Food Friday & Friday Letters: M & M Cake Mix Cookie Bars

Dear week, I am super busy all the time at work so the days go by fast, which is a good thing. I am glad the weekend is already here. Dear Max, your doing so well with responding to what we ask you. If we tell you to close the door behind your daddy (who never closes doors) you run over and shut it.  You can also ask for a cracker now by saying "ca  GA"  It is adorable.  Dear horrible news stories, I hate that there are so many tragedies going on right now. My thoughts and prayers are with everyone in Boston and West, TX.  Dear bank account, I wish you would grow faster so we can start some renovations. Our list keeps growing with what we want to do to the house (inside and outside). Dear pinterest party, I am excited for a girls night and hopefully to get some things accomplished. If only I had time to plan out my project and supplies. Guess that's what tonight is for.

My sister told me I had to make these cookie bars and she was right. They were SO easy to make (as in less than 5 minutes) and they taste amazing! I found this recipe via Parent Pretty.

Ingredients:

1 Box yellow cake mix (I used Duncan Hines)

1 Small box instant vanilla pudding
1/4 Cup water
3/4 Cup vegetable oil
2 Eggs
1 Cup chocolate chips. I used 1 cup full size m & m's. Mini ones would work too.

Directions:

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. 

Combine cake mix, pudding mix, water, vegetable oil, eggs, and M&M's in large bowl.

Pour the batter (it'll be thick) into a greased 10x13 baking dish sprayed with nonstick spray.

Bake your bars for 20-30 mins (I think I did 25). It may look sort of raw in the middle but if the edges are just golden and starting to get crispy, it's probably done. 

I made these for Davids birthday and they were gone very quickly!

I'm going to make them for my pinterest party since that's where we originally found them! Thanks to my sister for sharing.

Pinterest Party- This Weekend

This weekend I am hosting a pinterest party with some of my girl friends.  I am tired of pinning things and not creating anything I've pinned. We are going to have a little food and beverage and work on some projects.  Everyone is going to bring supplies for what they want to work on.  Here is an idea list I had for mine.

My first one is an easy one, but something I've been putting off for seriously forever.  Haven't you pinned a bunch of makeup tips for cleaning off your brushes. Well, so have I and I've never cleaned them (I tried just washing them but they got gunked together after that). This one uses just vinegar and hot/cold water. So although this one isn't craft, it's from pinterest and I'm going to do it!

My next one I thought I would take all my old Georgia Southern cheerleading shirts that are old and have holes in them and make t-shirt canvases. I also want to make one for Max's room from his 1st b-day party Wild Things shirt.  The caption from my pinterest says "because who has time to make a t-shirt quilt." True that. 

Upholstering Kitchen Stools {Stools}, shared by Laurie Turk on Tip Junkie

I want to have time for other craft projects, but I am still figuring out my embroidery machine so I will be doing that with the rest of my time. I am hoping my mom chooses to make these bar stool covers with some of my new fabric or

This beautiful upholstered ottoman from our old coffee table. Tutorial from Not So Newlywed McGees. What have you been wanting to make from Pinterest?

Lumberjack by Weekend

It was a pretty nice weekend weather wise so David tackled a few outdoor projects.  He's been wanting to remove some branches off a tree in our backyard that was getting too close to the house. He used a rope saw to get the job done.

I don't have a full before shot because David decided on Friday  night right before it was getting dark he was going to set up his rope. Well it was going so well that he just decided to remove one of the branches. The window was open because it was so nice and all I hear was SWOOSH and down it went. Very nice and easily. 

His goal was to remove the whole huge left branch that you see.  So he started with the one jets out to 10 on a clock hand.

It really didn't take but a few minutes each time to saw his way through the branches.

It got a little intense and David took a fall, but he was OK.

I took this from our upstairs window as he was sawing away.

Here are the action shots of it coming down. He had to be careful as our neighbors house is also very close to this tree.

On it's way swinging through our 2 houses.

All done, down it goes.

This is David showing off after he completed his lumberjack tasks.

This is what he removed so far.  I left for the store after this and I really didn't know that he was planning on taking the massive branch that was holding the other 2 that he already removed.  I am REALLY glad I wasn't there for this part. 

This is the after.  I took this pic Sunday morning and I thought it was light out, but I guess the sun was still making it's way up as it came out pretty dark. You can see that the whole thing is removed.   Apparently he grazed the side of our house (there is a slight mark that needs to be brushed off and the downpout is a little dented in one area, but it's mostly fixed now).  My mom heard the snap noise and David was pretty confident it wasn't going to do any severe damage and he was right.  Still scary though!  I just can't believe that the rope saw cut through those thick branches. 

Before and After

David also finished installing our indoor speakers and he flush mounted these outdoor ones.  It sounds fantastic and it's a nice transition from the family room through the kitchen and out the deck door.  I am so glad my husband is so handy and he can do all these projects.

Food Friday & Friday Letters

Dear New Job, I am really enjoying you so far. I have had to adopt the learn as I go method as inevitably something comes up that I do not know how to do, but it's turned out OK.  It's fun to hear people talk about houses all day every day.  Dear Weather, Thank you for cooperating for another beautiful weekend ahead. 70's. It can't get any better than that.  Dear Ribapalooza, I have self titled this weekends event.  We are having ribs (as we usually do) for David and his Dad's birthday celebration.  I can't wait.  It's been too long. Dear May 3rd, We're excited that we've booked a trip up to NY to see family and attend Jen's baby shower.  We are just hoping that the kids behave themselves as it's just the girls and the babes!

