Cream Cheese M&M Sugar Cookies

Let me start by saying that over the years I've come to a new appreciation for sugar cookies. Maybe it's because I've come across a few truly delicious recipes that don't even need frosting to make them delicious. When I was growing up, I loved eating sugar cookie dough, but was usually left pretty un-enthused after they were baked. Not the case anymore! My favorite cut-out recipe uses cream cheese, and my favorite drop recipe uses sour cream. The addition of those simple ingredients takes them over the top and keeps you coming back to eat cookie after cookie after cookie . . .

However, this recipe is neither of those, but oh is it good! There's a little bit of cream cheese in the dough, which adds a hint of tang once they're baked up. You don't have to use the M&Ms if you don't want to; these are seriously scrumptious without. You roll the dough in sugar before baking them, which creates this thin crust of sugary goodness. Then, the inside of the cookie is so deliciously chewy as to be pretty much indescribable. One of my favorite things about these cookies is their texture - wonderful.

You could certainly roll them in colored sugar to make them more festive around Christmas, Thanksgiving, Valentine's Day, etc. Or, try mixing in different things - white chocolate chips, toffee pieces, crushed candy canes, etc. The possibilities are endless!

Cream Cheese M&M Sugar Cookies (original recipe can be found here)
2 oz. cream cheese, softened
1 1/2 c. plus 1/3 c. sugar
6 Tbls. butter, melted
1/3 c. vegetable oil
1 egg
1 Tbls. milk
2 tsp. vanilla
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
2 1/4 c. flour
1 1/4 c. M&Ms
1. Beat cream cheese and 1 1/2 c. sugar on medium speed until light and fluffy - 3 minutes.
2. Add butter and oil and beat again on medium speed 1 minute. Scrape down bowl.
3. Add egg, milk, vanilla, baking powder, baking soda, and salt and mix until everything comes together and is smooth and creamy, 2 minutes.
4. Stir in flour until mostly combined, then stir in M&Ms until everything is just combined. Don't overmix.
5. Refrigerate dough 1-2 hours.
6. Preheat oven to 350 and roll Tbls of dough in 1/3 c. sugar. Place on greased baking sheet, flatten slightly with the bottom of a glass, and bake 10-14 minutes. Bottoms should look light golden brown.

Hugs and cookies,

Amanda

Crunchers

These no-bake treats will please any palate. They're crunchy and salty from the crackers, chewy from the caramel, and sweet from the chocolate topping. You can't go wrong with a sweet-salty, chewy-crunchy treat, right? Right.

As I said, these are no-bake, so the Club crackers serve as the base, as well as some of the middle layers. You might think these wouldn't have a very long fridge life (soggy crackers, anyone?), but I can reassure you on that point. These were in our fridge at least 5 days and they were just as crunchy the day we gobbled up the last bite as the day we first tried that deliciousness. (And they only lasted that long because I made them on a Thursday and we were out of town over the weekend.)

Most of these ingredients are probably ones you have on hand, which is always a bonus - I did have to go out to buy the Club crackers; I bought the reduced fat ones and they worked perfectly for me. Seriously, if you're looking for an easy treat (it's almost like candy) you should definitely give these babies a try!

Crunchers (original recipe can be found here)
80-90 Club crackers
1 c. butter
2 c. graham cracker crumbs
1 c. brown sugar
1/3 c. sugar
1/2 c. milk
2/3 c. peanut butter
1/2 c. semi-sweet chocoalte chips
1/2 c. butterscotch chips
1. Line a 13x9 pan with foil, leaving enough overhang over the sides to lift bars out when done.
2. Place one layer of crackers evenly over the bottom of the pan - cut them if they don't fit evenly. I used 30 crackers per layer and didn't have to cut them.
3. Melt butter in a saucepan over medium heat. Add graham cracker crumbs, both sugars, and milk. Bring to a boil (while stirring), and boil for 5 minutes.
4. Remove from heat and spread half the mixture evenly over the crackers in the pan.
5. Place another layer of crackers over the caramel mixture, followed by the rest of the caramel.
6. Cover the top of the caramel with one more layer of crackers and refrigerate while making the topping.
7. Microwave peanut butter, chocolate chips, and butterscotch chips for one minute. Stir until smooth (can microwave another 30 seconds if it's not smooth). Spread over the top of the crackers and refrigerate everything for at least an hour before cutting.
* Remove bars from pan using foil handles to make cutting and removing bars easier. Store in the refrigerator.

Hugs and cookies,

Amanda

Sharing the Love

Kids change pretty much everything about your life. It's inevitable, it's unavoidable, and it's wonderful. Having that first baby is magical.

But, along with that, is the fear in the back of your mind before the baby comes of, "How is this going to affect our marriage? Will everything be harder? How will we cope with the added stress?"

