the fall colors. I also made 2 bows from each of the black and white spools of ribbon. You can see my bow tutorial in my sidebar. Just make 2 loops per side instead of the normal 3 or more.

 

     My first ribbon was a bronze/brown with a rust floral on it. Using the wire I made the bows with, I attached the bows randomly to the wreath.

 

     The second ribbon was a deep orange mesh, again added randomly on the wreath. You may notice that I haven't cut the tails on the bows at this time. I wasn't sure what I was going to do with them at this point. After all the bows were attached, I cut the tails (which were left about the same size as the bow loops).

 

 

     Someone in my house loves ribbon more than I do. After chasing her around and grabbing the bows from her, I moved her bed to my work area and she finally calmed down.

 

     The last of my fall ribbon was a deep chocolate brown with an animal print in rust. Once again, filling in the gaps left by the other bows, these were added. At this point, I hung the wreath on the wall and snipped the tails, fluffed the loops and made sure that most of the wreath was covered with bows.

 

 

     I added the various black and white bows into the mix (this is the odd part) and wired in a sparkly witches hat.

 

I also had a witch tassel that was just screaming

at me, "pick me, I want to be on the wreath too"!

 

 

A few random faux pumpkins were

tucked in for added texture and it is done!

 

 

     I love the fact that it isn't screaming orange and that while it has hints of Halloween, it can be up through all of the fall months. I also love that it isn't covered with faux fall flowers. I can't wait to try a similar technique at Christmas! I was thrilled with the result and only had to buy the black and white ribbons to create it, the rest I already had at home. What do you think? Too strange?

 

I will be joining Kim @ Savvy Southern Style

for Wow Us Wednesdays

Please make sure to visit the party!

Luke Update and Other Things

 

     It has been an interesting time around our house. My daughter was home for 9 days! You have no idea what a gift that was for me. She hadn't been home in 18 months and she only gets here once a year. She hadn't experienced Fall since she moved 5 years ago, so that was her only request...she wanted to experience the season. We picked her up in St. Louis and took her along the Great River Road to Alton, Grafton and Elsa. The pictures above and below were taken at Pere Marquette Lodge.

 

     We also took a day and headed to Arthur, IL to Amish Country, where we went to an Amish auction (the handcrafted furniture is stunning), shopped at an Amish grocery store (noodles, homemade butter, fresh bread) and enjoyed being surrounded by all the horse and buggys. It is such a different world and yet not that far away.

 

 

     Her visit home was at the same time as my girlfriend's annual Witch Party, so of course we put on our witche's hats and had a fun luncheon with a coven of witches. Some of these women really go all out with their costumes. We completely took over the dining room at a local restaurant. It was such fun! Even more so with my girl child with me.

 

     We did arts and crafts! I know that you all are aware that I have no talent in that category, but after reading about making swearter pumpkins on StoneGable's blog, I thought we might be able to handle it. I went to Goodwill for sweaters and had them washed and ready. Believe it or not, ours turned out really well (for us). I'm linking to Yvonne's tutorial here. Believe me, if I can do this, you can.

 

     We spoiled ourselves a little bit at a spa. We actually went to Branches twice. My daughter had a facial and manicure while I had a pumpkin pedicure and then a few days later, she had a massage while I had a facial. Everything was wonderful, relaxing and very comfortable. I think a monster has been created as I can't wait to go back. 

 

     She had planned this trip to be home for my birthday, which was last Monday. I kept saying that between my trip to Michigan and then having my kiddo home for so many days, I simply didn't need a birthday this year. Well, it is a good thing that I felt that way, because Sunday night I had food poisoning from a local restaurant lunch. I have seriously never been that sick in my life. So, my daughter spent her last day home bringing me ice chips, rubbing my neck and making jello. I couldn't stand without getting dizzy until Wednesday and it was Thursday before I got dressed. I lost an entire week...Happy Birthday to me! I will admit, if I had to be that sick, it was certainly nice having her home to take care of me! One thing about it, life is rarely dull around my house!

 

 

     I kept reminding myself as I was sick last week, that it was really nothing compared to what this brave little guy has been going through. As you can see, he has lost most of his hair and is a bit puffy from the steriods. He has been having some wonderful experiences made possible by generous people in town. Our local fire department made him and honorary fireman, even letting him go on a call and hanging his picture on the wall. One of the most moving things I have ever seen is that they put out the word to other fire departments in the state, and over 100 departments each sent him a hat...such kind people in the world.

 

     Today is an important day for our friends and a very difficult one. Luke has his bone marrow test today and this is the day they have to decide to either have the bone marrow transplant or extremely strong chemo. Whichever direction they choose, it makes the other no longer an option. The doctors are split on their advice, so our young friends have to make this decision on their own, with God's help. Either choice will be dangerous for their 5-year-old, but may save his life. I can't imagine being in their shoes. So, please say a prayer for them today...for guidance and peace with their choice.