is this the real life? is this just fantasy?

can't you just tell today is going to be a beautiful day?

it's fall, there isn't any snow yet (knock of wood), i slept in, i'm going to ride my bike to d.i. today, and watch football, and make FALAFEL! i don't know if it really can get any better...

we started the weekend yesterday with a date. (yes, i actually did get a date... if it is only the one date that i get of the semester, i will consider my dating life a success!)

here's the crew:

and yes, it was a masquerade.

aren't those guys studly?

can you believe we got those at walmart?

they have reaffirmed my belief that they really do carry everything.

for dinner, we had fajitas - which we absolutely amazing. and that was followed by what we lovingly refer to as a "cookie monster"... which i have seen other places called a "pizookie." 

they were the cutest things that i've ever seen!

we each got out own individual cookie that was in a skillet that was about the size of the top of a mason jar. oh my lanta - i think i died and went to heaven!

(and it even came with the cute little hot pad for the handle!!!)

i want.

and when i do get some... cuz i shall!

this is what i'm going to be making. 

and then it is going to go for a very looooooong swim in an ice cream bath.

right before it all ends up in my tummy.

oh happy day!

Skillet Chocolate Chip Cookie

2 cups flour

1 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter, softened

3/4 cup sugar

1/3 cup packed light brown sugar

1 egg

2 tsp pure vanilla extract

1 3/4 cups chocolate chips

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Coat a 10″ cast iron skillet lightly with vegetable oil. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, and salt.

In another medium bowl, cream together the butter and sugars. Beat about 2 minutes.

Add in the egg and vanilla. Beat 2 minutes longer.

Gradually add the flour mixture to the butter mixture until well-combined. Stir in the chocolate chips.

Press the dough into the skillet as evenly as you can.

Bake about 40 minutes or until the edges are lightly browned.

Transfer the skillet to a wire rack to cool. When ready to serve, cut into wedges. Add a scoop of your favorite ice cream on top while it’s still warm!

if i might quote my idol, rachel ray...

{YUM-O!}

do you ever feel like your cookie-cutters are under-utilized? 

i mean, the poor things get to shine only once a year when you decide to make sugar cookies!!! it is a sad, sad existence if you ask me. 

so i think it is time to let the cute little cookie cutters out of their stereotypical role as a "cookie" cutter (here and here) 

i think that would make an interesting movie plot...

"the cookie cutter that wouldn't cut cookies."

i mean, they've got to run out of ideas for movies eventually...

today i love:

sweats after wearing a dress all night long

showers - since i ran out of time yesterday... (and yet my hair doesn't look that bad!)

farmer's markets. i caved and bought a honey bear. (my last one suffered a very horrible death in the microwave.)

writing. stuff. (no you don't get to see it yet!)

food. i'm currently soaking chickpeas for falafel for a picnic this afternoon!

going to school. and not having to worry about real life. yet.

taking liberties in the kitchen.

i keep hearing this sound lately.
it sounds a lot like a woooooooosh...! 
and then i realize that it is life. as it goes rushing by. 
i remember when i was a kid, and the school year seemed to go by. soooooo slowly. what happened???
we're already a month into school, and i barely feel like i've even gotten settled in.
it's times like these that i realize that if i don't start DOING something, the whole semester is going to go by and i won't have done any of the things that i wanted to! 
so my list of pre-planned adventures for the rest of the semester:
     go on a hike
     watch a sunrise
     have brunch before church (since it starts at 2!)
     have a very merry unbirthday tea-party! 
     have a pie social, potluck, waffle party... basically any party with food involved. especially fall foods.
     go to the dunes and have a bonfire
     train for a half marathon. (this will be tricky since i barely have time to do my homework... let alone run!)
     keep my room clean. ha.
     read a book a week. (or maybe every other...)
     stop procrastinating. 
that being said... i'll make this short. :)


my sister and i wanted to make these:

and we kinda did. but not really.

i have this problem with following recipes. if i don't have something, i will either leave it out or stick something else in. sometimes this is good... other times not so much. (honey and sugar don't make an adequate brown sugar substitute in cookies. just sayin.) 

we didn't have any brown rice.

did that stop us?

nope.

this ended up being more of a throw-whatever-we-have-available-in-the-fridge type of recipe... but we were both HUGE fans. definitely gonna make it again. 

here's the real recipe. 

this is what we did. 

