Little Lukey

Oh Little Lukey. Yesterday was my brother-in-law's 18th birthday! oh he is just precious!!

Anyways, he is a senior at the school I teach at. Our school is kinder-12th, just in different buildings, but on the same campus. Last night, Lukey informed me he wanted 2 DVD's from our house. So I brought them to school today and told him to come to my room to get him. He's the office aid last period, so he just came on into my room.

I had a 1st grade class in here at the time. So after my previous conversation today, I decided to try again with this group of kids. I announced to the class, "This is my brother Luke (they don't really understand -in-laws at this age). Luke had a birthday yesterday. How old do you think he is?"

"12"
nope
"18"
YES!

Second try, not bad. So we sing happy birthday to Luke in Spanish. Then we sing our new Spanish song for him (yes I do a lot of singing in my classes, and no I'm not any good at it).

Then a little boys stands up and announces, "If I were to get you a birthday present, I would get you Transformers and some other DVD's that are PG-13!!! I'm not allowed to watch those!"

So sweet. kids love bigger kids. Luke left. We finished class. We lined up.

The littlest girl in class came up to me and said, "Your brother is cute." Then showed me her paper where she had a heart with "Luke Hot" written in it.

Oh it starts young.

How Old Are You?

"Mrs. Sawyer, how old are you?"

"How old do you think I am?"

"15"

"Nope, I'm not 15."

"SEE I TOLD YOU SHE'S NOT 15!!"

Morning Cookies

I love this recipe!! Growing up, my best friend's mom would make these for breakfast when I'd sleep over!! I loved them!! Years later, I asked for the recipe. Turns out they aren't really cookies at all! they are very healthy!! My husband thinks they are terrible!! the name is deceptive, but it gets kids eating them :) I never knew they weren't really cookies until I made them myself.

Here's the ingredients...

You may notice thinks like all-bran, oats, nonfat dry milk, raisins, applesauce, whole wheat flour, etc. not your typical cookie line up. But trust me, try them just once, you'll like them and you'll feel good about eating them.

First, beat 1/4 cup butter with 1/2 cup packed brown sugar.

mix it up real nice.

Next, add EVERYTHING else (ingredients will be listed below in a real recipe format)

Mix it up real nice again.

Finally, add 1/2 cup raisins and 1/4 cup chopped walnuts.

Now, I ALWAYS add about 1/2 cup of chocolate chips as well. I figure, everything else in the cookie is healthy, why not add some chocolate and spice things up?

(PS I'm very messy when I bake, so I always lay out a couple of paper towels and do all of my measuring on top of them. When I spill - which I always do - it's no big deal. Clean up is so easy- just roll up the paper towels and toss!)

Next, spray a baking sheet with some Pam. (I've tried the Pam for baking before- and i do NOT like it, makes my food burn and my pans sticky. so I'm back on regular Pam)

Now, put a rounded tablespoon of dough on the baking sheet. I actually do use the tablespoon- it helps keep everything equal in size and makes baking times very consistent.

Now, you have to spread out the dough into about a 2 inch circle. You really have to do this. These cookies do NOT spread out while cooking at all. And if you don't smooth them down, they will be very tall and not baked all the way through. I know from experience. (In a Billy Madison voice)

Here's my 2 inch cookie before baking.

Here's my 2 inch cookies after baking. no change. literally.

Move them to a wire rack to cool.

The final step... you must make these cookies into cookie sandwiches. It is delicious! Spread one cookie with either peanut butter or cream cheese and then top with a second cookie. Delish!! i love both. I usually eat one of each. I don't want Peanut Butter to feel left out if I only eat Cream Cheese, I'm just being fair :)

Morning Cookies

1/4 cup butter

1/2 cup packed brown sugar

3/4 cup whole wheat flour

3/4 cup applesauce

1/2 cup rolled oats

1/3 cup wheat bran ( I use all-bran cereal, couldn't find anything else)

1/4 cup nonfat dry milk

1 egg white

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/8- 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

1/2 cup raisins

1/4 cup chopped walnuts

(1/2 cup chocolate chips)

peanut butter or cream cheese

In mixer bowl, beat butter and brown sugar well.

Add flour, applesauce, oats, bran, milk powder, egg white, baking soda, cinnamon, baking powder, salt, and cloves.

Beat on low until just combined.

Stir in raisins, nuts, and chocolate chips.

Spray baking sheet with Pam.

Drop rounded tablespoons of dough,, 2-3 inches apart on baking sheet.

Spread dough so each cookies 2 inches across.

Bake at 375 for 10 minutes or until set.

Cool on wire rack

Make sandwiches with cream cheese or peanut butter.

Chill or wrap and freeze.

If frozen, let thaw in fridge over night.

(makes about 8 sandwiches - sometimes more )

Bananas

Last week I went to Ann Taylor Loft to use a gift card- so exciting! Free shopping!! And they were having a sweater sale Buy 1, get 1 half off. So I bought 6. I had a gift card! And I actually wear cardigans to school MOST days- because my classroom temperature is unpredictable- so I like to have a cardigan- if it's Antarctica, I keep it on. If my room is Africa, I take it off. Very useful.

here was my new outfit yesterday. Love the happy yellow! Love the ruffle!!
So, one of my favorite 4th graders gives me a hug and looks me up and down and says "You look like a banana."
Oh. I just kind of looked at her, but didn't say anything.
So she quickly added, " A PRETTY banana."

Thanks. I like bananas. And now I am one.

ps- I wanted to share this story- so I set my camera on self timer and took this picture of myself in my classroom. Nerdy? yes. Important for the story? yes. And please don't look at the messy book cases- I have lost control.

Birthday in Review

Finally I remembered my camera, the connector, and I have a spare few minutes to post. So here's what went down exactly 1 week ago.

