Cap'n Crunch Brownies

Have you ever heard of Confessions of a Cookbook Queen? If you haven't, stop what your doing and click over to meet Kristan and check out her fantastic blog! She does some pretty amazing things and she's pretty damn funny to boot.

Kristan dreams up the most insane desserts and makes them come to life! I don't have any kids yet, but so far I haven't needed them to whip up this deliciousness!

Although having kids would probably make people look at me less strange for eating this madness... I mean what self respecting 34 year old woman mixes Reese's and Cap'n Crunch into her brownies?

Me. That's friggin who.

Yesterday I thought I'd try my hand at her Cap'n Crunch Brownies. My husband walked into the kitchen as I was standing over the stove, stirring the Cap'n Crunch cereal into the chocolate peanut butter mix and just stood there for a minute staring at me.

"What?"

"What in the world are you doing cooking Cap'n Crunch?"

"What? The cereal was going stale.

It's for you! It's gonna be good!"

Oh. And it was.

The ingredient list is as simple as you'll get:

Todd was a little more partial to them than I was - he's the big peanut butter freak. I might try them in an 8x8 pan next time and bump the Cap'n Crunch up a half cup... I like a little more chocolate in each bite. And the cereal gave them an awesome texture that I wouldn't mind more of it. But they were truly delicious!

Pop on over to her blog for the full recipe!


I have an entire 9x13 pan full of these, and I'm already searching her site for the next recipe to try, :)

'til next time... ♥

Are you freakin' serious?

Holy crap. I love Fall.

I haven't tried them yet.

I just keep holding the bag up to my face and inhaling.

What the holy hell can be better than pumpkin flavored marshmallow?

I'm off to find a wicked recipe that calls for these!

'til nex time... ♥

Fall Esentials Giveaway on Geektastic!

Hello again!

Just wanted to stop in to let you know that my awesome blogging pal Tab is having a very cool, very Halloween giveaway over on her blog, Geektastic!

You can enter for a chance to win a Starbucks gift card, Philosophy Trick or Treat set in Caramel Apple and Crispy Marshmallow Bar scents, and several more items!

Head on over to her blog to check it out and for your chance to win! You have until September 30th to enter!

'til next time... ♥

It's official!

Hello everybody! Happy Sunday! I've got some exciting news to share with you (well it's exciting for me, probably not so much for you - but play along if you would).

*****drum roll*****

freaked out 'n small is now open for business on Etsy.com

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYY!

*****crickets chirping*****

See? It wasn't like riding Space Mountain or anything...but I had fun. :)

Right now I only have a couple handmade Fall and Halloween Garlands up, but after our move I hope to be able to list some of my little dolls and possibly some embroidered items. If you look at the top right sidebar of this blog, you'll see that I included a widget showing items for sale. There is also a tab labeled 'Shop' that you can click on at the top of the blog and it will take you directly to my store!

You should show a sister some love and stop by to take a look at the shop! My adorable Candy Corn Garland is looking for a loving home! The garlands can be made in any color, any length, so if you have something specific in mind, just email me!

In addition to opening my Etsy store you'll notice that my blog layout looks a little different. I was up watching some really terrible movies at about 2am last night and decided to start messing with the design. So please bear with me if things look a little wonky every once in a while as I fix things up a bit. I'm still learning my way around html and blog design...

So that's it for big and exciting news this week. Frankly between finding a place to live and getting everything prepared to open the store...that's more than enough excitement for me!

'til next time... ♥

We're moving on!!

I think the last time I mentioned our living situation was when we were just starting to look for a new place to live. Unhappy with the place we're currently renting, we set out to find a place we'd be more comfortable in. My intention is to not move again until we're able to buy a house, so we need a place we're both happy with. Before we move out I'll try to give you a little photo tour of the place we're living now - you'll be able to see the crooked staircase with the cracked stairs and our kitchen that is conveniently located in the basement (with no dishwasher or garbage disposal). It's a cute little house in the historic district of Frankfort - I believe this particular house was built in 1935 - but it's just ollllllllld. And really hasn't had many improvements on it through the years.


Well, I am very happy to say (especially to those of you that made it through my rant - you guys are TROOPERS!!!) that we found a place! yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay! 


