Banana Oatmeal Cups with Chocolate Chips

Happy Sunday!

So I've been working out like a crazy mad woman and then I decided if I'm working out to lose weight why not make it quicker and faster by eating right? So lately I've been on this health kick. And let me tell you I feel GREAT! Need an esteem booster? WORKOUT!

Ok but the real point of this post is to tell you about these healthy and delicious "muffins." And I say "muffins" and not muffins because they aren't you typical muffin.

The title really says it better, Banana Oatmeal Cups with Chocolate Chips, and if you click on the link it will bring you to the pin I found it from. 

OR you can go directly to the lady's blog here.

I followed her instructions just like she said, except I might have "accidentally" added a few more chocolate chips, and yes I understand that is the least healthy part of this but I mean what can a girl do when the recipe only calls for 3 tablespoons?

So I mashed all the bananas and added all the ingredients except the oats and the chocolate chips. And it was pretty runny, wasn't sure how it was going to turn out. But when I added the oats it seems to be a pretty decent texture and not too runny. 

Then I added the chocolate chips and put them in muffin liners. I probably should have greased the muffin liners slightly because they didn't come out too nice. I did notice that on the lady's blog she said them come out nice once the cool slightly but that wasn't the case for me, just seemed to stick to the sides, oh well, they were sill delicious.

Then of course baking them, she said she split them up into 15 muffin tins, well who has a muffin tin that has 15 cups? I don't so I just added extra to each cup, so in that case her nutritional count is going to be slightly higher if you only split them into 12 cups. Anyway with the 12 cups I cooked them for 30 minutes at 375 degrees and that seemed like the perfect amount for my oven.

Finished product and delicious no doubt!

I give this pin 

Mostly because everytime I go into the kitchen and I see one of the "muffins" sitting there it says "Eat me!" So I oblige and I eat it. I will be making this again.

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And lets not forget my last little picture I like doing.

My little one is rounding the corner to 6 months! So freaking cute! I can't get enough of her!

We also started doing cloth diapers this week. 

Isn't that red diaper so much cuter than disposable diapers? 

Eventually I will write a post on how that is going and what I've learned but I'll give it a month or two before I do that.

DIY Maternity shirt

This should have been posted ages ago, since I now have a 5 month old and no longer pregnant BUT better late than never right? Anyway I found this little beauty of a pin on a cute DIY maternity shirt.

Here is the first step. getting ready to cut the extra large shirt I bought at Walmart. (Sorry the picture is kinda bad.)

With the extra material I made some ruffles for the sleeves.

Then I sewed them on, looks kinda cool huh?

Then I sewed the sleeves to the new sized shirt.

And VWALA! My shirt. Unfortunately I made it slightly too small so I could barely get it on at the time with my ever growing belly, so I'll spare you the ill-fitting shirt, pregnant lady photo.

Overall I would have to give this project 3 stars.

Why?

Not because of the pin but mostly at my lack of trying to look cute in it. I think sometimes I have a grand picture in my head on how it will turn out and then when it doesn't turn out EXACTLY like what I picture I consider it a fail. But whatever, I think I might try it next time I'm pregnant but try either with a larger shirt or just cut less of the sides.

Anyway 

HAPPY FIRST DAY OF SPRING!

I'm so excited that it is finally spring, although it is currently snowing in my neck of the woods, it still means more sunny days are right around the corner.

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And since this is a few months late I figured I share a photo of my little one! Just turned 5 months a new days ago. 

Isn't she the cutest thing you've ever seen? I just want to snuggle her all day!

ZOMG! Free Fonts!

New coolest thing ever—downloading fonts! K maybe not really but it is convenient when your handwriting looks as terrible as mine. I found these cute favorites on Pinterest and from there went on a crazy person rampage downloading hundreds of fun, new fonts!

http://lovelylittlesnippets.blogspot.com/2011/07/font-tastic.html

http://lilluna.com/free-handwriting-fonts/

Then just like a great pair of new shoes I needed somewhere to show them off. However, since my boss tends to frown on my sending him emails in Simon Script--weirdo--I decided it was time for a few design projects. All of these were designed using Swift Publisher 3 for Macs. Unfortunately, my CSS doesn’t download since I live in Afghanistan and Internet hasn’t been invented. Kidding! But this program is a great alternative and it’s only twenty bucks!

Free Printable

A design for Alix' new nursery. I'd show it in a cute frame but again I live in Afghanland.  Supplies are limited.

