Yum!

I just made these Cream Cheese Cookie Bars from Big Red Kitchen's blog and they are FANTASTIC!  I used my favorite chocolate chip cookie dough and they were super fast and easy.  If you don't have time to make cookie dough, store-bought dough works fine as well.  

Now that Kirk, our housemate Kelly, and her fiance have all come home, I think the pan will be gone within a matter of minutes.  Maybe they'll make it until after dinner...

Sewing

My couple of days off have been spent sewing and cleaning the house.  I've been making cloth produce bags and pillowcase bags (pictured), in hopes of selling them to raise money for our trip to Fiji.

This one is a bag I made for myself.

Catching Up

Sorry for the absence of new posts lately.  The last few weeks of school were really crazy and in my free time I was working on report cards and such.  Fortunately, I have turned in everything that I needed to turn in and am officially "checked out" for the school year.  I don't think that it has quite sunk in yet that it is actually over.  Maybe that's because I will still have to go in this upcoming week to plan for summer school and probably also to interview instructional assistants for next year.

It will be nice to have a few days off, however.  I hope to do some major cleaning and organizing at home and maybe even some sewing.  I might bake too if the weather stays cool.     

In other news, we have been invited to go on a missions trip to Fiji at the end of July.  Kirk will be teaching and playing music and I will probably be working with children.  What we are most excited about, however, is that we will both be helping build a water filter for the village.  They have had some outbreaks of typhoid and other diseases because they don't have clean drinking water, so we are going to try to remedy that.  We love going on trips when we can help meet people's physical needs as well as spiritual ones.  As I think about it, that is something important we have both learned from our parents, all of whom are examples of people who are great at helping others in very practical ways.

All this means that we have a lot of money to raise, so another thing I need to do next week is work on some creative ways to make some money for the trip.  Please pray for us as we prepare and be expecting more updates coming soon.

School's Out for Summer!

I just said goodbye to my students as another year comes to a close. As always, it's hard to believe the year is already over. This has been a great class, so I'm sad to see them go, but with a much needed break ahead, I won't complain. Plus, I still have three weeks of summer school to teach, just in case I needed another teaching fix. :)

Food for Thought

These are some of the cool prizes that my students get to take home tonight when they come to school to play math games with their family. And after the games, we have tamales, taquitos, and lots more food -like fried chicken and potato salad- but who really cares about that when there's authentic Mexican food? Who wouldn't want to be in second grade?

Happy Mother's Day!

to all the wonderful moms in my life!

After a long week of parent-teacher conferences, I decided to have a little fun.  I had been wanting to make this bag that I found here, so today was the day.  I had a couple of remnants that were just the right size.  It was a fun project and a good opportunity to practice my few sewing skills.  

Appreciated

It's teacher appreciation week, so I got several nice gifts today, including a canvas bag with our school logo filled with goodies from the PTA, these beautiful flowers from a student, poems a couple of students wrote, and lots of chocolate (which will help get me through parent-teacher conferences on Wednesday and Thursday :) ).

Peanut Butter Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

I got this great recipe from my friend Elisabeth.  She made them for us one day and we loved them.  They have continued to be a favorite at our house.

Super Long-Named But Delicious Cookies

3/4 cup butter

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1 cup brown sugar

2 eggs

1/3 cup peanut butter

2 or 3 Tbsp. water (start with 2 and add more if needed)

1 tsp. vanilla extract

1 1/2 cups flour (may need 1/4 cup more)

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. salt

2 cups rolled oats

1 cup chocolate chips

Cream butter and sugars.  Beat in eggs, then add peanut butter, water, and vanilla.  Mix well.  Mix in flour, baking soda, and salt, then rolled oats.  Finally, mix in chocolate chips.  Scoop onto greased cookie sheet, about 1-2 inches apart.  Bake at 350* to desired doneness (8+ minutes).

Happy Birthday Rachel!

A couple of things I made for my sister's birthday.  Unfortunately they didn't arrive in time for her to have them today.  Well Rach, at least you can see them on your birthday.  Love you!

Diaper Cake

I have seen some really cool diaper cakes and have a baby shower to go to today, so I decided to try my hand at it.  There is a great tutorial for making one here.  I didn't follow it exactly, but it was very helpful.  I hope Lisa likes my version!

May?

This is what was happening as I was getting ready for work this morning. What was really funny was driving to work and watching the sprinklers water the now freezing lawn of a church down the road. I hope this doesn't ruin our local and extremely delicious peach crops.