There are still many of the inconveniences that I bitched about before such as no dishwasher, no garbage disposal, only one bathroom and no garage - but honestly we were having a really tough time finding any place that had one of the things I just mentioned, let alone all of them. The set up of houses is just different out here, something I have to accept. Once we buy a place, we'll be able to do whatever we want with it, so we'll eventually have those items. I'm actually used to functioning without a dishwasher. I don't think I've had one for the past several years. Living without a garbage disposal isn't a difficult as you think, and it's made us a little more aware of food that can be used for composting purposes, or that can be used to feed the local wildlife.


The new place is on about a 1/3 of an acre and it's still in Frankfort, but it's on the other side of the town in a way more rural area. The backyard is fenced with HUUUUGE established trees, storage shed, much larger bedrooms, but most importantly it's all one story. I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to that reducing our heating and cooling costs. This old place was horrible during the winter months. In California my heating bill never, ever got above $50 - and that's with us being pretty wasteful. My gas bill was over $200 last February. Kind of shocked the hell out of me. But I guess since it typically gets to be 55° colder out here...that makes sense. I might want to plan these posts out better, I'd probably seem like less of an idiot.


Typing whatever comes to mind probably doesn't help much either.


We stopped by to look at the place and Todd snapped a picture of me in front of one of the trees in the backyard.

They're huge! Todd thinks they're about 60' tall, which may not sound like much, but it impressed the hell out of me! I can't remember how many were there, I'm thinking there are about 8 or 9 like these. I may be remembering it wrong though.

Here are some picture of the bark and leaves. Don't mean to seem stupid but can anyone help me figure out what kind they are?

We get the keys next Thursday, I think. But the place is ours as of the 1st of October. I can't even tell you how excited I am about this! Not really excited to do the cleaning and moving...and painting part, but ecstatic about the rest.

'til next time... ♥

Happy Autumn!!!

Yesterday was the first day of Autumn (hooray!!!) but it was raining and very muddy out here, so we ran some errands and then stayed inside playing Call of Duty. However today we had some occasional sunshine, so out to the park we went! Another area right around our house that we take the dogs to go romping is Cove Springs Park. It has a pretty decent little water fall with a neat little stream, a couple miles of beautiful hiking trails, and several huge open meadows...

We just brought Crystal along today. It was still muddy and I can only handle cleaning up so many muddy paw prints off the floor. She's getting so chunky...her belly falls over her feet when she sits. This is kind of freaking me out because Winter is just around the corner and she won't have as many opportunities to run the chunk off. We've already put her on diet food... I don't want to loose my dog because she's fat.

Anyhoo my friends, HAPPY AUTUMN!!!

Or should I say HAPPY BEST SEASON OF THE YEAR!!!  I know that most of you have been looking forward to it as much as I have, and it's freaking here! So let's all get out there and enjoy it! I know Todd and I will. We have to take advantage of every day we can before it starts to snow!

'til next time... ♥

Waiting for the giant smoking caterpillar

Todd was out walking around in the back of our house this evening and came across something that he'd never quite seen before.  He yelled to me to come outside - so I waddled out in my moose pajama pants to find this:

It's a giant ass mushroom! Or more commonly known as the Giant Poofball Mushroom. Look at the size of this thing! I'd seen it from my second floor window for the last week or so, but honestly thought someone had lost a volleyball over their fence. Never imagined it'd be a giant ass mushroom! The thing is like a bowling ball. After having poked around on the internet for a bit, I found out that this guy is a teeny one! There are pictures of people holding ones six times this size! There are several dozen smaller ones scattered about - I'm eager to see how big they grow before we move out...


We found several more large ones in the area. Looks like our recent rainfall has made them grow a little fast for their skins....do mushrooms have skin?

Our next door neighbor, Natasha, came over to check them out and being the devout little soccer player that she is, she decided to give one a good kick - and was rewarded with a big poof of mushroom cloud! Here's a look at the insides of the one she kicked.

The texture was like the softest sponge in the world. Really gross. However turns out that they're edible when immature and the spores haven't yet formed (I will totally take their word on that one - don't do the whole fungi thing). I'm pretty sure this one has gone to spore from the looks of it. All the pictures I found online of the ones people were eating are solid white throughout.


Here's Tasha holding one of the bigger mushrooms we found. I tried to get her to smile for the shot, but I think she was a tad bit concerned about the spider that had just crawled out of the middle of the mushroom. She was a trooper though and held it for the picture! :)

This kid seriously rocks. Since she was over we hung out for a bit, made pom poms, watched Futurama and played with some clay.  I made a teeny Mobee.  Isn't he cute?

About 30 seconds after I took this picture the tail broke off. So now it's a pig.


