Chocolate Chip Cookie Brownies

Chocolate Chip Cookie Brownies! What could be better than that?? NOTHING!
SO EASY!! a package of chocolate brownie mix and a refrigerated chocolate chip cookie dough...
Tear up about half of the cookie dough into small pieces and place strategically around a 9x13 casserole dish. (or just throw them around the bottom of a pan)

Mix the brownies according to the package and pour on top of the cookie dough.

Then tear up the rest of the cookie dough and place on top of the brownie mix.

Bake according to the brownie mix box... cut up and ENJOY!!

I made these for our Wednesday night Pre-Thanksgiving meal. YUM!

I also dressed up my glass cake display with a circle of fall scrapbook paper. Easy and cute :)

I used a family size brownie mix, so I used almost the entire package of cookie dough and a 9x13 pan.

If you use a regular size brownie mix, use only half of the cookie dough and an 8x8 pan.

A dessert that combines two favorites- what could be better??

I was thinking of other combinations you could do... chocolate brownie mix and peanut butter cookie dough could taste like a reese's peanut butter cup :) The possibilities are endless!

2010 Annual Friends Thanksgiving

The Saturday before Thanksgiving we fill our home with friends and FOOD!

Everyone brings a dish.

I make the turkey.

This year, we had so many people coming, I only made turkey and stuffing.
And I got to set the tables!

It was a bit of a challenge figuring out where to sit 24 people considering I only own 10 chairs.

So we borrowed tables and chairs from friends and family and made it work!

The dining room table sat 10 people... I used a variety of china, crystal, and napkins on each table.

I tied it all together by making the napkin rings out of scrapbook paper and a sticker.

The folding table held 8 friends.

LOVELY flowers! thanks to my friend Parris who brought them home from a dinner the night before. I am not ashamed of begging and borrowing.

A close up of the "napkin rings." just a strip of scrapbook paper, a little hot glue, and a cute sticker. Done and done.

looking back into the dining room. So full. So fun.

The round table sat 6 people.

I put a little appetizer spread on the coffee table.
People nibbled on it all night long, there was not much left in the end.

Yogurt covered pretzels, chex mix, cheese and crackers, cream cheese with jalepeno jelly. I also attempted some sweet and spicy nuts... I threw the recipe away after the party- NOT yummy.

The decorations at the front door- a happy greeting!

Kitchen decorations

The Drink Buffet in the laundry room.

Hot apple cider

coffee set to brew after dinner (this year I remembered the creamer, unlike last year)

Dr. Pepper, Coke, Diet Sodas, Sweet Tea, and Water

The Turkey!

I remembered to take a photo of it this year.

I tried stuffing it with rosemary after watching Pioneer Woman on Bobby Flay's throw down.

I think I could have used a LOT more rosemary.

The turkey was delicious! But I am still not good at carving.

Although I did learn some tricks from Bobby Flay.

The crew getting some food!

We had quite the spread...

turkey, stuffing, creamed corn, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, green bean casserole, bacon wrapped green beans, broccoli cheese casserole, salad, cranberry sauce, and rolls

(proof that Ty's brother was there)

The Dessert Table

chocolate pie

Jake's Famous Chocolate chip cookies

Pumpkin Crisp (A-MAZ-ING!)
strawberry bread

And Cole's Chocolate Mousse Cheesecake! YUM!

The night ended with some intense games of Apples to Apples and Pit!

It was SO fun!

I think I laughed so hard and played so intensely that I obviously burned off all of the calories I consumed.

Obviously.

Bathroom Inspiration

Although my current job has me talking about poop 90% of the time, this blog post is NOT about poop. Yeah!

We are probably adding on to our house pretty soon here. We will be adding a master suite (with a connected bathroom- don't have that yet- and a walk in closet- dream come true!) And we will be adding a new guest bathroom (because we will be removing the gross ugly, pink and blue current bathroom.

This summer we spent a couple of nights at the Broadmoor in Colorado Springs (amazing!) and we were able to tour one of their cottages and I fell in LOVE with the bathroom!

