Thankful - TTA

I'm thankful for chubby baby thighs, big toddler hugs,healthy kids, simple prayers, generous children, grateful teenagers, a hardworking husband, Mom who lives close and always has a diet coke available, wonderful neighbors, my family, good friends, personal revelation,the atonement, and the restored gospel of Jesus Christ.

(For the longer, more thoughtful version go see my private blog. Haven't been invited and want in: email me at lotsostuff@hotmail.com)

Fresh Apple Cake

Pare apples and dice to make 4 cups. Pour 2 cups sugar over apples in large bowl and add 2 beaten eggs. Let stand for 1 hour.

Then add the following ingredients, mixing well:
1/2 c. oil
2 c. flour
2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
2 tsp. cinnamon
2 tsp. vanilla
1 c. chopped walnuts

Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes in a greased and floured 13 x 9 x 2 inch pan.

It's even better served with Butter Sauce:

1 cube butter (1/2 cup)
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 c. cold water
1 heaping T. cornstarch

In a saucepan, melt butter, add sugar, mix together water & cornstarch, then add to butter/sugar. Bring to a boil, stirring constantly, boil 1 minute. Pour over each piece of Apple cake as it's served.

Dogger Blogger Christmas Poem

The holidays are coming
and I am not prepared,
finances are slim,
the kids are gettin’ scared.

But I’m a crafty girl,
fabric is aplenty,
and if I work my butt off
we won’t need lots of money.

So bloggings gotta go for now
‘cause I’ve got projects out my ears
and if I get to sewin’
we can avoid some tears.

I’ll be back to normal
when the New Year comes again,
posting every day
and commenting to friends.

Please come back when Christmas ends
and the celebrations through.
I’ll be thinking of you all…
Happy Holidays to you!!!

Happy Thanksgiving, Merry Christmas, and Happy New Year!!


P.S. Of course, this doesn't mean that I will be able to completely resist the lure of the computer, so you might want to check back periodically - but you know, that didn't rhyme.

Fun Friday & Rootbeer Milk

Well, I'm off ot do something fun with the babies. We're going to meet up with some friends for a playdate, so the kids can play and Mom's can visit, vent, and laugh. Love it!

My hubby bought a bunch of rootbeer. A BUNCH. So everyday, all day, that's all I hear...Do you want some breakfast? Rootbeer. How about an egg? Pancakes? Cereal? Rootbeer. Rootbeer please. How about a piece of toast? What kind of jelly do you want? Rootbeer.

My solution: How about some rootbeer milk? I put 1/4 rootbeer, and 3/4 milk. So he had 4 glasses yesterday. I figure he really only had 1 glass of rootbeer, and 3 glasses of milk. Right? It actually tastes pretty good, like a rootbeer float without the mess.

My wonderful Aunt Jane brought us dinner tonight - Tortilla Soup, Chips, Cheese, and an Amazing pudding Smores dessert! It was great because I was so relieved not to have to cook before my first night at YW. Everyone loved the soup - even my picky boys! I'll have to get the recipe and post it. Aunt Jane is the queen of delicious, easy prep recipes.

It was so fun getting to know the girls tonight and visiting with the ladies I'll be working with for the next year or two. I am so thrilled to be in with the Young Women.

Last night we had a really great enrichment meeting. We had displays, taste testing, and reminders about getting a 3 month supply of food, water, & the necessities in our storage. A lady came and told us about her plan - she has made up recipes for two meals a day (breakfast and 1 big meal, plus an evening snack). She did 7 different breakfasts, and 21 dinners. Wrote out the recipes (all stuff that she can store in the pantry - so nothing in the fridge or freezer). Then multiplied by # of people in the house and enough for 3 months. She then went out and purchased supplies to cover those meals. She actually cooks those recipes and rotates her stuff. Hmmm, I'm not sure that I'm quite ready to go without my freezer yet, but I do love her idea about making up menus for things that you have on hand in the pantry and food storage. I'm going to begin working on it, then buying things as I see them on sale. She said that in the next 6 months prices on wheat, flour, pasta, and rice will double. Just as milk has in the past few months. Get it now!

enRICHment Cake

Last night for enrichment meeting at church I was supposed to take a dessert. Of course, I forgot until a friend asked if I was going about 2 hours beforehand. I looked through my pantry for ideas and found a cake mix. On the back there was a recipe for "Better than Anything Cake". Sure enough, I had most of the stuff to make it. Here it is -well, something like it, because I threw the box away.

Better than Anything Cake (with modifications)

Make 1 chocolate cake in a 9 x13 pan
poke holes in it every 1/2 inch with the end of a wooden spoon
drizzle 1 can of sweetened condensed milk over it
drizzle 1 jar of hot fudge, butterscotch, or carmel over it (run a knife around the edge to let the goo soak in the sides too)
refrigerate for 2 hours or until cool
frost with 1 tub of cool whip or 1 can whipped frosting
(however, while still hot, I spread it with 1 jar of marshmallow cream
then poured hot fudge frosting over that and made pretty designs
then I refrigerated it) Holy Cow, Amazing! Gotta eat it with Ice cream or a big glass of milk though.

