Things I Love Thursday

1. Peanut Butter & Co peanut butter. My two favorites are Dark Chocolate Dreams and White Chocolate Wonderful. The dark chocolate is a great alternative to Nutella! I also have the maple one, which is delicious on pancakes. Also, online, the jars are selling for like $6, but I get mine at the grocery store for less than $4.

 

2. The Sector 9 Northern Lights Longboard. Since I've gotten a hang of snowboarding (as in, I don't spend more time on my ass than I do standing up), I am determined to learn to longboard. The graphic on this board is pretty sweet, and it looks like an all around good board for cruising.

3. The Dakine Suntop rash guard. My family is planning a white water rafting trip this summer. Plus, my sister and I are planning on stand-up paddle boarding and kayaking this summer (so many activities!!!). This top will be nice to wear in the water over my swim suit. It looks like of like a rugby shirt, plus it has a hood!

4. The Reebok Dance UR Lead shoes. I love Zumba and I love high-top sneakers. Hello, match made in heaven. I think I read about these in either Self or Shape as being a great Zumba/dance workout shoe, and I have been wanting them ever since!

5. The Nike Mogan Mid 2 Skate Shoe. Once again, I love a good pair of high tops. I have my eye on these, and I think once I hit my next goal weight, I will be buying them for myself as a reward.

6. Laura Mercier Stick Gloss in Poppy. First, I love this formula. It has some slip to it, and it's never drying. The color is an orange-y red, exactly as the name "poppy" would describe. To me, it's the perfect shade for summer. I've been wearing it lately with a lot of blue outfits. The color shown in the picture is definitely more subdued than it really is, but when applied it adds a great pop of color -- not too sheer, but not too in-your-face-bright.

7. Mom's Best Cereals Toasted Cinnamon Squares. So, when I eat cereal, it is typically the cereal choice of a 7 year old child. I was all about Cocoa Puffs, Reese's Puffs, etc. It was a disaster. When I went to Chicago in January, my bestie and her fiance had "healthier" (let's use that term lightly, shall we?) version of Cinnamon Toast Crunch. I have been sold ever since. Clearly, not what I eat every morning, but when I'm in the mood for cereal, I pour some of this into a bowl and top it off with almond milk. Beats Cocoa Puffs, no? I just tell myself that they're made with whole wheat, and then I feel a teensy bit better.

8. Bull Durham. This is one of those movies that I think I could watch every day. There's a solid chance that this was on a previous list of favorites, but I still love it. We watched it on the bus to BU a couple weekends ago, and then the coach texted all the girls to breathe through their eyelids ("like the lava lizards of the galapagos islands."). If you like baseball and romance, I'm pretty sure you'd like this movie.

9. The Nike Element Half-Zip running top. I do not run, but I do love a quarter- or half-zip top. It helps to ensure that my gigantic head does not get stuck while trying to put on my shirt. These tops are incredibly soft and comfortable. I have it in 3 colors, and if I had my way, I'd have more. I think 4 of my athletes have them, too. I refuse to buy them at full price; I've gotten them on sale at Nordstrom (courtesy of mi madre), and I've seen them on sale at Finish Line as well.

10. Anna Kendrick's version of "You're Gonna Miss Me" from Pitch Perfect. I've been listening to this on repeat. Plus one of my athletes sings it every time it comes onto the Today's Hits pandora station in the Athletic Training Room.

Mount It Monday

On Penn State's campus, there is a giant bell. I, clearly, decided it was a good idea to climb/hang off said bell. Lovely.

Happy mounting!

--K

Fire-Free S'Mores

So, during the summer, sometimes we'd go outside onto my friend's deck and make s'mores using her grill. We were being semi-ghetto and using straightened out wire hangers to roast our marshmallows. However, being the idiot that I am, I blanked on that whole metal-gets-hot-in-fire thing. Thusly, I ended up giving myself a (small) burn on my hand from that stupid hanger. However, I will never live it down... The next time we made s'mores that way, I got to wear oven mitts.

From like 5 years ago (holy crap...that's a long time)

This weekend we played the last games of the season, and I decided to make the girls s'mores bars. I was also trying to test drive my semi-made-up recipe before I decided to bring them to my work's end of the year bbq.

Indoor S'Mores Bars

Ingredients:

1 big box (I think 16oz?) Golden Grahams cereal

1 1/2-2 bags mini marshmallows

6 tbsp unsalted butter (I don't believe in salted butter...nor do I really trust people who use it)

1 bag mini (or regular...whatever) chocolate chips

1. Grease a big pan. If my roommate hadn't jacked my 13x9 pan to make lasagna at her boyfriend's, I would have used that. But I used a big jelly roll pan instead. Also, at this time, I'd recommend putting your chocolate chips in the freezer, since the heat from the marshmallow goo will melt them.

2. In a really big pot, start melting the butter. Then dump in 1 bag of your mini marshmallows, plus another big handful of marshmallows (super exact, I know). You can also do this in the microwave using a really big microwave-safe bowl.

3. Once your butter and marshmallows have melted together into a big poofy glob, turn off the heat. Dump in the entire box of cereal and start mixing.