2 large green bell peppers, bottom trimmed, cap end cut off and diced, and seeds removed
1/2 large onion, diced
1/2 lb. ground beef

1/2 leftover yellow bell pepper in the fridge

2 jalapeno peppers

1 eggplant (it was headed downhill and needed to be used!)

1 tomato

1-2 cups shredded cabbage

salt and fresh ground black pepper to taste

(i'm pretty sure we threw in some chili powder and red pepper flakes in there somewhere...)
1/4 cup grated mozzarella cheese

preheat oven to 375F. trim bottom of bell peppers so they have a flat surface to stand on. cut off a fairly generous amount of the stem end of peppers, then remove seeds. (our bell peppers were monsters!) place hollowed-out peppers in a baking dish that you've sprayed with non-stick spray or olive oil.

remove stem part from the pepper caps and trim off any white membrane, then dice pepper caps and the onion into fairly small dice. cook hamburger until done, add whatever spices you suit your fancy, then add in onions (and in our case eggplant) and cook until tender. then add in peppers (i made sure to dice the jalapenos up reallllllllllly tiny... i hate getting a bite of pepper that is a little too big. because my tolerance for heat is basically non-existent.) last of all, add in cabbage - it doesn't take long to cook. remove from heat and add tomatoes. i didn't want them really cooked, and i knew that they would get cooked more in the oven. 

stuff the filling mixture into the hollowed-out peppers, using a spoon to press the mixture down so it's tightly packed into the pepper shell. the recipe we found didn't say that we needed to pre-cook the peppers... i was hungry anyway. and when i'm hungry, the lazy, speedy way is the ONLY way. (we actually saved the extra "stuffing" and had in the next day in an omlette... also a BIG success.) 

bake peppers for 30(ish) minutes, then remove from oven and put a generous pinch of grated mozzarella on top of each pepper. put peppers back into the oven and bake about 10-15 minutes more, until cheese is melted and lightly browned. serve hot.

believe me... this was good. and super healthy! 

:)

a random side-note:

one of my roommates is our cousin - who is currently taking a culinary fundamentals class... i'm sure she comes home every day and is mentally making notes on how not to cook. just take a look at jess, and don't do any of these things. but oh, what fun we have in the kitchen!!!

and just for kicks and giggles.

how i feel today. 
(minus a few of the less-than-honor-code-approved behaviors.) 

--------------------------

i haven't been thankful in a while.

today i am thankful for sweat pants.

after running around in a skirt all day, i love the feeling that you get when you can just sit down in the sweats and not have to sit all prim-and-proper anymore! 

hellllllo unladylike behavior!

(just kidding...)

and belts.

that come to the rescue when:

pants are too big.

shirts are too baggy.

you lose your backpack.

don't tell me you never fantasized about carrying your books to school with a belt.

maybe it was just me...

the (im)proper way to do things.

"life is pain highness!"
can you guess what movie that's from???


this last week was "one of those weeks" that i probably would care never to think of again. 
like ever.
after 6 tests, 2 projects, trying to find time to squeeze in donating at the plasma center (yeah. i do that.), going to the temple, and trying to stay dry (even though rexburg decides that it is funny to rain for 3 days straight. and then throw a little snow in there for kicks and giggles. i don't appreciate it thanks!) this week was... tough. but, you know what? i feel so good now that it's over! 
and i aced 3 of my tests. (we'll see how the other ones turn out next week...)
so not too shabby for taking every day not just a day at a time... sometimes it really was hour by hour. just to make sure that i would survive until the weekend. 
now enough of that! 


