mississippi mud bars

Ingredients:
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter or margarine, softened
3/4 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 large egg
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
4 ounces semi-sweet chocolate, divided
4 ounces white chocolate, divided
1 cup walnuts, chopped and divided 

For the chocolates, I bought these 4 ounce baking bars, since it is originally a Ghirardelli recipe. I chopped them into pieces, but you certainly could measure 4 ounces of chocolate chips or chunks.



^ chocolate bars, chopped and divided

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Beat butter, sugar, egg, and vanilla until light and fluffy. Mix in flour, baking soda, and salt. Stir in half of the semi-sweet chocolate, half of the white chocolate, and half of the walnuts.



Spread in greased, foil-lined 9 inch square baking pan.



Bake 12-15 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in the center comes out almost clean.



Sprinkle with remaining semi-sweet and white chocolates.



Cover with foil. Let stand 5 minutes or until chocolates are melted. Swirl chocolates with small knife to marbleize. Sprinkle with remaining walnuts. Cool in pan until firm, then cut into bars.



You can see my bars don’t have walnuts in them. My son hasn’t had nuts yet, and since he likes to taste-test my desserts, I didn’t add them. But I’m sure it would add to their tastiness!

Bon Appetit!

happy Valentine’s day!

Found the cutest printable Valentines on Hostess with the Mostess!
They are  “Perfect Pairings”—sprinkle donut & coffee, peanut butter & jelly, pie & whipped cream, and milk & cookies.

Dunkin has some really cute donuts today.

I was scrolling through Pinterest last week when I saw my friend Shelby had pinned these hanging garlands in a chevron design. They looked so beautiful that I knew I had to make them. I didn’t have any Valentine’s Day decorations—and they are good for my student’s wife budget—all I had to buy was the paper! Instructions are at My Sister’s Suitcase. Those girls are geniuses. I was surprised how easy it was to sew through cardstock on my sewing machine!

Sweet cards from my mom and Aunt Lori.

A few chocolates from my aunt, sent from Indiana.  Mmm!

And a visit to the past:

Valentine’s Day 2011  (day I announced to the world that I was pregnant with Nolan)
The caption on Facebook for this photo was : I hope the baby has Steve’s eyelashes. He does!

Valentine’s 2012—five months old—wow, has he grown in a year!

Hope you have a wonderful Valentine’s Day!!!

raspberry cool whip pie

This recipe is VERY easy. In fact, this is all that you need to buy:

Ingredients:

1/4 cup water
1 package (4 serving) sugar-free raspberry Jello
2 containers (6 oz) fat-free raspberry yogurt
1 Cool Whip Free (8 oz)
1 Oreo pie crust

Directions:

Heat the water (in a  bowl or measuring glass) in the microwave on high for approximately one minute until boiling. Whisk in the Jello until dissolved. In a large bowl, whisk together the Jello mixture and the yogurt. Fold in the Cool Whip. Pour into the crust. Refrigerate at least four hours until set.

I’ve also made this pie in many other flavors—
They make sugar-free Jello in cherry, black cherry, lime, lemon, orange, peach, strawberry, and strawberry-banana. Then you match the Jello with a similar yogurt flavor.

I adapted this recipe from a Weight Watchers recipe… so it is low calorie (using sugar-free Jello, fat-free yogurt, and fat-free Cool Whip.)  I have tried using regular Jello (the pie in the photo was made from regular Jello), but for some reason it takes forever to set, so I even had to put it in the freezer for a while. I don’t suggest trying it.

Super easy, right?


Enjoy!

a summer to die

My favorite book, A Summer to Die, was written by Lois Lowry (author of The Giver & Number the Stars).  If it hadn’t have been published in 1977, a decade before I was born, I would think she wrote it about me.

The novel is about a 13-year-old girl, Meg.
Meg is reserved, artistic, and in a self-conscious stage of adolescence.
She has a love/hate sisterly relationship with her beautiful, extraverted older sister, Molly.
Meg’s life turns upside-down when Molly discovers that she has leukemia, and passes away after only a few months.

Meg is left to continue her life without Molly: accepting the loss, valuing the memories, and realizing the impact that her sister will always have on her life.

And through this experience, Meg is really able to find her identity, discover what she loves about life, and finally see the beauty in herself.

Meg=Rachel.

Lois Lowry wrote this book as fiction, but it was inspired by the relationship between herself and her sister, Helen, who passed away from cancer.

Lois Lowry writes on her website, “Like Meg in that book, I would go on to miss my sister, after she died young, for the rest of my life.”

Hannah and me

Hannah at 16.

Hannah passed away twelve years ago today, February 11, 2001.

