Did you know?

Did you know that we have a National Chocolate Cake Day?....well I didn't either, but when I heard, well I just had to celebrate such a delicious day.  I wanted a cake...a deliciously perfect, heavenly cake worthy of such a day so I scoured the internet for the perfect sounding cake....and found it on All recipes.  This one was a blue ribbon winner in a county fair in Pennsylvania,  how could it not be a winner for us too!  With as much brown sugar, sour cream and chocolate, how could it go wrong?

It was scrumptious...just perfect.  Chocolaty cake with a creamy light frosting, not too thick and overwhelming the cake.  I will bake it a little less than I did this time, but this cake is definitely a winner.  We all loved it!!

Every last luscious lick was enjoyed!

Sandy's Chocolate Cake   (from Allrecipes.com)

Ingredients

• 3 cups packed brown sugar
• 1 cup butter or margarine, softened
• 4 eggs
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 2 2/3 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup baking cocoa
• 1 tablespoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/3 cups sour cream
• 1 1/3 cups boiling water
• FROSTING:
• 1/2 cup butter or margarine
• 3 (1 ounce) squares unsweetened chocolate
• 3 (1 ounce) squares semisweet chocolate
• 5 cups confectioners' sugar
• 1 cup sour cream
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Directions

1. In a mixing bowl, cream brown sugar and butter. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat on high speed until light and fluffy. Blend in vanilla. Combine flour, cocoa, baking soda and salt; add alternately with sour cream to creamed mixture. Mix on low just until combined. Stir in water until blended. Pour into three greased and floured 9-in. round baking pans. Bake at 350 degrees F for 35 minutes. Cool in pans 10 minutes; remove to wire racks to cool completely. For frosting, in a medium saucepan, melt butter and chocolate over low heat. Cool several minutes. In a mixing bowl, combine sugar, sour cream and vanilla. Add chocolate mixture and beat until smooth. Frost cooled cake.

by the way, National Chocolate Cake Day was celebrated on Friday Jan. 27, 2012.... next year it will be on Sunday, Jan. 27 2013  .  I know I'm planning on celebrating. Will you?

He Got the Joke!!!!

It seems like we spend a lot of time explaining jokes, sarcasm and idioms to Ryan. Because of his aspergers he has a hard time understanding them. He takes everything very literal. The other day I called from work to tell him a joke I heard from one of the guys. He got it. He had himself a good laugh. The joke went like this.......
A young man in the Army came home for a visit. He was talking with one of his friends about his adventures. His friend ask him, "Hey I have not seen you for a long time, where have you been?" The young man said, " I've been in the Mo-ja vee desert. His friend noticed that he had mispronounced the word "Mojave. "Oh, you mean the Mojave desert. It's a Spanish word, you have to pronounce the J like a H. By the way, I hear that you are getting out of the army, when will you be coming home again?"
"Well," said the young man," most likely around Hune or Huly." Yes I know it was a dumb joke. I enjoyed sharing it with Ryan and hearing him laugh. That is one of the small pleasures I guess, but it made my day. 

Ouch!!

I'm not sure how many times we've told him.  Probably as many times as we've seen him do it....but does that stop him?  NO!  
When Liam gets out of the bath tub he will plant his foot on the side of the bathtub and then jump out. Well our prophesied moment came true.  We'd tell him, rather sternly, to not do that because he could fall....and fall he did!  With a slip of the foot, wham!, his chin hit the porcelain side.  At first I though he just bit his lip or tongue, but I found no blood.  So I cautiously looked under the chin and there it was, a deep gash.
I scooped him out and took him to the kitchen for a closer look. I left a sobbing, scared Brianne, to which Connor and Cailin promptly took care of.
Once in the light of the kitchen I found that it was somewhat deep, I just wasn't sure if it was deep enough for stitches.  Barry was out with Delaney visiting his parents. I called and beckoned him to come home.  He didn't think a visit to ER was needed but inlisted the help of our neighbor, a nurse,to see what she thought. She looked at it and thought we could handle it at home....thankfully after a bit of peroxide, bacitracin, steri-strips, and bandages...plus some movie time cuddling with me while watching Signing Time, all was well...without an 8 hour wait and a $500.+ bill.  It's been two weeks and he's scratched it, touched, pulled at it enough that the steri strips weren't able to hold it completely so now his scar will be bigger, but all is well, all is well.