Hot Fudge Frosting (for Texas Sheet Cake and any other decadent purpose you can think of)

4 T. cocoa
4 T. milk
1 stick of margarine

bring to a boil in saucepan

add 1 box of powdered sugar, mix well, and spread while still hot!

Holding my Babies

Bitty Baby is still sick. I kind of like it though. She's getting to the age where she wants to be down exploring all the time, but when they're sick, they'll let you hold them and fall asleep in your arms.

Buzz has finally become a pro at getting out of his crib. Last night he got out every 2 minutes and showed up at my elbow, grinning and giggling, thinking that he is sooooo cool! Finally, around Eleven, after threatening it many times, I had to close the door! (It kind of sticks, so he can't get out on his own.) He must have cried for a while and then climbed in bed with big sis. No problem, until he fell out of bed around 12:30. I felt bad for him and held him for a cuddle session, until we were both falling asleep on the couch. Finally, he stayed in his crib for the night. I'm sure not looking forward to putting him in his own room, with his big kid bed. But sooner or later he's going to have to graduate, so Bitty Baby can move into the crib.

So, tell me your tricks for getting a toddler to stay in his own bed. When do you usually move kids into a "big bed"?

Copy your blog link list...

Another blog life-saving tip! Crazymama told me that she copied her list of blogfriends and pasted it into an email. I just tried it and saved the entire list - including links - to a word document!!!! Just highlight the entire list, ctrl C, go to an open word document, and ctrl V. The whole list should be there in a neat little table, with blog names, and links!!! Super Cool!! I'm going to go see if I can paste it into my new blog, if it works, it will save hours of time!!! If you haven't been invited to my exclusive secret private blog and want an invite, just email me. (We'll talk prices later.)

Another great idea...

Hey, I just had another genius idea (that, of course, someone else probably already had)...I'm going to start composing all of my posts in a Word program on my computer and then cut and paste into my blog post!!! That way, although they won't be pretty, they will be saved somewhere else. Plus, if I have a giant, rude rant running around in my head, I can get it out, then choose not to post it and offend all my sweet friends but I'll still have it journaled. ........I'm hearing the applause! Thank you, thank you very much.

I have to complain a bit, (what's new?), last night I must have been up six times at least! Bitty Baby has a nasty cold and is waking herself up every hour and a half, coughing and snorting, then wanting to nurse - can't blame her, I always need a drink when I wake up in the middle of the night. But then Buzz had a nightmare, so I brought him into my room, but DH has the flu and is still recovering from the arm operation, so I put him in the recliner instead of into bed with us. Then, the next time I got up with BBaby, he'd fallen out of the chair, and was lying on the floor next to her crib -- I poked him and he was still alive, so I covered him and left him there (worrying about when was the last time I vacuumed my bedroom). So, I had to step over him every time I got up with BB thereafter. Whew, sometimes I miss those days before kids when I could sleep in 'til noon.

Just one more thing, I'm still trying to get all my blogcontacts back on my sidebar. What a pain in the rear! It really helps if you make a comment, so I can just pop over to your blog and copy your address. That's another thing, I'm making a blog address list for myself - off my blog, so that if this ever happens again, I can refer to it, and still know who and where my friends are! So leave me a quick comment, so I can link back to you.

Wendi is my new BestFriend!!!!

Dancin Girl Wendi sent me the best present ever!! She found that a bunch of my blog posts were on her google reader, she just chose "show all" and there they were, all they way back to Texas Sheet Cake!!! What a lifesaver! You can't believe how important all of that silly stuff suddenly became when I thought it was completely lost in cyberspace! I printed them all and have about 50 pages of valuable literature. Well, valuable to me and maybe to my kids someday. Thanks so much Wendi! If any of the rest of you have time to check, I'd appreciate any posts you might find the same way! I don't have the technical skills to find much, but I'm sure glad it's not gone for good!

Here's a great thing that I just saw on Kylie's blog, for any of you who are starting to think your own posts might just be at risk someday. It's a company that will slurp your blurbs and make them into a BOOK! So cool! What a great Christmas present! Check it out here.

Invites...

Please don't feel bad if I didn't leave you a comment with a personal invite. Remember, I don't have my list of blogfriends, so I was going through other people's blogs and clicking around through their links and comments to try and find everyone. Also, please let me know if you're a silent lurker and want an invite! (I'll just need a resume and 3 letters of reference, plus a plate of cookies or a king size Snickers).

Hah, I just looked over and generous Buzz has given Bitty Baby his peanut butter & honey sandwich (breakfast). Could there be anything worse to give an 8 month old? She was all over it too! It was only partially over her. A quick clean-up and no signs of allergies, so we'll just pretend it's 1950 and we haven't been warned about the dangers of honey and peanuts for babies.