Banana Pudding (quick, easy & no-cook)

It's been awhile, y'all.  So I'll just begin by telling you some of the random thoughts that swirl around in my head.

• School is out. For the summer. Could I please just press pause for a year or so? I used to be all for continued education but now I firmly believe that a first grade education is adequate. Plus, I'm now one of those annoying people that thinks "life goes so fast once you have kids in school." I'm not actually one of those people saying that, though, because that would make me actually annoying. But I'm totally thinking it.
• This is my baby. She is almost 1. Year Old. I just birthed her, so I'm not sure how she's turning one. Because I just had her the other day. Although she has nursed approximately 5,000 times in the last 12 months. I kept count.

• She is a complete joy. She screams if I don't feed her fast enough. She loves to swing. She still nurses as many times during the hours when normal people are sleeping as she did eight months ago. I let her because someday I will be sad when she doesn't want to nurse anymore. (Does that make me weird?) It's good to be the baby of the family, let me tell you. She's a regular celebrity around here.
• So the last time I blogged, we had just gotten Pip, our adorable and tiny chick. He didn't even have feathers. Just fuzz. Or whatever the scientific term of chicken fur is. Approximately 16 hours after we brought him home, he turned into an awkward, half-grown chicken with feathers. He grew something odd-looking on his face and his legs got long. He was not nearly as cute as he had been the day before. Then our mini longhaired dachshund attacked him. She was fierce. He suffered nerve damage in his leg (my vet confirmed this diagnosis) but he compensated well for his handicap. Then he escaped his pen (I use the term "pen" loosely for the box he lived in). We have not seen him since, though my children have been known to wander around the yard calling, "Pip!" as if he's going to saunter up to them. They were even looking for him at the Arboretum during a walk the other day.
• I haven't the heart to tell him that he got eaten by an animal. If you run into my children, please don't mention that our pet chicken was probably was someone's midnight snack.
• Our house is on the market. If you're shocked, sorry. I haven't had time to text and/or call and/or email my entire contact list. The good news about this is that my house is really clean. The bad news is that all I do now is clean my house. That's why I haven't told you that my house is on the market. I've been mopping, sweeping, vacuuming, picking up toys, emptying trash cans (where do kids get all of this trash they throw away???), folding blankets (someone makes a fort around here approximately every 4 hours), picking up pillows (all good forts require lots of pillows), putting the dogs out, letting the dogs in, feeding and watering the dogs, feeding and watering the children, cleaning up spilled milk (whoever said not to cry over spilled milk didn't have 4 children), changing lightbulbs (put your house on the market and within 12 hours half of your lightbulbs will have blown. guaranteed.), and wiping snot/spit/drool/yogurt/milk/banana sticky fingers/some unknown sticky or gooey substance off of every glass door and window that can be reached by the tongues and/or fingers and/or feet of little people.
• Following the advice of our wonderful realtor (if you want her name, let me know. She's awesome and I couldn't recommend her any more highly), I cleaned off our refrigerator, freeing it from the invitations, birth announcements, pictures, chip clips, calendars, magnets, memory work & art work that had accumulated there. Bubby (he's 2 1/2) thinks we got a new refrigerator. Just because it's clean. "Wook at our new fridge!" he announces every couple of hours. It's pretty funny. It actually does look pretty new because it has been protected by a nice thick layer of the items mentioned above.

• Our peonies bloomed. This is always a momentous occasion in our family because all of my bridesmaids and I carried bouquets of peonies at our wedding...12 years ago. The groomsmen even wore the large buds of peonies in their boutineers. It was fabulous. So now we have a long line of peonies in our yard, and every May when the bloom, it reminds us of our wonderful wedding. And we tell our children about it. And I cut big bunches and put them in our house. Yes, ants come into the house on the flowers. Life goes on.
• I'll be digging up every last one of my peonies bushes when we move and transplanting them to our new house. This announcement counts as a legal disclosure.
• So we just re-paved our driveway. It was worth every penny for the entertainment provided to these two middles. They loved all of the equipment, from the steamrollers & bulldozer right down to the sledgehammer.

Your eyes do not deceive you. That is, in fact, Tinkerbell on the left.

• I haven't really cooked a whole lot of new or exciting things lately. I did a Whole30 challenge. Have you heard of that? Think paleo on steroids. It's insane and awesome at the same time. Basically I turned into a carnivorous rabbit. Bottom lime: in the end it was worth it and I was glad I did it. But during that month I wasn't exactly fixing cheesy, saucy enchiladas, pasta dishes or peanut butter cookies - you know, the types of things that people want to read about and look at on a food blog. I did eat good food, but I was too hungry to even think about blogging. Just bein' honest, ya'll.

• After my Whole30 experience, it was my husband's birthday. He requested Banana Pudding. It's his fave. I love it too. He prefers the no-cook version and since it WAS his birthday and all, I obliged. But this is my favorite - with homemade vanilla pudding. Mmmm. How bad could that be. But the no-cook version is way faster and easier and you don't have to worry about curdling your eggs in your hot custard or scorching the bottom of the custard because you forgot to stir, stir, stir. (Been there, done that. Scorched and/or curdled pudding must go straight in the trash. There is no redemptive plan for such a mistake.) And this no-cook recipe is a very delicious version. I've already educated you Yankees on banana pudding, so if you need a refresher, read this post.

I'm off to clean up some mess that someone made in the time I wrote this post. I'm not sure who did it, how it happened or what spilled, but I guarantee someone did something somewhere. I just tell myself that sticky won't exist in heaven. And I'll just leave you with this picture of our perfect family, where no one cries or whines and everyone always is happy to have their picture taken.

Banana Pudding (quick, easy & no-cook)

2 large boxes instant vanilla pudding
3 cups whole milk
1 cup sour cream
8 oz. Cool Whip, thawed
1 box vanilla wafers (don't buy generic please)
6 bananas (give or take...depending on size, just don't be skimpy)

Whisk together the pudding mix and milk in a large bowl until no lumps remain. Whisk in the sour cream. Use a spatula to fold in the Cool Whip.

In a large serving bowl (think a salad bowl - and it's nice if it's clear glass so you can see the layers), start with a layer of vanilla wafers (cover the bottom), sliced bananas (cover the vanilla wafers), and pudding (use about 1/3 of the pudding mixture). Continue layers - you'll do 3 of each - ending with the pudding. Cover and refrigerate for at least 8 hours before serving).