And does he jump out of the bath tub now? you ask,   We still have to remind him not to, but at least he listens and climbs out properly!  Good boy.  What a treasure this one is to me.

Book group--Heidi

 We gathered together for book group yesterday.  Our book of the month was Heidi.  What a wonderfully delightful book this was to read.  Delaney and I greatly enjoyed it.  Ryan said he didn't like it, but always asked to read it...and Connor complained loudly about having to be around when we read it, yet, he always hung around to hear it read too (especially at the end), sooooo, I think they really did like it too.  Cailin, perhaps she really didn't like it for she would sneak away when the reading began.

 We found so many wonderful life lessons to talk about with the kids-- honesty, kindness, forgiveness, love, optimism, perseverance, faith in God, importance of prayer, and on and on.

The author talked so often of the good milk from Schwanli, one Alm-Uncle's goats. Toasted cheese on bread was talked of often too.  How could we not eat such simple yummy food.  Goat cheese toasted on rye bread. (and whole grain bread for the 'would be haters' of rye :)  It reminds me of the super yummy dark multigrain/rye bread Barry and I ate from the local bakery in our town Erfenbach in Germany.
Mmmm, delish!

"I love you"

It was said rather garbled.

It was said quite quickly, all jumbled together, but,

she most definitely said it

" I love you"

Those have to be the sweetest words a father and mother could every hear from their child.

Brianne and I were sitting on the sofa, cuddling as I was kissing on her and telling her that I loved her over and over, she joined in too and told me those beautiful words.  I'm so thrilled that I understood her.  This girl will talk...I can't wait to hear what she has to say!

Barry had a similar experience just last night.  He beamed with joy at hearing those three simple words.

Oh, how we love that girl!! 

Silly kids

Such silly kids!

They sure are enjoying our  mild winter weather...if you don't have snow to play in, 

well then,

 mud will just have to do

The blessing of a good book and prayer

     When she (Klara) lay on her great soft bed in the hayloft, to which Heidi had also climbed, she looked through the round, open window, out a the twinkling stars, and, completely charmed, exclaimed, "Oh Heidi, see it is just as if we were riding in the sky in the high carriage!"
     "Yes, and do you know why the stars are so full of joy, and wink at us so with their eyes?" asked Heidi
     "No, I don't know; what do you think about it?" asked Klara.
     "Because they see up in heaven how well the dear Lord directs everything for people, so that they need have no worry and can be safe, because everything will happen for the best.  That delights them so' see how they wink, that we may be happy too! But do you know, Klara, we must not forget our prayers; we must ask the dear Lord to think of us, when He is directing everything so well, that we may always be safe and never be afraid of anything.
Heidi, by Joanna Spyri




     What a wonderful gift it was to hear that as Ryan read aloud from Heidi at the end of a very stressful day for me.  I felt so withered, so tired.  Yet, I had many great tender mercies that day too.  How blessed I am for His directing hand in our lives.  Court cases will end. Ryan's delay with math class will work out just fine. Brianne's surgery will be wonderful for her hearing and speech problems. My wedding ring will be fixed (thankfully I found the diamond--a definite tender mercy in being able to find it!) Delaney's fears and challenges will be worked through.
     Why, because I'm not in charge and "the Lord directs everything for people,so that they need have no worry and can be safe, because everything will happen for the best."


Oh how I love reading a good book!

