PJ

I wasn't always a superhero, I didn't actually realize that I would know as much about superheroes as I do now until I met my hubby. And to be quite honest, my kids probably know more about superheroes than I do, and that's totally ok. I love the balance we have in our household with me being the techie, math, computer, and database loving mommy, and my hubby being the superhero, music, history, and financial savvy daddy. We first and foremost love Jesus and know we would not be where we are today if it weren't for His Grace and Mercy. And, I am a former Mombie. I don't know how some moms get it all done. I work full time, and have 3 kids 5 and under, and man I was exhausted. Until I found out about this crazy thing called gut health, and this cool thing called our microbiome. Now, I've got energy to get it all done, and am feeling so much healthier. I've also got a nice little side business where I actually get paid to help people feel better. What a concept, right?

The Superhero Family RV Trip – Day 7

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7/17/2019 – Elmore, MN to Ishpeming, MI

Another goal, another missed deadline…

We had lofty goals of making it to Ishpeming by the end of the day, but other things took priority. Like a wonderful homemade breakfast by Brittany. She was up late texting me to give me instructions and tell us their home was open for us if we needed to come in in the middle of the night. Their oldest kids are close in age to our kids, so we were really looking forward to hanging out the day we planned to arrive. When that didn’t happen, we were thankful they had time for us in the morning. We didn’t arrive until 1:45 am and Christopher left for work a few hours later.

So… we slept in a little then Brittany invited us in for breakfast. She made homemade waffles with strawberries and freshly whipped cream, along with eggs, and sausage. So yummy, and such a great way to start our day. Their house was beautiful and was over 100 years old. After breakfast their kids caught a firefly to show our kids. We had never seen a real firefly before!

Then we headed onward towards Michigan…

But first… we had to make a quick left and drive into Iowa. We wanted to cross another state off of our list of states that we visited on our road trip. Christopher told us it was just a few blocks away and that he has actually walked there from their house, so we had to take the little detour. We passed an American Legion (one of my clients at work) on our way out of Elmore. After we made our quick stop, and turned around, to head back to the freeway we saw him… The Jolly Green Giant! I had no idea that we would get to see him on our trip. But it was another fun little unplanned stop on our trip. After our little visit with him and Little Green Sprout, we headed on to see Christopher at work.

Christopher works at a gas station with… you guessed it… window washers with long handles! So we got to catch up with him for a little before we moved on toward our next destination.

Just a few more stops before we got to Michigan…

You can’t see a huge Bull on the side of the road and not stop and take a picture. This was right outside of Bennett’s Food Center. The kids were always down for any excuse to get out of their seats and walk around. Then a quick stop at Family Dollar because I didn’t pack enough crayons for each child to have their own box…. ha ha ha!

And we couldn’t pass a Hardee’s in Eau Claire, Wisconsin without stopping to grab some food to see if it tastes like Carls Jr like we have back home. They have packets of Horseradish sauce, which I’m totally into these days… as long as they don’t have high fructose corn syrup, which is hard to find. I think I had some kind of garlic sourdough burger and obviously I had to try the garlic cheese fries too…but don’t worry, I took my Block first!

We missed Michigan by an hour…

Tips for Day 7:

  • Tip 1: If you are minutes away from another state…. just drive there. Even though we only got to be in the state for a minute or two to make a u-turn in an RV, it was cool to say we visited another state.
  • Tip 2: Take the time to stop and see the cool things, even if it means you are going to be a little late. I had to be in Michigan by the next morning for my sister’s Bachelorette Party, so I got a little less sleep, but I was fine. I don’t regret a minute of missed sleep because of all the amazing things we got to see on this trip.

The Superhero Family RV Trip – Day 6

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7/16/2019 – Keystone, SD to Elmore, MN

As I look back through our memories, I am amazed at how much we would get done in a single day… this was one of those days.

We got the kids dressed while they were still asleep, but Alexandria, our Plexus baby, was like Mommy and was ready to go as soon as her eyes opened. She got to explore our campsite for a few minutes before we left Rapid City South RV Park and headed to our first stop of the day.

