An obsene amount of pictures, as well as a cookie recipe

I hope everyone had a good Christmas/holidays! :) I did. Today I just hung around the house and made cookies (chocolate chip hazelnut and ginger, but I didn't get pictures of the ginger cookies since I make them all the time) and pasta sauce. I also made smores, which were pretty tasty :D



It snowed here in SC for the second time this year, which has got to be a record. It didn't stick, at least not here, but it snowed pretty hard for a while. It was pretty crazy!

Hayden and Brett before Narnia 3-D

Brett and I before Naria in 3-D
Austen and I


My Christmas presents. Not including my very own camera! :D which I used to take allll these pictures. YAY! It's a Nikon and I loooove it!

Two cookbooks I got for Christmas :)Popchips are NOM
20 bags :D Gotta love Amazon!

Cannot WAIT to try this!



Chocolate chip hazelnut cookies

Adapted from Giada's Family Dinners by Giada De Laurentiis
Makes about 42 cookies

1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp of salt
2 1/4 cup of flour
1/2 cup of oats (not instant)
3/4 cup toffee, chopped (I used heath bar that they have with the baking chips at the grocery store)
12 oz bag semi-sweet chocolate chips
1/2 cup white chocolate chips
1 cup white sugar
1 cup light brown sugar
2 eggs
1 cup butter, room temp
1 cup roasted chopped hazelnuts
Preheat oven to 325.
Roast hazelnuts, remove as much skin as possible (mine still had a lot of skin on them, but I couldn't tell once they were done), chop, and set aside.
Put oats in a blender or food processor until finely chopped (both of mine were broken, so I just chopped them as well as I could).
Whisk together baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, salt, flour, and oats. Set aside.
Beat together butter and sugars until light and fluffy. Beat in vanilla and eggs, then slowly stir in flour mixture until just combined. Fold in nuts, chocolate chips, and toffee. Place on baking sheet and bake about 14 minutes. Let cool for 5 minutes on cookie sheet before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.

Frozen Smores made in the oven:
4 sheets of graham crackers (4 crackers each)
2 chocolate bars (like Hershey's)
4 marshmallows
Makes 4 smores

Break graham crackers in half, place 4 halves on cookie sheet. Put marshmallows on top of the graham crackers and put them in the oven with the broiler on high. Stand there and watch them, because they can burn very quickly. Once they're brown enough, remove pan from oven, put chocolate bars (1/2 bar per smore) on each marshmallow, then top with the other half of the graham cracker. Place back in oven with broiler on until chocolate gets melted to the graham cracker and marshmallow. Take them out, put them on a plate and put them in the freezer for about 30 minutes. Then eat them all :D NOM!


Pasta sauce


I don't really have a recipe for this because I kind of just throw random spices in xD but it's basically just tomato paste (the tiny can of it, because that's what we had in the pantry), three 28 oz cans of diced tomatoes, garlic, olive oil, and spices (thyme, oregano, sage, bay leaves, basil, rosemary, Italian seasonings, salt, pepper, a tiny bit of smoked paprika, and a tiny bit of chipotle pepper powder). It simmered for about 5 hours. It was good :D I like eating it as a soup, too.

Hope everyone had a great weekend!