Kitchen Sink Cookies

My mom always keeps our dinner leftovers in a bag in the freezer and when it gets full she adds some chicken broth to it and heats it all up to make delicious “Kitchen Sink Soup”.  It gets its name because she literally throws everything in it except the kitchen sink. 

I decided to make my very own “Kitchen Sink Cookies”.  My friend Kim has a great recipe for cookies that calls for bread flour and sour cream, but since we didn’t have those ingredients I just substituted regular flour and Greek yogurt.  The cookies became “Kitchen Sink Cookies” when I decided to throw in all our leftover chocolate, white chocolate, butterscotch, and Heath chips. They turned out delicious and were probably even a bit healthier because of the yogurt. 

Kitchen Sink Cookies

1 cup butter, softened

1 ½ cups creamy peanut butter

2 ½ cups firmly packed brown sugar

2 eggs

1 egg white

½ cup Greek yogurt

2 tsp. vanilla

3 ½ cups flour (or bread flour)

2 TBS. baking soda

½  tsp. salt

2 cups sweetened flaked coconut

2 - 3 cups of a mixture of chocolate, white chocolate, butterscotch and/or Heath chips

Heat oven to 350^o

In a mixing bowl beat butter and peanut butter with an electric mixer until creamy.

Add brown sugar, eggs, Greek yogurt, and vanilla and mix.

Add flour, baking soda, and salt and mix well.

Mix in coconut and chocolate chips.

Roll dough into large balls and place on a greased cookie sheet.

Bake for 8 to 9 minutes and let cool for 2 minutes then remove from pan and enjoy.

A Day in the Life of Lisa

It all started this morning when my alarm went off at 7 a.m. (because I am trying to get my self ready for the early morning wake-ups I will be having a week from today) and I started thinking about my day.  Since I did not have a whole lot of plans I thought I would make it more exciting by taking a picture of everything that I did.  My day actually ended up being more eventful than I ever expected!

1. My favorite breakfast of Greek yogurt with berries, honey, and flax seed.



Well this is what my breakfast looked like, but this is actually from another day.  I already had started eating when I remembered that I needed to take a picture so it wouldn't have looked as nice.



2. I took my golden retriever Amber for a walk even though it started to rain.

 Had to do self-timer for this one because my dad was at work,

 my mom and 2 brothers were at school while my other brother was still asleep.

3. Jumped in my Bronco to head off to the gym for a spin class with Katie.



It may basically be a truck, but I still have my keys on a girly Vera Bradley wallet.

 We love spin class even if we are exhausted by the end. 

4. Our morning wouldn't be complete without a little coffee.

My total came to $3.85 and I paid for it with the quarters and nickels lying around my car.

5. Leadership was our favorite class in high school and we are both very close with our teacher so decided to bring her some Starbucks and say hello.  I texted her to let her know her "favorite student" was coming.  She jokingly replied that she was happy Katie could come, but I didn't get the joke but that is why I am only her #2 favorite student in the pictures below.



Willford, me, and Katie

#1 favorite student

#2 favorite student

Willford still has my senior picture on her wall...can you tell which is mine?

I even convinced my brother Brian to stop by the leadership room during his passing period.

6. Next I headed back home to make a salad from our dinner leftovers from the previous nights:  salmon and stir-fry vegetables.

7. After lunch I drove to J. Crew to pick up the suit that I will need for my internship.

8. Katie was babysitting her cousin Annelies so I joined them to make Rainbow Cake in a jar.

The little chef.

We put a little too much cake mix in the jars so they kind of exploded in the oven.

Annelies wanted to go to our favorite cafe Sideboards to get a snack while we waited for the cake to cool.

She got hot chocolate...

Which was a little messy...

And Katie and I got ice tea.

Their homemade english muffins are the best.

We love Sideboards.

Back at the house we added frosting and sprinkles to our cakes.

9. The day was finished off with watching my brother Brian's semi-final lacrosse game.

A Proposal To Top

My dad showed this video to me, and it is just too adorable not to share with y'all!  It is probably one of the most impressive wedding proposals I have ever seen!

Mod Podge Madness

I don’t remember exactly when my obsession with mod podge started, but the first time I remember doing it was at my 7 year old flower birthday party when we covered cardboard boxes with magazine clippings of flowers.  Since then, I have mod podged everything from picture frames to planners to canvasses to bikes!

Here is the bike I mod podged.  It actually is the second bike I did because the first one was stolen right off the back porch by a homeless person which I guess I should take as a compliment. Everyone on campus knew my bike and sometimes I would even be introduced as the girl with the mod podge bike.

So for those of you who are still in the dark and wondering what mod podge is, it is a glue-water mixture that you paint on anything from magazine clippings to newspaper to photos that allows you to attach them to virtually any surface.  It then dries clear with either a matte, antique or glazed finish depending on what type you buy (I like matte the best). 

