If you give a mouse a cookie...

Once upon a time, I caught a mouse.

Well not me actually. But my brothers.

And I managed to catch it all on video. Enjoy : )

And please forgive me and all my screaming...

Baking.

So at the start of the summer I baked a lot. So much so that I didn't have time to blog about it. But now as I am running through my iphoto library I'm looking at all the beautiful concoctions I haven't shared with you. Most of these can be found at miss lizzy's blog and some of them are my own found recipes. 

Bon Appetit!

 Banana Cupcakes with Cinnamon Cream Cheese Frosting

 Vanilla Cupcakes with Classic Vanilla Buttercream

Chocolate Banana Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Cream Cheese Frosting and crushed Butterfingers

Jr. Mint Cupcakes (probably my absolute favorite!)

 Chocolate Banana Cupcakes with Chocolate Ganache and Peanut Butter Cream Cheese Frosting.

Now these next pictures are probably the most fun new recipe I've come across. And definitely the most addicting to eat! They are called cake bites. If you google them they are becoming a huge hit. I even saw a book at Borders about them. They have many different names cake pops, cake balls, cake bits, but I like Cake Bites. They are really a piece of cake in a bite. I decided to take on the challenge for my brother's graduation party. (I made some cupcakes too of course :) My advice is don't plan on showcasing your first batch. The more you do em they easier they become but my first couple bites looked terrible. But here is how you make em. 

1. Make a Cake. Any flavor. Boxed or homemade. Put it into square pan.

2. After it has cooled. Cut around the edges.

3. Put edgeless cake into mixing bowl. Add half a can of frosting. 

Or some of your own homemade stuff.

4. Mix cake on low till it crumbles finely.

4. Form into little balls.  Put into freezer. Freeze overnight. 

5. When ready to dip the bites, Melt Chocolate. Dark, Milk, White, whatever you want to go with your cake and dip balls into chocolate and put onto wax paper. Don't use chocolate chips. They are too thick.

 I highly recommend using chocolate bark. 

It is found in the baking aisle at the grocery store. Or CandiQuick.

These are my funfetti cake balls. Funfetti cake dipped in white chocolate and covered with sprinkles. These were the first ones I made. They look a little goopy and aren't very consistent in shape. 

Trust me they taste much better than they look.

They are soo yummy! Super rich and you want to eat a billion of them. They definitely are time consuming though. I've made them for two different parties this summer and they were a huge hit!

Happy Baking!

Summer Days

Remember what summer was like when you were little?

Running around in your swimsuit. All day.
Playing with your friends.
Eating ice cream.
Going to the pool.
Watching the Disney Channel.
Jumping on the tramp.
Riding Bikes.
Playing in the sprinklers
Lighting Fireworks.
But mostly playing and swimming!

Well this week I had the chance to be a kid again. I got to play with Hailey Johnson all week long while her mom and sisters were at Girls Camp and her dad was at work. She has the most amazing swimming pool. And imagination and sense of humor. She would wake up and play hungry hungry hippos. Then we'd watch a couple episodes of Phineas and Ferb. Then we'd put on our swimsuits and play in the pool.  We'd play sharks and minnows. Then we'd float on the pool mattresses. Then we'd do our best jumps and belly flops off the diving board. Then we'd do underwater summersaults. Then we'd take a break for lunch and eat chicken nuggets and grapes. After lunch we would perfect our handstands. Then we'd dry off and go watch more disney channel! (isn't MT/the yard beautiful!)

I'd forgotten how much fun it is to swim in the pool. And play sharks and minnows. I'd forgotten how to do a handstand and an underwater summersault. Hailey had to teach me! Remember doing that? You could just run all day in your swimsuit and no one cared. Then the day came when your one piece bathing suit wasn't cool and all your friends wore bikinis. No one did underwater summersaults or handstands. They just sat by the pool and tanned. Then you became really self conscious about your swimming suit and had to sit in the perfect position so you didn't have belly rolls.

I vote that every summer should be like the summers of our youth. I plan on doing something childish at least once a week for the rest of the summer. And I definitely have the tan (burn) lines to prove it.