Stop #1 – The Dinosaur Museum

I had seen the Dinosaur Museum online and thought the kids would probably love it. They don’t open until 9:00 am and we tried to get our days started as early as possible, so we didn’t add this to the agenda. Our goal was to get as much done as possible, in the time allowed, which was not enough. But, I did want to at least stop by so the kids could see the huge T-Rex out front.

Stop #2 Bear Country USA

Bear Country USA opened at 8:00 am and we were able to drive through in the RV, so it was a fun, comfortable drive, and we got to see tons of animals, right outside our windows!

After the drive through, we go to park, (they had RV parking spots), and walk through a little zoo area.

Then we were off to… Mount Rushmore!

Even though we saw it the night before, but it was even more majestic during the day! If Mount Rushmore is on your list of places to visit someday… you definitely need to make it happen! They had started construction the day before so we didn’t get to get as close as you usually can, but we still enjoyed it. And we will definitely go back!

Next stop…. Crazy Horse Memorial

We got another view of Mount Rushmore on our way to Crazy Horse. Like the Dinosaur Museum, Crazy Horse Memorial looks like a really cool place to visit. But, we didn’t actually have time to actually get out and really check it out. We pulled up to the entry window and found out it was $30 just to get in… so we asked them if we could turn around and leave, They let us pull up to the parking lot to make the big u-turn in the RV. We jumped out of the RV for a quick picture, then jumped back in and kept going on our way to Minnesota.

Dinner on the road…

Every day was a new adventure. This day we had planned to make it to Minnesota in time for dinner. I felt super bad because our friends Christopher and Brittany had prepared enough dinner for our family. Dinner for our family of 5 to join their family of 7 was a big dinner, and there was no way we would make it in time. 🙁 I mean, we could have made it… but we would have had to leave right after Mount Rushmore. And since we don’t get out to South Dakota very often, I thought we should see as much as we could before we pressed on. They have traveled with their kids before, so they understood.

After we passed the Missouri River we stopped for our not as delicious as a home cooked meal fast food dinner. Ryan and I picked up dinner from Taco John’s for us, it wasn’t anything to write home about. Then we made a second stop for old trusty (not saying it’s the healthiest by any means) McDonald’s for the kids. Then we were on our way again.

A beautiful sunset, more bugs, and more lightning storms on the way to Minnesota!

We saw another beautiful sunset, and even saw a sign with Alexandria’s name on it before it got too dark.

There were bugs… lots and lots of bugs. I’m sure you’ll see in plenty of pictures that there are bugs on the windshield. This day seemed to have more than the others. Ryan was always on the hunt for the windows washers with really long handles. Our friend Ashley gave us a tip that we should stop at the Truck Stops to get gas AND long handled window washers. We made a stop at T & C’s Pit Stop in Salem, SD and while Ryan cleaned the windshield, we got to watch this lightning storm from a little closer, but not too close for comfort.

Shortly after our bug cleaning stop we crossed the state line into Minnesota. We still had a ways to go until we made it to our spot for the night, or early morning hours, in Christopher and Brittany’s driveway.

Tips for Day 6:

  • Tip 1: Plan ahead and make sure you give yourself extra time. Once we were there and saw all the fun things that were available, we wish we would have had more time.
  • Tip 2: Be prepared to stop and clean your windshields if you are driving through South Dakota during the summer. And don’t forget to use your GasBuddy app to find gas stations with prices listed nearby. This station was not right off the freeway, but they definitely had the long handled window washer, so it was worth the little drive off of our route.

The Superhero Family RV Trip – Day 5

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7/15/2019 – Cody, WY to Keystone, SD

Cody WY to Keystone SD

Our first night in a WalMart parking lot was a success! We arrived at 12:36 am, popped out our slides and slept in. When we woke up and got ready to drive away, the parking lot had a lot fewer RVs but the section we were in was still a resting spot to several RVs at almost 10:00 am.

The long journey…

We had a very long, but also very beautiful, drive to Keystone, SD.