Getting the scraps ready.

My friend Katie, her sister Stephanie, and I decided to get painting canvases and create a picture from magazine clippings on them.  Well we ended up changing our minds and not quite making a picture but our art projects still turned out adorable and will be great decorations in our rooms at school.  I stuck with beige tones for the background and created and oak tree from chocolate brown scraps.  Katie used green and blue tones to create grass and sky which she topped with a pink and orange peace sign.  Steph just had her senior ball so she did a colorful background and then is mod podging some pictures from the night on top of it.

Katie and Steph's canvases.

My board.

Katie and I also decided to add a quote to our canvasses.  We typed our quotes up and then printed them on normal paper.  While we were doing this we soaked a tea bag in water and then when we were ready, dragged it over the pieces of paper our quotes were on to stain them brown.  After letting it dry for 30 minutes, we burnt the edges of the paper to give it an aged look and then covered it with mod podge and attached it to our boards.

The paper was a little too wet to burn right away.

Eventually it caught on fire.

Beware the ashes and tea bag make a bit of a mess.

Since you probably could not see the quotes we chose I thought I would type them for you.

Katie's quote:  "When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace."

My quote:  "If you don't go after what you want, you will never have it.  If you don't ask, the answer is always no.  If you don't step forward, you are always in the same place."

My oak tree kind of matches the oak tree on the hill behind my house. 

You can see it if you look close enough.

Not only was this a fun craft, but also pretty cheap considering the canvasses were only $2.99 each, the foam brushes $.59 each, and the mod podge $8.99 for a bottle that we used less than a quarter of!

Some Things Are Just Better In Spain

I was missing living in Madrid so I decided to try making some paella (a typical Spanish dish) for dinner.  It was not too difficult to make, but didn’t really turn out how actual paella tastes.  I am not sure exactly why…maybe it was the recipe, maybe I didn’t add enough saffron, or maybe because it just wasn’t made in Spain.  Oh well, it was still fun to make and my family liked it! 

I am not going to type up the recipe since it is pretty long and wasn't amazing,

but if you click on the picture it will zoom in so you can read it if you want.

 Organizing the ingredients.  Note the Domino's Pizza red pepper flakes

I had to use since we were out of the jar of them.

 I amazingly was able to cut all the oninons without crying.

Sauteeing the chicken.

 I even wore my fleece shirt that I bought at El Rastro flea market in Madrid.

 The onions took forever to cook for some reason.

My brother Brian was doing his chemistry homework and keeping me company while I was cooking.

 Letting everything simmer and hoping some of the liquid would be absorbed since it was a bit mushy at first.

 All done and ready to eat.

Twenty-Firsts and the California Wine Country

One of the advantages of being 21 is that you get to experience a new part of California, the wine country.  So what could be a better choice for my 21^st post than a description of a 21^st birthday celebration where my friend Katie’s parents took us to Napa for the day?  Well, I guess it was more of a late celebration because my birthday was in July and Katie’s was in February while she was studying abroad, but it was a celebration regardless!  Just a mere hour from home, Napa almost feels like a different world where the rolling hills are covered in grapevines and the smell of fog still lingers in the fresh air.

We started off the day at Hall Wines where Katie’s family are members.  To be honest, I could not taste the multitude of flavors that ranged from blackberry pie to barbeque which the elaborate descriptions claimed the wine contained, but nonetheless it was a fun experience and I did enjoy the wine.

The elaborate descriptions of the wines that we decided would be so much fun to write.

Next we headed to Joseph Phelps Vineyards where Katie’s roommate Hadley is working for the summer; not a bad job if you ask me.  She was able to put us on the guest list for the large event they were hosting for all their members!  Despite the cool weather and rain, it was a beautiful event where we were served delicious hors devours and were able to sample $200 bottles of wine (which I don’t know if I will ever get the chance to do again).  I was so impressed with Hadley’s knowledge of the wines after working there only a week.

The most creative tray that lets you carry your food and wine.

 The 3 Kappas:  Katie, Lisa, and Hadley

 Hadley...already an expert.

No one said we couldn't drive the golf cart.

Lastly we went to Frank Family Vineyards.  I loved the lemon yellow building with the cute porch that housed the tasting rooms.  Here Katie and I learned that sweet and fruity are not the same thing.  What we thought was a “sweet” taste was actually “fruity”.  We were mistaking the taste of the fruit as the taste of sugar so Katie’s dad and the man working at the winery explained that sweet wines have more residual sugar than fruity wine do.  It is still a bit confusing to me but it is a learning process!

 Mr. B is pretty happy with his purchase.

 Katie made a friend.

I would say that my first wine tasting was a success and I am so blessed to be friends with Katie and her wonderful family!