Maybe the Creator's of Zombieland were right...

There have been two articles recently that have stuck out like a sore thumb to me. 

An individual from Texas has started an online petition to secede from the union.  While this really is not new news, I mean pretty much every time an election finishes, someone starts one of these petitions because they are unhappy with the outcome of it, but this time they actually got enough 'signatures' to get a response from the White House.  I believe that the actual limit is somewhere around 25,000 signatures within 30 days is needed to get their official response.  Even then, I believe they can opt out of responding if they wanted, I mean, they are the government.  This whole situation completely reminds me of the Family Guy episode where Peter starts his own country and calls it Petoria.

I wonder what they would call Texas if they started their own nation? 

 

At this point, It looks like Texas has over 100,000 signatures.  While this sounds like a lot it's only approximately .4% of their population.  In fact, their petition is starting to look a little silly as Austin and El Paso have both put in petitions that they would like to stay part of the US.  I seriously am doubting the validity of any single state seceding from the Union.  It didn't end well for Petoria, so I have my doubts of it ending well for any other single state. 

 

This other issue, in my mind, is of utmost importance.  It appears as if the creators of Zombieland had it right when they showed Tallahassee not finding that little succulent creme filled yellow sponge cake we know as a Twinkie. 

 

 

According to the headlines recently, Hostess will be filing for bankruptcy.

 

 

What exactly does this mean?  Well besides the fact that over 18,500 employees will be losing their jobs, the people who make not only twinkies, but also Ho Ho's, Ding Dongs, Snowballs and Cupcakes will no longer be doing just that.

 

If they were right about the Twinkies, what else were the creator's of Zombieland right about? 

 

 

Sources: 

1.  http://www.inquisitr.com/401979/texas-secession-petition-surpasses-100000-signatures/

2.  http://money.msn.com/top-stocks/post.aspx?post=6d7b095e-e558-4dc4-83e9-1859d177e676&ocid=ansmony11



Menu Plan Monday 11/12 to 11/18

 

Hello, and Happy Monday!  This past week has felt like it has been incredibly busy.  Looking back, it really doesn't sound like I had a lot going on, but it sure felt like it. 

Work has been super busy lately, just with the normal shuffle of the new month as well as people being on vacation, things have gotten just crazy.  Home has been busy too, just with trying to keep up with everything with the kids, the hubby, and just trying to keep it together.

Last week Ashton had his first grade nursery rhymes musical.  It was so adorable.  He sure makes me proud of him.  I also got some exciting news about my brother's wedding, you can read about that here.  And last but not least, I actual tried another craft that I pinned on pinterest (I know, amazing, since normally I just pin stuff and never follow through on it).  I didn't get any pictures of it, but if I get a chance, I'll do another of this particular pinterest craft to post here later this week hopefully. *crossing my fingers*

Anyways, here's what's happening for our evening meals this week:

Monday

Chicken Fried Steak

Mashed Potatoes

Veggies

 

Tuesday

Leftovers

 

Wednesday

Spaghetti w/ Meatballs

Salad

Garlic Bread

 

Thursday

Mac N' Cheese with Hamburger

Veggies

 

Friday

Meatloaf

Rice

Veggies

 

Saturday

Tuna Helper

Veggies

Biscuits

(Unless I find a recipe I want to test before Saturday)

 

Sunday

Chicken Bacon Roll ups

Noodles

Veggies

 

So what's your family having for dinner?  Have you found any new recipes that are keepers lately?

 

As always, linking this up over at Lara's Menu Plan Monday. 

 

Happy Menu Planning!



Chocolate Chip Donuts with Peanut Butter Glaze

I recently came across this recipe both on Pinterest and Strut Your Stuff Saturday for Chocolate Chip Donuts with Peanut Butter Glaze.  Since I saw this recipe, I have been thinking about making them pretty much constantly.  It has been a constant buzzing in the back of my mind for probably a good solid two weeks.

So this weekend, I broke down, went out and bought a donut pan, and actually made them.  I have to say that normally I am completely happy with the Pinterest recipes I've tried, I was a little disappointed in this one.

I should clarify that my disappointment was not in the donut.  The donut was delicious.  I was letdown by the peanut butter glaze.  I'm not sure if I missed a step in the whole process of making it, or if it turned out how it was suppose to and just wasn't as tasty as I thought it should be?  Who really knows.  I think I may be trying the glaze again to see if it comes out differently, especially since my glaze looked nothing like the one in the picture at A Kitchen Addiction's blog, where I got the recipe.