Food Friday:
I have tried a lot of new recipes the past few months, but I have yet to post any here. I like to have them on the blog because it's so easy for me to look things up when planing my grocery shopping.  I have a bunch of recipes on pinterest, but it's SO hard to find after I pin them (they need to have a search box within your boards).  I swear I have posted this recipe before, but I can not find it anywhere so maybe I didn't.

No Bake Energy Bites, adapted from Smashed Peas and Carrots
Makes 18-20
Ingredients-
1 cup oatmeal
1/2 cup peanut butter (or other nut butter)
1/3 cup honey
1 cup crushed cheerios (she used coconut flakes instead)
1/2 cup ground flaxseed
1/2 cup mini chocolate chips
1 tsp vanilla

Mix everything in a mixing bowl

I used crushed cheerios as to help the bonding together of the ingredients as I don't love coconut flakes.

Refrigerate for about an half hour until the batter is workable. Roll them into balls and you can store them for about a week in the refrigerator.

She lists great variations that you can do if you don't like something or want to spruce things up a bit. So check them out. I love these and they don't take much effort at all.

Garage Sale Finds

I have been itching to do some decorating around the house, but that is not in the budget right now so I will watch as my sister decorates her new house.  Check out her new curtains from west elm and her new navy color scheme she painted behind her bookshelf.  It really transformed the room.  I love it!  She's getting ready to reveal her painted cabinets in the kitchen, I can't wait to see it all done.

David's parents live in a very nice neighborhood community with a ton of houses. They were having one of their semi-annual garage sales so we thought we'd take a look. We missed out a few great deals on deck lounge chairs (people were literally carrying them away as we walked up) and a few things we took too long to think about.  We did end up for some really great stuff though.  We purchased the adjustable classroom table and 2 chairs set for $25 from a lady who home schooled her kids.  She kept saying how nice the furniture was and that it would last forever and it's from a company in NY.  I really thought she was just trying to sell her stuff, but I looked it up and sure enough it's by Community Play Things and they manufacture quality furniture in the United States for a pretty penny.

The chairs alone go for $159 each and the table is around $250 new so I'd say we got a pretty good deal. Now of course I am dreaming of all the other super nice things I could put in Max's playroom eventually.  If only I had an unlimited supply of money.  The company mostly sells to daycare type places.

We also purchased all those safety locks and gear you see for $1, his little broom sweeper for $1 (he loves to help clean) and the baby gates for $10.

 

The gates are really nice quality and we're going to put the other one at the top of the stairs.  It definitely beats trying to climb over the gates we had in place there originally.  They are having another sale in a few weekends there (not sure why) but hopefully more people will participate and we can go back. The people who had kid items only had girls (seriously) so I wasn't able to get any clothes/toys for Max

Planned Play Activities

Part of my April goals was to spend some time researching and picking out planned play activities for Max. With my new job and busy to-do list I don't have a ton of extra time so I wanted them to be easy to execute. Thanks to Pinterest I found some great sites that have play activities by age. 

These are the sites I'm using:  

I Can Teach My Child

Play Create Explore

Productive Parenting

The first activity we tried was a Sensory Bin with noodles, rice and shapes. Now I know you are thinking that these are dangerous things for a small baby who tries to eat everything. You are right, but with careful watching or a pacci in place this is a really fun activity. They get to see all the different colors, feel all the different textures and hear the different sounds when they push around the shapes and noodles.

It was such a nice weekend so we brought the sensory bin outside since we knew it might make a mess.

Max had fun playing with everything. It only held his attention for 10 minutes or so because we were outside and he'd rather pick up sticks, but he kept going back to it.

This was literally right before I decided to take him to go get his haircut. Poor little guy couldn't even see.

I love how I could save our bin and put the lid on our glass container. David only let me keep it until the next day, but it was nice to just take it out and let him play with it again.

The second one we tried is called Cheerio Challenge and it's VERY easy to do, it has a problem solving aspect to it. All you need is an empty, dry water bottle and Cheerios. Put a couple of Cheerios in the water bottle and see if your child can get the Cheerios out. 

He got frustrated at first.

Then he tried to drink it like he would a regular water bottle.

He also tried to hand it to us to help him (which we nicely handed it back and explained that he needed to try).

David filled it with a lot of Cheerios to make the noise louder and it seemed to increase his motivation to get them out.

Then all the sudden he tipped it over and they came out! He was surprised by it and was able to do it over and over. We were impressed and proud. I am looking forward to picking out a few more for this weekend. 

Max's First Haircut

I finally decided it was about time for Max to get a haircut. His hair kept getting into his eyes and it was curling up all around the ends.

We went to What a Cutie Cuts so he could sit in the race car for his first experience. He was cool about it at first and was wondering what was going on.

Then as soon as she put the cape on, he started screaming!

She got the bubbles out, tried to give him animal crackers and a comb. He liked all of that so then he calmed down and let her cut his hair.

He was still iffy about what all she was doing, but let her continue.

He kept starring at her in the mirror making sure she was doing a good job.

Precious little boy, I'm glad I can see his eyes better now.

Look at that handsome young man. He's getting so big. This place was really nice. They had a little play area behind the stations (as you can see in the back) and also a HUGE play room in the back with all sorts of toys.

Tada! I couldn't get a smile out of him so this will have to do. They luckily reminded me that I might want to save some of his baby hair so they bagged it up for me. He looks so different now, we just kept saying what where did our little baby go.