oreo truffles, chores and... yuck!

A little over a year ago, I found this recipe for oreo truffles.  I figured that they would be a great dessert to make because I really don't like oreos that much-so I thought it wouldn't be bad having them around.  I could not have been more wrong.  They are beautiful and delicious, so if you continue reading, be forewarned. 

Oreo truffles:
1 package oreos, crushed
1 8oz stick of cream cheese, room temperature

melting chocolate
tsp of crisco
sprinkles or other decorative toppings

Crush the oreos, the finer the better, and blend in the cream cheese.  Chill mixture until it's firm.  Form small balls with oreo mixture.  I use the small scoop from Pampered chef to keep the size pretty uniform.  Once they are shaped, chill again until firm. You could even freeze them for a bit. 

Melt whatever color chocolate you are using.  I love to use the golden oreos with semisweet baking chocolate (again-you have been warned).  Add a teaspoon or so of vegetable shortening to the chocolate (thanks to my friend, Kathi, for that tip) to make it look prettier and more smooth.  Dip truffle balls into chocolate and then place on waxed paper to cool-make sure you add the sprinkles while the chocolate is still wet.  You could also use more chocolate to decorate the tops of the truffles by putting it into a ziploc or pastry bag. 

Keep the truffles refrigerated until serving.  You should also stay away from the refrigerator during that time! 

In other news, we are in full swing with daily chores, and the flower pot system is working really well.  I love that I am a little removed from the whole process and don't have to actually tell my kids what they have to do each day.  My youngest actually told me that his job (that day- cleaning up the porch) wasn't so bad because he had just done it a few days earlier and the porch wasn't that messy!  Love it. 

A few people have asked me what kind of chores my kids have and how I decide who does what.  To answer that, I will first tell you that my kids are (almost) 13, 9 and (almost) 6 so their abilities and attention span vary greatly.  I try to match up their personalities and interests, if you can call it that, to the task I am asking them to do.  Here are just some of the chores they have:

dusting each room (separate chore stick for each room)
collecting trash from bedrooms and bathrooms
taking out recycling
cleaning front and back doors (both are glass)
bringing down the laundry and sorting for washing
putting laundry away
cleaning their own rooms
putting dishes away
dusting baseboards
vaccuuming basement (our only room with carpet)

There are more and I have some more ideas about chores for kids, but that's a sampling of what they are doing.  My youngest usually gets either the porch, or cleaning up our "shoe basket" where we all leave our shoes when we come home. 

In YUCK news, I came downstairs the other morning to find that I had left a wine glass on the table with just the tiniest bit of wine in it.  The gross part was that there were fruit flies all over it-blech!!!  So, I decided to use wine as my "bait" for this old school fruit fly trap (Andi, you were close on your guess). 

It actually worked and served as a bit of a science project for my kids on the habits and life cycle of fruit flies.  Of course, the best way to get rid of those pesky pests is to put all the fruit away, but I wanted to make sure there weren't any stray bugs anywhere.  The flies go toward the bait (in this case the wine, but jelly works, too) and then can't fly back up the cone.