courtneyb

Icebox Banana Cheesecake

Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010 | recipes | No Comments

A friend sent me the recipe for icebox banana cheesecake; think it needs to be made.

Tags: banana, dessert, fruit

Nesting already?

Sunday, January 31st, 2010 | Oh, Baby! | No Comments

Yesterday was productive and probably a sign I’m doing a little early nesting. Kelvin had to attend commencement at NCC in the morning so I ran errands on my own sitting in what seemed like a million ugly grandma recliners. I also got by a local store that carries Bonavita baby furniture to check out the construction and color of the crib my sister and I found online.

After I picked up Kelvin we went for a yummy lunch at the new Fiesta Ole and headed to the Lazboy store for him to approve of the chair I wanted for the nursery.

It is one I found earlier this week and have antagonized over the color all week. I brought home two fabric samples that I ended up not liking with the fabric I have already purchased to make curtains and the bed skirt. After having Kelvin sit in two of the three (the second one he said was mawmaw enough he didnt bother),  I went with the Rex rocker recliner adding the swivel mechanism and having it covered in orange (take a look at my Flickr account to see the fabric together). I figure I can make orange work in the kid-o’s room for years. Maybe it just assures me that I wont have to cave to a princess pink room in the future; and that is not something i will regret. So in about 8 weeks (maybe sooner) I’ll have a comfy chair that Braut and Harriett will help me break in I’m sure.

So after the success of buying the chair, I promptly came home and ordered the Peyton crib from Albeebaby.com where they had it for a great price and included free shipping and 15% off.

And that is me nesting. I told myself I wouldn’t do anything else until after we get back from our trip to Australia, but I obviously lie; I started a registry list on Amazon so I could stop putting stuff in my google doc spreadsheet. Obviously, it’s just the beginning and I will most likely do a registry through BabiesRUs or BuyBuy baby when it opens. So if you have suggestions, send them my way.

Tags: nursery

Chair

Thursday, January 28th, 2010 | Oh, Baby! | 1 Comment

Too much?

Tags: chair

Lemon Whippersnaps

Thursday, December 24th, 2009 | recipes | No Comments

1 package (17 1/4 oz) Pillsbury Lemon cake mix
2 cups (4.5 oz carton) frozen whipped topping
1 egg
1/2 cup sifted powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 350. Grease cookie sheets.

Combine cake mix, topping and egg. Will be extremely sticky. Drop by tsp into sugar. Roll to coat. Place 1.5″ apart. Bake 10-15 minutes.

Tags: cookies, dessert, lemon

And for my next baking feat: Lace Cookies

Tuesday, December 15th, 2009 | recipes | No Comments

Cara send me the recipe for Lace Cookies so I think I’ll try these tonight and see how they turn out. It’s dangerous I’m in a baking mood.

Set oven to 380

1 stick margarine
1 beaten egg
1tbsp and 1 tsp flour
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup sugar
(beat until creamy)
add 1 cup oatmeal and 1 cup finely chopped pecans to above mixture and mix together.

Drop small spoons of dough on release foil and leave a couple inches appart because they spread thin. Bake for 8-9 minutes until golden. Once you remove them from the oven pull the foil sheets off the pan and allow to cool 1-2 minutes then pull them off foil and put them in air tight canister/tin.  If they aren’t done long enough they are too chewy and don’t pull off the foil easy.

Tags: baking, Christmas, cookies, holidays, oatmeal, pecans

Protected: Ho Ho Ho - Christmas 2009

Thursday, December 10th, 2009 | randomness | Enter your password to view comments

Forgotten Cookies

Thursday, December 10th, 2009 | recipes | 1 Comment

There are a few things that really remind me of the holidays, and one of those is definitely forgotten cookies. My mom would make those and sand tarts around the holidays. So when a friend of ours decided to have a cookie swap party this weekend, they were the first things that came to mind. I’ll make them tonight or tomorrow night and talk mom into making the sand tarts with me when I’m at her house.

The thing about forgotten cookies is that they’re perfect for the impatient like me… very few ingredients and not much time commitment.

Preheat oven to 350
Beat 2 egg whites until foamy. Add 2/3 cup sugar & beat until stiff. Sitr in a pinch of salt, 1 cup chopped nuts and 1 cup chocolate chips. Drop on foil on oven rack. Turn oven off. Leave in oven over night (6-8 hours).
Makes 2 dozen.

*** NOTE: I did make these and the first batch turned out super ugly and sticky. Same thing happened to Cara so here is the trick — After you add the sugar it’s really important you beat the mixture until it’s stiff. And by stiff think cool whip; it should stay formed as the beater goes through it.

Tags: baking, chocolate, Christmas, cookies, dessert, easy, egg, holidays

Take the movie, leave the popcorn

Monday, November 30th, 2009 | randomness | No Comments

I keep meaning to post something about this, and it just came up in conversation so while it’s on my mind I better do it.

We went to the movies this weekend — I took my niece to see Planet 51 while Kelvin took his parents to see The Blind Side. I always stuff snacks in my purse, or at least I have since the great weight loss journey of 2008. And this is why:

Here is a link to the NYTimes article where I pulled this from

Where did November go?

Saturday, November 21st, 2009 | randomness | No Comments

I can’t believe we did our Thanksgiving shopping already, and Kelvin’s parents and our niece will be here Wednesday. We were looking at the schedule between now and the end of the year, and we have a packed schedule.

Our big race in Memphis is coming up so quickly; we only have to long runs to go before our 13.1 for St Jude. I feel so fortunate that we have such good friends and family; we met the $1000 mark this week in our fund raising. If you’re reading this and you want to give to St Jude to support our run, you can check out our team site on St. Jude Heroes.

Tags: memphis, running, stjude, thanksgiving

The Slacker is back

Saturday, October 31st, 2009 | randomness | 3 Comments

I’m sure you are all clammoring for me to return to the site and begin being more consistent about posting.  I can tell this because not a single person has visited the site in months– got to love google analytics! But I figure maybe at least a few people look at Jess’ blog and see my last post and know the pickle post is still the most recent thing; and we’re way past pickles around here.

I will save you from the recap (in this post at least), and just start with this weekend– MY SISTER IS HERE! She and her husband J got in on Thursday night. The only thing she explicitly asked to do was to go pick apples and make a pie; and she can check that off the list. After I escaped early from work yesterday we drove out to Oldwick, NJ to eat lunch at the Oldwick General Store as per our friend E’s recommendation. The sandwiches were fantastic.

Once we stuffed out faces we went across the street to Mellick’s town farm for some apple pickin’. We waited patiently for the woman working to finish rining up a few people ahead of us and then we asked for the full orientation. She set us up with baskets, a picker and a quick lay of the orchard. I asked about Honeycrisp, and she responded “you know about honeycrips?” and after reading the blank look on the faces of Josh and Cara she promptly went over, grabbed one out of a peck for sale on the table and told us to enjoy it as we walked through the orchard.

Of course, we ended up with probably more apples than we can eat, but we already worked on two pies and I have my eye on a few other recipes that I’ll share later especially if they turn out yummy.

Tags: apples, josh&cara, newjersey