After school snack for a play date

5 Oct

Today my daughter is having a friend over after school. In the title of my post, I put the words “play date,” but with older kids, it’s really just “hanging out” now, not a play date.  I’m slow to change my ways I guess!

I always try to put out something for an after school snack every day, but when there’s a friend coming over, I try to make it extra good. I’m in the mood for something chocolatey (when am I not?) so I decided to make some Monkey Munch this afternoon before I head to pick everyone up. It’ll be a great surprise for my girls and their friend.

I first saw this recipe a long time ago when I used to watch (operative words here: used to watch) John and Kate Plus 8 on TV. Kate had made it as a snack for her kids and it looked positively delicious. Soon afterwards, I was at a friend’s house and she had the recipe so I copied it.

Here it is:

Monkey Munch

9 cups Chex cereal (sneak in wheat Chex, and that’s healthier! I did that a couple of times.)

1 cup semisweet chocolate chips

1/2 cup creamy peanut butter (yes, this recipe does use peanut butter so be sure to check for allergies!)

1/4 cup butter

1 tsp vanilla

1 1/2 cups confectioner’s sugar
DIRECTIONS:
In a large microwaveable bowl, combine peanut butter, chocolate chips and butter. Heat in microwave 1 minute. Take out, mix and return for another 30 seconds or until it can be mixes smooth.

Add in vanilla, stir.

If your bowl is large enough, you can put the dry cereal right in that bowl and mix until all cereal is coated. If not, put the cereal in a larger bowl and pour the chocolate mix right over it. Stir until completely coated.

Put into a large ziploc bag and add confectioner’s sugar. Zip sealed, and shake it all about (you do the hokey pokey) until the sugar coats everything.

Spread onto a large cookie sheet to cool.

Store in airtight container.

 

*Photo of chocolate chips taken from Google Images Editor at Large

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Saying Goodbye to Summer

2 Oct

Today is October 1, and this week the weather is supposed to turn into typical fall weather. We’re in the midst of work and school routines with soccer, dance and Girl Scouts in there too. As I look around my house, I see the typical transitional things happening, like the basket of bathing suits in the hallway, leaving the bedroom closet to make way for cooler-weather wear and the laundry basket of tank tops and sleeveless dresses ready to go up into the attic.

I realized today though, it was time to take down our Summer Vacation sign. I hated to see it go.

Our Summer Vacation sign ended up being so much more than I originally intended it to be!

On the last day of school in June, my youngest daughter, Alex, was still a half-day kindergartener. I wanted her return home on the last day to be special, just like I do for her sisters at the end of the full day. I wracked my brain for something special for her to do while we waited for all of them to be together at the end of the day for the full-fledged celebration. I came up with an idea: I would write out a banner for her to color and we’d hang it up to surprise her sisters when they got home.

At first I just wrote out Happy Summer Vacation and left it at that. Then I decided that she and I would think of all the things we like to do over the summer and I’d write them all over the banner to fill it up a bit more. So that’s what we did and it was a nice way to spend the afternoon together.

We put the sign up on the wall and I kind of thought that once the other girls got home and the banner had been seen, that would be it. Little did I know how big a part the Summer Vacation banner would play into our summer and how sad I’d be today when I finally took it down.

We began marking the banner with little star stickers each time we did one of the things on there and it became a sort of bucket list. The girls would take turns placing the stars. They also began adding things that either I’d forgotten or things we were adding to our summer plans. People would see our sign and talk about it when they visited, the kids would share with them the different summer experiences they’d had. One cousin was so happy to see themselves listed on the banner since we visit them at the end of each summer, and our other cousins were thrilled to be on there as well, since they visit us each summer.

We found too, that even though there were things we thought we’d do, they didn’t all get done, but at the end of the summer we discussed how although we’d missed some of the things on our list, other things replaced them that were just as good, or better.

In the end, this was one of our best summers ever. Our kids are at great ages to be going places, doing things, and enjoying time together. In addition to all of the “usuals,” we got a dog, we went camping; we really did do some extra-special things this summer.

I’m so glad that I have this sign, which I’ll keep in our memory box, so that we can one day look back at our Summer Vacation 2011 banner and remember it all.

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Old Fashioned Chocolate Chip Banana Bread

30 Sep

Best.Banana.Bread.Ever.

As I begin moving all my chocolate chip recipes over from my Facebook Page to here, I thought I’d move this one over first. This recipe is by far the best banana bread recipe I’ve ever had and it was given to me by my cousin Tina. The secret is the cinnamon and sugar that she sprinkles on the tops of the breads before baking.

I love the smell that fills my house when I make this bread and I think of Tina and how she’s so much more than a cousin to me, she’s a wonderful friend as well. That’s why I chose this recipe to be the first chocolate chip recipe that I posted on my new blog. This one is dedicated to Tina and to good friends.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup butter, softened

1 cup sugar

2 eggs, beaten

2 cups flour

1 tsp. salt

1 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. baking soda

2T milk

1 1/2 c. mashed bananas (I use two.)