Ryan’s friend, Karen, from his Rotary Club knew about our trip and told us to check in with her. They offered to show us around, but since we were on a time crunch… again, we didn’t have time for a tour. But she invited us to stop by their home, in Spearfish, SD for dinner. Another yummy homemade dinner with friends? You don’t have to ask us twice!

We did however have some “detours” on the way… if you can call them that… ha ha!

Karen met us at another Walmart to pick us up and drove us up to the house since the RV would have been a little too large for the neighborhood. Her husband, Jim, went to work grilling on the BBQ, while Karen whipped up the rest of the goodies in the kitchen. Their house was beautiful! And before we left we saw a storm rolling in. Jim told me about an app called MyRadar Weather Radar so we could keep and eye on the storm as it moved. We were following behind it and had quite the lightning show.

  • The views were amazing!
  • Check out that sign!
  • South Dakota!
  • I had never seen a minimum speed limit sign until I saw this one!
  • Smile…
  • Pretend you’re asleep…
  • Karen and Jim’s back yard.
  • Tracking the storm ahead of us.

Mount Rushmore at night…

We had heard about the lighting ceremony, but since we were notoriously behind schedule, we didn’t make it in time. We did however make it to our campground without too much rain. When we booked the RV site I found it under the name of Tee Pee Black Hills. But, it had since been renamed Rapid City South RV Park. They have a camera on site, so even if they aren’t on site, they are able to direct you to your spot over video. Once we knew where we’d be settling in for the night, we decided to do something a little crazy…

Tips for Day 5:

  • Tip 1 Go see Mount Rushmore at night! Go back during the day too, but it looks so beautiful at night and there’s a lot fewer people there are night. We didn’t see the Lighting Ceremony, but I bet it would be pretty awesome to see. Also, since we got there so close to closing, they didn’t charge us to park, and we got front row parking.
  • Tip 2 plan to spend a few days in Keystone, SD. We planned for less then 24 hours there. We got a ton done, but it was really hard to choose what we would do. There are so many fun things to do if you just look at all the billboards on the way to Mount Rushmore!

No Bake Peanut Butter Cheesecake with Ritz crust

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I had been wanting to try making a cheesecake in my Instant Pot, but I didn’t have a small enough Springform Pan, but I did have a big one I bought years ago, and had never used, so I figured I should try the one I already had before I spent more money on one for my Instant Pot.

Except… We are low on Graham Crackers and I didn’t want to make a trip to a store in my coronavirus mask just for Graham Crackers… So I got creative with what I had…

Ritz Cracker Crust…

  • 1.5 Cups crushed Ritz (that’s about 45 crackers)
  • 3 Tablespoons of sugar
  • 1/3 Cup Melted Butter (that’s about 5 1/3 Tablespoons)

Mix your crackers and sugar together first, then slowly pour in the melted butter while stirring. After mixed, press into bottom and slightly the sides of your springform pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 15 minutes, then let it cool while you work on the filling.

The rest was easy…

  • 3 cups (24 ounces) of room temperature cream cheese
  • 1 cup of peanut butter, I used crunchy
  • 1 1/4 cups of powdered sugar
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 1/4 cups of heavy whipping cream

First whip together the cream cheese and peanut butter until it’s no longer lumpy, then I added in 1/4 cups of powdered sugar at a time while whipping it all together, finally I added the vanilla extract. Once it was all ready, I added in the cold heavy whipping cream and blended until peaks formed.

Scoop it all into your cooled down crust, spread it as smooth as possible, and chill it for an hour.

I also made a chocolate mousse to add a little decorative border…

I used my immersion blender for this step.

  • 1 cup of heavy whipping cream
  • 1 Tablespoon Cocoa powder
  • 2 Tablespoons powdered sugar
  • 1 teaspoon Almond Extract

First I whipped the heavy whipping cream until it started to get thick, then I added in the cocoa powder, powdered sugar, and almond extract and kept whipping until it was thick and fluffy.

I put it in a piping bag and chilled along with the cheesecake then added the decorations after I removed the cheesecake from the springform pan.

