Last night, my husband was going to go to a United Methodist Men’s cookout, at one of the members’ home. According to my hubby, there was going to be a cookout, and they were probably going to play dominoes. They could bring either an appetizer or dessert. One guy said he’d bring a bag of chips. I decided to make cookies to send with my hubby.
I made my chocolate no-bake cookies, and they turned out really yummy. Sometimes they work for me, and sometimes they don’t.
Then I decided to try a different recipe. I have my favorite recipe for peanut butter blossoms. I decided to make it into a bar cookie, and put either chocolate chips or hershey kisses on them, to look like dominoes. Clever idea, huh?
Unfortunately, those were kind of dry. I didn’t taste them at the time, because I was hurrying to get ready to go to Mexican Bingo. I was assembling a charcuterie board , to take to that group. Anyway, I found a nice tray, and put a selection of the no-bake cookies on it, and some of the “dominoes”.
My husband said the no-bake cookies were a big hit. The “dominoes” were kind of dry and he had to explain them to the men. The host had no plans to play dominoes! Where did my hubby get that idea???
You win some, you lose some. I tend to try new recipes on friends. This one didn’t work. Tell me….how could I have changed the cookie recipe into a bar cookie recipe? Should I have added another egg? Give me your suggestions. Of course, one of your suggestions might be to only send tried and true recipes off to a party.
What has been some of your wins and losses? I have mainly wins, but this time I threw away all of the rest of the cookie bars. My recipes are kind of like a game of dominoes…you win some, you lose some.
Charcuterie Boards are the best! Check out my blog, to see my board to take to Mexican Bingo!
This afternoon, I made a Charcuterie Board. It was for a family dinner, and was a trial run for when I go to tomorrow night’s Mexican Bingo. My family was my guinea pig. Here’s what I did and I’m putting it here so you can do it too!
I have several sizes of boards. This time , I used the larger one. One of my recent purchases was the bag of little toothpick flags. So I used two of those and wrote Mexican Bingo on them. I pulled out several sizes of small ramekins and containers, and my kabob sticks. I didn’t use all of them, but it’s good to have them out to set up my station.
I decided to have a concentration of reds and greens, to represent Mexico. At one end of the board, I put a bunch of grapes. Next to it, I placed cut up sweet peppers. I spread a bunch of chips, added cheese cubes. At the other end, I added sliced strawberries, kiwi, and some fruit flavored jelly candy. The flags went on the cheese cubes.
Next, I added a container of Salsa and slices of Summer Sausage. I filled the rest in with green olives, pepperoni and some scattered Nutella biscuits…which are adorable little cookies with Nutella inside. Lastly, I put a daisy in the middle. And then…..my piano student arrived, and I made her come in , look at it, and ooh and ahh. LOL
My family enjoyed it, which was a good thing. My main dish was a little late getting done, so they snarfed from the board. Tomorrow night, I will make a few changes. I will add some wheat thins or crackers to go with the cheese. Also, I have a layered Mexican dip that I will add, and will make some taquitos to put in the french fry holder. And I will top it off with a Sunflower.
What kind of charcuterie boards have you made lately? Is that one of your staple recipes? I enjoy making them. Come back next week, when I present Charcuterie Board #3. Yes, I have more company coming! Woohoo!
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February is such a fun month for kids and adults, alike. Here are 10 things I love about February.
The weather changes a lot. We almost always get snow or ice around Valentine’s Day. Snow is unique in Texas. With 1/2 inch of snow, you will see school’s out, and lots of snowmen.
I love Valentine’s Day!! It’s a day of love and showing someone else how much you like/love them. I like to put up my decorations and have fun with it.
Valentine’s Day is also my Anniversary. I married my sweetie 47 years ago. Sometimes though, he thinks I only need one gift, to serve both occasions.
Helping my Grandkids make and decorate Valentine’s cookies. Love those kids!
Giving lessons to my piano students. I had three new students this month…all brothers. They are so fun!
Planting pansies and preparing to plant other plants.
Planning my garden for Spring.
Going to Bunko, Ladies’ Poker and Mexican Bingo
Having a Super Bowl Party
Singing in my church choir, being a liturgist and teaching children’s church…things that make me happy.
Anniversary bouquet
Isaac frosting sugar cookies
What are your favorite things about February? Leave me a comment . That section is either on the side with the #words, or at the bottom , under the Other things you might like. If you liked this post, press Like. That helps me!
Houston is a lot more than big skyscrapers. Check out all of the fun things to see and do.
A couple of weekends ago, my daughter and I took a girl’s trip to visit my sister, who lives in Houston. She recently moved there, and she’s still discovering the city. Her name is Toni, and she treated us royally, taking us to so many wonderful places. Jessi and I had sent her a list of odd things that we wanted to see, and Toni had her own things to show us. Plus she had a nice, new apartment that we were thrilled to see.
We drove there on Friday and spent the night. On Saturday, we packed it all in. Toni started our day by going to Tiny’s for Brunch. I felt so elegant! I rarely go to brunch. This was a nice place with great food. It sure beat my usual cheerios and diet coke!
Next, we went to The Beer Can House. (This, of course, was on my list.) The whole outside of the house was covered in Beer Cans that had been smashed and adhered to the house. The couple had drank 50,000 cans of beer to help their art. The man had also made wind chimes out of the cans, and he had a cement sidewalk, with designs in it of marbles and cans. It all started because he didn’t like to do outside work. So he covered it all in Beer Cans. Pretty fun…you should definitely go see this!
