Holiday Travel Park: Summer

Showing posts with label Summer. Show all posts

Pure Deliciousness: Zucchini Brownies

These are seriously delicious.

Like knock your socks off amazing.

I might be biased, but I love them.

My friend Kara Noel said they are more like a cake than

a brownie, you say tomato, I say tomato :)

Whatever they are, they are fabulous

and you'll be begging for more.

It's best to make these when you have somewhere

to take them, so you don't eat the entire pan by yourself.

In addition it's a much better alternative to getting rid

of your overabundance of garden zucchini than dumping

them on your neighbor's doorstep - leave these instead!

Plus, if you use Greek yogurt instead of oil, they are practically health food.

Well, that is until you frost them.

You don't have to frost them,

but that's what my mom does, so it must be right.

Don't forget the milk!

This is my mom's chocolate frosting recipe.

She doesn't deal in absolutes when it comes to frosting,

so play around with the amounts until you're happy with the

consistency and flavor.

If you'd like to recipe cards - just right click and "save as".

Unless you're a Mac, then I'm not sure what you do.

Wave your hands above the mouse pad?

Ninja Surfer Poncho

JT was invited to a Ninjago Spinjitsu party this past weekend.

Except for one brief encounter at a Cub Scout Pack Meeting,

I was relatively clueless about this Lego phenomenon.

So I did some research, as I love to do,

and now I know all about Cole, Zane, Kai, Jay and Sensei Wu.

Well, enough to know that Cole - the Earth Ninja - is the team leader

and therefore the most awesome of the group.

So, keeping with my theme of giving surfer ponchos as

birthday gifts this summer, I came up with with this

rad ninja surfer poncho.

JT was wholly convinced that a towel was a terrible gift.

When we went shopping for black towels he just kept saying,

"Mom! I just want to give him a toy, okay?"

It's already started.

But I assured him this would be so cool.

Needless to say,

he is no longer a doubting JT and he thought it was

super awesome once I added the ninja face.

I asked him what his friend thought of it and he said,

"He really liked it! And another boy said lots

of nice things about how cool it was."

You better believe it!

You can find the tutorial for the surfer poncho HERE

and I've listed a Ninja towel in THE SHOP if

you don't want to make one yourself.

Summer Recipe: Zucchini Casserole

When I went to visit my parents last summer they had quite the garden going.

One of the things that grows in abundance is zucchini.

I always wondered what one did with a plethora of zucchini,

besides leave it in unlocked cars during church.

Then one night my mom whipped up this delicious casserole

and I was fully impressed with the power of the zucchini.

I left last summer with full intentions of making this yummy meal

for my family, but I got home and with no zucchinireadily available
- and I am definitely not paying for something that neighbor tries to pawn off on neighbor in Utah -

I forgot about it.

Until -

We were visiting this summer and the garden was in full bloom

and my mom whipped another fabulous zucchini casserole.

So, I got the recipe and I made it when I got home.

Holla!

And, you'll be happy to know that I did not pay for my zucchini.
I sent out a plea to the ladies at church via our Yahoo Group
and my request was answered by my sweet friend Allison.

The one thing I did differently than my mom's recipe is to use
Chobani Greek Yogurt instead of sour cream.
I'm not a sour cream fan anyway, so figured this was the perfect opportunity
to try out this tip I'd seen on the Chobani website.

I've had this Pampered Chef mixing bowl for going on 12 years

and I totally adore it.

Here's my diced zucchini. Skin and all.

If you're wondering what size zucchini you'll need to get 6 cups,

here's what was leftover from the beast of a zucchini up above after I chopped it up.

Bake it til it's brown and the zucchini is tender.

Yum!

Now, if you abhor all things "cream of", I'm sorry.

Most of my favorite family recipes contain something from the "cream of" family,

so I can't help you there.

But I'm sure you have a replacement trick up your sleeve that you could try.

So, now maybe you can leave a nice hot meal on your

neighbor's porch instead of a bag of zucchini . . . you know who you are . . .

Saturday was my 11th anniversary,

so in honor of my wedding colors,

I did a little purple and white this week.

Superman Surfer Poncho

Last summer I did a tutorial for my Hooded Surfer Poncho.

This summer JT has had several summer birthday parties to go to and

so I thought it would be fun to give them as gifts.

One little friend {LOVES} Superman and

JT and I decided to turn the surfer poncho into a

Superman surfer poncho.

It just required a couple of addditions

and we had a very Superman-looking surfer poncho.

I bought an extra hand towel for the cape and pinned and sewed it

into the poncho the same time I was sewing in the hood.

I used a wash cloth for the pocket this time

so that I didn't have any unfinished edges to worry about.

I really like how it turned out.

If I had more time I would have liked to have

appliqued an "M" on the back for the little boy's first name

inside the Superman shield.

I hope you like it and that maybe you can use the inspiration

for the Superman loving kid in your life :)

I also did a manicure this week,

so I'm linking up to Mani Monday!

Just a glittery french mani to brighten the week :)

Fluffernella S'mores

My mom was visiting last week.

She came to watch the kids so I could take 18 girls

age 12-17 to camp for four days.

The food there was amazing,

but one thing was missing - S'MORES!

There was not one s'more made or eaten the entire time I was there.

What is camping without s'mores?

So, when I cam home and found an opened jar of nutella

on the counter from my mom's visit, a box of graham crackers,

and my marshmallow creme stash I knew what had to be done.

And Fluffernella S'mores were born.

They are gooey deliciousness and no campfire is required :)

The kids are crazy for them,

so I think they will become a favorite treat this summer.

Now, go, spread the Fluffernella yumminess with someone you {LOVE}.

It's the right thing to do :)

TOO Cute Tuesday: Linky Par-Tay! #44

Remember this list?

Well, we've almost accomplished everything!

Woohoo!

One of the things that was lingering was to make homemade ice cream,

so this week we attempted it and it turned out AWESOME!

The "batter" was so good it almost didn't make it into the machine :)

We went for strawberry because we had a plethora of frozen strawberries

to choose from and use up.

It was super yummy and the kids loved it!

Except that Isabella didn't love the noise the

motor of the ice cream maker made.

Funny thing, I remember how annoying that was

when I was a kid too.