Learning Curve [Brownie Dipped Oreos]

[I'll lead with this.  Hopefully her cuteness will naturally make you like this blog.]
Our Tulip Bea, 7 weeks. <3

10 Things I've learned in the 10 years since I've been 28.

1.  Don't hit.  Violence is not the answer. I tell my kids this ALL THE TIME now.  Especially Jonas & Oliver.  These two know how to throw down.  What I thought was harmless rough housing then or cute playful fun I think might have really been pissing people off.  Especially Andy.
 Sorry babe, I've learned, I promise!

2. Believe me, one day coffee will taste good.  Really good.  At 18 I could never understand how people could like coffee, it's so bitter, gross!  10 years later all the Starbucks baristas in a 5 mile vicinity know my order.  I was such a fool.

3. Never say never.  My rebel 18 year old self was all like "I'll never get married or have kids, that's not who I am."  Obviously I was wrong.  While it has taken me many years to prove my skepticism of marriage wrong I have never felt so right doing anything than I do being a wife to my husband and mother to my four beautiful children. 

4. It's ok to say sorry.  When I was 18 saying sorry was a killer.  I physically could not do it.  I hated/still hate being wrong.  But at least now I know to admit it when I am.

5. You have more money than you think.  This applies to my 4-job working teenage self.  I would get up to help Andy deliver papers at 2 in the morning, get home and go open Jamba Juice, head to either Old Tyme Burrito [r.i.p.] or Mrs. Fields Cookies and close them.  I stretched myself even thinner with school and without knowing how to budget in the slightest still didn't have enough money.  

Oh disposable income, where did you go?

Now I know how to run a family of 6 off a shoestring budget and I enjoy it.  We take pride in spending money we have earned and we don't throw it around lightly.  We feed our family good homemade food,  do things with our children every week and even get to treat ourselves every now and then off of one budget without much stress because of it.  28 year old self now realizes 18 year old self didn't really NEED that $50 pair of bell bottoms from Wet Seal.  Sigh.

6. It really is bad to run the dryer to just make one piece of clothing unwrinkled.

Seriously, do you know how much that costs?!  Use an iron!

7. I am beautiful.  It has only taken me having children to realize what a gift from God my body is.  The hatred I have had for my body is taken away when I realize how strong and awesome it is through the act of pregnancy and giving birth.  Even cooler, the ability to my nourish my children in the best way possible through breastfeeding. <3  I still fight this battle tho and some days are better than others, I try to remind myself that I am fearfully & wonderfully made. 

8. High school doesn't matter.  People would tell me this and I couldn't believe that anything would be more important than those four years of people making you feel bad about yourself.  And even more revolutionary?  What other people think DOES NOT matter.  

9.  Believe.  I know it is a process but all those years I lived not knowing God makes me sad for the girl I was then. It is still a constant struggle for me to KNOW God is with me, to believe it, to understand his love is not an easy thing especially for someone that hasn't always loved themself.  I couldn't force my 18 year old self to believe then the same way that I can't do it now.  But my faith grows stronger as I grow older and I pray it continues to do so.

10. Let it go.

You can hold on to every horrible thing someone in this world has done to you.  And it can eat you up, make you bitter and cold and suck the life out of you.  Or, you can let it go.  Understand that you have made mistakes too.  Hope the other person is sorry but even if they aren't, let it go.  

It's only hurting you. And if you see them on the street and want to punch them SO bad in their face, refer to #1.

And now!  For the food!
In these past 10 years I have also learned how to eat better.  I no longer think McDonalds, Sabarro pizza & mall Chinese food are a good combo. But, sometimes I just like something bad for me.
Oh well.

Brownie Dipped Oreos

1 Box Brownie Mix
1 package of Oreos
Sprinkles [Optional]

1.  Prepare brownie mix according to the box.
2. Dip Oreos in batter making sure to coat thoroughly.
3. Drop Oreoes into a greased cupcake pan.
4. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.

*This recipe makes 12-16 Oreos depending on what size mix you get.  My family-sized box made 16.
*Also, sorry to leave you with a lame-ish recipe but I'm tired. 

Mommy needs a beer. For....Cheddar Beer Bread!

Ahh.....the lovely 6 weeks post partum mark.

When all of reality comes back to kick you in the neck and ask you,

"Why would you think another child is a good idea??!"

Don't get me wrong, I LOVE my baby girl.  She is all that is good about babies, chunky, sweet, sleeps a lot, little dimpled smiles.  Sigh.  But oh yeah, the other three.