While I was a little dissatisfied with my results, the kids were very pleased.  They both thought they were very tasty, and Sydney loved decorating them.  She thought it was pretty fun to dump the sprinkles on them.

 

Ashton's exact words were that they were good, good enough to have again, but that he likes the store ones better. 

That being said, I think that there is room for improvement, although I'm thinking I may just need to practice up and try getting my glaze on again.

Any who, here is the recipe for these little guys, just in case you want to give it a go. 

Peanut Butter Glazed Chocolate Chip Donuts
From A Kitchen Addiction's Blog
Makes 6 donuts (per A Kitchen Addiction, the recipe doubles well)

For the donuts

1 cup all purpose flour
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 cup milk
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 egg
1/4 cup chocolate chips (I used mini chocolate chips in mine)

Glaze
1/4 cup sugar
2 Tbs. butter
2 Tbs. milk
1/2 cup powdered sugar
2 Tbs. creamy peanut butter

Directions

Preheat oven to 350. Lightly spray donut pan with non-stick cooking spray.

In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Stir in milk, vanilla, and egg until well-combined. (I ended up using slightly more milk than was called for, the batter was too dry at first)  Stir in chocolate chips.

Transfer batter to a pastry bag or gallon-sized bag with the tip snipped off. Fill donut cavities about 2/3 full.

Bake for 8-10 minutes or until donuts just start to turn light golden brown. Do not over bake.  Remove donuts to wire rack to cool.

To prepare glaze, melt together butter and sugar over medium heat. Bring to a boil, stirring constantly. Boil for 2 minutes. Add milk and boil for another 2 minutes. Be sure to continue stirring.

Turn heat to low and stir in confectioner’s sugar and peanut butter until smooth. Keep over low heat while glazing donuts to prevent glaze from hardening.

Allow glaze to cool before serving.   Store leftovers in an airtight container.

Enjoy.

A Star is Born, the Musical Debut

I feel like my children are growing up too fast.  It was only four short years ago my daughter was just born.  My son was still in diapers.  I still had bottles in the cupboard and binkies in every room of the house.  Those days are long gone now.

My daughter is in preschool.  My son is in first grade.  While I miss the good ole' days of them being completely dependent on my for pretty much everything, ranging from me feeding their faces to wiping their tushes, I am so proud of the bright little people they are becoming.  They both have such amazing futures ahead of them.

This last Thursday, my son's first grade class put on a musical for the parents.  They've been studying nursery rhymes, so the music teacher put the nursery rhymes to music and added some dance motions to it. 

It was pretty spectacular.

Afterwards to celebrate Ashton's musical debut, we hit Dairy Queen.  They both celebrated Ashton's performace with a healthy dose of ice cream.

 

Watch out world, the Diaz kids are coming.

Walking on Sunshine

Have you ever had one of those day where everything has just fallen into place?  Things have just gone so well that you check to see if you are really still awake?  I have felt like I was walking on sunshine today.  That is how today has gone for me. 

 

I started off the day by walking into my office to a Quad Venti Nonfat No Whip Caramel Brulee latte.  This drink is absolutely magical.  I think it may be the unicorn horn sprinkled on top, or something, otherwise I don't know how it could possible taste so delicious.  Who knows.  All I know is that I love starting my day off to some great coffee, especially when it's brought by a co-worker who just wanted to brighten my day!  It worked.

 

After I had woken up a bit and gotten some work done, I began thinking about the fact that Thanksgiving is just around the corner... Not too much longer until the bird will be cooking!  We always end up cooking at our house and inviting family over.  It seems to work better since then the kids aren't thrashing a house that is not their own while they are waiting for the food to be done.  I decided I better get to it and check to see what my brother and his fiance's plans were, since we hadn't talked about Thanksgiving yet with them.

After getting the Thanksgiving talk out of the way with my future sister Tricia, she started to talk about how the wedding stuff was coming along.  They are having their nuptials next October, so there is still a bit of time for planning, but I enjoy hearing about their wedding.  It is going to be truly amazing.

Anyways, the subject came around specifically to the catering portion of the wedding.  This part of weddings is always a bit spendy, so it's been one they have been thinking about for a bit.  I don't want to ruin any secret plans for anyone who may be going to the wedding so I'm not going to go into detail, but of course since food was mentioned, so was the desserts.

