A Quick Summery From February To Now..

Well well, I have skipped over much of the past couple of months, but I will briefly mention a few of the goings on now.
I had to work on Valentine's Day, but when I got home I first found a dozen red roses for me in the kitchen and then a live orchid waiting for me with my sweet husband. I don't remember what we had for dinner but my husband is a New York Cheesecake buff so I made a Junior's Cheesecake for dessert. It was heavenly.

In march I finished my Aunt's apron and sent it to her, but I believe I already wrote about that, so here is a picture of it.

My sister-in-law's birthday was in march and she loves chocolate so I made two chocolate cakes for her birthday. The first was a chocolate sponge cake with dark chocolate ganache from my Julia Child Cookbooks. The second was a Betty Crocker mix chocolate cake with Pillsbury Fudge Chocolate frosting.
Superman and I had a wonderful Easter, we had lots of fun Easter treats, listened to General Conference, and we had deviled eggs with lunch. Last month was my birthday and Jon took me out to eat with my friends and then we had cake and ice cream at home with family. By the way, Texas Roadhouse makes you sit in a saddle on a wooden horse while they announce it's your birthday and everyone shouts, " Yeehaw!" at you. It's not too embarrassing, but all you get for it is a scoop of vanilla ice cream (although it was pretty amazing ice cream.)

I have been growing tomato and bell pepper plants from seeds in egg cartons and next month I will transplant them into the back yard. In a couple of months I should be able to harvest my first crop! I'm so excited; look how tall and green and healthy they are getting, this is my first vegetable garden I'll be planting by myself. Superman has been a great help actually, he has watered the seedlings when I forgot and has been helping me prepare the earth in the backyard for transplanting. I plan to plant peas in the plot soon too.

Mothers

I am not a mother myself yet; although, I want to be. Motherhood is one of the most intimidatingly important tender desires of my heart. It intimidates me because of how people are being raised these days and how differently I want to raise up children of my own to be. I see people around me everyday who are indecent, impolite, crude, careless, irresponsible, and selfish among other things. It frightens me to think I have all of these ugly influences to overcome to teach my children to be decent, polite, generous, responsible, charitable and hard working people. I will just have to devote every thought and effort to teaching them to live healthy virtuous lives. At the same time I know I don't want to, and CAN'T, micromanage my family so I will just have to do my best. I think maybe that's what most women want and how they feel about becoming a mother.
I hope my own mother knows how deeply grateful I am to her for leaving work to raise us kids and for sacrificing so much time, thought, and effort to make sure we were taught right and felt loved and secure. Thanks Mom, I hope I will follow your good example when I have my own children. I also want to thank all the other good mothers out there who are carefully raising their children to be decent members of society. Thank you for your sacrifices you Beautiful Women!

Discovering a New Strategy

This week I used my new trifle bowl for the first time! I made a banana pudding in it. Isn't it beautiful? ...Well for a first attempt maybe?... Okay okay, I need practice. This trifle bowl from pampered chef is awesome though; it has a removable pedestal and a lid, so if I need to I can stick it in the fridge as is! I'm all about minimal clean up.. and my bright orange mixer!

I finally loaded my pictures onto my computer so I have to show you the new apron my sister-in-law made for me for Christmas. The orange stripes match my mixer! My oldest brother's wife is so crafty especially with the sewing machine.
She also made my husband a jean and flannel blanket for Christmas. Isn't she amazing?

Last week I unpacked my blender and I've been making a lot of smoothies and milk shakes ever since. When I was growing up my family never used the blender much and I think I had my first real smoothie when I was 23. I discovered jamba juice and made it a once a week ritual for a while. (I love the Peanut Butter Mood minus the Chocolate and with extra banana.) So cooking with the blender has been a gradual and unnatural discovery for me. Luckily I have my years working at Dairy Queen experience to fall back on.
Now I'm using my blender as a way to get fruit into my husband. Superman is allergic to many fruits and the only way he can eat them is if they are mixed up with other fruit or in something. I mix sherbet with a banana, cherry juice, berries, and Naked juice. It makes a pretty delicious breakfast for him and it makes me happy because now I know he's getting his vitamins and fiber. So, for anyone else out there who is struggling to bring fruit into her man's diet I thought I'd share the strategy. ;)