Pumpkin-Chocolate Chip Muffins

Happy First Day of Fall!

Fall is my absolute favorite season, so to celebrate I had to make some pumpkin goodness :) Found the recipe from Good Housekeeping and made some small adjustment! Hope you enjoy them and happy fall!!

1 cup light brown sugar

2 large egg whites

1 cup pure pumpkin (not pumpkin pie mix)

1/4 cup apple sauce

1 mashed banana

1/3 cup vanilla greek yogurt

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 cup all-purpose flour

3/4 cup whole wheat flour

1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg (or pumpkin pie spice)

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 cup chocolate chips (and some for topping)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Spray pan with non-stick spray.

In large bowl, with wire whisk, combine brown sugar and egg whites. Add pumpkin, oil, yogurt, and vanilla extract and mashed banana; stir to combine.

In medium bowl, combine all-purpose flour, whole wheat flour, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, baking soda, and salt. 

Add flour mixture to pumpkin mixture; stir until just combined. Do not overmix.

Pour batter into prepared pan. Bake muffins 15 minutes (45 to 50 minutes for a bread loaf). Cool in pan 10 minutes.

I used cupcake liners, but they stuck to the muffins... so don't use them :)

Easy and Fit French Toast

Tuesday was pouring down rain so I decided to cuddle up with a book before class. In that book, they made french toast and it reminded me how my mom used to make french toast forever ago, and I couldn't even remember the last time I ate it. I didn't even remember how to make it... so, obviously I had to change that!

I used Nature's Own whole grain bread slices (4 at 50 cal each)

1/2 cup vanilla almond milk

1 egg white

2 teaspoons cinnamon

I topped mine with half of a banana, some powdered sugar, and light syrup. 

Whisk almond milk, cinnamon, and egg white into a 9x9 pan. Place 2 bread slices into liquid and dip both sides for about 10 seconds. Let excess liquid drip before placing it on a heated skillet. Skillet should be on medium-high heat and allow each side to cook for about 2 minutes. Repeat steps for last 2 slices, top with fruit or syrup (maybe even Greek yogurt?), and enjoy!

 I'm obsessed with anything green tea so Greenberry's green tea bubble tea is so perfect for me! I went last week and they were out of bubbles! Rude. Anyways, I went back this weekend and got my bubble tea and it was amazing...just thought I'd share my little study treat with you all :)

Frozen S'mores Pie

Hey all! I've really missed posting to my blog and I'm SO happy to finally have some time to put up a post! Trying to move into my apartment and starting new classes I have been swamped. The days have been getting chillier and chillier and although I love autumn, I thought the perfect was to kiss summer good-bye is with a frozen S'mores pie.

Here's what you'll need:

-Graham crackers

-Mini marshmallows

-Chocolate chips

-Your favorite ice cream

Instead of making graham cracker crust, I just laid out whole graham cracker halves to cover the bottom of the pan (it would work great in a square pan!) Next sprinkle a layer of marshmallows and then a layer of chocolate chips and pop them in the oven or into the microwave until the marshmallows start to puff up or brown. 

YUM!

While it's cooling, take your ice cream out of the freezer to let it thaw. Once it's soft enough, use a spatula and scoop a layer of ice cream over the chocolate chips and marshmallows. Cover with foil and let it set in the freezer for a few hours. Cut, serve, and enjoy!

I also thought I would include these adorable turtle cupcakes that a friend made for a meeting. She made vanilla cupcakes with vanilla icing and sour watermelon slices, life savor gummies, Dots, and candy eyes she found in the baking aisle. Cute and delicious! Thanks Jessie!

DIY Pallet Shelf

 Hey everyone! I'm super excited to post this because I've been working on this pallet shelf for quite some time now and it's finally complete! We started with a plain pallet board and turned it into two shelves and shelf for books.

It took alot of nail removal and sawing to get from this to this....

Stained pallets and Parker's finished pallet with hooks...

After the stain was put on, I realized I really didn't like the color. It was perfect for Parker but too guy-ish for my style. I played around with just leaving it or sanding it down but then I found a tutorial on how to distress painted wood here. I painted them white and distressed it using coarse sand paper and a little bit of steel wool.

Happy with the color and distressing, I went along and started to decorate the pallet. I bought four hooks to hang mason jar lights with at Lowe's for $1.18.

I used wire to hang the jars. They all weren't the same size but I liked how they looked more vintage!

Closer look at the distress/antiqued wood

Now all that's left to do is hang it in my apartment!

Apartment Ideas

I will be moving into my first apartment at the end of August and I'm super excited to finally put all my ideas into place (hopefully they will all come together). My walls are white and I don't plan on painting them to save myself of having to paint them back white when I move out. I need to find lots of ways to brighten up the small space with pops of color. 

I'd love you put some twinkly lights with some lanterns or tissue flowers

Due to the lack of space, I'm going to need lots of practical storage options. I have a bookshelf that will help open up some space storing books, etc. but I'm still looking for ideas on how to upgrade the plain light brown wood. These are some storage ideas for the walls and the shelves:

Now for the curtains... I have a fairly large closet but the closet door is massive. When the door is open, you can hardly walk in the room. So to fix this problem I'm taking down the door, storing it under the bed, and putting up curtains to hide the mess of clothes. Because this curtain is more textured I'm not sure what curtains I should do over the windows... hmm, any ideas?

These are the curtains I bought

This was my inspiration

I also don't have a headboard so to add some decoration above my bed, I'm going to hang (very securely!) a pallet shelf. I've already made it and painted it.. but that's going to be it's own post! On the bottom I'm going to hang mason jars and place candles in them for some light. I'm going to distress the painted pallet and maybe add some vintage-looking knobs to hang the lights from.

For the bathroom my roommate and I were considering a nautical theme. Here are some ideas were playing with (but in our own patterns and colors, of course!) 

And last but not least, some kitchen ideas. 

Polka dot plates!

which I will be monogramming, of course

Please comment with any ideas or suggestions for color schemes or storage options or just anything really! Hope you enjoyed some of my apartment ideas :)