Next on our list of quirky attractions, was the fenced lot of Giant President Heads. The artist, David Adickes, is known for his heroic scale sculptures of historic figures. If you’ve ever driven on highway 45, from Dallas to Houston, you probably passed the giant statue of Sam Houston. That is by the same artist. We saw one of the heads in Branson, last year, of President Kennedy. This was really fun to see all of the President heads in Houston. Just wished we could have been able to go inside the fence.
Toni had a great place for us to explore. It was a huge park and grounds of Ima Hogg’s beautiful house. Bayou Bend is gorgeous, and we took a tour of the house and her grounds. Ima was a great benefactor to Houston, and her father was Governor Hogg. Ima was a society lady and collected art. The park and house are now owned by the Houston Museum of Arts.
And from there, we toured the Houston Museum of Arts. We didn’t have a lot of time before they closed, but my sister is the Marketing Director there, so she took us to lots of cool places and things to see. The Museum has 3 or 4 buildings at this site, and they are connected by tunnels that are artsy in themselves. This is one of the best museums I’ve seen in a long time. My favorite thing was laying down on a building, and it is projected up on the wall to look like we were hanging from the building. There was a really neat exhibit when you first come in, that is interactive. I need to go back when I have more time, and explore the rest of the museum.
Our Sunday finale , before driving back to Ft. Worth, was going to Joel Osteen’s church. My word!! It was like a huge theater, with several layers of balconies. We sat pretty close to the front. The first thirty minutes were praise music, with lights and singers. It was kind of like going to a concert. Then Joel came out and preached an uplifting sermon. Don’t know your feelings about this church, but it was something we wanted to experience. Pretty cool!
We had such a good time! Hope this gives you some ideas for when you go to Houston. It’s not just big buildings downtown. But then, again, I like to look for kooky things that are a little different. What do you like to do in Houston? Leave me a comment.
No matter their age, my grandkids have their silly sides. Gotta love ’em!
My Silly Grandkids!
The last few months, we’ve had some good times with our grandkids. They are growing up, and they are all in school, so we don’t see them as much as we used to. Add to that, someone in each of their families has had bad cases of Covid. So our time has been restricted. They are all at that age where they would prefer to be on their electronics. It’s just a great thing when we get them interested in something else.
Isaac and Nana the SpyWinter concert
Libby and Liam live in Hutto, TX. That’s about three hours away for us. They stayed with us, awhile back. We decided it would be fun to go to the Fossil Rim Animal Park, in Glenrose, TX. The animals come right up to your car, wanting some food. At one point, Liam stood up through the roof of the car, and a Giraffe came right up to him. I looked up through the roof, and it looked right back at me, licking my hand. It was a fun time and the kids really had lots of giggles and stories to tell their parents.
Buddies….through the top of the car!
A new friend
Another day, we took a hike at the Airfield Falls Trailhead and Conservation Park. There was a great waterfall feature. The kids climbed on the big rocks and had a good hike.
Sitting on the big rocks at the park.
Two cutie pies sitting on big rocks.
Liam came to stay for a couple of days, with his mom. It was great to spend time with him, without others around. He did get to spend time with his cousin, Isaac. Isaac usually plays with Liam’s sister, Libby, while Liam is on his electronics. It was nice to see them bonding. They played electronic games too.
After Isaac left, Liam decided to fix my hair. This is the first time he’s ever done this. He kept taking my brush into the bathroom, and getting it wet, dripping water all over the bathroom, and rushing back to try to fix a big spike in my hair. It was just LOVELY! LOL Oh…it was lovely the next morning too!
My hairdresser, creating a Spike for me.The next morning…try not to judge!
WARNING!!! DO NOT GO ANY FURTHER, IF YOU ARE HORRIFIED OR OFFENDED BY A PICTURE OF MY UNDERWEAR!!!
Liam is 9, and has a very advanced computer brain. He is amazing. BUT…he’s also a typical 9 year old boy. Sometime while he was here, he was playing around in my closet, and I thought he hid a pair of my underwear. It seemed to me, after he left, that half of my undies were missing! I called them and he said that he had hid one under the couch, and some in the closet. After a week or two, I have finally, I HOPE, found about 8 pair of my undies thrown around my closet. Good grief!
The Case of the Underwear Thief!
Isaac is 5, and lives in Benbrook, about 15 minutes from us. What a difference a year makes! Last year, at this time, he stayed with us for 3 days a week. I had “Nana School” and tried to get him ready for kindergarten. This year, he’s in kindergarten, and we don’t get to see him much. As usual, being in kindergarten has introduced him to many germs. He’s had Covid twice, in the last 6 months, plus other colds and viruses.
Isaac is super into Harry Potter. They read the book, and then watched the movie. He went as Harry Potter for Halloween. Just a couple of weeks ago, he found something on Amazon that he wanted to buy. He bought the cutest Harry Potter robe, and he has the glasses. We made Valentine cookies one night, while he was here. They were cute, and very popular.
Harry Potter RobeHarry Potter does his homework.Frosting Valentine Cookies.Isaac and I made Valentine Cookies.
I adore my sweet Grandkids. Do you have Grandkids? What fun things do you do with yours? I just went through the playroom, and decluttered a bunch of toys for younger kids. Kind of made my heart sad. Sigh.
