Cheryl's Stinky Cheese Ball

Yep, you read that right - Cheryl's Stinky Cheese Ball. I got the recipe from Cheryl and she calls this her Stinky Cheese Ball. I work with Cheryl. She is a hoot! She is dry and sarcastic and the right amount of crude. I just love her. Twice a year she brings this to work and I can't get enough of it. So about 6 years ago I told her I had to have the recipe. So now I make it every Christmas/New Years and gobble the whole batch up. (Well, I wrestle my son for it but I mostly win.) =o)

It's simple and tastes so delicious!!! Plus the name is great, don't you think???

Ingredients:

* 2 packs of cream cheese (sure, you can use light cream cheese if you want to, but why? Seriously. Cream cheese rocks.)

* 1 can of tuna or salmon (thus the Stinky part of the name)

* 3/4 cup grated cheddar cheese

* 2 stalks of chopped celery (I didn't put any in because all the celery at the grocery store was wiggly and it grossed me out.)

* 1/4 cup finely chopped onion (I used a Walla Walla sweet onion. YUM.)

* 1 carrot, grated

* 1/2 tsp. garlic powder

* 2 Tbsp. soy sauce

* 1 tsp. Worcestershire sauce

* 1/4 tsp. seasoning salt

* Mix all the ingredients together and shape into a ball.

* Refrigerate for 2 hours or overnight.

* Roll in grated nuts if desired. (I didn't desire, because I'm not a huge nut person.)

* Serve with crackers. Ritz are my favorite with this. Man oh man. I'm telling you that you will love this cheese ball.

Looks pretty tasty doesn't it? I ate it until my stomach hurt. Yep, I have that much self control =o)

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An Old Snack With A New Twist

Christmas is over. I can hardly believe it. All the preparation and anticipation and it's done so quickly. We had a great Christmas. It wasn't super eventful but that's how we like it. We played games and hung out with family. My kids said it was their best Christmas ever. That was all I needed. Everything else is just icing on the cake =o)

I about fell over last night when my daughter was in the bath and she started singing Christmas songs. She is so darn cute. She sang all of her favorites but then she started singing a new song that she must have heard on the radio. It went something like this... "Oh bring me some boogie pudding, oh bring me some boogie pudding". Oh my heck! I cracked up. I told her it was figgie pudding and she replied with "well that doesn't make any sense. What's a figgie?" Oh, the mind of a 5 year old.

One of my favorite snacks to munch on during the holidays is Chex mix. I just love it. I can munch on it all day and not feel like I'm eating something too unhealthy. (Because it's either that or fudge and I already downed a pan of fudge this Christmas.) But I like to "jazz" up our Chex mix a little to add some more flavor. It's delish!

Ingredients:

* Rice Chex

* Corn Chex

* Cashews

* Pretzels

* Cheese It's

* Cheetos

* 1 stick butter

* 2 Tbls. Worcestershire sauce

* 1 1/2 tsp. Seasoning Salt

* 3/4 tsp. garlic powder

* 1/2 tsp. onion powder

I don't do the microwave version. For some reason that sounds strange to me. How do things get crunchy in the microwave? I can't picture it so I don't even bother =o)

Preheat the oven to 250 degrees.

The directions are on the boxes of cereal but I do it a little different. It says to melt the butter in the pan and then add all the seasoning. If you do it this way all the seasoning is on the bottom of the pan and it makes it more difficult to stir everything. So I melt the butter in the microwave and then add the seasonings to it and stir.

In a large pan add the cereal. (I don't like the wheat chex so I don't use those.) I use about 8 cups of cereal total.

Add the cashews (about a cup but add more if you like) and Cheese It's (about a cup) and Cheetos (about a cup) and pretzels (about a cup.)

Pour the seasoned butter over the top and stir.

Bake for 60 minutes stirring every 15 minutes.

Let cool and enjoy!

I know it's not original, but it's mighty tasty!

Merry Christmas Pancakes

Merry Christmas Eve! I can't believe it's here! The year has flown by. All the preparation and anticipation and it's finally here. My kids are bouncing they are so excited!

I haven't done my blogging justice this holiday season. With both of my kids getting sick and me falling we haven't done nearly as much holiday activities as we normally do. So you'll have to trust me when I say we love Christmas and everything about Christmas! The house is decorated, Christmas music is playing in the car. We've watched hours of Christmas movies and eaten our fair share of Christmas cookies. We all have on our Christmas socks (yep, the super soft fuzzy ones!) and hot chocolate (with candy canes as stir sticks) have been a staple for breakfast every morning. So it shouldn't surprise anyone who knows me that I would own Christmas pancake molds.

Have you ever heard of pancake molds? They are pretty cool. We have other pancake molds as well (a heart, dinosaur, flower...) But these ones are super cool!