Free Printable

This is one of my favorite quotes and I thought it would help my new bulletin board look cute. We want to see what fun things you designed using your new fonts! Show us in the comments section!!

Geometric Nail Art

Ok guys I’m not creative. Don’t judge.

So when I saw this on Pinterest I was excited! 

http://pose.com/p/1geom

Some simple creativity and we’ll leave the difficult projects for Alix. 

Oh yea! My left hand is dumb. Other than that though the project was easy to follow and my nails turned out really cute! 

Geometric Nails Project Breakdown:

Start with clean nails and then apply base coat. I chose a light pink. 

Let this dry completely. After this I basically just applied tape all sorts of ways and painted in the spots left without tape. Second color—hot pink.

Let the second layer also dry completely and then again apply tape. Paint tapeless sections. 

Third color—grey. Let dry and apply a top coat.

All in all, I give this pin

  4 stars!

 Despite the ease of the project I had to take off a star since the project just took forever. Mostly I just ran out of patience. Also if you’re wondering about my color choices I’m in Afghanistan and the selection is limited. Good luck painting your nails!

Brownie Cookie Dough Sandwiches

Brownie Cookie Dough Sandwiches

I'm not one for homemade oreos, mostly because the filling isn't my favorite. But I saw this pin and thought, "cookie dough for the center cream? Yes, please!" So I pinned it and then pinned a bunch more things and forgot about this one. 

Last night, my husband and I, were chillin' and he had a craving for something sweet, so I pulled up pinterest and this is the  pin he wanted to make. Since I was missing a few ingredients I ran to the store and came back home ready for some baking. Although my husband said he would help, he quickly gets distracted and ended up only softening the butter for me, BUT he did stay in the kitchen and we chatted about things so it was a fun night of baking anyway.

Ok, ready for my review of this pin? 

5 stars!

And here is why. First off I followed the instructions to the letter. Doing everything that was said and they came out delicious. I usually tend to skip a step or add an ingredient too early and it messes up. But over the years of cooking and baking I've learned the cooking and baking is a Science and the proportions and order of things do matter. 

There was a couple things I altered though, as I did follow the instructions I didn't follow all the ingredients. Ok, I didn't follow just one. That was the cocoa. I'm a sucker for anything chocolate and an even bigger sucker for dark chocolate, so I substituted the cocoa for dark chocolate cocoa and they were amazing. I would like to add even though a cup and a fourth seems like a lot of cocoa, it is worth it. PUT IN ALL THE COCOA! Trust me! It'll be so much better.

The cookies turned out perfectly! yum!

 The marshmallow cream is such a weird substance and it took awhile to get the filling all mixed in correctly but it was sure good!

 Finished product! Success!

I hope you enjoy them just as much as we did.

                                                                                                                                                                             

 On a totally unrelated note. I saw this family of ducks the other day. I counted 11 babies and they were so stinking cute!

Intro to Jess and I (Alix)

Although both Jess and I will be writing on the blog, I (Alix) thought I would first write about Jess and me. We met in seventh grade, German class, both being awkward middle schoolers and probably taking the nerdiest class together made us quick friends. Then we found out we had more things in common and soon became good friends. Again in eighth grade we had German class together. Then high school came, I transferred to a different high school and Jess went to the high school where all our middle school friends went. We saw each other at church functions but not much more than that. I moved then after my Sophomore year to Washington and Jess and I lost touch. For college Jess went to BYU-I and I went to WSU, but like most plans, my plans for college changed and transferred to BYU-I after freshman year. Since I knew absolutely no one except Jess, I called her up and we were roommates our sophomore year. Jess takes most credit, and I don’t care if she takes it, but I met my husband through her, they worked together, which is great that your best friend and husband are good friends too. After sophomore year I got married but Jess and I still hung out all the time. Currently Jess is traveling the world and having crazy fun adventures. I am currently still stuck in the college town waiting for my husband to get into med school and embarking on my own adventure of motherhood.

Jess and I don’t claim to know anything. Really we don’t. I can answer math questions for you if you want, and Jess is an awesome writer (so if there is crappy writing happening on this blog you can attribute it to myself), and can speak like a billion languages, but really we are no experts. We just love to create and try new things. So enjoy our blog!

Jess on the right and I am on the left.

And I just realized that I don't have any half decent pictures of Jess and I, they are all quite goofy, so here is one.