Cake -- part 2 and another party

Well, we survived another birthday party! I think I've mentioned before that since both my sister's & I live in close proximity, along with a married with children niece, we have LOTS of birthdays to celebrate! It's often hard to find a date that works for (give up on ALL) settle on the majority of us. That's the reason these birthdays get stretched out, and kind of run into each other! (As you can see by my list up above, I have a nephew with a birthday tomorrow...) We had settled on Sun. eve supper (tomorrow) but then our workers announced they will have Sun. Gosple meetings, starting tomorrow eve. Scratch that plan. Re-schedule for tonight.
We had a great time. Luanne & I did a taco salad supper, easy to make a huge batch of. and not much work. Add watermellon & grapes, along with cake & ice cream, a warm late summer evening with our family & friends, what more could you want?
Oh, so you really just wanted to see pictures of the cake eh?

Well, for my first attempt I think it turned out pretty well. Made some mistakes, nothing serious, learned some things, TO do, and NOT to do, far from "perfect" but the girls liked it and it tasted good, so that's all that really mattered, right? That I got lots of compliments was a bonus, although maybe everyone was just being nice!
It really was fun, I think I'm hooked. Can't wait to do the next one!! Oh yes, I also canned 3 batches of grape jelly today, and although I ended up leaving for the party with a few dirty dishes & the remains of the gum-paste misc. on my counter, I managed to keep my kitchen reasonably clean during the process. YEA!! Now that really is an accomplishment :*) Unfortunately my hands didn't fare so well, they are several shades & blotchy with red frosting dye!

Here's a couple more of the "twins" birthday party pictures. Yes, they both got "chucks" for their birthday!

Cake-- Part 1

I have been increasing intrigued with the cake making thing. Now all my dear family, I can hear you snickering behind my back already! For the rest of you, yes I confess, I've never "liked" to make birthday cakes. I really have never even liked to EAT cake. And frosting, yuck for the most part. Yes, under stress, and I do mean STRESS, I've made my kids birthday cakes. Some even were pretty cute if I do say so. Usually I take anyone's offer to make one for me, or I buy one. Stress-FREE, right?
Well, I've spent the last several years being terrifically impressed with Lynisha's cakes she's made, here, here, here, here and my favorite, both in creativity & taste! So after "helping" (I know, it was only watching, tasting frosting, which by the way was so good I couldn't stay out of it..., and then spreading frosting on cakes) Lynisha on Jeanne & Floyd's cakes, I decided I had to try it for myself.
So, drum roll here please......I'm making a birthday cake for Rebecca & Meshayla's brithday party tomorrow. I'm using Lynisha's cake, filling & frosting recipes/instruction, so surely that means it will work, RIGHT?
All right, so a little more background here. Another reason I hesitate on this one, is that I can't stand a mess while I'm cooking. When I was growing up, the way I learned to do things in the Kitchen was get all of the ingredients out ahead of time, make the stuff, then deal with the huge mess. put all the stuff away, clean up the counters & deal with the mound of dirty dishes you made. I can't stand that, so the idea of making a cake, filling & frosting then decorating was/is a little intimidating to me to say the least. The last thing I want is the kitchen wrecked "just for a cake"
But, I did decide that surely If I've learned to cook large meals, & bake bread without ending up with total chaos, then somehow I can do the same things with a cake right?
So #1. Start with a clean kitchen! Check, did that.
The last months I've tried to quit doing quite so much multi-tasking. It stresses my brain. However for this operation it's a necessity if you don't want to spend time cleaning up afterwards. It's a no-brainer. Clean as you go.
I just took the cakes out of the oven, they look great, the filling is in the fridge cooling, my counters & stove are clean, dishes done & sink shined. So far so good.
Now, Do you suppose I can figure out how to do that while I'm making jelly?????
Stay tuned for Part 2.........

What I did yesterday

8 batches of Pear jam. Grape, Apricot, Elderberry & Blackberry/raspberry to do yet, I WANT peaches! Hope I can still find some.
Too bad this was to late for our "all in a row" photo challenge posting!

