Birthday Cake

So comes the first, of a few, back dated blog posts!  This one is about the tie dye cake created for our boys when they had some friends over for their birthday.  Got the idea from a friend, Heather P., from Five in a Row.  She'd made one and it looked cool and easy!

I started with a white cake, which I'll type out the recipe at the end.  Once the batter was made, I divided into 6 bowls and colored them red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple.

 

Once the pans were greased and floured, I randomly added dollops of each color to the pans.  Didn't really worry about what color was next to each other.  

 Cooling before taking them out of the pan.  Already looks pretty cool.

Frosted with chocolate icing and cut. 

White Cake (Better Homes & Gardens, New Cook Book)

Oven: 350 degrees

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup shortening, butter, or margarine
1 3/4 cups sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
4 egg whites
1 1/3 cups buttermilk or sour milk

1. Grease and lightly flour two 8x1 1/2 inch or 9x1 1/2 inch round baking pans or grease one 13x9x2 baking pan; set pan(s) aside.  Stir together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt; set aside.
2. In a large mixing bowl beat shortening, butter, or margine with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds.  Add sugar and vanilla; beat till well combined.  Add egg whites, one at a time, beating well after each.  Add dry mixture and buttermilk alternating to beaten mixture, beating on low speed after each addition just till combined.  Pour batter into the prepared pan(s).
3. Bake in a 350 degree oven for 30 to 35 minutes or till a wooden toothpick comes out clean.  Cool layer cakes in pans on wire racks for 10 minutes.  Remove layer cakes from pans.  Cool thoroughly on racks.  Or, place 13x9 inch cake in pan on a wire rack; cool thoroughly.  Frost with desired frosting.

Happy Baking!

A Month of Photos

On Pinterest, someone had posted a "Photographing December List", the original post is linked!  Well there's nothing like jumping in half way (or slightly before halfway) now is there?  I'll see what I keep up with and if I can catch up with some of the previous one's as well.

Today, December 15th, is Christmas cards. 

Wreaths Across America

This past Saturday, many folks across the United States participated in "Wreaths Across America".  Wreaths Across America are a nonprofit organization founded to continue and expand the annual wreath laying ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery begun by Maine businessman, Morrill Worcester, in 1992.  (Copied almost directly form their site).

A solemn time to remember those of have served our country and died in combat or later in life.  It was a time to come together to show our support, our respect, and our thanks.

Here are a few photo highlights:

 Presentation of the Color Guard

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Following are representatives from all Branches of Services including a

representative for POW/MIA's.  Unfortunately, I missed a photo, I believe

of the Marines.  I meant to talk one of all.

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Taps being played, prior to

laying the wreaths.

One section of Quantico National Cemetery

Gentleman paying his respects.

Still brings tears to my eyes when remembering the fallen soldiers service to our country.  Was hard to see dates of those younger than myself, who've died within the last year or so.  Reminded me to be thankful for those who have served in various wars and made it home safely. 

Remember, freedom is not free, there is a cost.

School Pictures

We actually had professional school pictures this year!  With a photographer!  With the usual blue back ground!  (I've had the disc with photo's on it for almost a month and am just getting to this ~ okay, blame my computer issues! ;) )

So, here is our 2011/2012 class:

 Thing Two

Third Grade

Thing One

Sixth Grade

It was Christmas Craft time this past Friday - Gingerbread houses to be exact!  Bought a couple Wilton's kits a week or two ago and thought it would be loads of fun for the boys to do.

Mid decorating, once the houses were put together.

Youngest adding decorating candy to "their" house!

(yes, decorating candy - tastes bad but looks pretty on this sort of thing)

More additions to the house!

First house put together!  Looks pretty bad from the

other sides as it was hard to find the right consistency

of frosting to hold the ginger bread together.

Boys finished project!  Looks a lot better than the other one!

Lessons Learned:

• don't plan to eat these and use super glue to hold house together
• probably does pay to trim the house part to a bit more square ~ I'd thought I could easily figure out the right consistency of frosting and use enough to keep it up (WRONG)
• have ginger bread cookies available to eat while working on houses as the house smells good enough to eat
• have a few bowls worth of different consistency of frosting; it will be helpful!

 

I'm B.A.C.K.

Kevin and I found a refurbished MAC on Ebay for a couple hundred less than what it would have cost to fix the water damaged one.  It arrived Saturday and various parts and pieces from the old one, that still worked (memory board mainly) have been transferred over.  So, I'm back to blogging again.

Boys and I are into a light Christmas school season.  We're reading a lot of fun Christmas books, watching Christmas movies, have made ginger bread houses (I'll blog about that soon - what an experience!), choir practice.

Now to spend some time updating the look of the blog for the holidays!

Testing & Musing

My computer is on the fritz, S.T.I.L.L. Have been wanting to blog for awhile, but it has been difficult with the boys computer. So I sit here trying on my phone. Has been a beautiful day for photos, but either I couldn't get a good photo (of the moon and stars) or didn't have the camera (trees with varying degrees of leaf loss - that sounds weird. It the best I can come up with).

Been home today with Thing Two today; he has had a bad headache since yesterday that seems to come and go. Have been getting a bunch of putzy chores done - a good thing I supppose. Best things so far: sharing Rosemary with a neighbor and making mini banana muffins.

Suppose this will do for a test and ignore the typos as I am still learning to type on a little keyboard.

1st day of the month

of November.  Only two calendar months left in 2011.  Can you believe 2011 is almost over?  W.O.W.!!

As there are 30 days this month, I am planning on going through this "30 day mom challenge" with the family, whether they realize it or not.  Here's the link.  I still need to print it out, but that is the next activity I'll be working on.