You need:

3 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 cups white sugar (for crust)

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup butter or margarine

4 eggs

1 1/2 cups light corn syrup

1 1/2 cups white sugar (for filling)

3 Tablespoons melted butter

1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

2 1/2 cups chopped pecans

1 cup melted chocolate chips

Preheat your oven to 350 and lightly grease a 10×15 jelly roll pan.

In a large bowl, stir together flour, 1/2 cup sugar, and teaspoon of salt.  Cut in 1 cup of butter with a pastry blender until the mix resembles coarse crumbs.  You could also use a food processor.

Sprinkle the mix evenly over your jelly roll pan and press to pack contents firmly.  Bake for 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, prepare the filling by mixing eggs, corn syrup, 1 1/2 cups of sugar, melted butter, and vanilla until smooth.

Stir in pecans and melted chocolate.  Pour over the prepared crust as soon as it it comes out of the oven.  Using a spatula, spread evenly taking care not to let pecans congragate in one area.  Bake for 35 minutes or until set. (check with a tooth pick)  This will take longer in some ovens.  Allow to cool completely before cutting into bars.  Enjoy with a glass of cold milk!

With all this rain, I decided it would be a great time to capture water droplets.  It was windy and cool.  I really needed to spend time on this and with a tripod.  I was cold and decided to handhold.  It is good enough, but I think I will revisit this after a warmer rainy day.

Using my Valentine’s bouquet, I went for a macro of the center of one rose.   I even did a few shots in which I sprayed the roses with water to try water droplets.  However, they ended up looking a bit like fake roses with glue water droplets! Know what I mean?

I think I like the softness of the baby’s breath better than the rose.

I borrowed a few gumballs from my kiddos stash.   I like the colors.

And now the fun tidbit!  I mentioned in this post that I didn’t think I was much of a food photographer…still don’t actually.   As I thought about that statement, I wondered why I was so quick to dismiss myself as a food photographer.   It is something I could work on like anything else.  So, on a total lark, I decided to make our favorite batch of cookies, and stage a food shoot.  I took a few different shots and decided to submit one to foodgawker just to see.  My image got accepted in just a few hours! I was shocked!  I had heard that it was a little tough to get approval.  So, I have one little lonely image in my gallery.  You can check it out at the foodgawker button on the right.  Feel free to like it or pin it, if it is something you would like to try!  I feel encouraged to try a little more of this.  This image is one of my cast offs, but I thought I would spare a 3rd showing of the accepted one.   And because of this, I got sidetracked leaving me a couple images short this week.

1. Love

Love in play doh tools.  Too bad the o only came in blue.

2. Duplicated

My cookies are duplicates of each other.  This prompt was multipurpose in getting my prompt filled, working on food photography, and most importantly in eating them!

3. Trending

My trends are my kid’s trends.  These are Star Wars “Squinkies”.  Actually, I think these are off brand “squinkies”.  These are a trend to collect.

4. Paper

Paper Valentine’s Doilies.

5. Plastic

These Somuku tiles are from my archives.  I just realized I was counting Love as both Love and Plastic.  These Somuku tiles will have to do, but I’m not sure they are indeed plastic. Oops!

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees.

You’ll need:

1 cup of soften butter

1 cup of white sugar

1 cup of packed brown sugar

2 eggs

1 teaspoon of vanilla

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 1/2 cups rolled oats

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

2 cups chocolate chips…we prefer dark chocolate chips

1 cup Heath bit o brickle toffee chips

To make:

Blend the butter, sugars, eggs, and vanilla together until creamy and smooth.

Gradually add the flour, one cup at a time, until incorporated.

Continue mixing and add the salt, baking powder and baking soda.

The next few ingredients should be folded in by hand.  Fold in the rolled oats until well incorporated.

Fold in the chocolate chips and toffee.

Drop dough by teaspoonfuls onto an ungreased cookie sheet 2 inches apart.  Bake 10-12 minutes.  Cool on a wire rack.

This recipe makes well over 3 dozen cookies.  We usually make a dozen or two and freeze the remaining dough for later.  You can roll the extra dough into small balls and freeze between sheets of plastic wrap and store in a large plastic container.   Set frozen dough out for a 10 minutes and bake as usual.

Our first stop was the newly restored court house.  It has been under reconstruction for the 4 years we have lived here.  We were able to tour the courtroom which has been restored to its original 1904 look.  We briefly played a little Matlock southern lawyer scenes.

Lunch lead us next to the iconic Redneck Gourmet.  I have mentioned it on this blog several times.   I love their Reubens.

Cute, isn’t he?

Well, this one is for sure.

Next we decided to go antiquing.   The town has many antique shops.  I found places that sell vintage milk bottles like I have pinned on Pinterest! I bought one, but I asked one vendor to try to find more like that one for me.   There are always things I’d like to have and some things that are well…interesting.

I do kind of like these salt and pepper shakers.

We wrapped up the afternoon with a quick stop by the toffee shop to say hello to aquaintances and get a little toffee.   It was nice to get out before the soaking of the next two days sets in.