Glimpses of Meshayla Rose

Shayla Rosie...you make me smile! How can a mom have 12 kids and think that they all are so different? How can you be SO unique out of 11 siblings? You do truly make me smile, you are such a happy girl! You have the ability to diffuse my anger at your mis-behavior just by the way you apologize and promise to do something for me. You are my only "born blond" out of all 12 kids. My first and only child that insisted on sleeping on your back instead of your tummy. My only child to be born in the morning (after 6 a.m.) Once again going thru the pictures to make this post I'm amazed and dismayed at how many wonderful pictures I have and how many I need to scrapbook. I WILL get there. I think it's going to be my 2009 goal :*)
I'm sure I mentioned before that I always wanted twins. (at least until #12!!) I never got them, but the closest I came to it was several of my kids haveing "twin" cousins. I could have done a whole slideshow on Meshayla and Rebecca thru the years. They are 2 days apart, Rebecca was born on Meshayla's due date and they were both born within several minutes of 7 a.m.

ALL I want for my birthday is a pair of "Chuck Taylors"....pretty please, PLEASE???!!!
She knows the right buttons to push with me, who can resist a 14 year old that "only" wants a pair of shoes?? Not me, even if I don't "think she needs them", "think they're the coolest thing ever" or can think of some other things she probably could use more! After all, I'm pretty sure that the days are numbered of when she wants to go shopping with her Mom anyway, and I got a pretzel out of the deal too! Besides can you amagine just how long she's going to tolerate me taking my camera to the mall to record a shopping trip??

Happy 14th Birthday Meshayla!!

Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday to you!
Happy birthday dear Meshayla,
Happy birthday to you!!





I didn't get Meshayla's pictures up today...I picked grapes & Pears instead.
However it was her wish that I take her to lunch at a little place here in town that we don't get to very often "The French Cafe". We had a delightful time & delicious lunch, and did a little shopping too before we headed off to do the picking.
Hopefully tomorrow I can get her pictures scanned & up.


We actually got two more boxes of pears after this from another spot!

More from the wedding

Here's the song that they sang at Jeanne & Floyd's wedding. The words were wrote by Doug O. Floyd's brother, for them. The tune is one you will recognize from our book.
Sorry, you will have to click on the image to get it large enough to read.
Mark, Gay, Raimie, Jana & Jim sang this Acapella and it was SO beautiful!!
Thanks you 5, you did an awesome job!! (and I am so lucky to have such wonderful talent in my family!!)

And life goes on

Lynisha was following us to convention, & had just called me to ask how far ahead of her we were. As I was about to tell her the mile marker, she said, "OH! I just blew a tire!" We went back to help her out, having to unload the trunk, put on the spare, call Ryan to come bring her his car & drive hers back to town (luckily we were only about 25 mi.) Traveling interstate speed, with 3 kids in the car I was quite thankful to see the car...AND ONLY HER CAR! pulled off the edge of the road & not the potential accident it could have been! And yes, although she was talking on the phone, she has a bluetooth, so no mishap there. We didn't make it in time for Wed. meeting after all, but just thankful to all arrive safely!





Proof I really was up early enough to see a sunrise! My sister torments me to death because I have always been a night owl, NOT a morning person, and she is the opposite. For years at convention I did not get up for breakfast. My kids did not eat breakfast either, so usually I would manage to wake up enough by the time it was over and the sleeping quarters came alive with returning people to get up and get me and X number of little people ready for the day. When my older girls were old enough to wait tables & were up, I managed to convince them to bring me coffee when they came back from breakfast. (I know, I was spoiled, but really, how DID you think I survived having 12 children??!) JK! Anyway, when my sister moved back to NE and started going to the same convention as me, somehow she managed to convince me that getting up for breakfast was a GOOD thing! To top that off, there have been years we even went on a walk BEFORE breakfast! WOW! So, I am converted. I've even been known to wake HER up. The best thing about it all is that we discovered the coffee gets put on really early! So, we pull on our sweatshirts & tennies & head over to the cookhouse & grab our before breakfast cup! At our spring convention it's already light really early, but this time of year the sun doesn't start coming up till a little before six.

The unloading, cleaning, & convention put away will wait,
My after-convention treat is my favorite re-treat. I hate showers. Convention ones are a pain, a necessity at best. Nothing like soaking away the aches of the day.
Tomorrow's another day, but tonight I'm relaxing!! AAAHHHHHH!