I am so excited about the dessert portion of their wedding!  Tricia and Dan have asked me to do their cake!  I cannot even express how excited and honored I am for this.  My baby brother and his fiance want ME to do their dessert for their WEDDING DAY, which is only one of the most memorable days of their lives.  I am completely on cloud nine!

 

I absolutely love baking.  It is so satisfying to make something that not only tastes delicious, but that is also visually appealing.  So when they asked me to do their desserts, of course I agreed!

 

(see below for some of my previous creations)

 

 

 

The whole dessert news had me floating through the rest of the day.

 

The final cherry on top of this great day was the raffle we had at work.  The administration department at my work has been doing a fundraising drive for the United Way.  Today was sort of the last Hoo Hah for it.  They were having a cookie social, a 50/50 raffle drawing, and a raffle drawing for a designated parking spot. 

 

The raffle for the designated parking spot was for any spot in the parking lot that the winner wants, excluding of course the handicap spots.  I purchased exactly one ticket for both raffles.

 

And guess what!?!? I won the designated parking spot.

 

I was completely surprised!  I only bought one measly ticket, and out of all the many tickets I sold, I won!!! 

 

It has been amazing day! 

The Ham on the Vending Machine

One day, quite some time ago, while I was still in high school in fact, I was standing in front of the vending machines with two friends, Laura and Stefanie.  We were perusing the wide selection of chocolate covered corn syrup confections when a boy suddenly burst from the cafeteria, slapped an oval shaped piece of sandwich ham (not to be confused with spiral ham or ham steak ham) on the vending machine and ran off.

The ham stuck.

I laughed uncontrollably.  I laughed so hard that I thought I may pee myself.  And then the ham slowly peeled off the machine, as if in slow motion, and fell onto the ground.

This naturally caused me to continue to laugh hysterically.  I had to sit down because I was laughing so hard.

I'm not sure why I found the ham being slapped onto a vending machine quite so funny.  Laura and Stefanie really didn't think it was nearly as funny as I did.

Olan Rogers tells stories that are pretty amusing.  He is the Master Commander.  And unlike the ham on the vending machine, his story is actually pretty hilarious. 

Check it out.

Cheesy Chicken Tacos

I first was introduced to these delicious little rolls of flour, chicken, and cheese goodness over 12 years ago at my best friends house.  It was late evening and we both had some seriously voracious appetites.  We looked through the cupboards and settled on these cheesy chicken tacos. 

To this day, I still make this delicious meal for my family.  My kids and my husband all love it.  A good friend, April, even said she almost always cooks her diced chicken this way now since it is so scrumptious. 

The first step to preparing the tacos is to dice up some chicken.  I like to use chunks, but if you prefer to julienne your chicken, so be it.

Once this chicken is all sliced and ready to be cooked, toss it into a skillet with a generous squirt of Italian dressing.

 

 

Cook the chicken until it is cooked all the way through and the Italian dressing has cooked down.

 

 

Meanwhile, while the chicken is cooking, in a small saucepan combine a can of cheddar cheese soup and half a jar of salsa.

 

Mix until the cheese soup and salsa are combined and then keep on the burner until hot all the way through.

Once the cheesy salsa is hot and the chicken is cooked, serve up the tacos.  I like to put just the chicken, cheese, and cheesy salsa... no veggies on this taco.

The kids on the other hand eat the tacos with just the chicken and cheese... They can't handle the salsa; but they love the chicken and cheese by itself on the tortilla.

 

However you make your taco, we sure hope your family enjoys these delicious morsels as much as we do!  ☺

 

(Linking this up over at Mandatory Mooch's Tasty Thursday!  Check it out, I'm featured this week!)

No Shirt, No Shoes...

Have any of you readers (the one or two that tune in regularly) ever been to summer camp?  As a child, there were several summers that I went to a camp with the youth group from my church.  I absolutely loved summer camp at Camp Wooten.  We would spend a whole week in cabins, away from home, with a group of people who really knew how to have a good time.  I remember we would go on hikes, there was rafting, play competitive games, etc.  (For those of you who actually know me, I know this sounds completely backwards as I shun the outdoors now, but at one time, I really enjoyed them.  I know, crazy how that works out huh?!?)

Today I decided to tell a story that may or may not cause my ears to turn a bright red from embarrassment and/or shame. I seriously have enough of these embarrassing stories to literally fill a room in the Department of Mysteries at the Ministry of Magic.  It's sort of hard to believe how awkward and gawky I am sometimes.  Unfortunately, every word of this story is true.  As you've probably guessed by the little intro above, this embarrassing story comes from my summer camp days.