Voila! ❤️

I also tried to save this as a draft after I wrote the crust recipe and… It published 🙈so my apologies for getting only part of the recipe in your inbox 📬. I hope you enjoy it!

Garmin Vivoactive 3 Watch faces not working…

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So I got a sweet Garmin Vivoactive 3 delivered yesterday from my company… Because… Well… They are awesome and they actually show us they appreciate the hard work that we are doing my rewarding us with gifts to help us on our health and happiness journey. ❤️

I was so excited when I saw all the watch faces I could choose from in the Garmin Connect IQ app 😍, so I downloaded 6 of them. Then I went to apply them and 5 of the 6 had an error 🤦🏽‍♀️.

So obviously I scoured the internet to figure out why the faces wouldn’t work. I found a long thread about things that worked, then didn’t, like rebooting, but I tried that… 3 times already and still couldn’t see the faces🤷🏽‍♀️.

Then I found the solution of all solutions… Garmin Express! You download the application to your desktop then hook your Vivoactive 3 up with the power cord to your USB slot and it will sync and make updates to your smart watch that didn’t happen from within the watch menus (I had checked for updates within the watch menu and it had said it was up to date 🤔).

After the updates were complete… I had all my watch face options available! 🙌🏼🙌🏼🙌🏼

So I slept with my new Vivoactive 3 on 1 wrist and my old Fitbit Blaze on the other to see how they compare. I’ll be wearing both the whole day today too to continue my research 😂.

I’m a database analyst, so you probably won’t be surprised that I chose a face with all the DATA (Data Lover 🤣).

I think my favorite thing about my Garmin is that I can wear it while swimming, giving the kids a bath, washing dishes… You know all the things I can’t do while wearing my Fitbit Blaze. But I’m still a Fitbit fan because that’s where all my friends are that I do fitness challenges with.

Are you into fitness? How’s your health? You can’t outlift or outrun an unhealthy gut. 😝 But I’ve got something that might help. ❤️

Mail Merge Labels in Word

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Since I’m trying to figure this out again… I think I do this every year (that we send Christmas cards), I’m going to just write it out for myself, and for anyone else that it may help. (Update: I never actually published this last year when I wrote it, and I had to figure it out again this year when I came to search my blog and couldn’t find my post… so I’m finishing it in 2019 so I’ll have it for our 2020 cards)

We have our Address List Master in Google Drive so that we always have it with us wherever we go, and we can update it as we need to.

First, I made all my updates, highlighting records for people I knew had moved, so we could follow up with them, removing people who had passed away in the last year, or people whose cards were returned to us with no forwarding address, and adding any new friends we had made throughout the year. After I got my Google Drive list updated, I copied it into a new Excel document and saved it with this year’s name.

Here is where I always run into trouble… I got into Word and cannot figure out how to update my data source. I love data, and I love databases, and it seems like this should be something simple, but I cannot figure it out… maybe… if I used the same file name, then I could just go into the same Word document and just refresh the data… but I am going the wizard route… yet again. If I get it figured out before next year, I’ll update this. But… Christmas is only 4 days away and we need to get these cards out.

Sorry if you get one from us and it’s late… we tried.

Open Word

Go to Mailing

Go to Start Mail Merge – then select Step-by-Step Mail Merge Wizard


You’ll see options open on the right side of the page, click the Labels option button then click on Next: Starting Document

Click on Label Options

A window will pop open and you’ll choose your Label vendor and Product number (we use Avery #18660) then click OK then click Next: Select recipients

Click on Browse, then

Double click on your Excel list that you just created/updated then click OK, it should show you a preview of your address list, follow the wizard to confirm.

Click Next: Arrange your labels, click on Address block, then click on Match Fields, you’ll want to make any updates here to make sure your sample looks ok. In my list I have first and last name in one column, so I make sure the First Name references my Name field and the Last Name doesn’t reference my data at all or it prints the entire name twice. Once your updates are made, Click OK. Then click the Update all labels button before clicking on Next: Preview your labels, then click on Next: Complete the merge

Select Next: Preview your labels, and then Next: Complete the merge.