If you have never seen them they truly are quite clever. You might be thinking, why go to all that trouble just for a pancake? Well read on and you'll see.

First you have to spray them really good with cooking spray. Trust me on this one!

Then fill them with pancake batter.

When they get all bubbly, slowly remove the molds.

How stinkin' cute are those?!?!

This was my first one I made. It didn't turn out as cool as the others but sadly, they were eaten so fast I didn't get a picture.

But even though, they are cute, right???

My kids loved them! And what better breakfast on Christmas Eve?

Merry Christmas! We hope you and your family have an amazing holiday! Here's to new adventures and discoveries and lots of laughter in 2011!

Candy Cane Reindeer And A Party

I saw these and thought they were pretty darn cute. I had been looking for a craft to do with my kids at our Christmas party but needed something fairly easy (there will be little ones there) but not "dorky" that the 7 year olds would like it too. A task harder than it sounds. But when I saw these cuties over on Jean's Crafty Corner I knew they were what we were going to do.

Here's how...

Glue two candy canes together. I used my hot glue gun so I did this ahead of time so the kids wouldn't have to A) burn themselves or B) use Elmers and wait and wait and wait for it to dry.

Then the rest is easy.

Use brown yarn and wrap it around the bottom of the candy canes. Now glue on googly eyes and a nose. How simple is that?

Apparently I needed to be more specific when saying we were making a reindeer. I never said a reindeer from earth...

My daughter thought hers was pretty cute. Especially with 2 bows.

Kids are awesome aren't they?!?!

Then we played a game. The older kids thought this was fun but the younger kids weren't into it at all. I had them wrap presents. Simple, right? But they had to wear gloves. Mittens would have been even better but the Dollar Store didn't have them. Yep, these fleece gloves are from the dollar store. Fun, easy and cheap!

My kids loved the idea of a gift exchange so we had all of the kids bring a gift. But we wanted to have fun with it. My co-worker told me about a story a friend of hers wrote for a gift exchange. It was called "The Right Child" and was about how Santa had one name left on his list Christmas Eve night. It went on to tell how he searched for the right child who was left on his list. Everytime I said right or left they had to pass their present to the right or left. It was a hoot watching them. The younger kids needed some help but they had a blast passing the presents back and forth. (I was the reader of the story so had asked someone else to take pictures. Sadly, this was the only picture that turned out.)

The kids laughed and got super confused. It was great!

I had to post a picture of my daughter's present that she brought. I did the wrapping paper and then she asked if she could tape on a piece of candy. When I came back into the room this is what I found...

Guess what gift everyone wanted.

We hope you all are having fun this holiday season. Are you making memories with your kids? They don't have to be expensive. Kids don't remember (or even care) how much something cost. What they remember is the laughter and the fun.

Enjoy! And Merry Christmas!!!

Pecan Tassies With A Twist And Week 12

I can't believe the 12 Weeks of Christmas Cookies Blog Hop is over. Twelve weeks! I have had so much fun baking along with all of you. It's been great to see everyone's creations and find so many new recipes that I can't wait to try. I'm honored to have been a part of this great blog hop and want to thank Abby over at Abby Sweets for doing all of this.

For the last week of this great cookie extravaganza I decided to make another of my all time favorite holiday cookies, Pecan Tassies. I love those little pies of goodness. And that's really saying something because I don't like nuts in my food and I surely don't like pie. I know, what's wrong with me, right? But these just call me name and I love them.

So last year when my Mom called me and said she found a new recipe for Pecan Tassies I was skeptical. Change an already perfect cookie? Impossible. But then she told me that she put crushed up Heath bars in the tarts as well. Okay, at this point in the conversation I stopped being able to hear my Mom because a light went on in my kitchen and I started hearing angels singing. Seriously! If you know me at all you know about my obsession with Heath candy. So I got right on it and made them with Heath bits.

And I thought they were perfect before. I now have a new favorite recipe. They are awesome!!! The only complaint I have with this recipe is that it only makes 24 little "pies". 24! Like that'll last more than a day in my house! So I have to at least double (if not triple) the recipe. And no, it's not just me eating all of these. My son also loves them. Strange. Can't get him to eat soup or even a casserole but he'll eat these little mystery pies.

Ingredients:
* 1/2 cup butter
* 3 ounces cream cheese
* 1 cup flour

* 1 egg
* 3/4 cup brown sugar
* 1 Tbls. butter
* 1 tsp. vanilla
* dash salt

* 1/2 cup Heath bits

- Preheat over to 325 degrees.
- Beat the first 3 ingredients until well blended. Chill for about an hour.- In a small mixing bowl, beat egg, brown sugar, butter, vanilla and salt until well blended.- Roll the dough into 24 one inch balls.
- Place into ungreased mini muffin pans.- Have you seen this handy, dandy gadget? It's awesome. I bought it from Pampered Chef but I'm sure they have them other places. They work perfectly to smash the dough into cup shapes. (Have I mentioned my obsession with kitchen gadgets???)- I gently pressed the dough around to make the side a little higher.
- Pour about a teaspoon of Heath bits into each muffin cup. The Heath bits I found didn't have chocolate in them (drats) so I added 3 milk chocolate chips to each cup. I like the chocolate taste with the Heath.- Pour in enough of the liquid mixture to almost fill the cups. Be careful not to fill all the way up to the top or else they will spill while they are cooking.- Bake for 25 minutes.
- Remove from oven and allow to cool.- Remove from pan and enjoy!