 

This particular incident happened when I was probably 11, maybe 12.  I had been at Camp Wooten for maybe a few days.  Normally at camp, we all would be assigned different activities based on our cabin number.  We would stick to our cabins with the cabin head so that all the kids at camp got to enjoy all of the activities available at the camp.

My cabin had just returned from either swimming or rafting, I can't exactly remember which (give me a break, it was over 10 years ago).  Regardless of which activity we really had come from, we all needed to change into clean clothes before we headed to the chapel.

The chapel was where the whole camp gathered to do basically our youth group meetings.  This was, as I said, an activity that the whole ENTIRE camp attended together, no stragglers.

As we were changing in our cabin, we were chit chatting about whatever pre-pubescent girls talk about, I don't know, maybe barbie dolls or how our tomagachi's were doing.  That sort of thing.

On a side note, for those who don't know what a tomagachi was, it was a key chain sized digital pet.  As the tomogachi owner, you were responsible for feeding this little digital blob, playing with it, and cleaning up it's electronic fecal matter.  If you didn't, feed it, or play with the little creature, it died.  If you did play/feed/clean up fecal matter, the little blob grew into a bigger blob that had appendages.  After awhile, even with good care, the tomgatchi died, and then you got to start the whole process over again.  It was all the rage back in the day.  In fact, I think they are bringing them back, sort of like the Furby is all popular again now.  They even started an anime television show based on them in 2009 I believe.

Anyways, back to the story, we were all getting ready.  After I was all set, I tied my shoes, grabbed my Bible and journal, and I told the gals I would see them there. 

The way the camp was set up, the chapel was on the opposite side of the camp from the cabins.  The cabins were set in the woods area and then the chapel was across the way.  To get the chapel from the cabins, you had to walk across an open field that also housed the bathrooms, and the mess hall.  The open field to the chapel was probably a football field or two long.  It was pretty expansive. 

So there I was going on my merry way to the chapel, probably thinking about all the electronic fecal matter I was going to have to clean up from that damn tomigatchi when I got back from chapel, when the breeze picked up a little.  I realized, brrr, I was a little chilly and thought to myself, "I wish I had worn pants".  If only at that moment I realized how true that sentiment was.

***I stopped in my tracks and looked down in pure awww and horror***

I had forgotten to put on my bottoms!  I immediately spun around and ran as fast as my legs could carry me to my cabin.  I don't think I have ever run as fast as I did that day.  Lucky for me, I suppose, there was no one there when I arrived back at the cabin from my walk/jog of shame. 

Quickly, I pulled on a pair of athletic shorts and then dashed to the chapel to join the rest of the group. 

No one at camp ever mentioned this incident.  To this day, I don't even know if anyone at camp even noticed my running across the open field with nothing but a t-shirt, tennis shoes, underwear, and my Bible. 

Looking back, I wonder how the hell did I forget my pants?  I mean, didn't I notice when I was tying my tennis shoes that I was missing something?  And how is it that no one thought to mention to me as I left that I was forgetting one of the most important things that I needed for chapel.

I suppose they figured I knew, or maybe they thought I had all I needed.  How does that saying go... "No Shirt, No Shoes, No Service."
 

Menu Plan Monday 11/05 - 11/11

Hello, Happy Monday!  And Happy November!  It is hard to believe how quickly this year has flown by.  It seems like just yesterday summer was barely starting and now we are knocking on the door of winter weather.  Insane!!!

So this upcoming week is sorta exciting for me.  My son is going to be in his first musical at school on Thursday!!!! I'm so excited.  I understand he's only in first grade, and that all the first graders are in it, so it's not like he had to audition or anything, but I am so incredibly proud of that boy.  He is so smart and talented.

Ashton's First Spelling Test.... 100%!!!!

Other than that, I'm hoping for smooth sailing.  Things at work have been pretty busy, but busy is good.  Makes things go quicker ☺.  Finishing up the fall yard work has been keeping us busy at home as well as the putting up and taking down of Halloween decorations last week.  Things are going good.

Here's my families menu plan for the week.

Monday

Pulled Chicken Sandwiches

French Fries

Tuesday

Chicken Tacos with Cheesy Salsa

Rice

Beans

Wednesday

Pesto Pasta

Salad

Garlic Bread

Thursday

Leftovers

(Ashton's Musical!!!!!)

