{TWD} Chocolate Creme Pie

I am sorry folkie polkies! I am once again behind on my TWD. I had every intention of making this pie this week and it is one that I really want to try! I finished my faculty certification course for teaching at University of Phoenix on Monday so hopefully things won't be quite so crazy and I will get back on track. Check out Kim of Scrumptious Photography for the recipe and check out TWD blogroll to see how a multitude of other bakers did!

Edit: I have the crust and the filling made. I am going to put it together tomorrow morning to take in to work.

Next week: Tierramisu Cake

12th and Porter

Salient played at 12th and Porter last Sunday night for a GMA showcase. I took some pictures of the band but my little point and shoot has a hard time with dark rooms. Even though I don't want to admit it, I am sure it is probably user error.

The band did awesome and put on a fantastic show. Poor Bobby whacked himself in the side of the head with a guitar at the beginning of the show. He had a good laugh at himself.



Since I didn't get any good pics of the band I will leave you with these of my sweet kids. Thanks 12th and Porter for having fun painted walls outside of your building! :)

Letterboxing at Deerwood Arboretum

Letterboxing is fun. Click here for details on what to do. My kids love it. This was in Brentwood at Deerwood Arboretum.

The boxes in this set were Winnie the Pooh themed. In honor of that I wore my Pooh Bear socks.
Much fun was had by all.

St. Jude Trike-A-Thon

Little Mans preschool had a Trike-A-Thon today to support St. Jude Children's hospital. They were supposed to collect donations for however many laps they were going to ride. We are just donating a little bit of money.
Due to Little Mans developmental delays he has a little bit of trouble with muscle tone. He has a difficult time pedaling the tricycle, especially uphill. He did great going down hill but got a little frustrated and carried his bike for a little bit. While I was there he rode about 2 laps....partially on the course and the rest going in random circles. It was cute and he did great.

The best part was when I got to school I was watching him on the playground. I turned my head for just a moment and that is when he spotted me. I heard him yelling at me "MOMMY !!!MOMMMY!!!!MOM!!!MOMMMY!!!!" I went up to the fence and thought to myself "I hope I never see him like this in the distant future!" He was so excited that I was there to see him ride. He is so sweet. I just love my boy!

Field Trip to Honeysuckle Hill

A cool think about learning about plants is getting to actually plant them. Munchkins class went on a field trip to Honeysuckle Hill on Wednesday. I was excited to get to go with her and she was excited that I go to come.
After going to the learning barn to learn more about plants the kids got to see all of the farm animal, milk a plywood cow, go on a hayride, eat lunch and play on the awesome playground. They did all of that in an amazingly short amount of time.

They were not all anxious to get back on the bus to go back to school so we took a few photos before we went. You can see Munchkin all the way on the left.

Last year and the beginning of this year I was in a Moms in Touch Prayer group with some of the moms in the photo above. I loved meeting with these ladies every week to pray for our school, our instructors and our kiddos. I really miss it. We all rode out to the farm together.

I love going on field trips and I hope both of my kids will want me on them for a long time to come!

Opening Day (Sounds) and no TWD :-()

I think maybe I sound like a broken record but I have intended to make this all week! Between working late, staying late for my certification class and class observation, going letterboxing on the weekend and a Salient GMA showcase I haven't been in my kitchen to cook dinner much less bake anything. Check out Upper East Side Chronicle by Lauren for Four Star Chocolate Bread Pudding. I am going to make this and soon. I have seen on the other bakers blogs that it has been a hit!
In the meantime here are some photos from Greer Stadium and opening day.

A couple of weeks ago my sweet husband planned an entire day of fun free activities for us to do. One of them included going to Greer Stadiums opening day. They have recently renovated a bunch of stuff and it was free to go in a look around. There were games for the kids, free hot dogs and vitamin water, and autographs from Ozzie, the Sounds mascot.


There were some inflatables for the kids to play in near the entrance. Little Man would have nothing to do with the slide until he watched big sister climb up the ladder and slide down. She held his hand and helped him climb a couple of times. He mastered the ladder and was so thrilled with himself that he was able to climb up all alone!

There were a couple of boys jumping all the way down the slide. Munchkin is a little timid when it comes to things like that but she was excited to try it. Yes, I know she shouldn't have been jumping like that but I only let her do it until I got this fun pic of her. Then I made her stop before we all got in trouble.
Ozzie was out giving out autographs to the kids. They each got an Ozzie hat and a baseball card with his signature.

Little Man was hilarious going up to give him 5. Munchkin was also excited to see him. She loves the mascots!Imagine my surprise when I looked back through my photos and saw Ozzie watching her hit off the pitching machine. I love that I caught that completely unintentionally.
Later, after free hot dogs and vitamin water we took a little self guided tour of the stadium. While walking to the seats by the visitors dugout we were approached by the announcer for the stadium. He asked Munchkin if she would talk to him as he had talked to some boys but no girls. She answered all of his questions loudly into the microphone. He asked about her favorite subject in school and if she thought her parents would bring her to opening night that Thursday. He then asked if she wanted Ozzies cell number since he was a ways across the stadium. He heard it over the loudspeaker and blew her a kiss. Very silly.
All of the balloons in attached to the seat designated season tickets available for purchase. There really were not that many available. Which hopefully will be good for their season! We love going to Sounds games especially when there are fireworks at the end.
The scoreboard used to be blue. I think the Jackson's will like the new colors especially. Check out Little Mans cool Ozzie hat. This was such a fun outing for our family. Thanks honey for finding out about it and planning such a fun day for us! :) I love you!

Dying Easter Eggs

I am so behind on posting. I have a bunch of posts hanging out in the edit folder and I just haven't had time to actually write anything. So, a few photos from egg dying fun! :)

Easter Baskets

I covered these buckets in MOPS a couple of years ago and the kids have used them ever since. I had to straighten Little Mans out just a little this year after he sat on it.

