"The Best" rolled sugar cookies with icing

Happy Halloween goblins! In the spirit of the holiday, I made some homemade Halloween sugar cookies with icing last night to take to work. I Googled "best sugar cookie" and was directed to allrecipes.com, which had a recipe for The Best Rolled Sugar Cookies.  I also found this Sugar Cookie Icing recipe, which was legit. Actually, both recipes were legit, so I'm sharing them with you today.

The Bargain Blonde's adventures in baking:

Do you love the breast cancer awareness eggs?

Bats, pumpkins and boo! shapes, oh my

Halloween Cookiepalooza

If you don't own a silicone slipmat and you ever plan on baking, I'm telling you right now that you need one in your life. They make baking so much easier. The bottom of cookies turn out perfectly every time and are so easy to transfer to cooling racks.

I baked mine for exactly 6 minutes at 400 degrees F and transferred them to cooling racks immediately after taking them out of the oven. They were the perfect chewiness. Ice after cooled. Full recipes below:

The Best Rolled Sugar Cookies

1.5 cups butter, softened

2 cups white sugar

4 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

5 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

Sugar Cookie Icing

1 cup confectioners' sugar

2 teaspoons milk

2 teaspoons light corn syrup

1/4 teaspoon almond extract

Food coloring (Orange = 4 drops red + 2 drops yellow)

Anyone have any fun Halloween plans? Since I live in an apartment, I am going to my bestie Kristina's house to pass out candy because I want to see all the kiddos in their costumes.

Speaking of kiddos ... how cute is Reese in his costume for preschool on Monday? This is his "Captain America pose" he said:

Ugh, he's the cutest ever. My heart can't handle it.

Anthropologie owl copy cat for only $11!

Popping in really quick to tell you about this amaze copy cat owl for waaaaaay less than you'll pay at Anthropology. Let's face it, Anthro is seriously overpriced. Case in point: Anthro's owl cookie jar that is $88 dollars. Um, no thanks. But yes, please, to the Kirkland's almost identical ceramic owl that is on clearance right now for $11.99. The only difference is Kirkland's version is not a cookie jar and is about 2 inches shorter in height. Let's be real, I'm not Holly Homemaker. I have no use for a cookie jar because I definitely don't whip up baked goods on the reg. Kirkland's version will suffice just fine.

So basically what I'm saying is you better hurry to a Kirkland's near you because they are sold out online. I found mine last night in the clearance section in the back of the store and there were quite a few left. Hopefully you'll have the same luck as me. Here is my owl in my NEW kitchen (I will update you on my move sometime this week):

I am so incredibly tired I am literally publishing this post, washing my face, brushing my teeth and passing out in my bed. Can't wait to update y'all on the move!!! Loving my new place. Good night.

Remember when I used to blog on the reg?

Yah, me too. Then I moved to Las Vegas and my blog went up in flames.

By the time I get home from work, the last thing I want to do is think so instead of writing, I get on Pinterest and pin for hours. Kristina's husband Josh even said to me the other day, "I have never in my life seen someone on a computer as much as you." Guilty! I told him I was busy running a blog empire but in reality all I do these days is pin. I pin stuff like apartment décor inspiration ....

Funny someecards that make me laugh because they describe me perfectly:

Touching pics like this soldier and his pup, who reminds me of Bear:

Dumb, I mean, awesome stuff like a company that makes you a stuffed animal to resemble your dog:

Totally need a Bear stuffed animal now. Someone make this happen for me, please.

Cute updos I have no use for in life:

But more than anything, I can't stop pinning recipes:

If you follow me on Pinterest, I'm sure you've seen the outrageous amount of recipes I've pinned to my Food & Drank board recently. The absurd part is I don't even have a kitchen right now! But I. can't. stop. I think I'm addicted to Pinterest, and I need to be addicted to blogging.

When I think of a blog topic idea, I write it down so that I don't forget it. I now have a long list of things I want to blog about so there really is no excuse for me to be blog MIA. You know it's bad when people stop even asking when you are going to blog again.

I am going to try to get back into the swing of things this week. I really do love and miss blogging. It's just been a struggle to find the time and energy these days because my job is so much more demanding. Yaknow???? It's not you blog, it's me. Anywho, wish me luck!

P.S. I move into my apartment this Saturday! My Mom is going to Dallas Wednesday to load up my moving truck and driving it to Vegas Thursday. I cannot wait to have all my things again. It's been 6 weeks since I moved here and it feels like so much longer, doesn't it? It's been such a whirlwind but I really love it here. I think once I get settled in my place, it will start to feel more like home and my life will feel a little more normal.


What's new with y'all? Oh, and I get made fun of for saying y'all here. What can I say? I'm a Texas girl born and raised. You can take the girl out of Texas, but you can't take Texas out of the girl. Yes, I just said that. Oh, and I need this shirt. Yet another one of my Pinterest finds.

 

Pretending it's FALL

1 / 2 / 3 / 4

While it doesn't exactly feel like Fall here in Las Vegas yet, I can pretend it is 70 degrees, the trees are losing their leaves and light jackets and scarves are required, right?