I am starting to feel delirious.  I thought before was bad.  Three kids and 8 months pregnant was chill!

Another diaper to change, another person to cloth before we leave the house.  Another person to please, and this little person is only pleased by one thing!  Boobies.  Which happen to be attached to me and make it near impossible to get anything else done.

[My idea of a good time!]

This isn't really supposed to be one of those pity me blogs, cause it's not.  I don't pity myself and in general I love my life, there's not much to pity.  I get to be with my kids all day, I get to go to school, drink Starbucks, go shopping at Target, eat dinner with my husband every night. I mean honestly I don't need much to be happy.  Or maybe it's the opposite?  

I don't need much, but I do need it to be my way.......

Anyways!  Life is hard right now, I'm not going to lie.  I feel like sometimes my blogs are TOO happy?

If that's a thing?  Or maybe that they're a little misleading.  You didn't REALLY think I had all my shit together did you?  Ha, I'm such a great illusionist.

I've also started following a bunch of people on Instagram that I don't know.  This might seem irrelevant but it's going somewhere, I promise.  I see all these beautiful Moms with platinum hair and red lips making their kids homemade bone broth and fresh squeezed orange juice popsicles [wtf?!] for lunch and it makes me feel grossly inadequate.  I know I shouldn't compare myself, and for a long time I was doing good on that one but lately I have just been feeling like I'm not enough.

[I did vote tho!  So that counts for something right? :]

I'm not a good enough Mother, I can't keep all four of my children quiet for an hour and a half church service while my husband plays music and I try to get someone to hold the babies while I go up and play drums.

I'm not a good enough Wife, I complain.  I nag.
I do things over because he didn't do them the way I would have.

I'm not a good enough friend, if you text me with a 911 message I might text you back.  Next week.

I'm not a good enough student, I do every assignment an hour before it's due so as I'm doing it there's an awesome red countdown system that makes me feel like I'm also going to pass out from anxiety.

I'm not patient enough.  I'm not soft enough.
I'm not ladylike enough.  I'm not thin enough.

I'm not crunchy enough.

The list could go on, but do I want it to?  

I need to come to understand that no, I will never be enough.  I will never be a perfect version of all those things because I will never be a perfect person.  But luckily I don't need to be.

My identity, although I'm working on it, should first and foremost be in God.  Which is why I think I've been thinking so much about how I'm not enough.  I have definitely not been faithful enough,  I haven't been praying enough, tithing enough, trying enough.

It is so easy to let God go, to fall from his grasp and to turn myself to the daily buzz of life.  Such a hard routine to get into, thinking about him everyday, praying, listening, making him a priority when my day feels like it can't possibly hold anymore. 

 I can feel myself slipping away, getting weaker, so I know what I need to do to not let this world get to me the way it has before and it's never too late to start again.

Luckily my God forgives and to Him I will always be enough.

And now of course, the food!
Made this Cheddar Beer Bread for Tulip's Baptism and it was a hit!
I love the edges where the cheese & butter meet and make delicious crispy heaven.  Yum.

Cheddar Beer Bread

3 cups AP Flour
2 tbs. Sugar
I tbs. Baking Powder
1 tsp. Salt
2 tbs. Honey
1 cup shredded Cheddar
1-12 oz. Bottle of Beer [I used Samuel Adams Pumpkin Harvest]
4-8 tbs. Butter [1/2-Whole Stick], melted.
*This depends on how buttery you want it, I used a whole stick and it was crazy good but REALLY buttery, I probably would do a half stick next time.

[1] In a stand mixer blend together all the dry ingredients.
[2] Using the dough hook add in your beer and honey and knead for 5 minutes or so. Add cheese and knead 1 more minute.
[3] Using a pastry brush pour half your melted butter into a loaf pan.  Make sure pan is completely greased.
[4] Pour dough into loaf pan & drizzle the rest of the butter on top.
[5] Bake for an hour at 350 degrees.  

Instagram Anonymous. [Frosted Zucchini Brownies]

Hi, my name is Nicole and I am an Instagram addict.

[Which by the way if you want to follow me I'm under: nicolehopefully]

Ok, yes, I said it.  I admit it.  I know, I know.  I really, really, really, like Instagram, even more than Facebook [is that possible?]  I always have this guilt inside of me that maybe I'm the Mom that takes too many pictures?  That I can't just go do something without taking 500 pictures as proof that I did it.

