Tuesday 4: Operation Cake Bake

I am up to my elbows in cake ingredients. I've made 4 9-inch rounds, 5 batches of chocolate fondant, 2 batches of Oreo truffle filling, and I'm getting ready to cook the sugar for the Italian Meringue Butter Cream frosting. My husband thinks I'm insane and a few of my friends do too but I can't help it. My first baby turned 8 years old and he asked for a Beyblade cake. This Beyblade as a cake.

So I'm going to try and get as close as I can in cake to this. Wish me luck. I'm going to need it.

Tuesday 3: One Down, Two To Go...

Happy 3rd Birthday, Grumpers!

January is THE month. Since the kids' birthdays are so close together -- Grumpers (13th), 4ft (20th), and Sassy (23rd) -- we got my family together for one big shindig to celebrate last Sunday. Since Grumpers doesn't eat anything, 4ft picked the menu and made sure we had something that each kid liked -- French fries for Grumpers, Mac n Cheese for Sassy, and BBQ ribs for 4ft. Not necessarily the healthiest lunch but it was sure delicious and the kids loved it and that's what's important.

I didn't make a cake because Grumpers doesn't really eat cake. He likes ice cream though so we all went to Baskin Robbins. They had Reese's Peanut Butter Cup ice cream. It was delicious. I'm super proud to say that while I wanted to go back for a second scoop. I didn't. I stuck with the one I got (but I really really wanted to go back for another one).

4ft's birthday is next Sunday. We'll probably take the boy child out for lunch but that's about it. He's having a ginormous extravagant (see expensive) birthday party on the 23rd and he opted for his actual day to be played down for the ginormous extravagant (see expensive) birthday party. For that party I will be making a cake. I will actually be making two cakes. Because we're having his ginormous extravagant (did I mention see expensive -- no I'm not bitter about the highway robbery birthday party places get away with) party on Sassy's birthday. And she needs a "I'm turning 1 so I can shove my face in the cake" cake.

I haven't finalized an idea for her cake yet. I'll probably do a "block" cake with her name spelled out on the sides because 4ft's cake is going to be a huge undertaking.

4ft wants a Beyblade cake. A Draco Beyblade to be exact, as of right now it's his favorite. I'm fully expecting to have a last minute change to the design but a kid only turns 8 once right? So it's going to be layers of chocolate cake, oreo truffle, and italian buttercream, covered in chocolate candy fondant and shaped like a Beyblade. I'm pretty excited to make it. I like playing in cake. It's fun.

It's really cold in my house. I think I'm going to go crank up the heater so I can then be complaining about how hot it is. See you next Tuesday.

Tuesday 2: Holiday Gluttony Be Gone

I always swear during the holidays I'm going to make healthier choices and avoid the chocolates and cookies and cakes and pies (oh my!) but I NEVER DO! And while I didn't get the weight gain I get some years -- I do believe those years coincide with being pregnant, just sayin' -- I still gained some and completely derailed the healthy choices train.

So instead of pancakes for breakfast, I've been having oatmeal. Okay, you got me, 4ft is back in school I don't have time to make a big pancake breakfast and get three kids ready to take one kid to school. But I could've had Fruit Loops and I didn't. Okay -- I don't like Fruit Loops. So really it was oatmeal or oatmeal but that was a conscious choice on my part to make sure I don't have any sugary "kid" cereals in my cupboard that I DO like. So see, go me! 

January is a lame month to do year resolutions. I get that it's the first month of the year but really, besides my birthday on the first -- which always derails the resolution train -- I have three more birthdays to get through and three more cakes to make and then try not to hork down my own body weight of them. I heart cake. It's like the perfect food. That and bacon. Is there any wonder why I'm always struggling with my weight? 

In other news: I found a great donut recipe. I love trying to make new things and I've never made doughnuts. And really, they're like cake, fried cake so kind of like bacon (yeah that's stretching it) so it's time to start practicing my watch word. MODERATION! *screams like Pee Wee Herman's Playhouse* Because I'm making homemade doughnuts this weekend. Probably on Sunday so what we don't eat for breakfast the husband can take to work Monday and I won't have to hear their siren's call drowning out the sensible song of oatmeal. 

Tuesday 1: Happy Birthday!