I add in chocolate chips, of course, about 2/3 cup or so.

Directions:

Mix all ingredients and pour into greased glass loaf pan.

Bake at 325 degrees for 30 minutes.

Lower to 300 degrees and bake for an additional 45 minutes.

 

Puppy Love

26 Sep

We have a new dog. Well she’s new to us, at least. Bella, an 18 month-old Shih Tzu has lived with our family for five weeks now and I am absolutely positively in love with her. My love borders on obsession, I think. When I’m gone I miss my kids and I miss the dog. When I dropped her off to be groomed last week, I almost cried because she looked so nervous. I never even cried when any of my three kids went off to kindergarten for the first time. But there I was, in my car, wiping my eyes, thinking “What the heck is wrong with me? It’s a dog!!” I kept my phone by my side that morning during my meeting,  just in case there was a problem, just in case she needed me.

This is Bella last Tuesday after her first grooming appointment since we have had her. Isn't she so cute?

It’s not like we’ve never had a dog in our house, because we have. When I met my husband waaaayyyy back in 1992, he had a beagle named Sadie. She was his dog. As we dated and later married, she became like our first baby and we were devastated when she died just after our oldest daughter was born. We were so sad in fact, that just a few months later we took our little baby girl with us and picked out another beagle, an almost-four-year-old rescue dog, named her Emma, and took her home with us.

There is a great quote by Jodi Picoult in her book, “House Rules” where the main character quotes a wise person who said, “Before you have kids, your dog is your baby. After you have kids, your dog is just a dog.”  Poor Emma. She was just a dog, as baby number two came and then baby number three. Emma was lost in the shuffle as our house filled with babies and baby things. I barely remember her younger days and I’m always surprised when I see photos of her playing or begging by a high chair, I almost forgot she was there all that time.

Emma died after a long illness and my husband and I were relieved for the break. It had been a stressful time, and we told the kids we needed at least a year to recoup. We both agreed we’d stretch it out as long as we could. Well, this summer was it. The kids begged us at least twelve times a day for a dog. We’d decided to go hyperallergenic this time but the thought of paying a high price for a dog killed us. So we started looking for free or for at least cheap. One August morning, my husband said, “I think I found one.” We didn’t tell the girls, and that night he went out to a “meeting” and came back with Bella.

Our girls had no idea this dog was ours. They said, "Whose dog is that?" and we said, "It's yours!!" The looks on their faces is just priceless.

I thought Bella was certainly cute enough, and loving. She loved to be held right away and loved to play and run and give kisses, all the things a dog should do, all the things Emma either never did or I was so caught up in the blur of motherhood with toddlers that I never noticed she did. I thought to myself, “Well, this is nice. This is just the kind of dog my kids will love.”

And then, they went to school. Labor Day weekend went by and Bella and I waved our hand and paw to them in the window as the bus drove by. My youngest daughter was a “full day” kid for the first time, leaving and returning with her older sisters. It was just Bella and me, all day, every day. I do work: I work from home, I work covering stories for the paper, I work selling books. However, I am home a lot, in and out for lunch, things like that. Bella and I take walks around the neighborhood. She sleeps at my feet when I type. She lays in my lap on the couch. She stands up for me to pick her up.

Before I knew it, I was totally, 100% smitten. In love, obsessed.  I’d find myself holding her for one more minute and then apologizing for having to put her down to put on makeup so I could leave for work. I’d find myself counting minutes in my head to see if I had enough time to run home and take her out before my next story so that she wasn’t alone so much. Did I mention this borders on obsession?

I have never loved a dog this much, I don’t think. And better yet, she loves me. Just when I thought I was ready to be on my own for full days, so I wouldn’t have to worry about anyone or anything for six hours, here I am enjoying the unconditional love and loyalty of my new dog and I don’t mind at all. In fact, I really love it.

 

I think it's the puppy-dog eyes that do it to me. She's irresistible!

My fourth baby...

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My first morsel

25 Sep

Welcome to my very first blog post for my new blog, The Whole Bag of Chips. Slowly but surely, I’m catching up with the world of mom blogging. I’m transitioning from the role of reader of mom blogs to that of writer of a mom blog. Wish me luck!

Over the days and weeks I hope to share with you funny or meaningful tidbits from my life as a married mother of three school-aged daughters, as a newspaper reporter and as an author. You can see more about me in the “About” section of the blog and you can also check out my website at http://www.jenniferlcowart.com. You can order my books at http://www.amazon.com.

But for now….

This is my family:

It was SO hot on this August day! We were letterboxing, one of our family's favorite activities, in Bristol, RI.

This is our new puppy, Bella, my fourth child!

This past August we got a new dog, so every once in a while, you might see a post about her on this blog! She’s a cutie-patootie!

I’m sure that with jobs and kids and a puppy, and all that goes on in our daily lives there will be lots to share as time goes by.  I hope that you’ll find it helpful, funny and engaging. I encourage you to comment along the way!

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