How Did God Bless Me Today?

I am working on journal pages for YW's camp this summer. I ran across this quote on Pinterest the other day and really loved it. I designed this page for the journal. But, do you know what? I think I am going to take President Eyring's advice as well. I know it will change my attitude and maybe my life!

Cake Pops

My friend, Benji's daughter is getting married on Saturday. She was telling me about her plans for the wedding last month and mentioned that she was going to make 100 cake pops for wedding favors. I knew she was really overwhelmed with everything so I volunteered to make them for her. Never before had I made cake pops but I figured it would be a great opportunity to learn. Yesterday I baked the cakes which was a cinch. This morning I got up early to mix in the frosting and start dipping. I mixed in the frosting, a little less than the recipe called for, but my "dough" was too wet-I could tell that the pops would be too heavy for the lollipop sticks. So fortunately, I had another cake mix-made it and added it to the mixture-just right. It took most of the day but we got them all done-103 cake pops. She was at my house to wrap them in the bags-ready for the wedding. A lot of work for a mouthful of goodness but oh so worth the cute-ness!

Pumpkin-Spice Mini Doughnuts

Tanya gave me a BabyCakes doughnut maker for Christmas so we tried it out today with a pumpkin-spice mini doughnut recipe from this blog. All I can say is YUMMMMMMM.

Christmas in Disneyland

The Monday before Christmas, Brent, Jennilee, Cache, Velzy, and I drove up to Glendale where we met up with Brett, Amy and their family (who had driven down from Oregon) and Kory, Erika and Zelia. We got to see Kory and Erika's new place in Glendale and we all went to the Americana (a big shopping plaza) in downtown Glendale to hang out and enjoy the festive atmosphere. They even had a "fake" snowstorm while we were there!

The next day, Kory and Erika brought Zelia to our hotel -they had to work :( but the rest of us went to Disneyland. It was very crowded but we had so much fun hanging out with all the kids. The weather was a little crisp but sunny and great for being together.

My Version of Molasses Cookies

I have been neglecting my blog for the past few months. Here is a past post about my favorite Christmas cookie (or anytime cookie).


I really like this Molasses Cookie recipe given to me by Nancy Madsen. I decided to make it my version by dipping the cookies in melted almond bark. Boy are they good!I think they look pretty-like cookies dipped in a little snow for Christmas!

MOLASSES COOKIES

3/4 cup shortening (I use 1/2 Crisco and 1/2 margarine)
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup molasses
1 egg
2 tsp. baking soda
2-1/2 cups flour
1/2 tsp. cloves
1/2 tsp. ginger
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. salt

Melt shortening-let cool. Add in sugar, molasses, and egg-beat well. Mix dries together and add to molasses mixture. Chill for at least 1 hour. Roll into 1" balls-roll balls in sugar and place 2" apart on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake at 375 for 10 minutes or until done. Remove from cookie sheet and cool on wire rack.

P.S.-Don't forget the baking soda. I made them the other day and I forgot to put it in. The cookies were little hard lumps of dough when I baked them

Halloween Treats

I was inspired by the candy corn cookies on the "Our Best Bites" website. They were really fun and easy to do but did take several steps to complete. I used the link she used for the sugar cookie recipe and the cookies were muy bueno! It was fun dipping the "white" ends of the cookies in almond bark and using sprinkles to jazz up a very cute cookie!

I also took some left-over fondant from my previous cake (the good homemade marshmallow fondant-see last post) and cut out circles to drape over mini tootsie roll pops-stuck them in the cupcake, punched out eyes with the end of a small decorator's tip and made ghosts! I added
the candy corn pumpkins for an accent. They were a hit with the
Young Women at Mutual the other night.

The Garden Isle

Every time I come to Kauai, I remember why I love it so much. It is such a beautiful place with many things to do or you can just do nothing and enjoy the surroundings! Brent and I have been here for about 4 days and we have a few more left before returning to all the obligations of regular life. It has been so nice to be here.

We found a couple of great places to eat. Yesterday we went to a place called Monico's Taqueria in Wailua. I had 2 fish tostadas that were gourmet, to say the least. The fish was ahi which was seared, served on a bed of delicious pinto beans, avacado, fancy lettuce with a radish slice on top and oh, that was all on a corn tostada. Brent had a huge burrito with carnitas inside served with a delicious tomatillo sauce. Today we stopped at a little shrimp shack in Waimea and had coconut shrimp. Yummy!

If you have ever been to Hawaii, you know that there are chickens and roosters everywhere. Well, there is this mother hen with 8 new little chickies running around our timeshare. Yesterday we saw one of the chicks running all by itself by the pool. Brent went over to see if he could steer him in the direction of his mom and he ran faster than Brent! Too funny. I later saw the mother hen with all 8-guess the chick caught up with his family.

These photos aren't intended to make you jealous-we just wanted to share some of the great things to see while you are here.

Wailua Falls

At Opaekaa Falls

Spouting Horn

Waimea Canyon

Looking over the Kalalau Valley