Sweets, with an ulterior motive

If you know my daughter you know she loves her sweets. She is pretty good about veggies but she LOVES cookies. I love to bake so we get along really well.
We are planning a trip back to Bradford County and I saw my chance to bake and not have too many sweets around. I was going to pawn everything off on my SIL. Then I accidentally discovered something we just cant share! Sneaky sweets. Sweets with VEGGIES! 
My plan was to try to make a healthier version of pumpkin cookies. I was ready with my applesauce for oil plan when I discovered I had used my can of pumpkin for smoothies. Shoot! What now? Hmmm think, think... I am a bear of little brain and I have ADD...wow that pan is shiny! Sweet potatoes were the last thing I made in that...sweet potato pie is good....its a lot like pumpkin pie...I have sweet potatoes. So after a bit of pondering and modifying the recipe we made cookies!
Now I wont lie. They would probably be even better with butter and chocolate chips. The ones we "tested with our mouths because they are cookies and ummy" were moist and pretty good! Next time I will try to make them with whole wheat flour so we can have super healthy cookies.

Hailey tells me we need to make them every day. I told her she could have one everyday. Two even. They are only 46 calories apiece. Hailey is willing to share ONE with Daddy. Speaking of Hailey, I have been blogging while I feed Blake and I haven't heard her in awhile. Hope there are some cookies left! If not at least I know she has had her veggies.

Ingredients:

• 1 Large sweet potato washed and pealed (1 1/2 cups)
• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 1 cup all purpose flour ( or just 2 cups of all purpose flour)
• 1 tsp Baking soda
• 1 tsp Baking powder
• 2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
• 1/2 cup apple sauce ( I used Mott's all Natural, no sweetener)
•  1 tsp Vanilla

Method:
Preheat oven to 350
Use cooking spray to coat cookie sheet.
Cut potato and boil until soft. Drain water and mash ( if you have a food processor,which I do not, I would run it though that. ) If you  are very serious about calorie counting measure the sweet potato. You should have 1 1/2 cups. In a medium bowl mix sweet potato, apple sauce, sugar & vanilla ( You could probably use almond extract here if you wanted. ) Add dry ingredients and mix. ( I used a hand mixer on medium speed.) For a extra yummy goodness you could add 1/2 cup of mini chocolate chips here. I checked it out and that would bring your calories up to 56 a cookie. Drop mounded teaspoonful onto cookie sheet and bake for 12-15 minutes. I have a quick bake option and with that it only takes about 7 min. Makes 32 cookies plus one or two.

Fairies and Angels

Little boys believe in fairies too. They believe in the tooth fairy and the fairy that steals all the matching socks. Grown men believe in the fairy that matches the socks, magically make clothing appear in the dresser, keep the bathroom clean and conjure a sack lunch every morning before they even get up. That fairy was no where to be found this week. That fairy fell down the stairs, then passed out in the living room and hurt herself. We all missed that fairy. She was replaced by a hardworking Daddy who doesn't clean floors, but makes that bathroom sparkly. She was still stuck, watching things pile up, when Daddy had to go back to work but never fear! There are little angels in this house. Everyday the little angel picked up the toys and carried them up the stairs one at a time. It took all morning but she did a great job. The little angel learned to put her clothes in the drawer herself because the laundry fairy couldn't bend down and do it. Because of  Daddy and the angel Blake still thinks that fairies still fill the drawer with socks... to eat.

Valentines... Wheel you be mine?

I love to give gifts and make things for people. I have a ton of fun giving things to people. Unfortunately I'm not rich and I don't have unlimited time. This year for Valentines day I enlisted a little help. I got to make up fun little one liners and Hailey painted pictures. She loved painting and mailing them. She also told me what to write on them. It was a riot listening to her tell me " Bees sting you," " Wheel you be my valentine... I dunno what that is." and my favorite, " I am was a baby but now I'm a big girl, I am Hailey."  We couldn't do very many but there were a few lucky recipients.  The sad part was I forgot to sign most of them. Oops.

Yes, cheff

Hailey is going through a bossy phase. Well, maybe it isn't a phase. Anyway she thinks she is the chef around here and I am, apparently the sue chef. Today, since Daddy and I are on a health kick, we made sweet potato chili. She handed me the ingrediants and said " You can chops because I not holding ifes any more cuz te cut tuff and I will hurt you."  I am hoping she meant she might hurt me with the knife, it is possible she planned to hurt me if I didn't chop. I cut the veggies and she arranged them in the pan, chose the peppers, and insisted on stirring the sauce. That was messy. It was a lot of fun and she must be a good chef because it smells great! Doesn't look bad either.

Getting groceries

We love County Market. They have the " driving carts. "

Some of us are more interested in our thumbs.

Its very important to help mom bring in the groceries.

Its important to work smarter, not harder.

Riding off into the sunset

I spent the day taking the kids to the Dr. , sledding with Hailey and getting rid of our tree. Since I also have the flu the house didn't cleaned. I wanted to get a little done...the kids decided they had to "leave mokmy alone for a minute. We better go for a ride."  So they saddled up and rode off into the sunset.

A Super Christmas

We had a very exciting, extremly busy week leading up to Christmas. It was full of late nights and long days culminating in a 6 hour drive on Christmas Eve. Given all the craziness it came as no suprise that we all had the flu on Chrismas day. It kind of killed the excitment when ot came to candy in the stockings, and the coffee cake. However the.kids loved thier presents, especially the gifts they gave eachother. My Hailey Monster LOVES super man and has always been jealous of Blake's onsies so he got her Superman PJ's and she got him more onsies! They sat together and Hailey told him  all about how.super they were and to be honest just being home with them, even as horribly sick as they were, was really super.