Today is my birthday. Happy Birthday to me *singing*

So far today I've:

got to sleep in til a whopping 6:30. But to be fair the husband and children would've let me sleep longer, I'm sure, but I was awake and couldn't go back to sleep. So why not get a dog pile of children on me when the husband noticed I was laying in bed awake.

had Happy Birthday sung to me on the phone by my mom and moaned at me by my dad. Apparently someone, not mentioning any names *cough*Dad*cough* hit the champagne a little harder than he should've last night. I was super sympathetic and told him, "When you play you have to pay." Aren't I an awesome daughter?

made breakfast for the family. 4ft wanted Cream of Wheat so I made it for us, poured a bowl of cereal for the husband and Grumpers, and cut up a banana for Sassypants. So easy breakfast -- yay -- and I didn't even have to clean the kitchen afterward -- even bigger YAY!

made the batter for my birthday cake. I'm doing a buttermilk vanilla layer cake with oreo truffle filling and Italian buttercream frosting. I may or may not pipe a design on it, depends on how frisky I'm feeling when I'm putting it together.

broke not one but TWO dishes. One I did one handed the other I looked at funny I guess because I didn't even touch that one. I broke one of my favorite Pyrex casserole dishes trying to get another bowl out of it with only one hand. I didn't feel like putting my book down. The other dish -- one of my chocolate warmer pots -- leaped from the dish drainer in a kamikaze dive that would've made any suicide bomber proud and snapped the handle clear off.

took a shower. (how's that for seriously news worthy?)

and am now writing this.

What else am I going to do today? I have no idea. But according to my husband since it's my day I have to be the one to decide what it's going to be. I hate decisions.

New Year, New Project.

Stay tuned for: 52 Tuesdays. 

Every Tuesday for the year of 2013, I'm going to write something, starting with my birthday tomorrow. I'm not promising earth shattering revelations or deep and meaningful insights -- it'll probably be a lot of nonsensical rubbish and babbling -- so don't get your hopes up. It should be fun though. 

Gotta Love the 60's

We had Horrible Movie Monday night and guess what? I OUTDID The FP horribleness that the Husband subjected me to with a little movie called, "Barbarella." Oh yeah in all it's Jane Fonda 1968 Shag Carpet awesomeness. Between the soundtrack, the fact that the plot mostly consisted on how many wardrobe changes they could squeeze Jane Fonda in after having them torn off of her, and my husband's comment, "We came for the breasts and stayed for the plot," it was an instant winner. My response to that comment, by the way, was, "What plot?" and he said, "Exactly."

4ft is loving Cub Scouts. We went to a Scout meeting last night and he had a blast, they made a Wolf Pack Flag with cutouts of their hands and decorated it. And last Saturday, I took him to the local car wash with another scout and parent - they sold popcorn for 2 hours. He had a lot of fun and actually sold quite a bit. He wants to, on top of getting to throw a pie at a person, earn enough in popcorn sales to get a camping kit that comes with a little pocket knife, binoculars, water bottle, flashlight, compass, and a bag to put it all in. So he's become a selling dervish -- please help support the Cub Scouts and 4ft by buying some 'corn -- http://www.trails-end.com/shop/scouts/email_referral.jsp?id=28430897. I need to get a picture of him in his scout uniform so you guys can see how cute he is in it.

I made a few new recipes:

Italian Herb Roasted Chicken Breasts:

I didn't have any skin on bone in chicken breasts so I made it with boneless skinless. I think it would've been better the other way. I couldn't really get a crunch because there wasn't any skin -- but because I made it skinless I went ahead and had a small serving of smashed potatoes and gravy. It was still pretty good. 2/3 of the boys in my life ate it and liked it a lot.

Grilled Chicken and Black Bean Tostadas:

Nothing fancy, just some grilled some chicken breasts in taco seasoning and garlic powder. I sprayed a tortilla down with olive oil and threw it on the grill to give it some color and crunch and then loaded it up with a little bit of spanish rice, black beans, chicken, salsa, and a small dollop of fat-free sour cream. Super good. Grumpers ate a shell with cheese on it and ketchup and Husband and 4ft always love a fried shell with taco fillings.

Pork w/ Fig and Bulgar:

I got the recipe idea from Cooking Light -- but I couldn't find Farro or Wheat Berries -- all I could find was Bulgar which kind of looked like wheat berries so if it is great -- if not -- it was still delicious. I didn't tell the boys what it was stuffed with until after they tried it and 2/3 of them loved it. Grumpers wouldn't touch it with a 20ft pole but I wasn't really shocked, as I'm sure you're not. 

