BAKE SALE for Vietnam Orphans!

Hi friends! Sorry I haven't posted in a while, but AP's were extremely hectic/stressful/overwhelming/insane so I needed to take a little break to recover.

Buuut a few weekends ago my NHS Committee had our second bake sale to raise funds for orphans in Vietnam, and we ended up raising almost $600! I went to the MB Pier with Aidan around 8AM and stayed there until 6PM, with the help with many many friends (thank you guys!). I also got a really fun sunburn that has evolved into a gorgeous tanline (hah). Anyway, for the bake sale, I made my usual White Chocolate Chip Macadamia Nut Cookies. My previous recipe from more than a year ago was really out of scale and a little weird, so here is my updated recipe. The cookies are actually amazing and very simple to make so I would 100% recommend you try it out!

Ingredients:
1 cup buter
1 1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup light brown sugar
3 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 large eggs
3 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
9 ounces white chocolate chips
1 1/2 cup macadamia nuts, chopped

Directions: 
1. Preheat to 350 F
2. In one bowl, beat butter and both sugars with a mixer until well combined
3. Add vanilla and eggs to the bowl and beat until the mixture is creamy and light, and the mixer makes this whipping sound (2-3 minutes)
4. In a second bowl, stir in flour, salt, and soda. Add this mixture slowly into the first bowl, but don't over mix. Stop when a few streaks of flour remain.
5. Add into the bowl the white chocolate chips and macadamia nuts; mix until combined thoroughly.
6. Roll tablespoon size balls of dough on silpat or parchment, 1.5 inches apart.
7. Bake for 11 minutes and check. If not done, check in 2 minute intervals. DO NOT OVERBAKE, it's better if you take them out slightly underbaked so that the cookies will be chewy. Remember, they will continue to bake outside the oven!

Vietnam Video :)

But wait....there's more! Here's a video summarizing our whole trip. It's long, but I worked really hard on it so it would mean a lot if you would check it out :)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TPX0G6JLc4

Again, here are the links to the websites I made for 2 of the orphanages we visited:

thienanorphanage.weebly.com

vinhphuocanorphanage.weebly.com

Thanks for reading/watching!

Audge

An Extremely Late Post About Visiting Orphans in Vietnam (sorry!)

Hey there!

So I've been extremely busy the last couple of weeks...actually since the beginning of August, when I started to visit the orphanages in Vietnam for my Gold Award Project. After that I was working on making websites for the orphanages, and also trying to register for a Graphic Design class at my local community college (which was really difficult because I was out of the country); then when I got back from Vietnam I was busy with beach volleyball, finishing up summer homework, getting ready for the school year, etc. I was just really busy so I'm super sorry I haven't been posting stuff. I think it will take forever to explain everything, so here's a BUNCH of pictures from the last month. Maybe I'll try to organize them. (sorry!!)

Let's start off with the orphanage shenanigans:

Aren't they so freaking adorable? It was actually such a heartwarming, sad, amazing, and  eye-opening experience. Literally so many emotions were taking over whenever I saw the kids. 

So here are the two (tentative) websites for some of the orphanages I visited:

http://thienanorphanage.weebly.com/

http://vinhphuocanorphanage.weebly.com/

Please check them out if you want!

ALSO, I'm really happy to say that with all the money I (with the help of incredibly amazing friends/family) raised, we were able to donate a total of 1,500 pounds of rice :) 

So that's it for now. I'll do a post soon of personal things my family and I did in Vietnam (like visit family, going to restaurants with weird food, etc)...and I'll also post a video with clips from the trip. Oh, and probably a post updating about exactly where I am with the Gold Award Project.

Thanks so much for reading!!

Audge

M&M's + Medicine

Hey there :) So today I sorted little bags of M&M's for the kids, packaged the medicine and soap that I got from Costco, and started to pack everything because we leave in 8 DAYS!

I mixed together 2 bags of regular M&M's, and 1 bag of Peanut M&M's. I took the candy from the mixture with a 1/3 cup scoop and placed the M&M's in 67 Ziplock Bags. Here are some pictures!

People have told me that the kids there really, really like American candy, particularly M&M's...and they weren't too expensive so I went for it:) They do, on the other hand, actually need medication such as Tylenol and Motrin. So I made sure to get those too! The medication and soap won't be put in the individual "kits" that I'm making, but they'll be given to the orphanage to share among the kids.

8 Days!!!!

Audge