Unfortunately, my reality is that it's going to be in the upper 80s most of the week, the only trees I see are of the palm variety and a light jacket and scarf would have me breaking out in a sweat in a few minutes flat.

Regardless of my reality, I still had chili for dinner last night. See what I mean by pretending?

Kristina whipped this up last night. It was delicious.

I can live in denial all I want, but the truth is that I have been very jealous seeing all of you northerners Instagraming photos of your boots, leggings, sweaters and scarves. While I certainly don't envy your bitter winters, I do envy the fact that you get a legit Fall and its happening already.

Since life isn't fair and I can't actually wear all those sweaters, scarves and boots like some of you, I have done the next best thing and pinned Fall clothes like crazy. These outfits need to get in my closet right now:

All photos via my fashion pin board

I want all of those looks. Fall, please get here quickly so I can stop pretending. I like reality better.

Is it Fall where you are? Do you love this season as much as me? I, for one, live for it.

 

Friday Faves: The Resurrection!

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Guess who's back? Back again. Friday Faves is back. Tell a friend.

... Too much? I know.

The day has finally arrived. Friday Faves has been resurrected from its temporary blogger death. Its been too long so I'm just going to get right down to business. Here is what I've been loving lately:

McCafe Vanilla Iced Coffee

I hate trying something that's been around forever, loving it and then knowing I have missed out on it for that long. That's exactly the case with the deliciousness that is McDonald's McCafe Vanilla Iced Coffee. The best part? It's only $2.50 for a Large coffee and 270 calories. Not too shabby.

 

Francesca's tops for work

I love this top but mine is light blue

This was $34 but on sale for 30% off in the store.

The shirts above are two tops I got this weekend using my winnings from craps (a perk of living in Vegas). I was lusting all of their tops for the office and all of their full price tops and dresses are now buy one, get one 50% off in the store. If you don't have a Francesca's by you, check out their merchandise online here. Love this store.

Parenthood and Glee

Parenthood and Glee are back on the telly! I've said it before and I'll say it again, if you aren't watching Parenthood then you are seriously missing out. Best. Show. On. TV. Period. I have yet to watch an episode without crying. The characters are so relatable and I need Adam Braverman to be my husband in a bad way. He's perfection. And Glee, well, how can you not love Glee? It's unconstitutional not to.

And last, but not least, this shirt:

During the transition from Dallas to Vegas, I went a month without a paycheck. An entire month y'all. Needless to say, I was checking the couch cushions for pennies until last Friday when I finallllllly got paid. Hallelu-yer. My most favorite thing of all: this bish has money in the bank again.
What are your Friday Faves? Join the revival!

Remedies for desert dry skin

Before I thoroughly disgust you with my alligator skin tales, I want to announce the official return of FRIDAY FAVORITES this week! I would love for anyone who would like to help "celebrate" the return of Friday Faves to link-up and share your faves from the week (or past few weeks if you've been Fri Faves MIA like me).

Moving right along ...


Imagine my disgust when I looked down at my feet last week after a long day at work and saw skin only suitable for a reptile. To say I was horrified is an understatement and I could not get my scaly self to the Target lotion aisle fast enough.

You see, I rarely wore or needed lotion in Dallas because of the climate. I just used my favorite moisturizing body wash at night and did not look like I slathered my legs in baby powder by morn. Le sigh ... Those were the days.

Lately, however, my scaly skin and lips have been completely parched on the reg. I'm obviously not OK with this reality so I turned where any serious researcher would turn: the Internet. Now, I know a lot of you obviously don't live in the desert, but since winter is right around the corner for all of us, I thought I would share some of the dry skin remedies I found.

1. Refrain from showering with really hot water and lotion up immediately after you get out of the shower while skin is still damp to lock in moisture. Who knew?

Currently loving the feel and scent of Dove Cream Oil Intensive Body Lotion

True Life: what I look like while typing blog posts after working all day. Hash tag not cute.

2. Butter and olive oil ... Huh?

According to a post in the "kichen beautician" series on Lauren Conrad's Beauty Department blog (how clever is that series name btw), a good DIY moisturizer is a mash of 2 tsp of coconut butter and 10 drops of EVOO. She said the butter/oil concoction can be used on dry lips, elbows, knees, etc. a few times a week to combat extra dry skin.

I've never heard of this, but the benefits of coconut butter and EVOO, which you can read about here, sound worth a try.

3. This is a no brainier, but find a good moisturizing lip balm for you lips and make sure you have one everywhere: night stand, purse, desk, etc. I've just recently made sure I had my favorite mint e.o.s. lip balm handy at all times.

4. Last, but not least, apparently I should drink lots of water. I always go through water drinking phases and I really need to get back into the phase where I drink a lot of it. But coffee and diet coke are so good. OKKKKK, fine, pass me the Fiji. FML.

If you live in a dry climate, what are your glowing skin secrets? Do spill.