Oatmeal Bites

Just like my Oatmeal Pancakes, I have been looking for more ways to eat lots of oatmeal, even when it's so hot! These are great for breakfast, dessert, or a 3 a.m. snack. They don't need refrigeration, but I think they're extra delicious that way. These are a good example of something that you can make to suit your mood: When I really want something healthy, I use oatmeal in the place of the coconut flakes and substitute all raisins instead of half raisins and half chocolate chips. On other days, I use these to indulge my sweet tooth and eat the recipe as written.

These are so easy -- just stir, scoop, and refrigerate for 20 minutes. Notice they require no cooking or baking, so I have made them countless times over the summer.

Revel Bars

I wanted to make some of those cookie bars with sweetened condensed milk and chocolate chips on top, but all the recipes online suggested I use a graham cracker crust. My husband is not a fan of the graham cracker crust, so I decided to improvise. 

Pie Crust in a Food Processor

Pumpkin Pie

When I was a kid and lived in Tucson, we always celebrated my July birthday with my grandma, whose birthday is just a few days before mine.

One year when I was probably 9, my grandma called and said, "Your mom is making me a cake. Is there a special dessert that isn't cake that you want for your birthday?"

I told her I wanted pumpkin pie. Some adults would have told the 9-year-old that you don't eat pumpkin pie in July, and to pick something else. I'm lucky the adults in my family all thought it was a great idea. I still have pumpkin pie for my birthday every year.

Glazed Applesauce Cookies

These sweet apple cookies with raisins are always fun to take to friends and events.

Simple Miniature Cheesecakes

These delicious treats are great for a summer day, and they don't heat up your kitchen at all! These cheesecakes were great when we had some missionaries from our church over for dinner. It was fun to let everyone put on whatever toppings they chose. My favorite was raspberry jam with chocolate chips.
Because it takes no cooking or baking, this would be a great recipe to let kids make. I imagine most 8-year-old kids could manage this with a little supervision.

Perfect Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

My mother always made huge batches of oatmeal chocolate chip cookies when I was little. She'd make quadruple this recipe. Now you're wondering why this post is on oatmeal raisin cookies when I am remembering oatmeal chocolate chip cookies: my husband likes regular cookies to have chocolate chips and his oatmeal cookies to have raisins in them. He has an explanation about textures: oatmeal cookies are chewy just like raisins, while chocolate chip cookies are smooth just like cookies without oatmeal.
Personally, I love these cookies with either chocolate chips or raisins. It's an old family recipe.

Date Night Reese's Bar

Something about chocolate is just romantic, especially since this easy recipe only makes 4 servings.

Chocolate Chip Cookies with Soft Caramel Topping

I love caramel, but I hate it when it gets stuck in my teeth. I saw a recipe for chocolate chip cookies with caramel that has the store bought caramels. I wondered if there was another way.
This recipe starts with basic chocolate chip cookies. After they come out of the oven, top with easy-to-make caramel with basic ingredients--brown sugar, butter, and marshmallows.

Hermits--Molasses Cookies with Raisins

This exact recipe originated over 100 years ago.

I didn't know what a hermit was until I found this recipe in a very old cook book, which had been put online as a part of Project Gutenberg. I downloaded Things Mother Used to Make by Lydia Maria Gurney here.

Hermits are molasses cookies with chopped raisins in them. I have a favorite molasses cookie recipe, but never thought to add raisins. What a great idea!

It was also so fun to look at a cookbook from someone who lived in a very different world than I did.

Mint Smoothie

My Pinterest feed is green. Everyone is excited to celebrate Saint Patrick's Day and look forward to the coming of spring!

I decided to call this a smoothie, though it was so thick I actually ate it with a spoon, and I don't usually put chocolate in my smoothies!

But being filled with healthier ingredients, including spinach, I decided smoothie was the best label.

Easy No-Sugar-Added Cinnamon Applesauce

Chunky-style applesauce

Applesauce sometimes get a bad rap--it's too processed, it has too much sugar. Personally, I think making it yourself is the perfect solution, especially if you have another problem: that you have some soft or bruised apples around the house. It's actually a healthy, easy choice!

Coconut Fudge No Bake Cookies

My mom always made no bake cookies growing up. In fact, they're one of my dad's favorites to this day. Sometimes when my siblings and I were teens and needed our dad to help us fix something or give us a ride, we'd use no bake cookies to sweeten the deal.
Last Father's Day I even combined his love of no bake cookies with coconut, which is this recipe.
This recipe is also friendly to those with milk allergies! The chocolate taste is so strong, I've never known anyone to notice when I sub milk free ingredients.

Banana Spice Smoothie

This smoothie is delicious with lots of flavor, but no added sugar. It gets its sweetness from the banana in it.

It's also great for an upset stomach. The ginger and cinnamon are natural remedies to help with stomach issues and bananas are naturally easy on the stomach.

Cherry Lime Cupcakes

My affinity for pudding helped me brainstorm these lovely cupcakes. The frosting is lime, there are cherries in the batter, and they are filled with cherry pudding.
Since I made them for a get together that began at 10 a.m., I used some short cuts to make things easier.