Whatever floats your boat...

I've had this recipe saved in my "to try" box for quite some time. I finally decided to give it a go. I'm so glad I did.

Whatever Floats Your Boat Brownies (credit Karen from recipezaar.com)

Ingredients

1/2 cup butter, melted
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
1/2 cup flour
1/4 teaspoon salt

WHATEVER FLOATS YOUR BOAT
1-2 cup chocolate chips (semisweet, white, butterscotch, peanut butter) or raisins or chopped maraschino cherry or chopped nuts or M&M' or Reese's pieces or miniature marshmallow

Directions

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Grease an 8 inch square pan or line with foil.

In a medium bowl combine melted butter and cocoa and stir until cocoa is dissolved.

Add sugar and mix well.

Add eggs one at a time and stir until well combined.

Stir in vanilla, flour and salt until you no longer see any flour (do not overmix).

Fold in "WHATEVER FLOATS YOUR BOAT"!

Spread in pan and bake for approximately 25 minutes.

DO NOT OVER-BAKE -- your brownies will come out dry. Adjust time/temp accordingly for your oven. If you do the knife/toothpick test, it should come out with moist crumbs, not clean.

Cool completely before cutting into squares.


My "Whatever Floats Your Boat" was 1 1/2 cups of milk chocolate chips. I then decided to add a "cheesecake topping".

8ozs of softened cream cheese
1 egg
1/2 cup of sugar

Beat the 3 ingredients together until smooth. It will be kind of runny. After you've put the brownie batter in the pan, top with the cheesecake mixture. Swirl cheesecake around in the brownie batter to create a marbeled look. I had to bake the brownies a lot longer then the recommended 25 minutes noted above because of the cheesecake mixture. I didn't time them but they definitely cooked for atleast 40 minutes. Just keep an eye on them and check with a tooth pick.

Marbeling


They were very moist and chewy and thick. Great flavors.


Here's a piece just for you....


So What Floats Your Boat???

Fall Fridays

In honor of my favorite season I'm going to start doing "Fall Fridays". I'll be writing about anything that reminds me of fall. Crafts with the kids, fall decor, fall inspired food, including desserts and cake, and well whatever else comes to mind.

My first fall item is farm fresh Apple Butter. I had this yummy goodness on toasted wheat bread this morning!



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I'm loving the color gray for fall! I have not one, but 2 new purses that are gray! I'm also currently wearing a new fingernail polish that I bought at Target the other day.
Sally Hanson Xtreme in Gunmetal
It's a cool gray that has a blue tint to it. I love it!

5 stars

Lemon Brown Sugar Chicken


Super easy to follow. I baked the sweet potatoes with a little butter and brown sugar. Then roasted the asparagus with some olive oil, garlic powder, salt and pepper with a couple of sprinkles of mozzarella cheese. Delish!

1,2,3,4

Recently I discovered a new radio channel, well it's not exactly new but new to me! 100.5 GenX..it plays old school songs from the late 80's and 90's. This morning I was driving to get a yummy Iced Mocha with the windows down on this gorgeous day while jamming out to old school TLC and some Coolio! Great way to start the day if you ask me.
After a pitstop to the hospital to visit my gorgeous husband in his white "dr" coat. I made this beautiful lunch!

It's a simple Salmon Salad that I made. I kind of stole the idea from Eat, Live, Run (love that blog!). I took left over salmon from last night's dinner (baked with olive oil, lemon juice, salt, pepper, basil, and garlic) and flaked it with a touch of olive oil, half a lemon and it's juice, and an avacado. I put the salad on top of some lettuce with sugar snap peas, tomatoes, and cucumber. Lovely! This eating clean stuff is great!

Now if I can get started on running. Our treadmill should be arriving sometime this week. I can't wait for it to get here! Kell came up with a great running program for me to start with. So pumped!

I'll end today's post with a picture my mom took at Brogan's soccer game.

Is it me, or does she look like she's watching the game, smiling?

weekend goodies

This week I went to my local Dollar Tree and found some really cute placemats that I just couldn't pass up! Check them out!