And then baby comes and somehow it works. You don't love your spouse any less - your love for him or her isn't diminished because there's another person in your family to love. If anything, it's enhanced because you get to watch him transform into a parent - and that's magical, too.

Despite having gone through that family transformation with Asher, my husband and I were still nervous about how things we would change when our second little baby came. Keep in mind that Asher was only about 9 months old when we found out I was pregnant. You can probably imagine how we were feeling: how was our little, little guy going to become a big brother in just a few short months? He'd only be 16 1/2 months old by that time!

So yes, we had our concerns. And part of me was wondering how we would split our love, time, and attention between two very little boys. Asher was always my little sweetheart - he was pretty attached to me from the very beginning. And, with me being a stay-at-home-mom, he had a lot of one-on-one mommy-time (poor guy!). He was definitely spoiled in that regard, and when Dusty and I went to the hospital for me to be induced with Aiden, that was the first time I had spent the night apart from him.

Then little Aiden was born, and all of those fears and concerns vanished. It was needless worry on our part. Again, we didn't love Asher any less than we had, but we loved Aiden just as much. As parents, you don't split your love between your kids, or between your kids and your spouse; that love simply increases. Just when you think you couldn't possibly love any more than you already do, you can. And it's simple.

It makes it so much easier to understand God's love for us, and how we are created in His image. It's no difficult matter as a parent to love each of your children more than you ever thought possible, just as God, our Father, loves each and every one of His children equally and unconditionally.

So, now that we have baby #3 on the way, I have no qualms about how we'll manage to "share the love." It starts before they're even born, and continues to grow, and grow, and grow . . .

Butterscotch Pudding Triple Chip Cookies

I am a recipe-a-holic. I can't help myself. If I see a recipe for something that looks and sounds delicious (usually some type of cake/cookie/bar) I have to save it. I do that even if I already have a similar recipe that I love. Apparently the adage "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" doesn't apply to my recipe collection.

So . . . 

Even though I have this Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe that's my all-time favorite, I couldn't resist trying these Butterscotch Pudding Triple Chip Cookies. And oh am I glad I did!

They're so good. They're especially good if you love soft, cake-like cookies. The butterscotch pudding keeps them so, so soft, and gives them a flavor different enough from traditional chocolate chip cookies to make them special. And you can't go wrong with three different types of chips in there, either! 

They don't take long to whip together and are sturdy enough to travel if you're driving in the car or want to take them to a friend. Yummmmm . . .

Butterscotch Pudding Triple Chip Cookies (recipe adapted from Two Peas and Their Pod)

1 c. softened butter

3/4 c. brown sugar

1/4 c. sugar

1 pkg. butterscotch instant pudding mix

2 eggs

1 tsp. vanilla

1 tsp. salt

1 tsp. baking soda

3 1/2 c. flour

3/4 c. white chocolate chips

3/4 c. butterscotch chips

3/4 c. semi-sweet chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 350 and grease a cookie sheet.

2. Beat together butter, both sugars, and pudding mix until thoroughly combined.

3. Scrape down bowl and beat in eggs, vanilla, salt, and baking soda.

4. Scrape down bowl again, and stir in flour until almost combined.

5. Add all three chips and mix until just combined.

6. Drop by Tbls. onto prepared baking sheet and bake 8-10 minutes, or until light golden brown around the edges.

These are delicious warm out of the oven, but don't worry, they're just as delicious when they're cool!

Hugs and cookies,

Amanda

Drumroll . . .

And the baby bump is a . . . 

GIRL! GIRL! GIRL! GIRL!

Halfway There and I Might Be Going Insane

Today I hit the 20 week mark - hooray! In some ways I feel as though I should be a lot closer to my due date, but in others it's surreal to already be halfway there. Things have been gettin' weird lately . . .

I still have that chubby feeling, even though I'm assuming strangers would know I'm pregnant.

Sometimes, I already have trouble breathing when I lean forward - like when I'm reading a book at the kitchen table waiting for cookies to come out of the oven. It's weird. I know that happened with both of my other pregnancies, but definitely not this early. And I know I've gained about the same or less weight than with the previous pregnancies so who knows what's going on there.

After the nausea from the first trimester wore off, I started getting headaches. Every. Day. And they definitely weren't debilitating by any means, but it starts to wear on a girl when it's literally every day, and you're limited to Tylenol due to the pregnancy. When I asked my doctor about it, she said it's really common, especially during the teen weeks of pregnancy. Phew! That came as a relief, because both my husband and I were starting to feel a twinge of concern with how frequent the headaches were. And it was totally new to me since I hadn't had that with either of my previous pregnancies.