4. After you've coated all the cereal with the marshmallow mixture, dump in another handful of marshmallows and about 1/3 of the bag of chocolate chips.  This addition of stuff will get kind of melty and swirl into the already-melted marshmallow, since it'll still be pretty warm

This pot/pan clearly is not big enough, but it's the biggest one we have in our apartment.

5. After that's all mixed together and a little bit cooler, add in another handful of marshmallows and another 1/3 of the bag of chocolate chips. Mix that all together.

6. Pour all that deliciousness out onto your greased pan.

7. Smush it into the pan and stick it in the fridge to let it cool. If you want (which I did), sprinkle some more chocolate chips on top! I didn't have enough of the cereal mixture to fill the entire pan without making really flat/wimpy bars, so I just squished it into a shape that seemed good enough. Once, they've cooled/are solid, cut them up into bars and enjoy!

Ta-da!

These got rave reviews from the team, and I will definitely be making these for my work party. And probably a bunch of other times too. One of my girls also suggested that I make this into small pieces and turn it into a cereal.

One of the best parts is, that because the marshmallows and chocolate chips get added two separate times, the first addition gets all nice and melty, and it kind of swirls into the melted marshmallow mixture/coating. To make these again in a jelly roll pan, I'd probably use two of the small boxes of cereal and use a bag and a half of mini marshmallows for the coating.

Enjoy!

--K

Current Favorites

1. Vanilla Berry protein smoothies: I dump about 1 cup of regular almond milk, 1/2 a scoop of vanilla protein powder, and about 1 cup of frozen fruit. I've been using one from the grocery store that's a blend of blueberries, raspberries, and peaches. Today, I decided to toss in some frozen spinach. It was delicious!

2. Dunkin Donuts Caramel Mocha Swirl iced coffee (with milk). One of my softball girls got me hooked on this. I could (but shouldn't) drink one of these everyday.

3. Scandal. I am hooked on this show. The drama. The outfits. The drama. Need I say more?

4. Graze. This is a subscription snack service. It's $5/box, and each box contains 4 little boxes, each with a different snack. I've loved pretty much everything I've been sent. Also, it's super convenient for me, since I can just throw a snack pack or two into my bag and take it to work. They're perfect for when I want a snack while I'm in the dugout!

5. Bull Durham. I could probably watch this movie everyday. Starting Susan Sarandon, Tim Robbins, and, one of my favorites, Kevin Costner.

Visiting the BFF in Chicago (pt. 2)

One of the days we were in Chicago, we went to see our lovely bride try on her wedding dress for the first time! There will be no picture of that, juuuust in case the groom somehow finds my blog (doubtful, but who knows). Afterwards, her mom was ever too kind and treated us to drinks at The Public Hotel (home of a myriad of cow pictures...odd for such a chic hotel) and then a wonderful Italian dinner!

The Public Hotel was stunning. I cannot even explain, so I will let the photos do the explaining for me.

The bar/lounge

Lobby

Front desk

More of the bar

Divider between bar/lounge and lobby

Aaaaaaaaall the way at the other end of the bar.

Basically, it was one of the most fabulous places I've ever been. And the drinks were ballin'. If you're ever in Chicago, you should definitely check it out.

--K

Visiting the BFF in Chicago

My best friend (since the 3rd grade) is getting married in July. I'm in the bridal party, so in January the whole bridal party managed to make it out to Chicago to go bridemaid dress shopping! Well, to be fair, two of said bridesmaids live in Chicago. One of them still lives in San Francisco. And I have banished myself to the middle of nowhere in Maine (it grows on you, I swear). We had 3 different appointments and then we dropped into Anthropologie's bridal store, called BHLDN (it was like a dream come true, if you, too, are an wedding-loving Anthro-obsessed nut-job like myself).

The one I am in was a front runner. 

The only problem: not as wide a color selection as our lovely bride so desired.

I would also have had to sell a body part on the black market to afford it.

We also liked the dress I am in (I could not fit into the one Tiffany is wearing to save my life).

However, bride ruled out black. Our girl is all about color!

We definitely hit the mark on color.

I look like an uncomfortable daffodil, but it's all about the bride!

It may be all about the bride, but i had to draw the line somewhere.

This was it.

We felt okay about these.

The bride loved the coral. I hated that hemline. I don't have a photo, but I felt like a fish in that thing.

Ding! Ding! Ding! We have a winner!

A dress in which I did not feel like a troll. (This appointment, for a while, was pretty bleak).

The same dress on another lovely bridemaid.

And then they told my BFF (the color-loving bride) that, for a nominal fee, she could select from any color of satin available, instead of just the ones matching the lace. I believe the words out of her mouth were: "THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING!!!" So Baja Aqua with Champagne lace it is.

Let's also note that the dress is hiked up at the sash region. Otherwise the dress would be down to the middle of my calves. I shall bless the tailoring people and pray for a miracle. 

--K

Mount It Monday

The Nittany Lion shrine on Penn State's campus that everyone and their mother climbs.

Happy mounting.
--K