When they came downstairs Easter morning it took a few minutes for them to find them....our table was actually cleaned off so that may have been the problem. :)
They were super excited about the Webkinz and the candy. Munchkin got The Animated Passion in her bucket. Hopefully she will like it when we watch it.

Mobile Blogging

what a day! it has been crazy so far. now i am just testing out mobile blogging. we'll see how it goes!

{TWD} 15 Min Magic: Chocolate Amaretti Torte

From the Joy of Baking:
Amaretti, pronounced "am-ah-REHT-tee", is the Italian name for macaroons, which means little bitter things. Crisp and crunchy on the outside and soft inside, these small, domed shaped cookies originated in Venice Italy during the Renaissance period. Amaretti cookies are made from either ground almonds or almond paste, along with sugar
and egg whites and can be flavored with chocolate or liqueurs. I was not sure where to buy these cookies so I cheked out the questions and suggestions on the TWD site. Someone mentioned World Market had them. My hubby happened to be in the vicinity of one that day so I sent him to get them. They were $2.48 for a 7 oz package. I thought they were delicious!

When you take these cookies and grind them up in your food processor with some almonds you can turn them into this delicious Chocolate Amaretti Torte.

This weeks Tuesdays with Dorie recipe was chosen by Holly from Phe/MOM/enon. You can check out her blog for the recipe or better yet pick up Baking From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan.
This torte was a winner. Remember when my husband willingly let me out of the house with the Banana Cream Pie? This wasn't going any where. I asked him if I should take it with me to work. The look on his face was an incredulous "NO".


The recipe said the cake may dome and crack. Dome and crack it did. I let it cool for 15 minutes before removing it from the pan. Now you are supposed to invert the cake and let it cool to room temperature......
Because it was so thin, when I tried to flip it over it cracked. Any suggestions on how to flip over a cake without it cracking to pieces? Since the one piece fell out anyway we all tried it. Everyone really like the plain ol cake.

This is the first glaze I have made that actually ran off the sides of the cake. I was a little surprised and then realized why I should have had a drip pan underneath the baking rack. The broken edge didn't help keep the chocolate on either. That was ok. It gave me more to taste to make sure it was ok for everyone else to eat!

After refrigerating for 30 minutes I made the almond whipped cream. I pulled out my handy dandy Pampered Chef Easy Accent Decorator and piped the whipped cream onto the torte. I realize I am using torte and cake interchangeably. It was cakey but the title is torte so that is why I think I keep doing that.

Hubby loved this recipe. He wouldn't let me take it to work. I really liked it as well but it is really rich. For a girl who thinks chocolate is a food group, that is saying something. My daughter really liked the cake but she requested it without whipped cream and without extra cookies. She bit one in half earlier in the day and handed it back to me. She is a little bit funny about different flavors. My little guy liked the cake when he tasted it earlier in the day but didn't want any when we had it for dessert. I am guessing that was due to eating almost an entire chocolate bunny when he was only supposed to eat the ears.....

Overall, a quick and easy, delicious dessert!

Happy Easter 2009

He is Risen...He is Risen Indeed!!!

Last night I was contemplating getting up for the sunrise service at a local church. As it was we hardly got out the door for the 10:00 service at LifeChurch. I am so glad we made it though. Both kids came out talking about the resurrection of Jesus! Sweet babies. We want the to understand the sacrifice that God made for us through his only son.




Check out 2008 and 2007 to see how these two have grown!

Hello cuteness! Easter Cake Pops

OK! Here is my second attempt at Bakerella cake pops. I decided these would be easier than the Hello Kitty Pops I made a couple of months ago.
When you actually read the directions instead of just trying to do them from memory they actually turn out OK.

Things I did differently this time:
-refrigerated the cake balls over night
-dipped the end of the lollipop sticks in the melted candy before putting them in the cake ball
-used a tall glass for dipping instead of a shallow bowl.

Things to do before the next time:

-buy an expensive camera and a lightbox

-or put in super duper windows for natural light and take pictures when it is actually light outside

-or paint my dining room bright white instead of dark yellow

Munchkin found out that I was making them for Little Mans class and really wanted some for hers as well. Lucky for her this made 40 pops. Only two of which were sacrificed to the melted candy gods. The kids got to share one and I ate one.

They are still not as purty as Bakerellas but they are getting there. At least I feel a little more confident in my cake pop endeavors than I did before.

80's Bunco

Once a month I get together with a bunch of girls to play Bunco. Bunco is a dice game where you roll to 21. If you roll 3 of the number you are rolling for (say 3 5's when rolling for 5's) you get a big Bunco.
It is a little confusing at first but once you have been through a couple of rounds it is easy to catch on to.
What could be more fun than simply playing Bunco? Themed Bunco of course! When it was at my house it was costume party as it was Halloween time. This months Bunco was 80's bunco. I am not one of those people that toss everything they have that is out of style or I have no use for anymore. Why? Because everything comes back around. Why should I go out and spend money on new 80's clothes when I have my originals?Thank goodness bangs are back. Obviously not big like this but they worked for that night. My sweet daughter took this next photo of me. Here I should make mention that most people that use my camera cannot get it to focus. So, my children may just think that I was out of focus all of their childhood. Yes, I still have my original crimper.

Leslie, the lady that hosted this month pulled out some of her vintage 80's gear:

Now, I was in 9th grade in 1989 so I will admit that I was more 90's big hair than 80's. You can tell the ladies who actually had 80's big hair.

Bunco essentials:

Believe it or not Michelle got her 80's gear at Hot Topic and Claire's Boutique. Like I said it all comes back around...