Excellence in Cookies.

This is Catherine's favorite Chocolate Chip cookie recipe, and therefore, by extension, it's my favorite as well.  :)

Here's a stock picture of some chocolate chip cookies, because ours don't stick around long enough to be photographed.

Raisin cookies that look like chocolate chip cookies are the reasons I have trust issues.

When we first decided to try and have kids, Catherine looked for an egg-less cookie recipe, because apparently you're not supposed to eat raw egg when you're pregnant.  And who can make cookies without eating at least a little cookie dough?  Robots, that's who.  So Catherine found this loverly recipe, and lovely it is!  Although we've had no success in the "making kids" department *EDIT*we made a thing!*EDIT*, we've had excellent success in the "making cookie dough without eggs" department.  And even if you manage to get the dough in the oven to make the cookies, they are absolutely DELECTABLE! 

2 1/2 cups Flour
1 tsp. Baking Soda
1/2 tsp. Salt
3/4 cup Butter
1/2 cup Nuts (optional)
1/4 cup Sugar
1 1/2 tsp Vanilla (Kevin Miles Home-Made Vanilla Extract is the very best of the best!!)
4 Tbsp. Milk
1 cup Brown Sugar
1 cup Chocolate Chips (Guittard are the absolute best!)

Grease cookie sheet, bake at 350°f for 12-15 minutes.
Eat and enjoy!

Pictured:  A filthy imposter!

Strawberry River April 2012

This one has a LOT of pictures, so please be patient!  Also, if anyone wants me to notify them on FB when I post, just let me know!

All of these pictures were taken with my Android phone, so they're not the best quality.

We got to go to Grampa Marlin's Strawberry River Cabin this weekend!  It was so much fun!

We've been DYING to get back to the river for a long time!  This was my second time there.  With all of our working, and moving around we haven't had much time for vacationing.  This was our first "real" vacation in almost 2 years!  We wouldn't rather go anywhere else though!  This was one of Catherine's favorite vacation spots as a kid, and it has become one of my absolute favorites as well!  I love being out in nature and we enjoy the time away.  We both grew to love vacationing in spots like this as kids.  I have very fond memories of vacationing in northern California near Crescent City, and in the Sequoias during the summer.

Here it is on google maps:

Catherine and I drove down to Pleasant Grove to pick up Marie and some weirdo named Ben.  We left our car at the house, and drove the Miles' Sequoia to the river (Thanks Mom and Dad!).  We met Dad about half way up the dirt road and followed them in to the cabin.  The trail is impassable without four wheel drive, but it was fun to do some off roading :)  We finally made it to the cabin after dark, unloaded the cars and went to sleep.  We woke up the next day to a wintry snowy wilderness, it was impressive!

Andrew even got some time in prepping for the inevitable zombie attack.  Arrows are best, as they are a retrievable source of ammo!

Happy Birthday Andrew!  He's already really good at playing that Cajon!  

It warmed up considerably later that day, and it was really nice out!  The weather was great, and as always it was gorgeous up there.  We had a blast!

Isn't she the cutest?