Don't they look like something from Pottery Barn. Love them. :)

I also wanted to share this cute picture of my little bohemian baby. Caitlyn wanted to put on her necklaces on Ryleigh's head. It was cute.


Yesterday was Brogan's first soccer game..well actually the first game was last weekend but we were in Pittsburgh. It's so great living back with family because my mom, step dad, dad, grandma and grandpa, and my uncle all came to his game. It was so nice having everyone there and seeing them all cheer him on. It was a gorgeous day and perfect for a little soccer game. Here are some action shots.
Kell's the assistant coach this year.



#8

Caitlyn cheered him on the entire game.

I really need to play with my camera so the action shots don't come out blurry...any tips on that? camera is a Canon Rebel Xsi

Wordless Wednesday

*sisterly love*

Redecorating..in every sense

It's time to redo some things in my life. Recently I've fallen in love with the Eat, Live, Run blog that lots of people I know read..yes I realize I'm late to the bandwagon. But Jenna's blog is helping me realize I want to change some of my habits. Starting tomorrow, hubby and I will be changing the way we eat. While we have mostly cut out white flour, I plan to become a little more strict about this. Eat more fruits and veggies, snack on healthy fats and proteins, try and eat as "clean" as we can. Absolutely no more fast food or processed foods, we are also giving up our beloved soft drinks. I'm am personally "redecorating" the food I eat.

It's also time I get back into running. I haven't ran in almost 10 years. Not since running track in high school. So Kell has put together a running schedule/plan for me to follow to build myself back up. He, himself, has been trying to train for a couple of upcoming races. I'd love to one day join him in one. So I'm "redecorating" my health.

Since returning from Pittsburgh...which I fell in love with...I've decided to try and simplify things. I've been slowly going through things the past couple of months but have decided it's time to kick it up a notch and really go back to the basics. Meaning, do I really need full drawers and closets of clothes when I really only wear the same 10-15 items over and over? Do I really need the 10 purses that are in my closet, even though I haven't used them in years? do I need half of the things in my junk drawer, or night stand drawer? No, No and No. It's time to clean it all out. "redecorate"

Last but not least..actual redecorating. Not every room since my living room, bedroom, and kids room did just get a facelift. But thanks to Roxanne and her wonderful decorating for her wedding, I've got this big urge to redo the color scheme of my kitchen. My kitchen has always been a mish mosh of "chef's" and "wine" stuff, with rich colors. It's time to lighten the mood a bit. Here's the photo for my inspiration.


I'm loving the blue tinted mason jar..with some creams and white.....

Time to Redecorate!

Coming to you from Pittsburgh

Oh boy it's been a busy couple of days. As my title says, I'm blogging this morning from our sweet suite hotel room in Pittsburgh. One of my very best friends got married last night. I was her matron of honor and also had the pleasure of making her wedding cake. The day was perfect! The weather was amazing. She has some of the most awesome friends and family and I was so honored to be surrounded by such wonderful people yesterday. Every single detail of her wedding, down to the tiniest details were simply stunning and a complete reflection of the bride's personality and love for nature. I can't wait to see pictures from the photographer. I was so busy running around doing matron of honor stuff that I didn't have a chance to take any pictures! Although I do have pictures of the cake. Of course!

Here's a little explanation about the toppers. Her husband is in EOD school right now, for those that don't know what that is, he learns about bombs all day. Roxanne love knitting. It's her life, it's in her blood. So their toppers are unique and orginal but a complete reflection of them. I hope you love this cake as much as I do. It's by far my favorite cake I've done. Oh and when you see the picture, don't pay attention to what the cake is sitting on. The caterer was the one to put the cake on the log and she put the turntable (which is only used in the decorating process in order to spin the cake around) on the log as well. Which she wasn't supposed to do but I didn't even notice she did it, until after the cake was cut! oh well. I loved the caterer so I'll forgive her. :)




We head back home tomorrow (we've been here since Tuesday). I'll be sad to leave but it will be nice to relax at home. I can't wait to catch up on blogs when I return home.