Stationery card

Bright Happy Holiday Card

Turn family photos into holiday cards at Shutterfly.com.

View the entire collection of cards.

Cream Cheese Frosting

There are many recipes out there for Cream Cheese Frosting, but this combination has been my favorite blend!

Cream Cheese Frosting

Ingredients:
4 oz cream cheese
4 T butter, room temperature (softened)
1.5 c powdered sugar
1 tsp vanilla

Directions:
Cream together cream cheese and butter. Add vanilla. Slowly add powdered sugar.

Store in the refridgerator in airtight container, best within 3-5 days, Freeze up to a month.

I have left frosted cupcakes out on the counter all day and still ate them with no ill side effects!

Ices approximately 12 cupcakes or muffins.

Pumpkin Pie Chex Mix

I love anything Pumpkin Pie, and Chex mix is such a perfect snack, so I found this Chex Mix recipe to make for a Thanksgiving Day snack!

Ingredients

1/4	cup brown sugar
1	tablespoon pumpkin pie spice
1/4	cup butter
2	teaspoons vanilla
2	cups Cinnamon Chex® cereal
2	cups Wheat Chex® cereal
2	cups Honey Nut Chex® cereal
8	oz pecans

 

Directions

	In small bowl, mix brown sugar and pumpkin pie spice; set aside. In small microwave-safe dish, microwave butter on High about 30 seconds or until melted. Stir in vanilla. In large microwavable bowl, mix all cereals and pecans. Pour butter mixture over cereal mixture, stirring until evenly distributed. Add sugar and spice mixture and stir until coated.
	Microwave uncovered on High 5 minutes or until mixture begins to brown, stirring every minute. Spread on wax paper or a cookie sheet to cool. Store in airtight container.

1 Serving (1/2 cup) 16 servings: Calories 180 (Calories from Fat 80); Total Fat 9g (Saturated Fat 2 1/2g, Trans Fat 0g)

 

You can make the mix up to 2 weeks ahead of time, store in an airtight container.

Snicker Salad

My son's FAVORITE salad is Snicker Salad, my daughter doesn't like it because she doesn't like snickers....seriously, who doesn't like snickers?!?!

Snicker Salad

1 (3 oz.) pkg. instant vanilla pudding
1 c. milk
1 (8 oz.) Cool Whip
3 regular size (or 9 fun size) Snicker bars  - cut into bite size pieces.
3 medium (or 4 small)  apples - cut into bite size pieces

Mix Pudding and Milk well, fold in whip cream. Add cut up apples and snickers. Enjoy!

Best served that day. Can serve 1-2 days later, however it does start to get a little runny.

Almond Bark Puffcorn

Here is the easiest recipe, and so yummy !

Almond Bark Puffcorn

Ingredients:
1 package of Almond Bark
1 BIG bag of puff popcorn
Sprinkles (optional)

Instructions:
Melt the Almond Bark, start with 30 seconds, stir, then in 15 second intervals until a smooth consistency, do not over cook.

Pour over Puff Popcorn and stir. Add sprinkles if you like (I did but my bottle was too little and included yellow, so you barely see any!)

Lay out on wax paper to dry

Once dry, break apart and put in large bowl. Enjoy!

I ate a lot of this when I was pregnant last summer :)

Lemon Cookies

Using inspiration from these Chocolate cookies from Lil Liz-bits, we made Lemon Cookies. I wasn't sure if my kids would eat the lemon, but they loved them!

Lemon Cookies

1 box of cake mix

2 eggs

3/4 cup shortening

Powdered Sugar (I only used 2-3 large spoonfuls)

Preheat Oven to 350. Mix the cake mix, shortening and eggs together

until well combined

Roll into 1" balls and roll balls in powdered sugar

Bake at 350 degrees for 12 minutes. Take out and leave on the cookie sheet for 5 minutes. Move to wax paper and let cool

YUM!

 

Nutrion (24 cookies):

Calories: 149

Carbs: 18

Fat: 8

Protein: 1

Pumpkin Cupcakes with Maple Frosting

First, let me just say, yum! I found the recipe at House Beautiful

Makes 10 cupcakes
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
2 extra-large eggs, at room temperature
1 cup canned pumpkin purée (8 ounces), not pie filling
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup light brown sugar, lightly packed
1/2 cup vegetable oil
Maple Frosting (recipe follows)
1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Brush or spray the top of 10 muffin tins with vegetable oil and line them with 10 paper liners.
2. Into a medium bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg. In a larger bowl, whisk together the eggs, pumpkin purée, granulated sugar, brown sugar, and vegetable oil. Add the flour mixture and stir until combined.
3. Divide the batter among the prepared tins (I use a level 2 1/4-inch ice cream scoop) and bake for 20 to 25 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Set aside to cool completely.
4. Spread the cupcakes with the Maple Frosting and sprinkle with the chopped toffee bits.


Maple Frosting

6 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/4 teaspoon Boyajian Natural Maple Flavor
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
2 cups sifted confectioners' sugar
In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the cream cheese and butter on low speed until smooth. Stir in the maple flavoring and vanilla extract. With the mixer still on low, slowly add the confectioners' sugar and mix until smooth.

