I am SO happy it is Friday! It’s week two of the new school year and waking up early again is hitting me hard. I’ve been in grumpy zombie mode all week. I’ve wanted nothing but a serious nap. I went to bed one night at 9:30 and I still can’t shake it! This weekend I will be lounging in bed late every morning and soaking up the laziness! I think I may also work on some Valentine’s Recipes and check out Wolf of Wall Street. Has anyone seen it? Thoughts?

ok, Friday Favorites:

New Music: New Taking Back Sunday (duh!):

Favorite new exfoliant: Lush‘s Let the Good Times Roll. This was one of my Sydney Lush purchases and I can’t get enough of it. It smells amazing, like caramel popcorn, and leaves my skin so soft. The lady at Lush told me to use it every other day or every three days. It nearly kills me not to use it every night. Ob-sessed!  I think it’s seasonal, though

Picture from Lush.com

Favorite New Make-up: Garnier’s BB cream. I’m not going to get into a big make-up rant because I sound like a commercial. I will say getting up early, working with kids and living in a sunny, hot climate has resulted in me almost never wearing makeup during the day. When I do, I wanted something much lighter and gentler on my skin. This meets all those requirements. Plus, my skin actually looks better after I wear it. True story. Downside- it’s not all natural. Leave a comment below if you have a good all natural foundation you use.

Favorite Beverage: Boost’s King William Smoothy. It’s just cold, liquid chocolate. Perfect thing to kick my chocolate cravings. To make vegan, I switched the milk for soy milk and the yogurt for sorbet. In this case, I’m pretending all chocolate is vegan. I’m the worst vegan ever.

Favorite Treat: Popsicles. When I can’t afford the above smoothie, I reach for these. It’s been hot here and I’ve been on a cold treat kick. I made these fudgesicles a few weeks ago and had to force myself to keep them to a snack. A hot meal for lunch and dinner? Nah, bring on the frozen chocolate!

Mocha Fudgesicles
slightly altered from Take A Mega Bite

Ingredients:

• 1 (14 oz) can full fat coconut milk
• 3/4 cup vegan chocolate chips or vegan chocolate
• 1 T instant espresso or 2 T instant coffee
• pinch salt
• 1/2 t vanilla
• 1/2 T- 1 T sugar, depending on the chocolate used (my chocolate chips were sweet enough so I used 1/2T)

Place the coconut milk, chocolate, and espresso in a saucepan and heat until chocolate is mostly melted. Set aside for 5 minutes for the coffee to steep. Stir in salt, vanilla, and sugar. Taste and add more sugar to taste. Pour into popsicle mold and freeze for a few hours or over night.

If you do not have popsicle molds (like myself), pour into small paper or plastic cups, cover with tin foil and poke your popsicle stick through the tin foil. Freeze for a few hours or over night.

When ready to eat, run the mold under warm water. If you pull a stick out sans pop just run it under water and place back in the popsicle to freeze.

These were so creamy and delicious. I definitely hoarded them from the children because I didn’t want to share. I mean… because they don’t need the caffeine. yeah…we’ll go with that.

Now, what are your weekend plans?