White Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Cookies

The first holiday my stepmom shared with our family, she made these cookies that were to die for. She's made them year after year, because they're such a big hit!. They're from her mother who was a Home Ec. teacher for many, many years. I don't know where she got the recipe, but I am so very glad she did! They're soft, cake like cookies that are sweet enough to cure your sweet tooth, but not so sweet that you'll go into a sugar coma. You could whip them up in a second with ingredients you have in your pantry, and are definitely a crowd pleaser.

Pumpkin Cookies

1 Cup Shortening
1/2 Cup Brown Sugar
1/2 Cup White Sugar
1 Cup Canned Pumpkin
1 Egg
1 TSP Vanilla
2 Cups All-Purpose Flour
1 TSP Baking Soda
1 TSP Baking Powder
1 TSP Cinnamon
1/2 TSP Salt
1 Cup White Chocolate Chips

Beat the shortening until creamy, gradually add the sugar until the mixture is smooth. Add pumpkin, egg, and vanilla and beat well. Sift together the dry ingredients, and add to the creamed mixture. Stir in the chips and spoon out onto a greased cookie sheet. Bake at 375 for 10-15 minutes, remove from cookie sheet and cool on a rack. Makes about 25-30 cookies. Enjoy!

It's important to always gather your ingredients together. This is called putting together a Misen Place.

I beat the shortening until creamy using my KitchenAid.

Once it was creamy, I added the brown and white sugars and beat that until they were mixed together.

I added the pumpkin, egg, and vanilla. A good trick for the egg, is you crack it in a small bowl first to make sure there won't be any shell shards in your finished product. 

I sifted together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice, and salt in a separate bowl. Once they were sifted i added it in increments to the wet ingredients.

After scraping down the sides to get everything incorporated, I took the bowl off of the mixer and added the chips by hand. I do that so the chips don't get broken up by the mixer's speed.

Scoop the dough onto a parchment or silpat lined cookie sheet. They won't spread much, and will hold whatever shape you put them in.

When you're done they'll look like this!

I hope you'll love these as much as I do! Please link back here if you share this! :)

Rachel

Small Spaces

I don't have a lot of room to work with, decorating wise while I'm in school. It causes me to be a little inventive with how things are able to work together.
Two of these places are my bedside tables. One of them isn't used by me, so it's my temporary vanity. It's where I keep my jewelry boxes, a spare compact, and a couple other odds and ends.

I use vintage scarves to cover my tables to try and liven up my bedroom. 

Fun fact, the bottom jewelry box is completely empty. A couple of days before I found it I had sorted through all of my jewelry and donated what didn't comfortably fit in the top box. 

It gives me an excuse to buy more jewelry though!  

The three trays sitting on top are from my first estate sale where I also found a beautiful mint green tea cup and saucer. They're plaster snack trays from Occupied Japan that are in great shape for their age. The jar (and its matching tissue box) were a gift this past Christmas from my Dad and Step mom that I was able to pick out myself. The compact was found at an antique store, and the cardboard "Kim" doll was from an estate sale where I also found a cute pink and gold glitter bathroom scale. The purple crystal was a gift from my Step dad when we were first introduced, from a national park he used to work at. 

My other bedside table is the one that gets used by me. It has my lamp, the tissue box mentioned earlier, a mirrored lipstick holder slash perfume display I found at a garage sale for a steal that holds my Nyx chap-stick collection. An unmarked stamped glass creamer I found at a Goodwill with fruity candy corn and off to the side is my suitcase and train case both of which I found at a vintage store this past December. 

I love that I am able to collect things that hold memories for me, as I'm sure held memories for the previous owners. I feel so much better knowing that I'm able to give old things a new home where they'll be as used and loved as they were the day they were first bought. 

Rachel

Oh, and I'm linking up this post for a Thrifty & Vintage Finds Link Party!

My Craigslist Finds

I love scouring Craigslist for vintage finds for cheap that would cost an arm and a leg on Etsy. Up until now I was too wary of the horror stories I've heard about Craigslist killers to actually buy anything. About a month ago I decided to suck it up and hope I don't get killed for that perfect MCM piece. My very first purchase was a slightly rusty magazine rack that I knew I could spray paint over and give a new home. It cost me $20 and an hour of getting lost on the other side of the city, but I eventually came home with my new (to me) piece.

 Isn't it beautiful? 

I spray painted it gold, filled it with vintage cookbooks and stuck it next to an arm chair that I have in my room for reading.

Anyway, on to my most recent find. Kromex spun aluminum canister sets. I've seen these for sale on Etsy for close to $100 for incomplete pieces in horrible shape and in the hundreds for perfect sets.
I found a four piece set with Sugar, Flour, Coffee and Tea all with original lids, no rust spots, and only one noticeable dent for $25. It's the perfect design for my cake carrier I got earlier this year too!

The dent is on the Sugar canister

 They nest inside each other for easy storage too!

These are perfect for display on the counter top once they're shined up a bit. All I need to find now are the Cookie and Grease canisters to match, but I'm in no hurry to find them. 

That's it for today. I definitely need some improvement on writing, but i think this could be fun.

Rachel

Getting Started

Okay, well since I was suggested to start a blog years ago I decided to go ahead and see what happens. This will be home to my thrift store finds, recipes I'm trying out and anything else I find interesting or I think will be fun to do. I might post on here regularly, I might not we'll just have to see how this goes.

Rachel