Oreo Balls (my sister's specialty)

My sister started making these oreo balls a few Christmas' ago to take to my Grandmother's house.  They are soooo good.  The other day, the other RA in my building made Cake Balls (delicious.) and some residents started talking about how great oreo balls would be one day.  I picked up the hint! We're having them at a floor mingler where we're playing "People Bingo."  We're not using the same board that's in that link, but you get the drift!

So...here's how to make oreo balls :)

1 package of oreos
1 8oz package cream cheese
1 package white almond bar

Put the cream cheese in a bowl and let it start to soften while you make good use of your food processor for the next few minutes.  Put your oreos in your food processor and chop 'em up till they're tiny.  After I finished, I realized it probably would have been a good idea to crush them in a ziploc bag beforehand, but oh well!  Once they're all crumbs, add the oreos to your cream cheese and mix it as well as you can. (I did this pat slowly, adding about 8 or 10 crushed oreos at a time).  You'll get to a point where you just can't mix with a spoon anymore, so push up your sleeves, put on your apron and mix with your hands.

Once everything is mixed nicely,  roll the mixture into about 1 inch balls.  (I used a melon scoop to make them about the same size).  Chill them in the refrigerator about one hour.  Just before you take the oreo balls out, melt your delicious almond bar.  Now coat the oreo balls and let them set to harden before eating sampling serving. :)  I think when my sister does this, she rolls them in the bowl with the melted almond bar, but I stuck a toothpick in them and used that to dip them and pull them back out.  I made two batches and came up with 75 oreo balls.  Perfect for the 26 people that came to my activity tonight!!!

Oreos in the food processer

Mixing oreos and cream cheese

yummmmmm

oreo balls minus chocolate

Yummy yummy yummy yummy

Some of the people left when I remembered to get a group picture

Relatively Unique

Week Recap! :)

Ok so sorry my only blog this week was a picture of a cup of coffee...but the first week with residents/week of training doesn't leave much time to do any creative cooking or sewing to blog about.  So let's see...what did I do this week?

Sunday - Rested and relaxed in my apartment with Megan...watching Netflix and periodically checking on the girls who had moved in (although they were all pretty busy for the most part).
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Monday - Training. I got a new book to read too (Three Cups of Tea).  Every incoming student at Auburn (whether they are a Freshman or Transfer student) was assigned to read this book because some of their introductory classes are supposed to incorporate the book into lesson plans.  Since I have a pretty large group of incoming students this year, my boss gave me (and the rest of the staff members) a copy of the book to read.
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Tuesday - Training.  We learned about our new online system for submitting documents and such for work! I like it! :)
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Wednesday - Training.  Listened to some guest speakers who gave us information about on-campus services

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Thursday - Training.  We did a really neat activity called "The Story of Us" where everyone in the group (about seven of us) shared whatever we wanted with everyone about our life story.  We did a lot of laughing, but a good bit of crying too.  I definitely got to know those folks better! :)

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Friday - Training.  We listened to a couple of police officers talk about safety on campus.  We then did an activity called "Behind Closed Doors" where the returning RAs act out scenarios that new RAs may encounter  in their first year and the new RAs get a chance to practice comforting residents, approaching residents, and referring residents.

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Saturday - Check-Ins!!!! :)  We didn't have very many check-in today because almost everyone was here already!! :)  Megan and I also cleaned out our office again and rearranged it so it's more like an "office" and less like a "storage closet."

Saturday night was the most fun I'm sure!!  We cooked up a pasta feast for our girls who didn't have plans tonight and had "Family Game Night."  We had 25 girls come to dinner! It was an absolute blast and everyone seemed like they were having so much fun! When everyone was getting ready to leave they were all swapping phone numbers.  Seeing that makes me smile and remember why I love my job. :)  Not that I forgot, but when you don't have your regular residents for about three months, you really get to missing having girls hanging out in the lobby.

Anywho, now that I've gotten you completely caught up in what's likely my longest blog entry ever, I'll leave you with some pictures from this week. :) (mostly tonight obviously!)

Cupcakes we made last Saturday for check-ins...inspired by M&Ms :)

Maybe not the prettiest way, but for sure the easiest way to cook Marinara and Alfredo sauce to feed 25 people....especially if you're trying to cook noodles and toast for all those people at the same time!!

Side note: The crock-pot on the left was a wedding gift my parents were given when they got married...and the one on the right was a wedding gift Adam and I got when we got married!

Look at all those girls! :) This is 16 of the people who came.  Before the end of the night, we had 25 people!  When 1/4 of your building come to an activity, that's AWESOME! Especially when they don't know each other for the most part! :) :) It just put smiles all over mine and Megan's face! :)

Move In Mania...Part One!

We have residents now!

Today, we're having about 20 of our 100 residents move in while we finish all our prep work in the building (finishing checking rooms and such).  Needless to say, it's pretty busy around here today!  Megan and I are taking a lunch break while we work on paperwork.  But....tonight we have staff dinner, so we get to see a lot of folks we haven't seen since May!

Anywho, here's a glimpse at what some of the dads/brothers/boyfriends/recruited guy friends are going through right now!