Picnic Cookies

We brought these to my cousin's grad party a few weeks ago.  They are really oatmeal-peanut butter-chocolate chip cookies, but it's easier to just say Picnic Cookies.  We reduced the original amount of butter and sugar and used organic eggs and flour, so they're about as healthy as granola bars.  

Preheat oven to 350.

1 cup butter, softened

2 T. canola oil

1 cup natural peanut butter

1 cup granulated sugar

1 cup brown sugar

3 eggs

2 teaspoons vanilla

In a very large mixing bowl, beat together above ingredients until smooth, about 2-3 minutes.

To the above, add:

2 cups flour, preferably organic

3 1/4 cups rolled oats

3 T. unsweetened cocoa powder

1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda

  

Slowly pour the dry ingredients into the butter mixture.  Blend in mixer, but do not over mix.

Stir in 2 cups semisweet chocolate pieces.

Drop dough onto parchment paper-lined cookie sheets.  I use a big cookie scoop.

Bake about 14 minutes, less for smaller cookies.

The Best Shower Curtain Ever

The new shower curtain against fresh green walls.

My daughter has finished painting her bathroom.  Oh, it is so much brighter now.  I thought, from the picture in House Beautiful, that "Rainforest Dew" was a rich cream.  My daughter kept saying how much she wanted green.  We went to Benjamin Moore and got the sample and it was......green.  The lightest, freshest green.  I spent my childhood in the rainforest, and I remember faint sunlight filtering through the tops of giant trees.  I don't remember this pale celery color, or much dew for that matter.  But it's a name I can remember.

This is my favorite new thing in the room.  I kept yammering about the ruffled shower curtains at Anthropologie, so we looked them up.  They are $118.  More for the long curtains. So my girl and I went to the fabric outlet store and found these linen fabrics.  Each ruffle took 1/2 yard of fabric, cut in half lengthwise, hemmed, and ruffled.  She did all the work.  (I am 9 months pregnant!  Of course she did all the work!)  It was her idea to make the ruffles deeper, and out of 3 different fabrics.  The top is a tiny stripe, the middle is solid white, and the bottom one is wide stripes.

The first ruffle, sewn onto our shower curtain, which is a cotton twin sheet 

with grommets pounded into the top.

This is the best way to get a really long curtain.

 

She sewed each ruffle so the seam was hidden.

 

This picture shows how long the curtain is, 

also the cool antique cabinet and old card catalog drawer.  

The cheapest thing in the room is this 25 cent IKEA clock.  

I love unusual vases, this one is hand-blown and filled with our first garden flowers.

Getting this little bathroom finished was the last thing on that to-do list from my last post.  As I write this, I have 3 half-days of work left.  My husband is upstairs, singing a love song he wrote for me.  My son is in the next room, studying for the MCAT.  My baby is kicking and squirming.  Life feels sort of simple, sort of complicated.  I try to remain in a place of gratitude. And because of my constant craving for beauty and order, I feel.....happy.....when a project like this is done.