If everything looks good, you can choose to Print, but I choose the Edit individual labels option because we almost always have a few more records we are waiting to get addresses back on, but we don’t want to wait to print the rest. We click Merge, then All and it writes every address to the Word document so you can make any updates before you print. I save my document to my desktop then when I am ready I load my labels into my printer and print them. (Make sure you are loading your paper the right way, mine has to be print side down in the tray).

I hope this helps you! And I am sure it will help me next year when I’m trying to figure this out again!

Merry Christmas!

Meringue Cookies

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I had never tried meringue cookies until a few years ago when we were visiting our friends that live in Las Vegas and they had a container of them in their pantry.

It’s not something I had ever seen in the grocery store, but I did find them at Whole Foods and bought myself a container… Once after trying them in Vegas. 😂

So that was the only two times… In my LIFE… that I had meringue cookies, until… I saw them on Pinterest recently. I don’t know how Pinterest knows just the right things to show me 🤷🏽‍♀️. I think I was actually looking up royal icing and since you make that with meringue powder it noticed the connection and had to throw it out to see if I’d bite… And I totally did.

But, I didn’t see any recipes that used the Wilton Meringue Powder, only recipes that say how important it is so make sure you only have egg white and nothing else… AT ALL. Sorry, but I don’t have time for all that madness, I just wanted an easy recipe using my cheater meringue powder… Which was also not easy to find.

I was trying to order from Amazon but they won’t ship to California… They’ll ship to every other state… But California 🤦🏽‍♀️. So I asked my trusty Facebook friends and they said I could find it at Wal-Mart. I went on my search for all things baking and there was no meringue powder to be found 🙄. But… I thought I remembered seeing baking things in the craft area as well on a previous visit, so I made the trek across the store and found it! 🙌🏼🙌🏼🙌🏼 If you are looking for meringue powder make sure you check by the baking pans in the craft area… Baking is an art after all! 😘

Since Pinterest wasn’t much help for a recipe using meringue powder, I had to try to navigate my way through the Wilton site… I did find a recipe but I wouldn’t say it was the most descriptive… So I’m going to write it in easier to understand (for me anyway) terms and hopefully you’ll me able to follow along.

What you’ll need…

  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extra
  • 1/8 cup meringue powder
  • 1/4 cup water
  • 2/3 cups granulated sugar

You’ll also want to have:

  • A mixer (I used my mother-in-love’s old Kitchenaid mixer and am loving it, but this one looks like it has all the same attachments and is much more affordable)
  • Piping bags with tips (I bought this set and these bags are amazing! The tips are pretty cool too)
  • Icing color (I used these gel drops)
  • Baking mats… you could use parchment paper, but I didn’t have any so I ordered both parchment paper and these baking mats from Amazon at the same time and I don’t know how I lived without these mats before… LOVE them!

Before you get started, you should know that these need to cool in the oven for several hours, so they are best made at night so they can stay in the oven overnight and be ready in the morning.

Step 1

Preheat oven to 250°F. Place your baking mats into your baking pans.

Step 2

In large bowl, whip Meringue Powder and water with electric mixer on high speed until soft peaks form, do you even know what soft peaks are? If you don’t, I took a picture, essentially it’s when you see little lines forming and it isn’t a runny texture anymore. With mixer running, gradually add sugar. Whip until stiff peaks. Add vanilla extract and icing color and whip until well combined, scraping down bottom and sides of bowl as necessary.

Step 3

Fill your piping bag with the meringue and squeeze out 2 inch circles onto your baking mat about 1 inch apart from each other. I also did smaller little stars between my bigger circles and they turned out super cute as well.

Step 4

Bake 50 minutes or until outsides of meringues feel firm and crisp, turn off the over and let them cool for several hours on the pan. If you make these at night they can stay in the oven overnight. Once cooled, peel cooled meringues off of baking mat. Keep them in an airtight container at room temp for up 2 weeks.