Come and see all the other great creations for our final week of Christmas Cookie madness!

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Fun Christmas Activities and Lots of Free Printables

Christmas is going to be here in less that 2 weeks and I have nothing. No new craft ideas, no new recipes. I'm scrambling around trying to fit everything in before I implode from the stress of it all. I know, how sad is that, right? Work is so crazy right now. I work in a middle school and you might think this time of year is great and wonderful and stress free. But it's not. The kids that I work with are not excited about the holidays and it makes me sad. They don't want 2 weeks off from school because that means being home with people who aren't very nice to them. It means sitting in a living room with no Christmas tree and no presents because they have no money. So this week is always so hectic at work and depressing if I let it get to me. So I'm trying to not let it get to me. I have so many wonderful things to be thankful for.

My two best things that I'm thankful for are my wonderful kids. Love them to pieces! And to me, 2 weeks off from work means time that we get to play and cook and be together. We go fun places, we stay home and do fun things. We just hang out together and watch TV and giggle and I love it!

So when I was blog surfing today (I mean, working really hard) =o) I came across some great Holiday activities that I am going to do with my kids and thought I would pass along the great blogs that made these cute things. A huge thank you to them for coming up with such great activities! I hope you enjoy them as much as I do.

Christmas Activity Printable

Silly Jokes Memory Game

Christmas Crack Ups

Christmas Memory Game

Christmas Tongue Twisters


I Spy

Lots of Printable Christmas Cards to color

Holiday Messages / Lunch Notes

Christmas Mad Libs
(sorry, no picture for this one.)

Merry Christmas everyone! I hope your weeks are calm and peaceful! And don't forget to have fun along the way!

Double Chocolate Cookies and a Mission

Have you ever been to Shari's Restaurant? I'm not sure if it's a local type chain or if it's all around the US. We don't go there often but awhile ago they were having a deal where kids ate free on the weekends. Needless to say, we were there every weekend while that deal was going on. It wasn't a buy one get one kind of a thing. It was a kids eat free if they purchase a drink thing. Seriously. Now that I think about it, I very well could be they reason they no longer do that. We would go (did I mention every weekend?) and I would order a diet Coke and the kids would eat. I would eat their leftovers and we would all leave full and the bill would come to under $5. Bargain!

We did go there once after this deal ended and ate. Heck, every once in awhile I can fork out some money at a restaurant =o) But when the meal was over and my kids were ready for their double chocolate cookie on a stick that they always give to kids, they brought them a Gogurt. Now, don't get me wrong, my kids love yogurt but yogurt instead of a chocolate cookie? My kids were not pleased.

So a couple of weeks ago my son came up to me and said "we need to make those cookies like Shari's used to have. I'll draw you a picture in case you forgot." Then he went over and drew this picture to jog my memory. (How stinking cute is my son?!?!)So we searched and searched the Internet and found lots of chocolate cookie recipes. The first 3 were a big thumbs down by my kids. They didn't taste like the ones from Shari's. But then we found this recipe on the Hershey's website. (Awesome website, by the way!) My kids gave it the thumbs up (even though I didn't put them on sticks. Next time!)

Ingredients
* 1 cup butter, softened
* 1 cup sugar
* 3/4 cup brown sugar
* 2 tsp. vanilla
* 1/2 tsp. salt
* 2 eggs
* 2 cups flour
* 1/2 cup Hershey's cocoa
* 1 Tbl. baking soda

* Cream together the butter and sugars.
* Add vanilla and mix well.
* Alternate the eggs with the rest of the dry ingredients (I'd say sift all the dry ingredients but I don't know if I have ever actually sifted dry ingredients so I'm not going to try to fool you all.)
* Place on an ungreased cookies sheet and bake in a 375 degree oven for 8-10 minutes.

Frosting:
* 1/2 cup butter
* 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa
* 4 1/2 cups powdered sugar
* 1 tsp. vanilla

* Mix all the ingredients until it looks delicious!

* Frost cooled cookies and add sprinkles if you would like. (Guess which ones my kids sprinkled!)
Or not.
So Shari's management, if you're reading this... bring back the chocolate cookies on the sticks. My kids lived for those. And bring back the Kids Eat Free deal on the weekends. We just might come back and eat there =o)

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