Today I finished my last two finals of the Fall 2012 semester! Yay! Even though I have been able to complete these two tests for the past week, I procrastinated until the very last minute to do them. This just shows that I have many other things that I would rather do than my assignments, as is the story of the entire semester. Anywho, since classes are now officially done, I celebrated my day doing some things that got pushed aside thanks to my studies.

Throughout this semester any free time I had to myself was spent running and doing chores and things that I don’t really care to do. My classes were online this semester purposely so that I could train for my 50k race in October. On my days off work I was able to run for 6 hours a day if I wanted to, but that usually didn’t happen. I would run for a couple of hours then do homework and chores before getting the kiddo from school. My schedule was ideal and really spoiled me for any future semesters where I wouldn’t be so lucky with time.

So as a way to celebrate the end of this semester I did two things that I love that I hardly had any time to do during the semester.

I spent my day gardening and my evening baking Happy Day! I should have taken pictures of what I accomplished in the garden today but totally spaced it so that will be for another day, but I did make some yummy pumpkin chocolate chip cookies!

On a side note, I am attempting to eat everything in the pantry before adding more to it, so this was a perfect way to use up some canned pumpkin and chocolate chips that were waiting patiently to be put to use, and since it seems to be rare that I have an opportunity to bake, they won’t be missed for long.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

1 cup unsalted butter at room temperature
1 1/2 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 cup canned pumpkin
1 tsp. vanilla
2 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp. baking soda
3/4 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. salt
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 300 degrees F.
2. Cream butter and sugar together.
3. Add egg, pumpkin and vanilla
4. Combine and sift flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt. Add all dry ingredients to butter and sugar mixture.
5. Add in chocolate chips by hand.
6. Drop spoonfuls of dough on ungreased cookie sheet and bake for 23-25 minutes. The cookies do not expand too much and appear the same way as they did when first placed in the oven. To make sure cookies are done, gently touch the tops. They should start to become firm and slightly browned at the edges.

Cool on wire rack and enjoy!!