233 calories in cupcake alone
417 calories frosted

Cookies N Cream Cupcakes

The following is a historical blog post from my first ever attempt at making homemade cupcakes:

Yum, Yum...this past week was my Dolly's 1/2 birthday, and she requested cupcakes. After rummaging through the cupboards, I realized I didn't have a box mix on hand, and would have to try cupcakes from scratch, yikes! Sounded scary to me, but was actually just as easy as a box!
my son walked in half-way through, and asked, "Where's the box mom?"  I replied, "There isn't one." Then he said, "then how did you make the cupcakes?" HA!  Shows how my cupcakes have been thus far :) Hopefully being at home now it'll improve!!

I found a recipe in my fun kiddy cookbook: "3 Books in 1: Silly Snacks, Classroom Treats, and Cookie Dough Fun"

Cookies & Cream Cupcakes
2-1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1-2/3 c sugar
1 c milk
1/2 c (1 stick) butter, softened
2 tsp vanilla
3 egg whites
1 c crushed chocolate sandwich cookies (about 10 cookies) - this was enough for me for the garnish, too
1 container vanilla frosting (I used cream cheese - my favorite!)

1. Preheat oven to 350, line 24 regular muffin cups with paper baking cups
2. Sift flour, baking powder and salt together in large bowl. Stir in sugar. Add milk, butter and vanilla; beat with electric mixer at low speed 30 seconds. Beat at medium speed 2 minutes. Add egg whites; beat 2 minutes. Stir in 1 cup crushed cookies.
3. Spoon batter into prepared muffin cups. Bake 20-25 minutes or until toothpicks inserted into centers coue out clean. Cool in pans on wire racks 10 minutes. Remove to racks; cool completely
4. Frost cupcakes; garnish with additional crushed cookies

We decided to try making 12 big and 24 mini-muffins. I took the mini muffins out at 15 minutes, but it was still a touch too long. So I cut off the bottom part of the cupcake, as the top was still good. We then made sandwiches with these!

I let the kids decorate most of the cupcakes, and besides a mess, here is the "pretty" cupcakes I ended up with!

and of course I forgot to take a picture of the 1/2 birthday girl, who was mad at me because a 1/2 birthday does not equal presents and a party!

Nutrion: (24 servings)
Calories: 228
Carbs: 39
Fat: 8
Protein: 2

Cream Cheese Cookie Bars

Yum, Yum

I found this recipe at Amanda's Cookin' and it is fabulous!

Cream Cheese Cookie Bars
Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 cup butter, softened
8 oz cream cheese, softened (I use fat free)
1 egg
1/2 t almond extract
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
2 1/2 cups all purpose flour

Beat the butter, cream cheese, sugar, and egg until nice and frothy, about 4 minutes. Add the vanilla and almond extract and beat for 1 minute more.
In a small bowl combine the flour, baking powder and baking soda. Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture and beat for 2 minutes. Press the dough into a large jelly roll (cookie sheet) pan. (Mine was 10.5x15.5) Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes. Let the pan cool completely.

Frosting:
1/2 cup butter softened
4 oz cream cheese, softened
3 1/2 - 4 1/2 cups powdered sugar
3-5 tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
food coloring or icing paste

To make the frosting, in a medium sized bowl (or your stand mixer) combine the butter and cream cheese. Beat for 2 minutes. Add the powdered sugar, milk, vanilla and food coloring. Mix for 1-2 minutes or until smooth. Frost your pan of cookies.

Cut the cookies into bars and serve.

Don't forget to lick the frosting bowl clean.

Add sprinkles if desired, like we did for this Valentine's treat.

Enjoy!

** You may want to ignore this part of the post. I did a little math and calculated that if you cut the pan into 54 bars like I did, there are 148 calories per serving, using fat-free cream cheese. Sadly, it is easy to eat 2 or even 3 bars without blinking, oops!

Freezing
I did freeze half my bars (so I'd stop eating them!!) and when I took them out a week later they were still fabulous as if they were freshly baked that day!

Cinnamon Roll Pancakes

A while back I came across a recipe for Cinnamon Roll Pancakes that sounded delicious! I told my husband about them (he typically makes the kids pancakes on the weekend) and he was sold :)

Typically, this is what he does to spruce them up!

So, when the weekend came for Daddy's pancakes, he searched for the recipe without me and didn't find the same one I had found. His recipe called for flour, and it was pretty lumpy and difficult to put in the pancakes. We tried my recipe the next day, and there was too much butter and the mix was too runny!  This weekend we cut the butter WAY down, and here is what we got:

Perfect! (although a little messy this morning :) )

Here is our preferred recipe:
1/2 stick butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon

Cream Cheese Icing:

2 cups powdered sugar

2 ounces cream cheese 

1tsp vanilla

4 Tbsp milk

We use Bisquick pancakes, I know lots of people out there make their own batter, but the Bisquick is so easy!  We tried it with frosty, and although delicious, we prefer in our house to use syrup and whip cream

or on just plain Maple Syrup :)

Yum! Enjoy :)