Wednesday the 18th was my birthday. Thursday the 19th was hubby's birthday. So we went out Wednesday night for an INCREDIBLE meal!! At the Palm Restaurant. Neither of us had been there. But it was awesome.


It's a really nice restaurant, a steak place. But the inside is so NOT elegant. They have these faces EVERYWHERE! And there are names written under them.

We kept reading the names saying " I don't know any of these people." We were shocked that we couldn't identify one famous person on the wall. But halfway through the meal, the waiter brought a flyer for the 842 club (or some numbers like that, I dont' really remember). Turns out, you can join the club and it works like frequent flyer miles. For every dollar you spend at the restaurant, you get a point. And you can redeem your points for certain rewards- like gift cards, travel, dishes, cookware, etc. And at 15,000 points, you can get your caricature on the wall! So, everyone on the wall has spent $15,000 at this place!! We were cracking up about that. We do not intend to get our faces on the wall.

But then the food came. And we understand why people may become a bit obsessed with this place and over a few years, just possibly end up spending $15,000.

We received a coupon for a special dinner for 2 - steak and lobster. we used it. it.was.awesome.very.awesome.
you can see our sides of onion strings, homemade chips, and asparagus. Even the bread was amazing. We ate a lot!! I don't think I was able to eat even half of my steak. (I was saving room for the included dessert.)

The birthday couple!

Molten Chocolate Cake. Delish.

So after dinner, we went to a night at a wonderful hotel! It was huge!! And due to hubby's many work travels- he has enough hilton points to automatically get upgraded. So we stayed on the executive floor with access to the executive lounge. I feel so fancy and special.

Oh- I forgot- we checked in before dinner, and I went to the SPA for a pedicure!! it was my first pedicure at a real spa (not one of those cheap places) and let me say, I would have argued beforehand that it was not worth the extra money, the cheap places are just fine. I would not say that now. It was luxurious. Simply divine. She also did my nails as a birthday gift. It was wonderful.

Okay- so then out to dinner, then back to the hotel. Here's the view from our room. and you can just barely see the pool in the middle of the photo (there was really bad glare from the window). We spent Thursday at that pool. fabulous. relaxing. luxurious. ( I just really like that word)

Thursday morning breakfast in the "executive lounge."

The birthday boy!

Aww- we're cute. We walked around the hotel for a long time (it was huge!!)- we needed to work off some of last night's dinner before hitting the pool. You can't see the background of this photo really -but we were in the room of our FIRST DATE!! You see, I came down to Dallas to visit some girl friends about 4 years ago. Ty found out and asked me to go to a banquet with him, just to catch up a bit, and then I could spend the rest of the weekend with the girls. I actually had NO CLUE it was a date until he held my hand in the parking lot after the banquet!! (He of course knew the whole time.) Well, the banquet was in this room at this hotel. So we walked in, took a picture, and argued about who held who's hand first. (But obviously he held mine, I didn't even like him then. duh.)

So then we hit the pool for a bit. Checked out. Went home. Ty went to play golf. I baked my first sheet cake. Of course I used Pioneer Woman's Recipe. it turned out quite nice. Ty's mom fixed dinner, we ate at their house, and enjoyed the cake!!

It was a fabulous 2 days of birthday fun!! It took about 4 days to come off our sugar high :) And now we're back to work and back to normal life- just a year older and wiser :)

Vibrant View

One of my most favorite spring time moments is right after it rains. When the sun comes back out. When the trees are so wet they are dark dark brown, almost black. when the new leaves are so new they are a vibrant lime green. and when it all happens at the same time, the freshness, the view, is.a.ma.zing.



And every once in awhile, I will just glance out the windows in my backyard and see a take your breath away view. I love it.



I tried to capture the moment for you. But a few things happened...



1. my digital camera is just a point and shoot. doesn't take the most amazing photographic pictures, but it does basically capture good color.



2. American Idol was on, and I paused it. But my DVR has been wacky since the electrician came last week, and so the DVR froze and I missed Kris Allen singing. So I quit taking pictures.



3. I tried to be like Pioneer Woman and take photos with great bokeh. And I did discover ways to manually alter my f-stop and manually focus the photo. This basically resulted in blurry pictures and completely missing Kris Allen.



So here are the best of the pictures I came up with. Do try to use your imagination and pretend they are excellent pictures. And next time, when it is finished raining, just take a moment to go and notice the trees- dark and bright - all at the same time.

(this one shows the real darkness- but doesn't get the greatness of the greens. of course I dont' use photoshop or anything- so just imagine.) by the way- this is the straight out view that I get as I pass by the back window.

This last picture is me trying to focus on just part of the leaves. I also adjusted the lighting some how on the camera- coming up with wonderful greens, but not so dark darks- so just put the top and bottom pictures together in your head. okay?

what's your favorite spring time moment??

Duh

The first day back from a long break I always let the kids share 1 thing they did over the break. It gives them a chance to tell the story, I get to learn more about each student, and then we get to have regular class without the many interruptions of "guess what I did over spring break..."

So today I had a 1st grade class back for the 1st time. They are adorable- their stories crack me up. I normally limit this "sharing" activity to about 10-15 minutes. But I was feeling pretty laid back today, so we just talked basically the whole class long.

anyways, there are these 2 precious little girls. they look nothing alike, but for some reason I always have to think extra hard about who is who- I think they sat next to each other at the beginning of the year and I've just never fully learned their names.

So I called Dana by the wrong name. I called her Lauren. But Lauren had just talked, so obviously she wasn't Lauren. I quickly corrected my self and then said "Uh, where's my brain?"

Loudly from the back, a boy stood up and said, "IN YOUR HEAD."

To which someone else added, "Behind your forehead."

Duh. Why didn't I think of that? Kids just don't get sarcasm do they?