I will miss my big sister for the rest of my life.
And I will continue to live my life well enough for the both of us.

groundhog day in punxsutawney | non-stagrams

We live close to Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, and we drive through it all the time. So on Saturday (Groundhog Day!) we needed to get there and see all the excitement for the first time. Unfortunately, to see Phil’s big “does he see his shadow?” moment, we would have had to drive to Punxsy, park at Walmart before 6:30 am, take a shuttle, and stand in a crowd of 30,000 people in 15 degree weather. Maybe someday when we don’t have young children, we’ll have to do that. But in the meantime, we settled for an afternoon tour of the hot spots.

First stop was Gobbler’s Knob—about two miles outside of town. This is where Phil has predicted the spring’s weather since 1887.

It’s quite a small park for the amount of people who squeeze in every year.

 source
A photo of Phil predicting an early spring at 7:30 Saturday morning.


Excited to be standing in the same place, just a few hours later!

After Gobbler’s Knob, we had lunch at Cakes & Steaks

Shots of downtown.

And then we visited the town library—Phil lives in the library with his wife Phyllis.

Trying to find Phil from the inside of the library.

From the outside, we were able to see Phyllis hiding from all of the attention.

mmm! a delicious chocolate souvenir.

So Phil lives at the library all year round, which means (family, friends, new blog friends), if you ever want to meet this little national treasure, come visit us!

happy birthday Hannah

Today is my sister Hannah’s would-be 29th birthday.

She turned 17 on her last birthday here on earth.

Hannah was completely beautiful.

She was intelligent. Creative. A perfectionist. Determined. Sassy. Kind-hearted. Funny.

Those of you closest to me know that she treated me quite poorly sometimes. Sisters fight. And I was healthy, when she was not. I forgive her for that.

Sometimes I like to envision that in Heaven, God has those big black binoculars on a pole, and our family members can look down on us and see how we are doing. And I imagine that they wouldn’t see any of our sad moments, because there is no sadness in Heaven, but they would just see a glimpse of us in our happiest times. I like to think that she knows that I found my way out of adolescence, did well in high school, had some amazing college years. I hope she knows that I got married, and that she has an adorable nephew.

I suppose a more theological approach would be to say that when we are reunited with our loves in Heaven, it will only seem like minutes since they last saw us. I can’t wait for that day.

I am grateful for every one of her seventeen years. But I wish there were more. Her life has shaped every facet of my life, from my personality to my faith, my life goals, and my priorities. There is not a day that I don’t think about her and miss her deeply.

If you knew her, I hope that you will think about her today, the times that you had, and what you learned from her life.

If you didn’t know her, I am glad that her circle of influence has now reached you. And I hope that you have learned more about me by seeing my big sister.













I celebrate her birthday every year by making a cake, and sharing her story.




Happy birthday, Hannah!  You would be a gorgeous 29.

pin-spired with my eShakti dress

A few weeks ago, an online women’s clothing company called eShakti e-mailed me about doing a review for one of their items of clothing. I jumped at the chance, pulling up dozens of tabs on my computer screen of pieces that I liked.

Although there were some gorgeous sleeveless options, it is February in Pennsylvania, so I narrowed down my favorites to this red (perfect for Valentine’s Day) dress with ruched elbow-length sleeves. It is the “Red goddess knit dress”, currently only $41.95.

eShakti offers custom alterations! I could have just chosen a standard size (0 to 36W), but I opted to do custom sizing—entering all of my measurements to have the dress made perfectly for my body. Not only that, I could choose the length of the skirt (from short to mid-calf), and the length of the sleeves (from a cap sleeve to three-quarter).

It came very quickly after I ordered it—and it was perfect.

But how do I style this red dress for winter? I referred to Pinterest, and found these images of inspiration: black tights, black heels, black blazer.

(left: source, right: the daybook)

 

Here are some of my other favorite pieces from eShakti—be sure to check their website for more!

1. Floral illusion yoke linen dress
2. Sails ahoy high waist skirt
3. Draped toga knit dress  (bridesmaid dress, anyone?)
4. Belted corset style dress

eShakti on Pinterest
eShakti on Facebook
If you’re new to eShakti, register today for a $25 gift certificate towards your first order!:

Affordable, Adorable Dresses. Your size, your style, your choice! Only at www.eShakti.com

Linking up with these lovely friends:
Shay at Mix & Match Mama,
Sheaffer at Pinterest Told Me To,
and Mel at The Larson Lingo
today for their first “Get Pin-spired” linky party! They have amazing blogs which I enjoy very much. Thanks for encouraging me to do my first real fashion post!