oreo truffles

this weekend, me and carley went on a mini baking spree.
we made chocolate chip cookies (pre made dough though),
orange bars (like lemon bars, but with orange), and delicious
oreo truffles. i've made these so many times because
they're so good and really simple.
there are only three ingredients, oreos, cream cheese, and chocolate.
first you break up oreo cookies into a food processor
and add a block of cream cheese. (i usually do one row of
cookies with 1/3 of the cream cheese at a time because i don't have a
huge food processor) after the two ingredients are very well
mixed, you will have a blob of black dough. refrigerate the dough
until it is firm and not mushy. then roll the dough into bite size
balls and refrigerate again (the warmth of your hands will have
made the dough mushy again). lastly melt some chocolate to coat
the truffles in. you can use a double boiler (or make a double boiler
with two pots) or you can melt chocolate in the microwave with oil
or baking wax and mix well. coat eat ball with chocolate and set on
wax paper. if you want to add sprinkles, nuts, or oreo crumbs,
do it now before the chocolate hardens.
also, you can drizzle white chocolate or melted peanut butter
chips over the balls after the coat of chocolate has hardened.
place the truffles in the freezer or fridge until the chocolate has
hardened and then enjoy! store them in the fridge.
they're so rich and good! :)
(the pictures above aren't mine)

fear

the greatest mistake you can make in life is to

continually be afraid you will make one.

elbert hubbard

to fear love is to fear life, and those who
fear life are already three parts dead.
bertrand russell

courage is not the absence of fear, but rather
the judgment that something else is more important than fear.
ambrose redmoon

the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.
franklin d. roosevelt,
first inaugural address

poor mr. casey

casey got surgery this week and has to wear

a cone around his head for ten days :(
he hates it so much. here are some pictures
from a while back of me and the caseface.
i hope he gets better soon!

snuggling with me

casey kisses!

such a good study buddy :)

yum!

eastern is always trying to make their food options better.
sometimes they actually do and sometimes their ideas fail.
the newest success was a milkshake machine in the eagle's nest cafe.
it is exactly like milkshake machines seen at wawa.
you pick what flavor you want; mint chip, cookies and cream,
vanilla, chocolate, coffee, strawberry, or fruit smoothie.
i documented the first time me and carley got one
because i was so excited. :)
we've gotten them pretty much weekly since then.

you peel off the lid and put the cup inside the mixer machine.
the lids have cute little messages on them.

and while the machine mixes your shake, you watch a little show. :)

the cups have cute little characters on them, too!
carley's mint chip (our current favorite) had a cute cow.

my coffee one had a cute little bean face.


there he is again! :)

heart dissection

a sheep heart that we got to examine before we
dissected the pig heart

jaz, my loyal lab partner with the pig heart.
she made sure that i didn't have to touch the poor heart at all.
:)

the inside of the heart.
you can see the ventricles.

the heart before we cut into it

one tree

“love is a temporary madness; it erupts like volcanoes and then subsides.
and when it subsides you have to make a decision.
you have to work out whether your roots have so entwined together
that it is inconceivable that you should ever part.
because this is what love is. love is not breathlessness,
it is not excitement, it is not the promulgation of eternal passion.
that is just being in love, which any fool can do.
love itself is what is left over when being in love has burned away,
and this is both an art and a fortunate accident.
those that truly love have roots that grow towards each other underground,
and when all the pretty blossoms have fallen from their branches,
they find that they are one tree and not two.”

~louis de bernieres

change.org

FRIDAY DEADLINE: Tell the Maryland legislature to pass crucial legislation to help Maryland trafficking victims. Dear Heather, Two weeks ago, Maryland police entered a Baltimore hotel room to find a 19-year-old woman held against her will and violently forced into prostitution by East Coast pimp Edward Perkins. Who knows how much money Perkins made forcing this teenager to have sex with paying customers, but thanks to a glaring loophole in Maryland law, the victim won't see a dime of it. Some states have "asset forfeiture" laws for human trafficking -- laws that ensure that trafficked women and children see some of the money their captors made by trafficking them. But not Maryland. In this case, an asset forfeiture law would mean that the money Perkins earned from selling his victim on Backpage.com – even if he used it to buy cars, jewelry, or other assets – can be used to help his victims seek counseling, pay legal fees, and find housing. In addition to being left without financial help, the young woman won't have any prostitution convictions removed from her record, despite being a victim of sex trafficking. That's because Maryland doesn't expunge convictions for trafficked people. So in Maryland, traffickers like Perkins keep their ill-gotten money to hire lawyers, and their victims are often left penniless and struggling with undeserved criminal records. Two proposed bills in the Maryland legislature would address these serious issues, and the first committee vote is scheduled for this week -- if it fails, the bills likely won't pass until 2012 at the earliest. HB 418 would allow Maryland to seize the profits from human traffickers and use that money to aid law enforcement and victim service providers, thus removing the financial burden of fighting human trafficking from Maryland taxpayers. SB 327 would allow the courts to order traffickers to pay their victims restitution and reverse commercial sex convictions for all human trafficking victims. Tell the Maryland legislature to pass HB 418 and SB 327 before Friday's vote comes and goes. Victims of trafficking are depending on us: http://www.change.org/petitions/marylanders-please-help-bring-human-trafficking-to-an-end-in-maryland?alert_id=aTMKFNKkTW_PqLQldsJGq&me=aa Thanks for taking action, - Patrick and the Change.org team I get these emails every once and a while to sign petitions and this one made me so angry! I can't believe this isn't a law already, but it's too late to sign the petition now. I just thought I'd make whoever reads this aware!