Strawberry Picking at Waltz Strawberry Patch + Announcing #StrawberryWeek!

HAPPY 4TH OF JULY!

What's more American than strawberry picking, rigggghttt?

My mom is adorable. She was so excited to take me strawberry picking and to then make strawberry jam together. She's adorable. We planned on a day to go strawberry picking and then...the place wasn't open yet (even though they had said they would be). So my mom did some research and found Waltz Strawberry Patch and it worked out wonderfully!

We pulled into this gorgeous farm that had strawberries as far as the eye could see...

We decided to each take a large bucket (I don't remember how much that equaled...a lot) and then we split up and went down our assigned lines of strawberry picking. I was AMAZED at how beautiful these strawberries were!

Before I knew it my bucket was filling up with lush, juicy, red strawberries!

The whole thing was so beautiful and picturesque, it was just crying out to be photographed!

Even with my frequent photo breaks, I managed to fill up my bucket faster than my mom (although some of that may be attributed to the allergy attack I was suffering at the time, and my desire to finish up and get the heck out of the nature lol).

Strawberries are just so pretty!

We were super choosy about which strawberries we picked, because we could be! 

Just look at how perfect they are!

We both filled up our baskets, paid, and headed home.

And I took a strawberry selfie for good measure.

After this awesome day, I made strawberry jam with my mom, and then I took home a bunch more strawberries. Which I proceeded to make things with. And thusly, next week is #StrawberryWeek! I'll be sharing the 3 recipes that were made with the fruits of this day's labors and it'll be sweet, juicy, and pretty-as these strawberries deserve! So come back Monday for the strawberry fun!

Cinnamon Toast Crunch Popcorn-Guest Post with A Zesty Bite

(Side note: Today is mine and Michael's 5 year anniversary!! Yay! <3 <3 <3)

This is it! The final "ahh I'm moving and planning a wedding and need help" guest post! I am so grateful to all the wonderful ladies I had helping me out and am already so behind on making, photographing, and wirint for the blog...so I can only imagine the mess I would be in if it weren't for these posts! Today's post is courtesy of the adorable, talented, wonderful Meagan of A Zesty Bite! I actually guest posted for Meagan a while back, so I was so excited when she said she'd return the favor! Meagan is so incredibly sweet and has the most adorable little toddler (*sob* she's not a babyyyy anymoooore!) She is also probably the only person who ever made me consider moving to Texas (no offense to TX, it seems cool and all!) And her photography skills are amazing, her site is adorbs, and her recipes are all mouthwatering.

Like this one, for instance...

Hi, Cooking Actress readers!  When Kayle contacted me to help out since she would be busy moving and planning a wedding I was absolutely thrilled to help out my friend.  We have never met but I feel like Kayle is a close friend of mine and I would LOVE if she would move to Texas.  For those of you who don't know me my name is Meagan and I'm over at A Zesty Bite.  I'm a stay at home mom to a busy little toddler girl who is 19 months old.  My website consists of easy and delicious meals that anyone can make whether you cook a lot or have never cooked before.  My recipes range from healthy to complete and satisfying comfort food.
I also like to cover travel and lifestyle posts about our busy little family.

Popcorn is my all time favorite snack!  It's quick to make, healthy to eat and just fun to add different flavors to it.  Now you can't go wrong with lightly salted popcorn but this recipe with cinnamon toast crunch will have you craving more.
Totally…..
Now I have to admit that I like plain non-frosted, non-sugary cereal but for this recipe I needed the extra sugar and there was no glass of milk included.  My little one LOVES popcorn just as much as me and I couldn't wait to share this fun afternoon "special" treat with her.

If you have left over popcorn just store it in an air-tight container.

ENJOY ~ Meagan

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Brownies

"Oh and Mike likes decadent desserts like you. Like...brownie sundaes with chocolate and caramel. So if you want to whip up something- that'll prob win him over real quick ;) haha."

So read the text (more or less) that I received from my best friend a couple days before I got to see her for the first time since moving back, and before I'd get to (finally) meet her boyfriend.

Decadent dessert you say, hm?? Brownies, hmmmm?

It was my duty as a BFF to make Alex's Mike (and yes, I realize our boys have the same name. He, however, is Mike. Mine is Michael. Soooo yeah.) cookie dough topped brownies. Like...I had no choice.

So that is what I did. The next day I whipped up these cookie dough topped brownies to give to Mike and Alex. In a way...it was sort of the best thing I could have made. You see...Alex and Mike have been together for like...4 years-ish. And I just now finally met him. And...you see...these brownies? One of the first blogger recipes that I bookmarked. Probably a similar amount of time ago. And I just now made them.

Kismet.

Decadence was asked for and decadence was delivered!

The brownie base is really rich and dense-so delicious. And then you top it with an eggless cookie dough?

So rich and so decadent...you really only need a tiny piece (and that's coming from me!)

I also gave some of these darlings to Michael's co-workers. It's like I'm the Mother Theresa of cookie dough brownies*. Apparently they made such an impact that they're still talking about how "Michael's 'wife' makes the best brownies!" ohhhh yeah.

*(that seems sacrilegious or some such...I apologize)

The only downside? I feel like you can't taste the cookie dough enough because the chocolate brownies sort of take over. However, I voiced this concern to Michael, Alex, and Mike and they all said I was crazy.

Well...technically Mike said "Just turn it upside down so the cookie dough touches your tongue first."

We were impressed by his genius idea. To which he stated:

"I'm an engineer."

(he really is)

So there ya have it. Endorsed by an engineer.