And I think I'm guilty as charged.  

I've always been a picture taker, I took photography in high school, back in the day when we developed our film in a dark room in the pitch black hoping we would load the film right and the whole roll wasn't ruined.  My photography teacher finally had to tell me that not every assignment could be pictures of my, "druggie boyfriend" aka Andy.  Although why he thought Andy was a druggie I'll never know, maybe it was the fact that he was in a band, wore a beanie 24/7 & had long hair?

[I've also decided I'm just going to start using my own pictures for my blog instead of random graphics I find.  My blog is mostly for myself and I think it will be cooler to remember what we we're doing at different times than random memes I think are funny that day.  So here's Andy teaching a science experiment for our homeschool co-op the other day.  

I guess I never did listen to my photography teacher, sorry Mr. Allen!]

Besides photography class I would constantly take pictures with my little point & shoot cameras or disposables if those we're on hand.  I would use my allowance to develop rolls of film every week and the ladies at Rite-Aid would ask if I was ok if I missed a Friday developing my pictures.  I don't know why but I have always just loved pictures.  I'm a big memory person I guess, I love looking through old pictures and remembering how horrible I looked, or what we did on vacations, the fun we had that night, old pets that have since passed. [We love you Caboose!]

My room in high school was plastered in photo strips from the old photo booths that had developer in them, if you put your ear up to it you could hear the tray tipping back and forth.  Another thing that's long gone and if I wasn't feeling older before I definitely am now.  Come to think of it, I can't even remember the last time I developed a roll of film myself.  I loved making collages with pictures for the front of my binders and even tonight I just got done re-doing our fridge with all the new Halloween pictures we just took.

I have carted literally thousands of pictures across the ocean and back.  Reminisced about my brother's rat tail, of beach bonfires on the Central Coast, birthday parties where everyone has a drunken grin, pictures of the kid's as they've grown.  Of Andy & I in high school, my favorite of him drinking tequila out of my hair, oh I pray my children are nothing like us at that age! 

So sometimes when I wonder if I'm just going with the fad, if I just like Instagram cause it's popular and I want to be like the cool kids I remember myself as a not so cool kid taking pictures at punk shows, at funerals, and of the things we ate on road trips.  I've never been big on souvenirs, or buying little things to remind me of the places we've gone or the things we've seen but I do love pictures.  Of visits with our friends in Washington, of my Nani's gravestone when I can't visit her there, of my Grandma on Christmas with her 50 year old fur coat in 70 degree weather.  When I miss them they're here with me.

I'll never be a photographer, I'm not good enough at staging pictures, [even tho my cousin and I would hang bed sheets in our room and play "photo studio"] I always miss that perfect shot and I can barely use the auto setting on our awesome Nikon.  

But I promise you, wherever we go & whatever we do.....I will always be there taking pictures. 

Like this picture!

Yummy zucchini brownies I made for Halloween.  I have tried other zucchini brownie recipes and not loved them, made these the other night & they we're a hit!  The frosting is delicious and you seriously can't tell it has zucchini at all.  I will never make another brownie again.

Frosted Zucchini Brownies

[adapted from mommyimhungry.blogspot.com]

1/2 cup Coconut Oil

1 1/2 cups Sugar

2 tsps. Vanilla

2 cups Flour

1/2 cup Unsweetened Cocoa Powder

1 1/2 teaspoons Baking Soda

1 tsp. Salt

2 cups shredded Zucchini

1/2 cup chocolate chips 

Frosting:

2 cups Powdered Sugar

1/2 cup Whole Milk

1/4 cup butter

6 tbs. Unsweetened Cocoa Powder

1/2 tsp. Vanilla

[1] In a stand mixer beat together coconut oil & sugar.  When combined mix in vanilla.

[2] In a medium sized mixing bowl whisk together the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda & salt.

[3] Slowly add flour mixture to oil and sugar on low speed.  It will look crumbly and dry.

[4] With a spatula mix in zucchini and chocolate chips.  Stir well until there are no dry spots.

[5] Grease a 9x13 baking pan and set your oven for 350.

[6] Bake for 30-35 minutes until brownies spring back when touched. 

[7] Let brownies cool completely before frosting!

Frosting:

[1] In a medium sauce pan melt butter on medium low and whisk in cocoa powder. 

[2] Add powdered sugar, milk and vanilla and whisk until smooth.

[3] You can add more milk or powdered sugar depending on how thick you want your frosting. 

[4] Spread on brownies & enjoy!