"you gotta put your behind in your past." 
or something like that. (said by a very wise meerkat)


as i was leaving the library late last night, finally being finished with the week-from-you-know-where, i saw a girl with a backpack. and i wanted it. luckily i restrained myself and she lives to wear it another day. 
you wanna know what it looks like?

super cute right?

but i'm too poor to buy them right now. 

maybe i'll get lucky at d.i. one of these days...

i'm one of those people that likes change. 
at home, the layout of my bedroom changes about every 6 months... i move my bed, the desk, and i have to go through and "de-junk". (that's a common term in our household... whether or not it is actually an effective practice has yet to be seen.)
but having a bed on cinderblocks doesn't leave a whole lot of room for change. 
so i have to change other things. 
i'm also a list person.
i have so many goal lists that i sometimes forget what goals i am actually trying to accomplish! then i find them like a year later and go oh yeahhhhhhhhhh. oops. 
so i am making a goal list. but this one has an end date. the end of the semester. 
which is like... december 17. 
this list might be considered a "de-junk-ing" of my life. because i can't move my bed. i guess i could move it into the closet (like harry potter!), but i don't know how roommate allison would take that...

da list:
train for a 10k. run 6.1 miles by the end of the semester.
go to a dance class
do something to my hair. maybe this?
spend less time on the computer. sorry there guys.
meet one new person every day.
read the entire book of mormon. (i'm in 2 nephi right now...)
try a new, healthy recipe every week (that i've never ever tried before!)
have an unbirthday tea party. and here. and here. and here. and here. 
go to bed earlier (so that i don't sleep through class...)
write more often. and share it with someone.
read a book a week. currently: a single voice
memorize the family: a proclamation to the world


ok. i think that's enough for now...
have an awesome (and hopefully less-rainy!) weekend

and just feel good. 

ready or not... life here i come!

i need some chill music right now.

this is just one of those days when life just seems to press down on you from all sides.

you know?

the feeling that you have to make a decision, but the stress alone threatens to incapacitate you...

i'm feeling that way about grad school right now.

(lame right?)

scared out of my wits.

the future is a scarrrrry place.

do i really have to grow up?

not that i don't have a plan for my life,

i just don't know what to do with the 5 different plans that i have. (i'm the type of person that has the plan, the backup plan, the backup-backup plan... you get the picture. i don't believe in failure.) 

the problem with that is that sometimes i don't make a decision because i'm afraid that it won't work out.

so while sitting in class, plotting out my life (for about the gazillion-th time this semester) i came to a conclusion:

life is gonna happen.

no matter what i decide to do, the rest of the world is going to continue to spin, and everyone else is going to keep going on with their regular day-to-day lives.

so what am i going to do about it?

two words.

no.

fear.

imagine me gritting my teeth and attempting very hard to look like a very menacing individual...

you ready mr. future???

{cuz you gotta deal with THIS!}

:)

so no matter what happens, i'm going to give life my 100%.

i know it's cliche, but you miss 100% of the shots you don't take, and the worst thing that can happen is that they say no.

well what do you do when they do say no?

time for plan b.

and then plan c.

plan d?

you keep tryin' stuff until something works!
(and by george something will!)

so here is to all of the plans, and the backup plans...

but never give up!

(that's the only time that i believe that failure exists. when you decide that you aren't going to try anymore.)

so we are making a pact.

right now.

you and me.

to never

ever

ever

ever

ever

ever

ever

ever

ever

ever

ever

ever

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

give up!

(pinkie swear.)

alright.

good luck!

now for some light-hearted kicks and giggles:

(i was in my exercise physiology class, and i got this brainy idea that i wanted to develop my own line of energy bars... so i started doing a little research. and this is what i found.)

scooby snack protein bars

scooby poo bars 

(i didn't come up with the name...)

th-th-th-th-th-that's all folks!

wishin' i could do this every day...

i've been very selfish. i've been showing you all of the fantastic things that i've been finding online... but i haven't told you anything of what i've actually been up to! (actually... i just haven't had any of the pictures on my computer to upload. but i love you soooo much that i actually braved the darkness underneath my bed to pull out my hard drive. you better believe i did!) 

so two weeks ago, my mom came up to play. 

and did we ever play!

