the purple boa

So there's not much to say.  I was at Joann fabrics looking at fabric with the boys.  Sometimes you will do anything to keep your kids happy.

He was happy the whole time.

Maybe I need a girl...

rainy day cookies

It has been raining here for two days.  What a wonderful change from the hot sunny days we have had all summer.  The sky is grey and the air, although humid, is cool.

I love to bake on a nice rainy day.  A day that most people think dismal, dreary, depressing, I find a wonderful excuse to blow up the kitchen and make something delicious.

Today I had a helper in the kitchen...

We decided to make my all time favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe.  I love them because they are crisp and chewy and gooey.  

I'll start by telling you to pre-heat  your oven to 400*.  Don't preheat it to 350* like I did.  Then you will have to wait even longer for them to be cooked.

Here's what you will need:

You'll notice on the left side of the picture is a large jar of granulated sugar.  You will only be using brown sugar in this recipe.  I am not sure why I got it out.  But it does look good in the picture.  

sweet little hands...

 So I know that you know how to make cookies.  Here are some pictures of our process.

1.  "Can I help, Mom?"
2. "I can't do it!"
3. Butter
4. creamed butter
5. brown sugar, eggs, vanilla
6. sifting dry ingredients
7. mixing dry ingredients
8. stopped the mixer to take picture of dry ingredients
9. add chocolate chips

 The recipe calls for a 12 ounce bag of chocolate chips.  I use a few less because a certain little person always wants a bowl of them.  

Guess which little person...

 Sweet little hands again.

 How many can I fit in my mouth?

chocolate all over face

realizing he has chocolate all over face

 "I'm so cute!"

So after you do all of the measuring, mixing and wiping off little hands and cheeks, you actually bake the cookies. 

 I use a 2 tablespoon cookie scoop.  This yeilds a pretty big cookie.  

12 cookies will fit on a large sheet pan.

Here they are again.  I couldn't decide which picture to use so I just uploaded both.  I think maybe the first one is better because the background is blurred a bit.

 When they come out of the oven, they look like this.  Well...not half eaten, but golden around the edges and soft in the middle.

"Can I eat this cookie, Mom?" 

 "Stop taking my picture mom!"

Notice the spiky hair.  We were trying a new hair style.  I was going to say hair do.  Can you say that for a boy?  He did not like it in the mirror but soon forgot that it was sticking up.  

Enjoy these tasty chocolate chip cookies with an ice cold glass of milk.  They are not only perfect for a rainy day, but for all occasions.  

side note:  For those of you who know that I am working really hard to lose weight...now you know why I have not been so successful.  Who could resist these sitting around the house.  They call your name every time you are in the kitchen...or in the living room sitting on the couch...or working on the computer.  I could go on forever...

Here's the recipe:

1 cup (1/2lb.) butter, at room temperature

1 1/2 cups firmly packed brown sugar

2 large eggs at room temperature

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 cups (12 ounces) semisweet chocolate chips - I prefer Hershey's

1 cup chopped pecans (optional) - I opt out

Preparation:

1. In the bowl of your mixer, beat butter and brown sugar until well blended.  Beat in eggs and vanilla until smooth, scraping sides of bowl as needed.
2. In another bowl, sift flour, baking soda, and salt together.  Stir or beat into the butter mixture until well incorporated.  
3. Stir in chocolate chips.
4. Drop dough in 2-tablespoon portions, 2 inches apart, onto cookie sheet.  I use an ungreased non-stick cookie sheet.  
5. Bake at 400* until cookies are lightly browned and no longer wet in the center.  6 - 8 minutes.  Turn the pan 1/2 way through baking.  Mine actually took exactly 9 minutes.  But all ovens are different
6. Remove from the oven, and transfer cookies to a cooling rack.

Nutritional information:

            I could tell you, but who really cares at this point.

My little Picasso

I will start by saying that Matthew loves to craft.  I don't know if it is the actual craft that he likes or if it is the personal attention that he gets while we do a craft, but none the less, he is always happy when we are crafting.

So last week he wanted to paint.

Washable?  We'll see...

Notice we finally insulated the walls. No more studs to look at.  It is much cooler and quieter too!

Of course he chose blue first.

Being the particular little person he is, he would not use his hands so I gave him a paint brush.  

 "Dots"

by
Matthew Pendley

We'll start the bidding at $100.00.

Um...maybe I should add another ZERO to that number.

Well his hands got dirty after all.    

While Matthew was having fun painting I had some fun of my own.  I had not swept the kitchen floor in almost a week. 

GASP!!!!!

GASP again!

That's all the fun for now.

After the mess...

If you saw my previous post on making messes you'll be glad to know that everything got put back in its place.  If fact the room was probably cleaner afterwards than when Matthew started with his mess making.

Matthew picked several books to read so we sat on the floor in his "clean" room and read.  First was Duckie's Rainbow.  Even Samuel joined in.  He likes to bat at the book and tries to turn the pages before we are done reading.

Then we switched books and Samuel was much more interested in the yellow dancing, singing chicken.  (Thanks Grandmother!)

About half way through If You Give A Cat A Cupcake, Samuel was done with me and Matthew and the dancing chicken, and moved onto more fascinating things...the camera. 

It was a nice calm way to end our evening.