Creative Creations

*you'll see the connection at the end of this post...maybe*

As I sit here eating my delicious Tomato Basil Soup from the Met, waiting to Skype with my wonderful best friends from Cottey, I decided I should update about my weekend! This weekend has been one of creating...both with edible and non-edible materials.

As previously stated, I'm a blog-aholic and read MANY different blogs...especially delicious blogs about baking! My sister-in-law introduced me to Lovin' From The Oven. During the commercials of the Oscars last week, I was online browsing for yummy recipes to try, and I came across both Oreo Stuffed Chocolate Chip Cookies and Chocolate Chip Oreo Cookies (notice a trend?). Needless to say, I was itching to bake them...drooling every second that passed without them!

I made it a mission of mine this weekend to bake them, but I wanted to bake them with my friend Matt. Only problem is...Matt's a vegan! So, being flexible, we set out to make these bad boys vegan style! It was pretty easy, though, since Oreo's are vegan by nature. So our modifications consisted of substituting margarine for butter and "egg-replacer" for the eggs. They turned out pretty darn good!

I was mad that I forgot my camera since I knew ahead of time I wanted to blog about this baking endeavor, but I did have my phone on me. I apologize for the poor quality of these photos!

 Matt now knows, after two baking sessions with me, that I'm more obsessed with the cookie dough than the actual finished cookie. He's had to stop me from eating the vast majority of dough these past two weekends. Ooops!

Here's the remainder of the Oreo-infused Chocolate Chip cookie dough 

(yup, we ate ALL that was remaining after we dished up the cookies for baking)

 Oreo-infused Cookies. WINNERS! So tasty!

Our second round consisted of Oreo-filled Chocolate chip cookies. They were MONSTERS! (Well, they had to be big because there was a whole cookie sandwiched in the middle!)

 After baking!

 The cross-section!

The verdict from all who have sampled:

The oreo-infused cookies trumped the oreo-filled cookies, simply due to the base cookie dough recipe. The latter was more flour-y and not as sweet as the oreo-infused dough. So in the future, I'd recommend mixing and matching...using the dough recipe of the first and smooshing oreos in the middle, like the second!

My other big project to tackle this weekend was an assignment for my Vocal Pedagogy class. We had to build a model of a larynx to help learn the anatomy of our vocal structure! So, I set out to make something that would last me for years so I could show future students what a larynx actually looks like (since, let's face it, most people don't know!)

I started with Sculpey clay so I could form everything, then bake it and have it harden.

All of the pieces post-baking, ready to be assembled.

The finished product!

Behold! A larynx with the Hyoid bone, Thyrohyoid membrane, Thyroid cartilage, Cricothyroid membrane, Cricoid cartilage, Epiglottis, vocal folds, Arytenoid cartilages, and trachea. 

Ta-da!

*Now do you see the connection to the video above? Sing it with me...all together now! "The hyoid bone's connected to the Thyrohyoid membrane...the Thyrohyoid membrane's connected to the Thyroid cartilage..." Yeah...ok...it doesn't quite work. Oh well!*