Now its getting colder I am realizing I am going to be wanting some hot chocolate. I'm wondering if anyone makes a homemade version that maybe uses cocoa powder + Splenda? If not I am still open to suggestions on how to make it bit more healthier.

I do that for chocolate milk. I use undutched cocoa powder. Dutching (a way the chocolate is processed) takes out a lot of the good stuff in cocoa, like greatly reduces its anti-oxidants. The undutched versions are also much more flavorful so you need less for your hot chocolate.

Personally, I use Scharffenberger cocoa. I heat up a little milk, mix in the cocoa and splenda, and after that's dissolved, add additional milk and microwave. If I try to mix the cocoa into all the milk, it has a much harder time breaking down and you have those little irritating lumps in your hot chocolate. The cocoa powder is only like 30 calories or so per tablespoon and I only use 1 tablespoon---with the high quality cocoa powder, I find that 1 tablespoon cocoa powder per 1 cup of milk is a good ratio.

I've heard that Hershey's has a non-dutched version -- it's call natural cocoa powder, so that may be more common in your mainstream grocery stores. Otherwise, you may have to go a more specialty or high-end natural food store like Whole Foods to find undutched cocoa powder.

I like the vanilla almond milk with (1 cup 40 cals) and hersheys syrup with splenda
barb

I start with a cup of milk and warm it up in the mircrowave. Then I add a T of cocoa and a T of Splenda. My dd loves it and so do I!

the Hershey's regular cocoa powder is a non-alkalized cocoa powder. The Special Dark is dutch processed (alkalized)

I haven't fixed it for a while, but I enjoyed this recipe last winter. (Didn't always have a vanilla bean, but it was OK without one.)

I saw some sugar-free hot cocoa mix at Sams the other day but I didn't pick it up to look at the ingredients. That might be an option, though.