Spicing Up Waffles

I love making a good, yummy breakfast on Saturday mornings to celebrate a break from the week and give us a chance to relax a bit. (I would love to be the kind of person that makes a great breakfast every morning but that isn't going to start happening anytime soon...or ever.)

I was feeling a little bored with waffle mix one recent Saturday morning when making waffles and started to think, "How can I spice this up?" So I added vanilla extract and cinnamon to the batter and topped off the waffles with butter, powdered sugar and warmed raspberry jam instead of syrup. The changes were small but made a big, delicious difference!



And you can really add anything you like to spice up a simple waffle recipe...any extract or spice you like. For fall you can add pumpkin pie spice and top with apple butter or you can even make waffles savory by adding cooked bacon, cheddar cheese and green onion, topped with some sour cream (ooh, I'm going to have to make those!) The possibilities are endless.

Happy Saturday morning! What's your favorite waffle recipe?

20 Weeks

Well, it is hard for me to believe it but I am over half-way through my pregnancy so I guess it's time to post some bump pictures (however cheesy I think it may be). So here I am last week at 20 weeks. Everything is progressing well and the baby has already been on the move a lot!

Hawaii

We had the wonderful opportunity to go to Hawaii a few weeks ago. Matt and I spent a week with my parents on the big island of Hawaii, near Kona, and just loved every minute of it! There were so many interesting things to see and we tried to take advantage of all that but there were also long, lazy days in the sun and soaking in some rest. I don't want to post a million pictures but I thought I would share some...

One of the beaches we went to.

One of my favorite things that we did was rent some kayaks to get to a beautiful reef for some snorkeling...

We unloaded our kayaks...

...then kayaked across this bay...

...and enjoyed some amazing snorkeling. This is not my picture (it came from here) since I didn't have an underwater camera, but this is a picture from that same bay to give you an idea.

Afterwards, my mom and I were walking around and saw this sign in front of a house which we thought was pretty great. And yes, we had seen the lady without teeth so we knew who the sign was talking about.

One of my other favorite things was going to the farmers market for fresh fruit and veggies.

(especially since I have been craving fruit ever since I have been pregnant.)

and I love anywhere that has fresh passion fruit.

Black sand beach

(Look Mom, the picture isn't even that great so now it is up for debate again...was it worth it or not?)

We also went to the volcano national park...this is looking into the caldera of Kilauea volcano.

And inside a lava tube ( which is made by flowing lava during an eruption)

Some famous arch that everyone goes to see...I mean it was cool, but whatever.

Layers of lava

This was a spot where a lava flow had taken over the road in the national park.

And we didn't get to see any actual lava flowing because it was a little too far away but we did see this...the glow of lava from an open crater on the volcano (close second?).

Sea turtle

You may also notice emerging evidence of me being 17 weeks pregnant in this photo.

Goodnight Hawaii! I hope to see you again someday!

I was a little dissapointed when I looked back on these pictures just because I feel like the pictures don't fully capture the beauty. Oh well. We had a great trip, have wonderful memories and as always on a Wallgren family trip, we have lots of jokes that will live on long after coming home. The other reason I was excited to go to Hawaii is that now that I have been there, I only need to go to North Dakota and then I have been to all 50 states!

Oh, and here is a picture of Joe Jackson at LAX. I like to think that this pose is like a tribute to his late son...

right?

(photo from here)

Leaving World Relief and the Many 'What Ifs' in Life

(A picture from a field trip last year to Garfield Park Conservatory.)

It has been a few weeks now since my last day at World Relief but I still thought I should document it. All-in-all, I had a great experience working at World Relief...I learned a lot, I did a lot and I met a lot of great people along the way. And although it wasn't extremely long, I am thankful for my time there.

I had an interesting last week as it was the first week of After School Program and that kept me pretty busy. Among all the other tasks, my last responsibility was to drive all the kids home after programming. I was looking forward to it as it was my last time with the kids and a good chance to say goodbye. So the drop-offs were going well, I was having some good conversations, the kids were being really sweet and I was busy reflecting on my time when all of a sudden...one of the kids threw up in the van! So then all the other kids starting freaking out, screaming and gagging which was quite the scene (and made me laugh a little). It had never happened before in all of my hours spent with kids in the van so I thought it was ironic that the absolute last thing I did was some serious cleaning.

But the circumstances just made me keep going to back to the 'what ifs' of it all. We were only about 30 seconds away from his apartment when it happened, only 30 seconds! So I'm thinking what if we had left just a bit earlier? Or what if I hadn't driven past one of the kids' apartments on accident which made me loop around and waste precious time? Or what if I had chosen to take that kid home first like I had originally planned on? Well, I guess the answer is that if one of these 'what ifs' had been reality then the dirty deed would have happened somewhere other than the van, which would have been great, and I would have never known that I had been spared from the clean-up...which makes me wonder...

