Peanut Butter Chocolate Cookies!

This morning while I was waiting for the furnace people to come (we are getting a new furnace), I was doing some applique work and watching Good Morning America. Emeril was cooking and made a great looking Chili Mac (which I will try) and then he talked about some Peanut Butter Chocolate Cookies that were super easy and had no flour. So I tried them!

The recipe only makes 24 rather small cookies which is the perfect number when only 2 people live in this house. They really are simple (unless you tip over the sugar canister!) and good. Here is the recipe:

Peanut Butter-Chocolate Cookies
From Emeril Lagasse on Good Morning America

1 cup creamy peanut butter

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1/2 cup packed light brown sugar

1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips

1 large egg, beaten

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F.
2. Combine all the ingredients in a bowl, and stir until smooth.
3. Roll about 1 heaping teaspoon of dough between your hands to form a smooth ball. Place the balls on ungreased cookie sheets, spacing them 1 inch apart. Using a fork, press on the dough in two directions to form a crosshatch pattern.

4. Bake the cookies about 10 minutes. Remove the baking sheets from the oven and let the cookies cool on the sheets. Then remove them with a metal spatula.

Makes about 24 cookies

Haunted Hollow Wallhanging

I bought some quilt wall hangers at camp and now want to make more wallhangings. This is a neat Halloween print and I added the borders. Haunted Hollow:

Six Little Bunnies - done!

The bunnies are ready to go meet some African children!

They each have a soft tail!

Getting things done!

I have been sewing all day... well, trying to anyway! I worked on some little bunnies but ran out of fiberfill so I will finish them later in the week.

Here is a tiny quilt, about 9 1/4 inches square. It is called Thimbles. The idea came from Quilt Camp. I machine quilted it about every 3/8" - an idea I read about on Crazy Mama Quilts, a blog that I enjoy following.


I decided it was time to do some more with my Alaskan stash of projects. I made this pillow today. The fabric is from Ketchikan, home of many totem poles.

The fabric for the back and piping is also from Alaska. It is a very pretty batik.

Nice to have something finished!

Bunnies, bunnies, bunnies...

My friend Nancy recently emailed me that her pastor and his wife are going to Ghana in the near future. They will be visiting orphanages and would like to take handmade dolls, etc. for the children. Nancy then gave me this link: http://weewonderfuls.typepad.com/. There is a free bunny pattern there.

Here is my prototype. Of course, I changed a couple of minor things in the pattern - you know me, I don't think I've ever met a pattern I didn't change!

So now I am ready to make a few bunnies to send to Africa.

Eventually I will get the doll pattern. I really haven't made many stuffed toys, but today I am having lunch with my friend Colleen and she has made hundreds, maybe more! I'm sure she'll share any secrets!

A new grandson!

A new grandson!!! Crosby Hayes was born at 6:02 PM yesterday in North Carolina! He is 6 pounds, 18 1/2 inches long, and has dark wavy hair. Brad said Mom and baby are doing fine!

Extreme Makeover Home Edition

The Extreme Makeover Home Edition came to Northwest Illinois last week! A home outside of Lena was rebuilt for the Stott family in 1 week - actually 106 hours. Lena is only 15 miles away. Ray was able to volunteer on the site for four hours last Sunday. I didn't get my request in in time to work on the site - I was less than 2 minutes behind Ray! We did go to the site on Monday night just to see how things were going and I took this picture of the new house.

I was able to volunteer to do some sewing. The fabric was very slow and late getting to the site so we didn't really get very busy until Tuesday and the house had to be ready to reveal on Wednesday by midday! Yesterday (Tuesday) I began sewing at 10:30 AM and finished after midnight! We did pillows for the family room - brown and cream with a little gold, and pillows and curtain panels for the master bedroom - black, cream, and yellow.

Working on another pillow:
Our official sign at Good Times.

Krista was REALLY sewing!!!

One yellow pillow.

Gracie and her creation that matched the flowers in the curtain panel.

It was getting late and it took ALL of these people to make this one yellow pillow!

Wednesday officially arrived and we were tired so we all stopped working for Ray to take our picture.

It was FUN! I hope the Stott family likes what we made!