How About Some Cookies?

Happy Wednesday to you! It's great to have you stop in for a quick visit!

We are thawing out after our little ice storm from Monday night! Christopher is on a two hour delay for school this morning, but he will be leaving shortly. It'll be nice to get him back to school! Hopefully that goes smoothly. With autism, it's difficult for him to have his schedule interrupted.

I mentioned yesterday that I'm working on some crafty projects and I had hoped to have one of them done to share, but they are still in the works. Can't rush a good thing, right? Instead, I thought I could post a cookie recipe that I tried over the Christmas holiday.

These lovely cookies are called 'Frosted Almond Sugar Cookies' from The Tasty Kitchen at The Pioneer Woman. The Tasty Kitchen is a place that real folks like you and me can upload recipes to share.

Here's the batch I made on Christmas Eve. I love the taste of almond extract added to the cookie dough as well as the icing! They were out of this world good! It took every fiber of my being not to eat more than one after lunch and one after dinner! ;)

I plan on making another batch of these heavenly cookies for Valentine's Day. Can you picture heart shapes frosted in red, pink, white and maybe some lavender too! Then there's Easter and all those lovely pastel colors! Oh and red, white and blue stars for the Fourth of July! Pumpkins and leaves for fall! I'm thrilled I can think of many occasions to whip up a batch! And there's plain old smiley face cookies for when I'm having a bad day! ;)

Maybe you have some time to go forth and bake up a batch?!?! Enjoy! :) Kathy

Meatloaf Anyone?

Wait! Before you run...this isn't the dried up shoe leather type of meatloaf you were forced to eat when you were a kid! This is a deliciously moist recipe from The Pioneer Woman. This meatloaf calls for Parmesan cheese, is wrapped in bacon and a slathering of tangy barbecue sauce that you make in just a couple minutes! From now on, I will be making my own barbecue sauce...it's that good!

Look...no onions and bell peppers in the mix. Instead, there's fresh chopped parsley and Parmesan cheese!

Here it is fresh out of the oven! Looks so good, doesn't it?

I served our meatloaf with roasted potatoes and steamed broccoli and my boys gave it two thumbs up! They wouldn't dare fib about something like this for fear I would make it again! Ha! I hope you decide to give meatloaf another try. For the recipe click here!

This is the second new recipe I've tried in the past couple weeks in an attempt to discover new recipes my family will eat and enjoy. We were stuck in a terrible food rut! If you and your family are too, give this or another recipe a try and let me know how it goes! I would love to hear about new sites for great recipes! Thanks for stopping by! I'll be back tomorrow with a crafty share. :) Kathy

Are You in a Food Rut?

I've been in a food rut! I cook the same old thing for dinner over and over and over! The only reason my family hasn't gone on strike is because the few recipes I make are their favorites, like breakfast for dinner every single Monday night. My guys love breakfast for dinner! So much so that this tradition has been going on for over two years! I doubt very much that Monday night's dinner will change anytime soon, but it's time to mix in some new favorites! My friend Audrey, feeling the same about her dinner menu, agreed to broaden her horizons with me. Indeed it's more fun to cook with a friend!

Last Friday we got together and tried our hand at Ranch Style Chicken, a recipe from 'The Pioneer Woman' cooks. We knew that none of our picky eaters could pass up a boneless chicken breast topped with thick cut bacon and melted sharp cheddar cheese!

All of The Pioneer Woman Cooks recipes are rated from easy to difficult and since we wanted to ensure a successful outcome, we picked an easy dish. Although nothing about this recipe was hard, it was quite messy because of frying the bacon and chicken. I would advise you to cook this dish when the stove needs cleaning anyway!

I served my chicken with steamed zucchini and mashed potatoes. The chicken was not as flavorful as I expected it would be after marinating it for over an hour and topping it with bacon and cheese, but not too shabby.

For desert Audrey and I made 'Pumpkin Cupcakes with Maple Frosting' from Ina Garten, The Barefoot Contessa. These cupcakes were easy to make and were so delicious that I'm at a loss for words to describe them! The cake was very moist and the cream cheese frosting absolutely sinful! I would highly recommend making these if your aim is to impress! Just look at these great big lovely cupcakes! I was so tickled with myself that they actually looked like something I bought at a fancy bakery! I owe it to the Pampered Chef  'Easy Accent Decorator' for the outcome of the frosting!

I'm happy to report it was a successful and fun venture and that we plan on doing this again soon! Click on the highlighted food titles above to get the recipes. If you try either of these recipes I'd love to hear how you and your family liked it. If you want to share a great recipe you have tried recently, I'd love to hear about it! Thanks for dropping by today! I hope you enjoyed my food share!  Kathy :)

Birthday Bliss

The sun is shining here this morning after yesterday's rain. A little more chilly, but so beautiful! I get so much energy and happiness from our sun!

I was able to take photos of my latest page for you. I created this page just for fun...not for assignment of any kind! I love to squeeze a little time here and there to do my own thing!

If you follow my blog, you probably remember my darling husband's birthday was this month and I made him a card, homemade macaroni and cheese and fresh baked chocolate chip cookies? He's pretty easy to please and was quite happy so I wanted to scrap these photos to remember his day.

I love this picture! This is how I see Dan, a content happy go lucky sort of guy!

I'm typically a less is more kind of paper crafter, but on this page I piled on quite a few goodies! I enjoy stepping outside my comfort zone, mixing things up and trying something different once in a while.

That's my artsy share for the day. I have to keep this short because I have to get ready for my friend to arrive for our cooking lesson! If you were here yesterday I mentioned that the two of us were getting a little tired of the same old dinner menu and decided to try some new recipes. Tonight's dinner will be Ranch Style Chicken from The Pioneer Woman Cooks. For desert, pumkin cupcakes with maple frosting! Oh boy! I'll share some pictures and the recipes very soon. Hopefully, it'll be a successful adventure or at the very least a fun story to tell you about! ;) Kathy