Gruyere Grilled Cheese w/ Tapenade: -- of course I forgot to take this one's picture. I tweaked the recipe a little bit I forgot to buy actual tomatoes and I added a little more cheese -- more Gruyere and some 2% Colby cheese. I'd never had Gruyere before. It's super good melted. Not that impressive raw. I had no idea the little block I got was freaking $11 until I looked at the receipt after I'd bought it. It was worth the money. I made the sun-dried tomato and kalamata olives tapenade -- it was super delicious. Grumpybutt never eats anything but the Husband and 4ft really liked it.

Grilled Chicken and Peach Chutney Sliders: -- I also forgot to take this one's picture. We were in a hurry. We had Cub Scouts and so we needed to eat and bounce. But it was also super delicious. I grilled the chicken, sprinkled with red pepper, black pepper, and garlic salt in olive oil. When it was done, I tossed 2 peaches (pitted) on the grill pan with a little more olive oil and roasted them. I threw them in a food processor with a garlic clove, tbs of apple cider, tbs of dijon mustard, tbs barbecue sauce, and a tbs of dark brown sugar. Then I shredded the chicken and mixed the chutney with the chicken and put the mixture on sliders with a couple thin slices of Gruyere cheese (for 11 bucks I have to make sure it gets eaten before it goes bad!). Grumpers didn't eat it but Husband and 4ft thought it was delicious -- 4ft so much so he took one to school for lunch today.

I also picked figs last weekend. Oh. My. Bob. I picked a LOT. I think I ended up with easily 5lbs if not more. So what did I do with the fig abundance?

Made jam. It turned out super delicious. I'm going to go and pick more so I can make some fig and walnut bread to go with it as Christmas gifts this year. The bread freezes wonderfully and is better for having been frozen really. So it'll be a great Christmas gift, I think. That is, if I don't eat it all. It turned out really good.

Busy Week

As much as I love blogging -- I'm going to have to come up with a new posting schedule. I just don't have the bandwidth to do it everyday anymore. I'm hoping to do it more than once a week but we'll see how it goes. Mostly, I just feel like I'm talking to myself -- which isn't a problem, I do it ALL the time but even that's lessened dramatically since I've gotten soooo busy.

So here's a recap of this last week.

Last week, after my genius friend Jessica suggested it, I ordered some Sugar-Free Torani syrup from Amazon at a much cheaper price. It came with delicious flavors and I'm now addicted to them. They're naturally awesome in coffee but they are epic in oatmeal too.

I also baked a carrot cake from scratch for my dad's birthday on last Saturday (I grated the carrots and everything). It turned out really delicious and it was a lighter version without sacrificing any of the flavor. A normal carrot cake has upwards to 1400 calories a piece and the one I made was around 250 calories a slice. I ate a piece on Saturday with my Dad and then I cut it up into little squares and sent it to work with the husband. One of his coworkers said it was "Da bomb!" so that totally made my day.

I tried a couple new recipes this past week as well.

The Parmesan Chicken Burgers, I got the base of from a Cooking Light recipe. I ditched the ciabatta roll -- that's a lot of bread and dipped the chicken patties in panko to give it a little more of a Parmesan chicken crunch. I added sauteed garlic spinach instead of fresh basil (I didn't have any) and it turned out super wonderful. Grumpybutt didn't touch his, but then I wasn't surprised. 4ft said it was super yummy and he took one to school for lunch the next day. So that was a win.

I also made  Rosemary Garlic Steak, oven fries (hooray for my julienne attachment and mandolin), and steamed broccoli. Grumpybutt had to squeeze every fry and say, "Yuck-yyy," with every squeeze and didn't even look twice at the rest of his food. 4ft said it was the best dinner ever and he wishes he could have the fries with every meal. So another for the win column. This one was my own "throw-it-all-in-and-see-what-you-get" recipes.

Lets see, 4ft has joined the Cub Scouts and the Wolf Den doesn't have a Den Leader so me and a couple of other parents of the Wolves are going to run the meetings and activities until they find someone. Which will probably be NEVER since we're doing it. So that's something else added to my already busy schedule. He's also selling popcorn to raise money for his troop if you're interested in helping a boy out here's the link to order it online: http://www.trails-end.com/shop/scouts/email_referral.jsp?id=28430897. And here's a sorry in advance to the fact that I will be driving you all nuts with this. If he can sell $200 bucks in popcorn he gets to throw a pie at the Pack Leader -- needless to say he's ALL OVER THAT idea. I thank bob I'm NOT the Pack Leader. He's in Pack #951. If the link doesn't work. It should though.

Other than that I've been wrangling my children (a never ending job), doing laundry, and working -- writing, drawing, coloring (I know, how awful are those jobs?), and website coding.