pinteresting wednesday

(all photos via pinterest)

homemade thin mints (recipe)

Ingredients
-8 ounces butter
-1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
-1 cup powdered sugar
-1 teaspoon vanilla
-¾ teaspoon salt
-1 ½ cups all purpose flour
-For the coating:
-10 ounces semi-sweet baking chocolate
-1 ½ teaspoon peppermint extract (make sure to get peppermint, not spearmint)

Directions
   Preheat oven to 350° degrees. Cream butter until light and fluffy, then add the powdered sugar and mix until combined. Stir in the salt, vanilla and cocoa powder. Mix until the cocoa powder is integrated and the batter resembles a thick frosting. Add the flour and mix just until it is combined, making sure to not over mix.
   Form dough into a ball. Knead a few times to bring together, then flatten into a disk between half an inch and one inch thick, cover in plastic wrap then place in freezer for 15 minutes.
   Remove dough from the freezer and roll it out really thin on a floured surface, about 1/8-inch. Cut cookies using 1 ½ inch cutter
   Place cookies on a baking sheet and bake for 10 minutes. Remove the cookies from the oven and allow them to cool completely on a wire rack. While the cookies bake, make the peppermint coating. Chop the baking chocolate into very small, thin pieces. Place over a double boiler, and stir every so often until it is completely melted. Stir in the peppermint extract. Feel free to add more peppermint as you see fit, but I thought the amount called for was perfect. :)
   Gently drop the cookies, one at a time, into the chocolate coating. Turn to coat entirely, then lift the cookie out of the chocolate with the fork and tilt against the side of the bowl until the extra coating drips off. Place on a parchment or plastic wrap-lined baking sheet, and repeat for the rest of the cookies. Place the cookies in the refrigerator or freezer to set.
   Viola, now you have Thin Mint cookies!

 I think I just earned my baking badge, oh yes...

november 11th

A week ago I turned sixteen.

No big hoopla was made. We had a BBQ with some good friends, and then helped them clean out their hangar. It was pretty fun actually. :)

I don't feel different, more grown up, or anything like that. Parents always tell their kids, "Don't try to grow up too fast." When I was younger I never really understood that or took it seriously. I just wanted to be as mature as possible. Now that I am older though, I wish I could go back and just enjoy some of those younger years. 

Not that being older doesn't have its perks. (: But I've slowly been learning (and still am) that we should be content where we are, live in the here and now, instead of always dreaming about our future. Yahweh has placed us where we are for a reason. We may not know what it is at the time, but we need to trust Him and walk by faith.

Not that I speak in respect of want: for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, [therewith] to be content.

Philippians 4:11