Confessions...

I have a serious confession to make....

I have not read HARRY POTTER!

Well not until recently that is.

Once upon a time I went to a Harry Potter themed dance my freshman year. And I felt like a loser. An impostor. One who knows who Daniel Radcliffe, but does not know the true Harry.

So I decided to change that. I started reading. And I'm hooked.

I just put down the 5th book. And let me tell you. It was a whirlwind of emotions. From Sirius Black's death. To the amazingness of Dumbledore. To Umbridge and her biotchiness. It's ridonkulous. I freaking love Harry. So much so I wanted to cry.

Then tonight I was watching The Voice and the trailer for part dos of the Deathly Hollows came on. I wanted to poop my pants. I've got until July 14th at midnight to finish all of book 6 and 7.

Bring it on.

It's Official.

Being from Montana is a wonderful thing.
I love the "Big Sky State"
I take pride in it.
I enjoy it's many wonders.
As well as it's lack of many other wonders.
But for a while I've felt like a fake Montanan...

Whenever anyone asks...
"Do you live on a farm?"
"Do you ride a horse to school?"
"Do you own cows and sheep?"
I have to answer NO to all these questions.

But now I can say YES to this one. "Do you own real cowboy boots?"

Look at these beauties.

Oh yeah. They're bona fide real leather boots from Wayne's Boot Barn. Be jealous and prepare to see me rockin' those on campus, at the grocery store, at the movies, etc. Trust me their cute. Plus I can be all Taylor Swift and wear em with a dress! haha. I'M A REAL MONTANAN.

Salsa and Mercedes!

This weekend besides having the pleasure of working at Old Navy a lot, I spent some good old fashion time with my best gal Emily Gates as well as some time with Chris, Mike and other singles ward friends. Friday night the YSA group was invited by a very nice member of our stake to come to his grand opening of his Mercedes Benz dealership. He had hired a Salsa Band called Poco Loco and wanted us to come dance the night away. I was stoked. I haven't had a good dance party in a while and especially not a salsa one! So I decided to go.

Chris said he would meet me at the dealership and apparently a few other kids from the ward were supposedly coming. As we were walking into the building I realized how fancy this party was. I mean come on it's for Mercedes Benz. I should've known. I was wearing jeans, a cardigan and my birkenstocks. Chris was also in jeans. Not only were we the youngest people in there but we looked like a bunch of hoodlums coming to crash it. All the fancy adults were sipping wine in their fancy apparel and we were walking around with our jaws open. As we went into the garage the band was playing and we ran into the owner. He greeted us warmly and told us he was so glad we could come! I laughed and said I felt bad about how underdressed I was and he said "Oh no. You look great!" then motioned for us to get the dancing started. Luckily 3 more kids from the ward showed up just then and the dancing commenced.

I felt like such a tard. I had no idea how to salsa and everyone was just staring at us. I thought hmm. Let me text some people to get this party really started. I went through my contact list and realized nearly all of them were in Utah. If this party had been in utah there is no doubt we could of had it bumpin. I texted like the 5 people I still talk to in MT and all of them were pansies. Except for Gates. She showed up all excited and we danced the night away. Even after most everyone else had left.  We just embraced our awkwardness and shabby apparel and shook what our mothers gave us.  Here are some great pics of the night.

(I have no idea who this girl in the white is. 

but she liked to dance!)

Haha. Anyways after everyone had left. Emily and I caught up on our lives. We went back to old school times in elementary. She and I have known each other since 4th grade and so much has happened to us throughout those years but we are still really great friends. It was so nice to just unload my brain and she's always been such a great listener. We stayed in my car until 3 am when my mom called and was freaking out and wondering where I was. haha. Anywhoo. I love this girl. 

Then Saturday night we had a little campfire! Emily, Chris and Mike and I headed up to Chris's house and made s'mores! It was yummy and so funny. Those two boys have such funny and different senses of humor. Mike is super sarcastic and you can practically believe the opposite of everything he says. Whereas Chris on the other hand is just dramatic and makes everything and every story so freaking hilarious. But anyways. Great weekend with great friends. 