Friday

Meatloaf

Mashed Potatoes

Veggies

Saturday

Hamburger Helper

Veggies

Biscuits

Sunday

Enchiladas

Rice

Beans

So what is your family having for dinner this week?  Any new recipes you'll be trying out?  Need more ideas?  If so, check out Laura's Menu Plan Monday.  She hosts Menu Plan Monday and always has some great links to some tasty recipes.



Teaching Thankfulness

With Thanksgiving coming up later this month, I have noticed quite a few people who are posting on their facebook pages daily about what they are thankful for.  I think this is a great idea, it reminds us that while we may have wants* (don't we all), there is so much that we have already that we can be thankful to God for.

One of the hardest things I've come to find around the holidays, particularly Thanksgiving and Easter, is to find ways to teach my children why we celebrate them.

When you think about it, what does a bunny have to do with Christ being risen from the dead?  Or what does a turkey have to do with being thankful to God for what we have been given?

The things that have come to represent these holidays don't always have to do with the actual reasoning behind the holiday, and the separation of the commercialization and truth behind the commercialization doesn't always translate exactly when talking to little ones.  They see the flashy lights and glitter that society has come to associate with the holidays.

In order to attempt to reinforce the idea of Thanksgiving being a celebration of all the things we have to be thankful for, I have decided that for everyday leading up to Thanksgiving, I'll have the kids, on a cut-out of their own hands, write something that they are thankful for.  So far (on Day 4), it seems to have gone pretty well.  Not only have I remembered to do this everyday, but the kids have listed some really great things to be thankful for.

 

Today, Ashton decided to put down that he is thankful for his family.

 

 

Sydney decided that she was thankful for Ashton today (It's nice to see this one in writing, since usually she doesn't act like she is so thankful for him ☺)

 

So far, I've just been basically taping these hands to the wall.  I was thinking it would be neat to put up a paper tree so the hand prints look like leaves, or even turkey bodies so they could be like feathers (although floating turkey bodies may be a little weird, particularly the ones that don't have 'feathers' yet.... it would be like a large plucked bird just staring at you as you walked in the house).

 

Here's how it looks so far:

 

So far this month, Ashton has been thankful for his family, Halloween, Valentine's Day, and his birthday (he's slowly working his way through the holidays).  Sydney has been thankful for Ashton, hugs and kisses, Christmas, and Santa Clause (she also is very thankful for holidays).

So what about your family?  How do you teach the importance and reasoning behind holidays and their celebrations to your kids?  Do you have any special traditions that keep these 'reasons for the season' more prominent than if you didn't practice these traditions?

 

 

Your Own Feet

"I wanted to run away that day.  But you can't run away from your own feet." - Flint Lockwood

For those of you who do not recognize that quote, it is one from the movie "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs."  I absolutely love that movie.  It is one that not only is entertaining, but it also offers some good lessons for life on being who you are, no matter what.

One of my favorite quotes comes from that movie is, "I wanted to run away that day. But you can't run away from your own feet."  I know it doesn't sound like a super meaningful quote, but it is.

The situation that led up to that quote, for those who haven't seen this movie, Flint Lockwood had sprayed his feet with his very clever invention, spray on shoes.  He had been showing them off in school for show and tell.  The kids then laughed at him because, as they pointed out, how was he supposed to get them off?  Flint them runs out in the rain and talks of running away.

The reason why this quote is one that stands out to me is because it reminds me of the responsibility that everyone faces from their own actions and how we all have the obligation to face the consequences.  Whether it is the consequences from spraying your own feet with spray on shoes, or the consequences stemming from some other decision.  We can't run away from our own decisions, because they are our own to own up to.

What are some of your favorite quotes?  Do they come from a movie such as mine?  Why are they meaningful to you?

The Last Meal

Have you ever thought about what it would be like to know that the thing on your plate, you know, the unknown blob that you are forcing your children to eat (or wait is that just me), is the last thing that will pass through your lips and down your throat hole ever?

I know this sounds random, but I was reading up on some blog post ideas/prompts and this is one of the ones that popped up, and I thought it would be interesting to say the least, or a least a good conversation starter.

I've been contemplating this all day.  There are just so many different foods I love that would have a very deserving place in my stomach if it was the last thing to be there.... So I asked a few of my co-workers what their take on it would be.