Tips:

  • Use granulated sugar, I felt that it kept the consistency better for piping. I tried the second batch with powdered sugar and it seemed way too soft.
  • You can experiment with different flavors, but…. after trying 4 additional flavors, I think vanilla is still my favorite, even thought I love almond and coconut flavors, they just didn’t taste as great as the vanilla.
  • You can double the recipe. This is actually half of the recipe that Wilton has posted and it made so many cookies that I was glad I only did half because my oven wouldn’t have had the space for 4 pans.
  • I also bought these spatulas with my other baking goodies and they make it much easier to load your meringue into your piping bags towards the tip and not have to squeeze it down from the top.

Please let me know what you think and if you have any other fun ideas for me me to try!

Peanut Butter & Chocolate Bars

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So I got the Costco sized Honey Maid Graham Crackers and then realized they are best when used by December 31, 2019. And normally I would be ok with using things after the best by date… except we had an unopened box of Honey Maid Graham crackers… that were like a year past the best by date and they both smelled… and tasted foul. So… I won’t be making that mistake again… at least with Graham Crackers, I’m totally willing to try something past the best by date if it is another product.

Anyway, I had a cookie exchange party with my cousins on Sunday and I was trying to think of an easy, fast, recipe that I could make between church and the party and I came upon these… and I could use more of our Graham Crackers these before they go bad. I made the recipe and didn’t think about the cooling time needed, so they came out not so pretty when I tried to cut them and pack up up to leave the house quickly… so I did not take a picture of the final project… But I am making more today for our neighbors and for my hubby to take to his Rotary Club cookie exchange tomorrow, so… I’ll get a picture today!

Here’s what you’ll need:

  • ½ cup unsalted butter (that’s 1 stick)
  • 1½ cups graham cracker crumbs (that’s about 15 full crackers with all 4 pieces)
  • 14 oz sweetened condensed milk (that’s 1 can)
  • 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
  • 1 cup peanut butter chips (the bag comes with 1 2/3 cups of chips so if you are going to double the recipe, make sure you get 2 bags)
  • 13 x 9 pan
  • This is all you need!
  • I never knew making a graham cracker crust was this easy… Ha!
  • I tried smoothing this… I would definitely use my tilting method instead.
  • I would also mix up the chocolate and peanut butter chips to have it more evenly blended.

Step 1: Making the crust

First, set your oven to 350 degrees on Bake before you make the crust so it will be ready when you are. And also… Grease your 13 x 9 pan… I forgot… And got a workout trying to get the bars off the sides.

You’ll need 15 sheets of the graham crackers, I broke mine into smaller sizes to fit into my food processor so they would get ground up easier.

I used my Kitchenaid Food Processor on Sunday and that thing is a beast. I can never figure out how to get it to start, then I remember that it has to line up correctly, and I still, for the life of me, can’t figure out how to put it all together. I think, if I remember correctly, I had to have the base using with the handle locked into place before I locked the lid into place, but I feel like I’m going to break it every time I use it. It was my late mother-in-loves, but she’s not here to show me how to use it, so… I keep it, but don’t use it very often. I should probably watch a YouTube video, because you can learn to do pretty much anything on YouTube. But… today I decided to try my immersion blender food processor attachment instead, because that thing is sooooooooo much easier for me, and wouldn’t ya know…. it chopped just as well, and it was a lot lighter, and fewer pieces to wash after. If you don’t have one… it’s pretty amazing!

Next up, I took a cold stick of unsalted butter straight from the fridge into my glass 2 cup Pyrex Measuring cup and cooked it for 1 minute and 15 seconds. Yours may take more or less time, so do what works best for you to get your butter melted. I linked you to a 3 size measuring cup set because it’s only 5 cents more to get all 3 sizes (1 cup, 2 cup, and 4 cup) than it is for you to get just the 2 cup size right now….

Mix the melted butter into the graham cracker crumbs, after combined, press your mixture into the bottom of your greased 13 x 9 pan.

Step 2: Adding the toppings!