...how many times am I spared from something that I am unaware of? It's interesting if you really think about it (and some of you may disagree and say that if something never happened then it was never going to happen so it's not worth thinking about). But thinking about it made me appreciative of all the little unknown events or annoyances that I may have been spared from and never even knew about. I guess it's kind of a weird backwards way to be thankful but I was thankful none the less.

So it was an unexpected way to end my last day at World Relief but at the same time it was very fitting since every day there was filled with the unexpected.

"Finger" painting during After School Program at World Relief...the kids turned it into full hand and arm painting.

Last week I started my new job as director of the Parenting ProGRESS program at Ravenswood Covenant Church. The program serves to provide support in various ways to teenage parents whose children are enrolled in the day care at Ravenswood. I am also subbing in the day care for now (before the baby arrives). Things are going well so far, I have a lot to learn but I think I will really enjoy it!

Celebrating Five Years

A few weeks ago we celebrated our fifth anniversary. It seems like every year we say, "Wow! I can't believe it has been ____ years!" And it felt like that even more this year but I guess that it is the way time works. Looking back, we decided that it has been a wonderful 5 years (not that that was really in question). We have had some great and interesting life experiences together and those experiences just wouldn't have been the same without each other. I guess that is one of the things I love most about marriage...you get to hang out and experience everything with your best friend.

Some of you know that we have an anniversary tradition of breaking a glass each year. This started when I accidentally broke a glass on our first anniversary and it has continued on. That first year I became a little obsessed with starting a tradition on our anniversary so weeks before I kept thinking and thinking and came up with nothing. Well, right before going to dinner I had an idea...maybe every year we could drink coffee out of some special glasses that we bought on our honeymoon. I know, a little stupid but it was down to the wire. So as I'm pouring steaming hot coffee into our beautiful Mexican hand-blown glass....it shattered all over the counter. The tradition changed to breaking a glass instead.

This was the winner (or loser) this year. And after 4 years of breaking one of our actual glasses, this year I opted out for a thrift store purchase...a bit more practical.

Recently I was walking through North Park and realized that I had never taken a picture of the staircase where we got engaged. Well, here it is. It is a staircase by a river path and it was a special spot for us in college...a place where we would go to talk, reflect, pray and figure out our lives so it was a fitting place to begin the whole journey. I'm also pretty sure it is a special hangout for nearby high school students but for sketchier reasons.

I think these are the actual steps where it all went down.

And the path leading back to campus.

It was great to look back on these past five years. I feel lucky to have such a wonderful husband and a marriage that is growing, deepening and gets better with each year. Here's to another great 5 (okay, maybe a few more than that!) Love you Matt!

Chocolate and Peanut Butter Cream Topped Shortbread Cookies

Lately I noticed that Matt has been eating straight up peanut butter with chocolate chips as a snack. I know he has a habit of having a sweet snack at night but I thought this one was a little weird...until I tried it. So simple but so good. It reminded me of those chocolate and peanut butter girl scout cookies. So then I thought...I want to make a cookies like that! Once I said that, Matt did not let it go until I actually made them.

I started with a basic shortbread recipe then made my own version of a creamy peanut butter layer and topped with melted chocolate chips. They turned out delicious and decadent and most importantly, Matt approves (he supplied the inspiration after all). He likes them so much that he actually counted how many I made so that he could pace himself in eating them.


The Recipe:
Shortbread part adapted from foodnetwork.com

• 2 cups flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons powdered sugar (plus 2 more for peanut butter cream)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 sticks room temp. unsalted butter (plus 1 tablespoon for peanut butter cream)
• 1 teaspoon water
• 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
• 1 1/2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips

The Method:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees
2. Beat butter, sugar (the 1/2 cup plus 2 T.) with hand mixer until fluffy. Add vanilla, salt and water and mix to combine.
3. Add flour and mix just until dough is formed.
4. Shape dough into a log about 1 1/2 in. wide, wrap in plastic wrap and chill in the fridge for 30 minutes.
5. After chilled, cut log into 1/2 in. slices. Place on parchment paper lined cookie sheet and bake for about 12-15 or until golden around the edges. Allow cookies to cool. (I made indents in the center of each cookies with a spoon before baking. This made it easier for the peanut butter cream to stay on top.)
6. Mix peanut butter, 1 tablespoon butter and 2 tablespoons powered sugar. Spread some of this mixture onto each cookie and chill in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.
7. Melt chocolate chips either on the stove or microwave (in the microwave only for about 30-45 seconds). To drizzle chocolate more easily, place melted chocolate into a plastic baggy, cut a small hole in one of the corners and drizzle in any pattern you want. Chill finished cookies for another 30 minutes for chocolate to harden. The cookies are best when kept in the fridge until right before eating.

Spreading the peanut butter cream.

Chocolate drizzling method. If you don't want to use a bag, you can add a little cream to your melted chocolate to thin it out then just use a spoon to drizzle.

Yum! Next time I'll probably come up with a better looking chocolate drizzle. Oh well, they still taste good.