First of all- I love cottage style! Secondly, our home was built in 1938 and we would like for the addition to look like it was original. So here are some pictures I took of the bathroom in the cottage while I was on tour. Embarrasing, I know.

LOVE the vanity! I find that I am drawn to the open shelf vanity style. I realize this may not be super practical (I use my current bathroom drawers daily), so maybe I'll find something that is a nice mixture of both.
I love the mix of stripes, subway tiles, and the cute floor!!

The little toliet room is precious. We probably will not add the phone feature :)

I liked that the tile comes up to the chair rail all the way around the room- very 1938. I will probably do bead board instead of tile. But same idea.

Ahhh... Love.

I love the openess- the soothing colors. The blues, grays, creams, and whites. I love the way it is simple, yet luxurious.

So that is my bathroom inspiration.

Ka-Boom!

Our church is located in the middle of downtown Dallas. And our buildings were over 60 years old. We literally have 1 new building. It's 5 years old. The rest... ancient.

Our sanctuary is old, historic, and beautiful. but also limited in space. and since it's a historic landmark, there is nothing we can do to make it larger.

And there are buildings surrounding our church. We are literally land-locked.

And it was time to make some improvements. Time to make a larger sanctuary so more people can come. Time to get rid of the asbestos filled buildings. Time to make a more inviting, open campus.

So, what options did we have? But to implode 6 buildings... and here is the aftermath...
I taught in 3 of the buildings. I spent 3 years of my life, day in, day out, in these buildings.
Ty went to 6th grade in these buildings. Ty played basketball in the gym for hours upon hours.

And this is what is left... This picture has Ty in it so you can grasp the scale of the wreckage.

That building on the other side of the debris- the one with 4 floors of 4 windows on top... that's where I live, I mean teach now. BUt I'm on the bottom floor on the back side.

The trees were covered in so much dust it looked like it had snowed!

The 6 buildings were separated from the historic sanctuary by a plaza about 40 feet wide. They built this temporary ply wood wall to protect the sanctuary- you can see in this picture that the debris came all the way up to the wall- good thing they put it up!

Classic.

They have 1 more building to take down. But it will be done by hand because it shares a wall with the sanctuary. So the only buildings that will be left are the new 5 year old building, my school building, and the sanctuary. After they finish tearing down the last building, they will remove all of the debris- and apparently begin building in January! They have been working CONSTANTLY all week! We took these pictures last Saturday and it is a noticeably smaller pile now. Impressive!

The implosion was shown live on television - all over the world! You can probably watch it on You Tube- just search for First Baptist Dallas implosion. If I didn't have 17 four year olds wiggling around behind me waking up from nap, I'd add a link. But i can't.

Reminiscing

Yesterday it rained ALL day long!
Last night it rained ALL night long!
24 hours of rain.

made me think of last January when it snowed in Dallas for 24 straight hours.
It had never done that before.
it was a TON of snow.
It broke LOTS of tree limbs around our house.
It weighed down smaller trees so that they were literally bending over and touching the ground.

So when I woke up the next morning and saw my bended over trees, I decided I needed to do something about it. I decided to go and shake off all of the snow.

I knew I would get covered in snow and I did not have proper snow clothes or boots. SO... I made it up.

And last night, Ty was reminiscing about this and laughing at me. It was pretty funny.

My "snow" outfit:
2 pairs of socks
tennis shoes
leggings
swishy sweat pants (don't know the real word)
sweat shirt
scarf
all tucked into my rain jacket.
hood pulled up
gloves
Oh yeah... best part- to make my shoes "water proof"- I put each foot in a plastic grocery bag and used packing tape to tape it around my leg.

It worked.
I stayed dry.
Ty came home to find a laundry room literally full of my wet clothes laid out to dry.

I was reminded of my recent preparations for a possible tornado and realized I'm either:
A- very good at making do with what I have OR
B- very weird

You can decide.