Here is a list of a few things they would eat:

1.  Chicken Alfredo

2.  Steak

3.  Nachos

4.  Chicken Fried Steak

5.  Salad

6.  Mongolian Noodles

7.  Country Fried Steak
 



While those are all some great ideas, I'm not sure that I would choose those for the last thing I would ever taste.  So I did a little research on inmates and their last meals.  According to The Atlantic Wire, the average calorie count on a last meal is 2,756 calories.  That is a massive number.  They also reported that about 80% of the 247 death row inmates studied ordered meat and two-thirds of them ordered something fried. 

So what would I choose if I was eating my last meal?

I think that I would choose Chicken Cordon Bleu Pasta, with Cheesy Garlic Bread, a salad with that Italian dressing from Olive Garden, and probably Creme Brulee for dessert.  I think also a side of extra crispy bacon.

Ask me in another week and it will probably change... I am forever changing my mind about things, so who knows... Maybe next week it would be pizza or nachos, or chicken curry... who knows.  What I do know, is that whatever my final meal was, if I knew it was my final meal, I would make sure I killed it.  There would be no survivors left on my plate.

So what would you choose for your last meal?

 

Source:  The Atlantic Wire

Bake Sales and Owl Pops

Happy November!  Today is the first day of NaBloPoMo!  To kick off this worthy endeavor, I'm starting out with owl pops.  Are these owl pops completely one of the cutest things you've ever seen?  Well, maybe not cutest ever... but I thought they turned out pretty adorable. 

Tomorrow, my work is having a bake sale to help raise money to support the local chapter of the United Way.  I figured this would be the perfect opportunity to make these adorable little pops, since not only are they fall festive (thus meaning they needed to be made, bake sale or not) , but they will be going to help out a good cause as well. 

When I originally decided to contribute something to the bake sale, I searched high and low on pinterest to find an idea of some sort of fall idea that was unique enough that it wouldn't get lost in the sea of goodies I expect to abound tomorrow at work, but something that was relatively simple as well.  This is when I stumbled across these jewels.  They originally were done by Bakerella in her book, but I found them on Ms. Fox's Sweets.  One look at these, and I was sold.  Owl pops were going to the bake sale.

The first thing I did to get these little guys going was to collect all the ingredients used in them.

I used a box mix of cake and canned frosting, since I didn't want to invest too much time in them in case they turned out hideous.  I also used Dark Chocolate Candy Melts, Reese's pieces, Candy necklaces, chocolate chips, orange sprinkles, and flower sprinkles.

Bake the cake following the directions on the box.  Any homemade recipe would work too if you prefer to not use a box.  Once the cake is baked and cooled, crumble it up until it is just a bowl of fine crumbs (A crummy cake is a good cake).

Then add about 2 tablespoons of frosting to the crummy cake and mix it until the cake forms a sort of dough almost.  Once the cake has reached a dough consistency, it is ready to be formed into the owls.  I used a sort of triangular shape for the owls body/head.  It really doesn't need to be perfect, the candy coating will cover any little lumps or bumps. 

Then add chocolate chips to the top corners of the owl bodies.  These can be 'glued' on with a small amount of melted candy coating.  This will end up being their ears when it is all said and done. Then dip the lollipop stick tips into the melted candy coating and stick them into the owl bodies.  Then refrigerate for a few minutes to help the candy firm up. 

While the owl pops are in the fridge, get out the chocolate candy coating and melt it.  It should be thin with no lumps in it.  When the candy coating is all melted, bring the cake pops out of the fridge.  Using a spoon, carefully pour the chocolate coating over each owl pop until there is a solid coating all around the cake.  Once the cake pop is coated, put in a cake pop stand (Styrofoam or a box with holes in it would work as well) until the candy coating is firm and dry to the touch.

Once the cake pops are dry to the touch, line them up on a cookie sheet.  Using a clean paint brush, dip the wrong side of the brush into the candy coating and use that to glue on the candy necklace pieces (for eyes), the Reese's pieces (wings) the candy sprinkles (the nose), and the flower sprinkles (the feet).

Once all the owls have all of their pieces 'glued' on, let them dry and then package or store them however you plan on keeping them!

I am so excited to bring these to the bake sale; although I'm not sure how I feel about them actually being eaten.  I suppose that is to be their owl fate though.

How about you?  Have you ever tried making cake pops?  How did they turn out?  Have you ever made character/animal cake pops?

 I'd love to see pictures of your baking creations!

Are you new to Angela, Herself?  Feel free to follow me on facebook or by email!
(Linking this up over at Mandatory Mooch's Tasty Thursday, and onto "Your Great Idea" Link up Or So She Says...)