Have some exciting news to share with you! That will be another post though, as my husband is FORCING me to play the new Call of Duty with him. And from my understanding it is my responsibility as a good wife to make sure he doesn't get capped in the ass by some crazy Cuban guy with a AK-47.


So my dear friends, until next time... ♥

Pups know how to give moms heart attacks

Today we had an really scary experience. I just want to sigh thinking about it now. It wasn't anything crazy life threatening or anything....but one of our dogs, Fletch, hurt himself and it was quite a scary sight. Any doggie mom out there knows that seeing your baby in pain is just pure torture. The end result here turned out to be no big deal but....


I was outside taking pictures of some garland while Todd and the dogs played around in the yard. Suddenly I see Todd race over to Fletch. I'm not paying particular attention because I think they're just horsing around - but then things got real still and quiet behind me. I hear Todd trying to get Fletch to hold still. I raced over there thinking Fletch had tried to eat a bee again and had a stinger in his lip or something. Couldn't tell though because he wouldn't hold still. He was digging at his mouth with such a ferocity he had blood all over both his paws. He was tearing his gums and tongue to shreds trying to get at whatever was in his mouth. Flipping around on the ground like he was convulsing. I have never seen the likes of it before. He was panicking, and the blood was quite a sight. I started to think maybe a live wasp...


I'm having a freaking heart attack by this time - knowing it's Sunday and all the vets in town are closed. Todd and I were having to lay on top of him to restrain him from hurting himself any further. I ran inside to grab a cup of water to wash some of the blood out of his mouth so that I could get a good look inside- which was damn near impossible. After a minute or two of laying on top of him (and once I calmed down and stopped yelling at Todd to "HELP HIM PLEASE!!!!") he seemed to calm a bit and understand we were gonna help him out.  Todd restrained him while I pried open his jaws. Turns out our HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGE nerd of a dog got a stick stuck in the roof of his mouth! It was jammed sideways between his teeth...stuck in his gums which I'm sure didn't feel good, but sure as hell didn't warrant the fit he threw!


I held his jaws apart while Todd pried it out, and I swear to you three seconds later it was as if nothing had happened. Apart from all the blood, and the fact I was shaking like a leaf. He was totally cool with everything and went back to chewing on Crystal's leg, prancing around like a freak.


Friggin Drama Queen.

'til next time... ♥

Bad Dog!!!

Fletch ate the crap out of my Basil Kitty doll today.

Jerk.

Meticulously chewed off the ears, and then the eyes.  

I'm a little worried for the cats.

'til next time... ♥

How we wake up in this house...

First it starts off with a quiet snoot in your face.

Just silently waiting for you to open your eyes...

As soon as you do, it's a very graceful jump onto the bed, where he can sweetly lay his head on your chest and stare at you with huge brown eyes.  

He then proceeds to do this adorable exasperated sigh thing every minute.

Of course, that then alerts the other animals in the house that the humans are awake.

So in come the rest of the crew.

Crystal insists on making her presence know by laying directly on top of me whenever possible.

And of course Marley wants to be fed.

Now. He wants to be fed now.

In order to get you out of bed they will just sit there,..stare at you..stick their paws in your face...and make weird noises like grunting, whining and some weird Chewbacca shit that comes out of Crystal...

and if that doesn't work....

they will literally dog (and cat) pile on you.

Please ignore my disastrous room. I had my cell on my bedside table this morning and thought I'd snap a few shots of the pile of fur that I had to extricate myself from...

'til next time... ♥

Just workin' away

This is what my life has consisted of for the past 24 hours...

That's only half of the bunch...and I'm only a quarter of the way done!!!

I just hope my fingers still work after this.

'til nex time... ♥

You're Invited to a Blog Party!!!

So I just wanted to pop over and tell you that I've got an awesome sponsor spot over on ShannonBear.com!!!! If you haven't met Shannon yet, tomorrow would be a GREAT time to stop by her blog and introduce yourself! She's hosting a blog party to celebrate 100 followers!

Congratulations Shannon!

The festivities start at 9am and go on through 6:30pm. The day will bring several guest posts, yummy recipes and a couple awesome giveaways (including one by yours truly). Pop on over and enter the giveaway, and you may be the lucky recipient of my handmade fall colored pom-pom banner!



