Old School Chocolate Cupcakes

I'm sharing my not so secret family recipe for chocolate cake/cupcakes.
They are dense and rich and full of all kinds of good calories and pretty much the easiest recipe on the planet. Topped with sweet butter cream and you have AMAZING!

Wacky Chocolate Cake
3 cups flour
2 cups sugar
1/2 cup cocoa
1 1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp baking soda
Mix above ingredients, form 3 wells & add:
2 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup CANOLA oil
2 tbsp vinegar
Pour 2 cups cold water over top and mix well.

Pour into a cake dish or cupcake tins and bake at 325-350 - 15 mins for cupcakes, 35 mins for cake (or use the good ol toothpick trick).
Mmmmmmmmmmm!

FRIDAY Favorite!

PEEK A BOO!

A  very popular game at our house!

Tea Party with Grandma!

Oh we do have a lot of fun with visits from Grandparents.
I love my Grandma!

Baby Stormtrooper

Today we had a chance to meet our newest family member, TYSON! AKA Stormtrooper.
Lawna, Mike, and Braiden added another BOY to the family, that makes 3 grandson's for Nama.  No pressure for a girl at all.
Hard to believe they start this small.  He is so tiny and quiet and very cuddly.  Soooooo precious!  Braiden can't wait to teach him all his big boy tricks.
WELCOME BABY TYSON!  We love you.

Eating and poopin all day is hard work ya know!

Andrew isn't too sure what to think.

Proud Uncle D!

Cousin LOVE!

I can't wait until Andrew can play STAR WARS!

Nama & her boys!

Uncle Darcy with Tyson Micheal Darcy Pedde!

Num num num!

Andrew has become a great eater.  So far he hasn't turned his nose up to anything... unlike his Mamma.

MUST reads!

I'm not a huge reader, never have been (mostly because I can't sit still long enough), but I've read and reread two amazing books in the last little while that I have to recommend. They are MUST reads in my opinion. Books that truly make you reflect on the amazing and relatively easy life we have now. They are great to "refer back to" when you need a life check.
If you have a chance to read tuesdays with Morrie & NIGHT you won't be disappointed.  They are quick easy books but the words are amazing in many many ways.
Happy reading....

I love my Grandpa!

It isn't hard to see where Andrew gets his big baby blues...

Wordless Wednesday

My Boys!

So hard to put into words what these smiles mean to me.
Who knew I'd have two kids to take care of seven months ago.

I love my boys!

FRIDAY Favorite!

Andrew had a date with his buddy William today!  They are 9 days apart and it is so fun to see how differently they develop.  SO CUTE!

You want our autographs?

Sooooo, how about those Stampeders?

If you just take this hand and put it like this Will it will be much more effective!

Yes we planned the matching outfits!  NERDS.

Happy Mother's Day!

I hope you had a wonderful day!
If I can be half the Mom mine is I'll have had a huge success with my child.

xoxox
Thanks Mom!

Wordless Wednesday

Farewell PIGLET...

This week Bean had his first signs of a cold.  COUGH COUGH.  Breaks my heart to hear baby coughs.  He was up during the nite more than usual with coughing fits and a few nites we had to prop him up on pillows to help lessen his coughs and let him get some rest, we did this without a swaddle.
I've been working hard to try to get Andrew out of a swaddle and this week I think we may have said farewell to our sweet woombie swaddle, we called him PIGLET.  Andrew LOVED being swaddled to sleep, it changed his sleeping habits overnight and allowed for nice long naps and uninterrupted nites.
www.woombie.com
This is the last picture I took of Andrew sleeping in his PIGLET (we called it PIGLET because it was pink, it is pink because I bought it on sale and it was the only color left - don't judge us!)

zzzzzzzz...

Surprise trip to PHX!

Bean handles all travel documents.

Big boy on the airplane!

Best buds!

Mom is cool!

Andrew loves his soother and jumeroo a LOT!

Grandma's cuddles are the best!

Our good friend Chetra.

Hangin with Auntie B!

Grandma and Bean with bed head

A few shots from our surprise trip in April to see Grandma & Grandpa.  Gotta love palm trees and sunshine!