Open your can of condensed milk and pour it over the pressed crust. I tried smoothing it out with a spatula on Sunday, but found that I had better luck by just picking up my pan and tilting it from front to back and side to side to get the condensed milk spread over all the crust without flipping some crust on top of the condensed milk.

Next I added the cup of chocolate chips, just sprinkle it all over, then the peanut butter chips, just sprinkle them all over… Now that I have done this twice with chocolate chips first, and peanut butter chips second, I realize all the peanut butter is on the top… so you may get a better mixture swapping back and forth from chocolate to peanut butter, then back to chocolate and back to peanut butter. But… it all tastes the same… so that’s up to you.

Step 3: Bake it!

Bake it uncovered in preheated over for 25 minutes. Then… here’s the part when I messed up… you have to let it cool before you cut it. So… I waited about 5 minutes, but you should probably wait more like 30-45 minutes. I’ll wait that long today and let you know how it works out for me.

Step 4: Share and bring some happiness to those you love

We will be sharing these with our neighbors and my hubby will be doing a cookie exchange with them too. They were a hit at the cousin cookie exchange, so I’ll definitely be adding these to my holiday baking list.

Just some tips…

These are the measuring cups and spoons I use… and while they are affordable, and lightweight, they also melt in the dishwasher… so I have a couple deformed measuring spoons. If I were to buy myself some new measuring cups and spoons, this is what I would choose next time.

I hope you enjoy these! They can stay fresh if you keep them covered at room temp.

You can double the recipe for a thicker bar.

You can make this recipe your own by adding your favorite flavor of chips, or nuts, candy, or even coconut.

Yummy Chewy Almond Sugar Cookies

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I’m a total chocolate chip cookie fan… I’ll almost always choose that over sugar cookies… until I found a recipe that uses Almond Extract… What??? How have I lived my whole life without Almond Extract?

So I made the cookies, with the Almond Extract, and they were a hit! So much so that I made them a few times in a row… that was dangerous.

I was actually supposed to roll them into balls 🤷🏽‍♀️… so they don’t look so pretty.

The kids have been asking for Chocolate Chip Cookies, so I used my old faithful Bisquick recipe… super easy…

And today Bobby started asking for muffins when he saw them on the Bisquick box that I pulled out to make the Chocolate Chip cookies… so I made those next.

And finally… I made the Almond Sugar Cookies… then Hot Chocolate from a can since it was already running late and we still wanted to get the Christmas Tree up and let the kid start decorating it.

I only had one extra stick of softened butter when I went to make the Almond Sugar Cookie recipe… so I tried to halve it… and I am horrible at measuring things, mostly because I don’t like to have to wash my measuring cups between ingredients, so I try to make do with other clean cups and do the math in my head… good thing I’m pretty good at math and fractions. Ha! So I may have used the 1/8th of a cup 10 times to measure out 1 1/4 cups of flour…

Anyway, here’s the recipe that you should follow and not try to do my halved one.

Chewy Almond Sugar Cookies

  • 1 cup butter, softened
  • 1 cup granulated sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 2 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1/2 tsp almond extract,optional, but it adds an extra layer of flavor
  • 2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
  • 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • 1/2 tsp baking powder
  • 1/4 tsp salt

Topping

1/4 cup granulated sugar, for dipping

Instructions

  • Preheat oven to 350 degrees and coat a baking sheet with baking spray.
  • In a large bowl, cream butter and sugar together until light and fluffy, about a minute. Add in the egg, vanilla extract, and almond extract and beat until combined.
  • Next, add in the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Mix until just combined, making sure to scrape down the sides of the bowl every now and then.
  • Roll dough into 1″ balls, and roll in sugar.
  • Place on baking sheet, about 2″ apart. Bake for 10-11 minutes, or until cookies have set.
  • Allow to cool.

Enjoy!

You can frost them or cover them with a glaze, if you like… I like them just the way they are.

We got the tree started, maybe we’ll finish going through the boxes tomorrow to finish decorating the house, or maybe…. just maybe… it’ll take us a few days… or weeks until we are ready for Christmas.