Hope to see you there! ♥

Monday Morning Rant (very, very long rant)

Our home lease is up this month. Mister and I have talked about it in depth and have made the decision to start looking for another place to live. We're very unhappy with our current landlords and are ready to move on.  Turns out looking for a place to lease sucks. Sucks pretty badly in fact. This isn't something that truly comes as a surprise to me, as it sucked last year when we were looking for this place. But it is something I feel inclined to complain about.

When we moved from California to Kentucky last year we were rushed into finding a place to live. We had been staying at my in laws farm in Indiana, Mister was making the drive to Kentucky on Mondays and staying at a hotel in Lexington, KY during the week, and on his three day weekends we made the 3 hour drive to look at houses.

Looking at houses in a state you know and grew up in is a breeze considered to this scenario. Looking at houses in a state you have literally just stepped foot into for the first time is nerve wracking in every way imaginable to say the least. You have no idea what to expect from rent prices (which on the whole are about 1/3 of what they are in California. For example we rented a 2 bedroom condo in Pomona, CA (not the nicest of areas) for $1395/month. Here in Kentucky we have a 3 bedroom house in historic Frankfort for literally half that. Now, you do have to calculate in heating and electrical costs, because the winter and summers are obviously much more severe than in California, but it still doesn't make up the difference. 

Trying to figure out which neighborhoods are acceptable has proved to be trying as well. You'll turn onto a street and start to get really excited - "holy cow, is this the area? It's soooo nice!", but then you turn the next corner which is actually the street you'd be living on and it's just complete crap. There are cars on blocks in front yards, various crap such as kiddie pools and plastic chairs strewn all over front lawns, what appears to be hoodlums lurking about, the guy next door obviously hasn't mown his lawn in over a year (and can I tell you that I am absolutely paranoid about getting chiggers out here? I guess the little shits hang onto grass blades and jump on you when you walk through it) so overgrown grass is a huge no-no for me, and many, many...manymanymanymany more complaints.

Many more complaints such as hardly any houses out here have garages (even those circa 50s, 60s and 70s. Does that make sense? It snows out here. Wouldn't you want to put your car and your lawn equipment in out of the elements? Instead, we have to spend 10 minutes every morning warming our cars up and then scraping ice off all the windows during the winter. Or how about the fact that this is freaking Kentucky and everyone looks at us like we're a little crazy when we tell them we have three dogs and two cats. People will allow a couple with five children to inhabit the same house, but my three dogs (who have never caused any damage to any place we've ever lived) will not be allowed unless we pay an extravagant amount in pet rent. Do these people realize that they live in Kentucky? Before I moved here I thought everyone rode around on a horse and I sure as shit thought that everyone had packs of dogs roaming freely to herd their damn cows and sheep around. Definitely not what I imagined. Kentuckians are just as uptight as Californians about that shit.

I mean, I get it. I don't need any snarky comments from landlords. I understand that there are shitty people out there and that those people are more than capable of being shitty tenants. I get it. It is just f-r-u-s-t-r-a-t-i-n-g. In the last year alone, I have forked out over $1100 just for the privilege of having my dogs in this house. The house that these LANDLORDS didn't bother to clean or paint when we moved in. We killed five mice the first week. IT WAS DISGUSTING!!! I could dedicate a long ass post to the things that weren't done when we moved in and haven't been done since. I guess my very long point is that there are shitty landlords out there too. As a matter of fact, as a tenant you are lucky if you get a decent landlord. Looking at some of the places for rent, man, you just have to laugh. And we did, at quite a few of them. Most people are stretched so tight on their mortgages for rentals that they have to ask exorbitant amounts just to cover their payment, which means little or no upkeep gets done on these properties. However they still ask full price. Which in my opinion, isn't a business exchange, but basically asking somebody to pay your bills for you.

Personally I consider the next person who rents to us lucky. Our house is WELL taken care of. We've even made improvements (with landlord approval) at our own costs. Our neighbors love us and our rent has never once been late. Our landlord has even commented more than once on "how cute we keep the place". Go figure why they wouldn't want to keep us as tenants, especially since we don't bug them about all the stuff falling apart in this house (we figure they wouldn't fix it anyway). We've invited them to come inspect our house in detail. If they still insist on charging the pet rent...then so be it. C'est la vie.

We're just pulling our hair out over finding a new place now. :)

Ahhh the joy. We've found a place that we're going to look at today....rent is over $100 less and the landlord seems cool with our animals. Has a fenced back yard, another bathroom, off-street parking... And hopefully this one won't have us trying to pay off their farm and beemer.

Keeping out fingers crossed... ♥