What's been going on in Hall M these days?

Last week we celebrated Breast Cancer Awareness Month by having a "Think Pink" party!
We ate all sorts of pink snacks and had information about breast cancer available to read.
One of the snacks we had was Yoplait yogurt. We're saving the lids to send in to help raise money for breast cancer research! Here's a collage of pictures from the night! (Check the "Pictures" tab to see all the pictures.)

Later in the week we had October Family Dinner!

The girls made mashed potatoes, green beans, toast, rice, and veggie stew.  Everything disappeared pretty quickly! :) We had a "how to make oreo balls" lesson after dinner!

PINK PARTY!!!

Soooo pink party=SUCCESS!

We had cupcakes, oreo balls, Hawaiian Punch, and Yoplait Yogurt!
We also made awesome bracelets and buttons!

The best part....well if you insist on know was DRESSING IN PINK!!! :)

Chicken & Corn Casserole (AKA WendyJulia Casserole according to JKL)

This casserole was inspired by a casserole Adam's mom has made in the past and it's always good!

One of the girls in my building wanted to try a casserole using the ingredients in the fridge, so this was the result!

Preheat oven to 375*.  Put 2 cans Cream of Chicken and 2 cups of milk into a mixing bowl.
Add a bag or two of frozen corn (depending on how much corn you want!)
Boil 2 chicken breasts (or use 2 cans of cooked chicken). Cut up and add to the mixture.
Cook 2-3 cups of rice and add to the mixture.  Pour into two (1.5 qt) casserole dishes (this makes quite a bit!)
Cover with crumbled crackers and shredded cheese.  Bake about 20-25 minutes or until the mixture is bubbly around the edges. (If the casserole has more rice, it won't be very bubbly...so pull it out when the cheese is good and melted!)

A casserole tends to look like a casserole....hahahah, but here it is!!! :)

Banana Cupcakes with Chocolate Chips and Peanut Butter Buttercream Icing

How's that for a title? :) :)

Emily and I got a little creative last night.  Once again, we had some bananas that needed eaten (maybe we should start eating more bananas?? :) ) And we wanted to make something we've never made before.  Here's the result! :)

DE*LI*CIOUS

Funny story how we came up with this recipe.  We decided to make banana cupcakes and then realized we had no eggs.  We looked up egg subsitutes and found out that one banana is a sub for one egg. Perfect!  Our cake mix called for 3 eggs and we had 3 bananas.

Banana Cupcakes

Using a Golden Yellow Cake mix (we used Betty Crocker), follow the instructions but leave out the eggs and add in three smushed bananas instead!  It's that easy! :)

Yummy Batter...that's safe to eat because it's egg-free!!!!

Peanut Butter Buttercream Icing

(Basically buttercream icing plus 2 cups of peanut butter minus the vanilla extract.)

4 cups confectioner's sugar

1/4 cup milk

1 stick of butter (softened)

2 cups peanut butter

Mix it all up! If it's a little too thick, add in a splash of milk.  If it's a little too thin, add a little more confectioner's sugar.  The humidity tends to have an effect on whether you need to add one, the other, or neither.

And here's where the chocolate chips come in!

You can either drop the chips onto the cupcakes before they cook, or wait and drop them on right after they come out of the oven.  They'll melt a little and you can spread them on the top of the cupcakes.

And Ice them when they're cool! :)

We found out it's easier to ice them after you take them out of the pan...otherwise you get a lot of icing on your hands when you try to get them out of the pan!