Recipes worth Sharing: Lazy Day Cookies

I love my mom's Lazy Day Cookies!  I think the "lazy" comes from the fact that you use a cake mix as your only dry ingredient.

Without further ado...the recipe:

Ingredients:
German Chocolate cake mix
1/2 c. packed brown sugar (I use 1/2 c. white sugar and 1 1/2 tbsp molasses sometimes)
6 tbsp. shortening or butter, softened
2 eggs
1/4 c. water

Toppings:
1/2 c. each of: pecan pieces, butterscotch chips, and chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
Grease and flour a large jelly roll pan or 9x13" metal pan.  (I like the taller sides, sometimes it will rise over the sides of the jelly roll pan).

Mix the wet ingredients (sugar, butter, eggs, and water) with 1/2 the cake mix and beat well.  Add the rest of the cake mix and beat until smooth.
Spread over the cake pan.  (This is easiest if you flour your hands and press it out into the pan gently...it's a pretty sticky mix)
Sprinkle with chips and pecans and bake for 20 minutes.  Cool in pan.

Mmmm...the smell is the best part...until you get to taste them :)

MMM...good

Just a quick post to say you should check out these two recipes if you need a quick, delicious meal.  We had everything in the house!

First, Mid-eastern chicken thighs (you'll need Garam masala, curry powder, onions, and red wine)

Second, Sauteed Broccoli with Cumin and Mustard Seeds (okay, I know not everyone has black mustard seeds lying around...but we cook Indian food often around here.  I'm sure yellow would work.  Also, we used frozen broccoli and ground cumin.)

And then we used a box of pre-seasoned couscous as a starch.  Mmmm...delicious.  I would've taken pictures but it didn't last long enough!

UFO Sunday Successes

Well, it really has turned into UFO Sunday everyday here at our house.  Any day I've been able to quilt I've been working on the unfinished baby quilt or my unfinished t-shirt quilt.  Sundays have become the days to tackle the tasks that I'm weary of...such as binding...I just haven't done enough binding to feel good about it.  And the coaster I made recently for a friend? I did an atrocious job with the binding so now I'm "afraid" of the task.

But this week, I continued to avoid binding but put some other helpful hints to work.  As Leah suggested, as I sewed the strips of sashing to the shirts, I didn't pin.  No ripples!  Also, as B suggested, I used the lengthwise grain instead of selvage to selvage and it worked much better.  B suggested pinning; I'll have to try that and compare.  So far, I've had more success with no pins and careful feeding of the fabric no matter what I'm working on.

So here's the progress so far...

And without a doubt my favorite shirt is the Baby Einstein reading Science magazine.  Never would I have guessed I'd be teaching my high school students to write papers that they could submit to peer-reviewed journals someday as I bought my first STUDENT edition of the magazine (the t-shirt must have been a "free" gift.)

But wait, there's more...my UFO progress has extended to my knitting habit too...
The pair of socks I started during professional development in August...finished!

Before blocking

Blocking in progress

Of course, I've come to the awful realization that the Christmas knitting season has arrived.  Here's  two upcoming projects:

Use the white Misti Alpaca "baby me boo" to make another cowl.

And finally, my hubby made a great meal tonight...we bought a spice mix for tandoori chicken, marinated overnight and broiled.  I found a fabulous recipe for spicy Indian green beans here.  And the garlic naan was from Trader Joe's...yum!

Deliciousness...

Dinner was so good I had to keep a record of it so that I could reproduce it later...

...okay, so I started eating before I took the picture...if you could've smelled it you'd understand!

Recipes used:
French Potato salad with mustard vinaigrette
(I used more lemon because we had too much potato...also accidentally bought russets.  I don't make potato salad--ever--and was shopping without the recipe)

Lemon Coleslaw by Kay at The Church Cook
This is delicious!  You know it's good when your husband requests it a second time in the same week and it's a vegetable!  I halved the mayo (healthier!) and used any onion we had laying around (green onion and red onion thus far).  Also, I just used a bag of pre-shredded coleslaw mix.

Slow Cooker BBQ Ribs
Oh my goodness, it's better than being back in Texas because it is cooler in VA and the beef tastes the same!  I used 16 oz of barbeque sauce instead of the ketchup and 1 c. ketchup instead of the chili sauce.  We bought beef ribs (2 lbs)--boneless and short ribs.  Cooked overnight, refrigerated all day, and then did 1.5 hours on high to warm back up for dinner!

Our stomachs are full, and we're happy after long days at work.  Pretty good day I'd say.  Goodnight all!