Pregnancy hormones? Oh. My. Gosh. I don't know what is going on lately. Sometimes I'm close to tears when literally nothing has happened. For instance, as I was driving back from a short shopping trip yesterday I almost started crying. There wasn't a sad song on the radio, I hadn't tried anything on so I wasn't feeling depressed about how I looked . . . Nothing had happened. And that's been happening kind of frequently. I wouldn't call myself an easy crier, so it's weird. Last night my husband wanted me to watch Taylor Swift's video for her song "Ronan", which is a true story about a 3-yr-old little boy who died of cancer. She's singing it as though she were the mom of the boy. I got about 30 seconds into it and said, "Okay, I can't watch this right now."

I think Dusty thought I might be a little crazy, but I knew I'd be bawling in a second and didn't feel like crying right then. And, we had put the boys to bed but they were upstairs being stinkers and jumping in their beds; on a normal night, I would have been annoyed that they weren't sleeping. Thinking about that song and listening to them laughing while the song was playing in the background was too much! I did listen to the song today while my hubby was at work, and sure enough I bawled almost the entire time. It's heartbreaking. If you need a good cry, there's probably no better way than to listen to that song.

On a happier note . . .
I've been feeling the baby moving a lot lately! I always love that feeling - Dusty hasn't been able to feel it yet, but I think if we caught it at the right time he'd definitely be able to.

We have our ultrasound tomorrow . . . What will it be, girl or boy?

I'm not sure what to think - at first I thought this pregnancy was pretty much identical to my previous ones aside from the headaches, but now I'm not so sure.
          - I wasn't nearly this emotional with the other two.
          - I had the linea negra (black line) faintly down my stomach, which I don't have . . . or at least not yet (I don't remember exactly when it showed up with the other two).
          - And the headaches, of course.

Anyway, I have no idea girl or boy, but am really excited to find out!!!

A Roarin' Good Cake

When I asked our now 3-yr-old what kind of cake he wanted for his 3rd birthday, I was not expecting him to say, "A dragon!" As I tried to hide my dismay behind smiles of excitement (how on earth was I going to make a dragon of all things?!), my mind immediately went to the internet.

You can find anything on the internet these days, and sure enough I found this tutorial for how to construct a dragon cake! The design was so easy to follow as far as how to construct the dragon out of cake, and all you need are two round (8 or 9 inch) cakes.

The absolute best thing about this cake was how much Asher loved it. I mean he loved it! He kept going upstairs to look at it and would call down, saying, "Mommy, Daddy, come look at my dragon cake!" Talk about making a mom feel good. :)

I used my favorite doctored up white cake recipe, and added sprinkles to it because Asher loves sprinkles. I also used my go-to buttercream frosting and made 1 1/2 times a regular batch just to make sure I had enough.

The original tutorial used different kinds of candy than I did to make the spikes, talons, etc. and you can certainly use whatever you think will work best.

Supplies
2 8-or-9-inch cakes
3-4 cups buttercream frosting, tinted the colors you like (I did blue and green)
Starburst candy
Chewy Spree
1 large marshmallow
2 fruit roll-ups (I used the tie-dye kind)
4 chocolate chips
2 skewers
candles (I found those crazy squiggle ones at Hy-Vee)
a large cutting board, or some other flat surface to use as the cake base

1. Cut the dragon out using the tutorial link above.
2. Secure each piece to your cake base using a dollop of frosting, and also secure the cake pieces together using frosting (this helps the pieces from separating after you've finished frosting it).
3. To frost the cake you can either slather the frosting all over and then use some type of round bottle cap and make indentations for scales, or you can do what I did. Fill a plastic baggy with frosting and snip off the end. Pipe a line of dots (about 1/4-1/2 inch big) straight across the top of the body. Use a spoon and lightly press into one dot at a time and pull down gently. Pipe the next row of dots close enough to the first to not see cake in between (I alternated my blue and green colors). Continue doing this until the entire dragon is covered with frosting. *Don't be discouraged if it doesn't look perfect - some of those angles are tough, and some of those spaces are hard to get to with piping. The end result will still look good!
4. For the spikes along the spine, slightly flatten the Starburst and cut in half diagonally into triangles. Insert each triangle into the dragon spine and down the tail.
5. Use Sprees and insert them vertically into the dragon's feet.
6. Snip the marshmallow in half horizontally and press each half onto the face for eyes. You can either use black icing to make the pupils, or insert a chocolate chip into each so the round part is facing out.
7. Use 2 chocolate chips to form the nostrils.
8. Insert candles into the snout to look like fire.
9. Wrap fruit roll-ups around each skewer and stick it to itself. Then insert each skewer into the cake to make the wings - you may need to cut the skewers to fit (you can scallop the edges of the fruit roll-ups just by using a scissors).

Look out, he's breathing fire!

It looked good, but does it taste good . . . 

The official verdict was a resounding, "YES!" :)

Hugs and cookies,

Amanda