(she also happens to love taking pictures... so what a better combination for us photogenic primadonnas?)

we heard about this hike from a guy at the fair.

talk about totally RANDOM.

i never believed that we would actually find this place.

you head out of rexburg, keep driving (and driving... and driving...) we actually made it all the way out to the highway on red road before we figured out that the "crater butte" we were looking for was back about 3 miles. and then off on some random dirt road.

poor baby car.

i promised him that i would give him a nice washing. (still hasn't happened...)

this was all you could see of the "crater"

you go from seeing tons of nice, sage-brush-y idaho landscape to a full-blown forest in a matter of seconds. 

pretty awesome.

me breaking in my brand-new hiking boots.

:)

boo-ya!

my sister and i ran in the temple-to-temple relay race.

domination!

(this was after i'd finished my 3.4 mile run)

ps - i hadn't run in like... 4 months?

probably not a smart move... but since when is that any fun?

finishing was sure fun though.

we had to pass on one of those slappy-wrist things... i know that they think that is supposed to be more convenient or something like that... but that takes a lot more coordination than i realized.

my heroic picture in front of the idaho falls temple.

funny (or maybe not-so-funny) story: 

the guy that was supposed to run the last leg got lost. so when my sister shows up (having sprinted to the end of her leg) with blue lips... i knew she wasn't going to be able to run the last 2.8 miles to the finish.

i'm standing there.

at the finish line.

i'm the only one in shorts.

with tennis shoes still on (i swear there was a little voice in my head that kept telling me not to change all day... little did i know...)

next thing i know, i've ripped her headphones out of her ears, and i'm jogging towards the corner.

sometimes i'm just too dang nice.

(bah.)

we're the studliest women i know.

the grand finish!

(my team was out looking for the "lost sheep")

and the weekend wasn't even close to being over!

i bet you wanna know where we would find 3 such adorable dresses.

we made them.

you heard me right.

well... mom made them... she just told me where to sew.

don't leave your attitude at home ladies!

cousins.

best friends.

sisters.

the photographer (aka mom)...

told me that this picture made my feet look too big.

but the converse are just so sweeeeet!

they caught me napping.

i like to pretend i'm a cat lying in the sun some days. 

(come on... you do it too... don't lie!)

skill.

or just weird.

i was NOT going to lose that hat.

{which i made by myself!}

best. shoes. ever!

{everywhere is walking distance if you have the time.}

                             steven wright

***

walking takes longer... than any other known form of locomotion except crawling. thus it stretches time and prolongs life. 

life is already too short to waste on speed. 

edward abbey

***

chicken enchilada bake here

(psssst! i'm making this... if you want to come over for dinner...)

did anyone else think that this was meant specifically for them?

absolutely amazing.

i need to eat a skinny person.

so i'm in a nutrition class... consequently, being the food junkie that i am, food is always on the brain. 

does this present a problem for a food-addict like myself?

quite possibly.

(how am i supposed to go to class and feel good about my eating when i was looking up super-yummy-and-not-remotely-healthy-recipes online last night???) i don't know if the class is supposed to make you feel guilty, but it's too late. i'm conflicted. 

will i change? 

probably not. 

so in honor of "eating healthy" (BAH!) and other diet-related bizness...

and to make sure that the whole world stays right:

self-saucing chocolate pudding.

i actually have a cake recipe like this one, but i am really liking the idea of "single serving"...

not necessarily because it is smaller, mind you.

because it's all mine.

no sharing involved!

wanna know what i'm going to buy myself?

i saw these babies and fell in love.

besides, winter is coming and i need some new boots.

***

this last weekend i watched general conference.

and i swear - every time they talk, they are talking specifically to me! (except maybe the parenting ones... i have no idea what they are talking about there...)

this was one of my "favorites"... if that is really possible.