And here are the latest cupcake concoctions I made today for the missionaries when they came over for dinner. The recipe can be found under "perfect lemon cupcakes" at Your Home Based Mom. They were a hit!

Tornadoes, Floods, Thrifting and Cupcakes Oh my!

So as some of you know. Today is Wednesday. And it's already been such a fun crazy week! And we're only half way through! So let me catch you up with my dealings in the wonderful Billings, MT. Warning this is long but very exciting.

So ever since I've been home the weather has been terrible. There have been maybe 5 days that have been nice and that I've wanted to play outside. All of the other days it's been raining. It's been raining so much that we are like 6 inches above the flood level. Luckily the metro part of Billings has been totally fine. Like me. Cause I live on a hill. But most of Montana especially the surrounding little areas near creeks and rivers are completely soaked! Here's a picture of Round Up MT which is like 20 min from where I live.

So that's been happening for like two weeks and then we finally get some beautiful warm sunny days and I went swimming and then the weather service is like "Screw You MT!" There is going to be tornadoes and crazy thunderstorms! I almost didn't believe them. But they were right. I went to FHE and the sun was shining and beautiful. Then as we played kickball it got cloudier. Then Sara and I went to Softies and as we were getting our ice cream cones lightning started and all the people in line were getting texts that said that tornadoes were approaching and Sara's Dad called and told her to come home immediately. So I drove her home on the other side of town and as I started to my house I could tell that they were right. I was freaking out. I was speeding home and I even passed a cop and didn't slow down. haha. It looked like the lightning was right over my house and the clouds were getting worse. I came home and my family had no idea. They were watching a movie downstairs and then we turned on the news and my dad started being serious. He went and grabbed all the important documents and his shoes and a coat and my mom grabbed her book and a change of clothes. My little sister went and grabbed a bunch of useless items and her scriptures (good kids) and I decided I'd better get my act together. So we popped some popcorn and watched the news. Then it got really annoying listening to the weathermen so my siblings and I watched Phineas and Ferb and it was a great family bonding night. Nothing happened to us and I was pretty much oblivious to what it looked like outside but apparently there were several tornadoes surrounding Billings. Only two touched down but luckily no serious damage was done. Only a farm and one small house was affected. But check out that crazy picture. It was taken in Lockwood which is another area very close by.

So that was all Monday night. Tuesday I got to have a lovely lunch date with Liza Smith. I thought that we went to high school together but it turns out I graduated when she was in 8th grade. But regardless of age she is way fun to hang out with and I can hardly tell she's only 16! We went to McCormick's Cafe downtown and had yummy food. There was no one there and we got to sit in the garden room all by ourselves. We stayed in there for like 2 hours just chatting. Look at the cute garden room!

So after lunch we decided to go thrifting downtown at this sketchy thrift store. I got a an awesome spirit animal shirt as well as some classy gifts for my brother. Liza found these beauties.

Gosh I love them. She is probably the only person I know who could wear little kids overalls and get away with it! You can't tell from this picture but they have a great stripe to them!

So today is Wednesday and after a wonderful day of work at Old Navy I decided to bake some cupcakes and go to Scheel's. I made these delicious oreo cupcakes that I found at my cupcake bible. They turned out pretty delicious. My brother Aaron loves them. But he is the kind of kid who will eat an entire box of oreos without realizing it. haha.

Then Ethan and I went to Scheel's to get my dad some "GU" for his marathon this weekend. While perusing the shoe department I found these beauties. I'm not quite sure what possessed me to buy them but I've always found them cool and I wanted to try them on. And then some inner force inside me told me to buy them. So I did. Plus they were on sale. So that made it more difficult to resist. They are purple and classy. And I can't wait to wear them to Old Navy and see the looks I get from customers. and on campus this fall.

But anywhoo. Sorry for this extremely lengthy blog with terrible grammar and spelling. I've just had so many exciting things to share!