     "When the two little girls that night looked up from their beds at the starlight, Heidi said, "Haven't you been thinking all day long today how good it is that the dear Lord doesn't give us what we pray so terribly hard for, when He knows of something much better?" 
     "Why do you say that now, Heidi?" asked Klara.
      "Don't you know, because I prayed so hard in Frankfurt that I might go home right away, and because I couldn't go, I thought the dear Lord had not heard me. But, do you know, if I had gone right away, you would never have come up on the mountain, and you wouldn't have got well."
     "But Heidi," she began again, "then we ought not to pray for anything, because the dear Lord certainly has always something better in mind than we know and ask Him for."
     "O Klara, you really do not think so?" Heidi hastened to say.  "We ought to pray to the dear Lord every day, and about every single thing; for then He will know that we do not forget that we reeive everything from Him. And if we forget the dear Lord, He will forget us too; your grandmamma told me that. But , you know, if we do not receive what we would like, we must not think the dear Lord has not listened, and stop praying, but we must pray like this, "Now I kow, dear Lord, that You have something better in store, and I will be glad that You will be so good to me."


Faith and trust.

Up and Up, Again and Again

This scene is played out....oh about 20 + times a day now.  We just can't keep her down!  She loves to climb the stairs and find her brothers and sisters in their bedrooms. All she wants to do is play with them, (or just create havoc!!    :)

You go Girl!!

Yeah, I made it again!

One more reason why I hate camping

I can explain this camp out in three words, but mom wants me to write more. Here goes. The three words are, Cold, Wet, Windy. The reason why it's cold is obvious, we were camping in January. Wet has more to it than you'd expect. Of course, when it rains things get wet. everyone knows that. But there's more. We didn't get the rain tarp on properly (that or the tent needs to be re-waterproofed) so our tent was full of water. Due to the pillows, sleeping bags and clothes lying around the tent, all the water was quickly soaked up. That's a good thing. A bad thing is that this made it hard to sleep. My only pair of jeans were so soaked that I could have dropped them in the river by our camp site and they wouldn't have gotten any more wet. The next morning, breakfast was provided, meant for twice as many people as were there, so we got a good breakfast. Then we went to the activities. There are only two things that need to be said about this. Tomahawk throwing, and a fun game called sneak up. In sneak up, one person sits beside a real cowbell. Then, everyone else tries to take the cowbell back to the starting point without muffling the sound. If the person sitting there points directly at you, you're out of the game. That's it.
       
                The Great Conn

Presentation Time

Liam and Delaney shared all they learned about grizzly bears and polar bears with the group.  Liam was quite hesitant to come, for fear of the others laughing at him about his chin bandaged.  It took the soothing and comforting words of Cailin to help him over his fears and come.

Connor's been learning all about Quasars and black holes and shared more information on this favorite science topic.

Cailin's been enjoying her anatomy and physiology book.  The latest chapter she's been reading about is on the circulatory system....so this is what she shared with us.  She presented it in her creative way...as a story of a red blood cell giving a tour to other, freshly made from the bones, red blood cells of the heart and how it all works.

Bear Habitats--a Study Unit

For the past few weeks Liam, Delaney, Brianne, (for the book reading),and I, have emerged ourselves into learning about grizzly bears and polar bears.  We've dipped our hands into plenty of paper mache to create their habitats and had quite a lot of fun turning an old pizza box and paper guts of an electric mixer into a forest and a polar region for the two bears.  The kids also had fun making bears and seals (the ringed seal is a favorite meal for the polar bear) out of salt dough.

Peak under the top of the ice block, you can see the Momma bear with her cubs living and growing in the den she dug in the ice and snow for her babies to have a home.
The dark shapes in the water are seals.
In the very upper top left side, you'll find a polar bear waiting patiently for a seal to pop up and breathe.  Sometimes they wait for hours on end, but patience is rewarded with a tasty meal for them.

One day, while out on a walk at the local school, we found many rocks, mossy sticks and ever green trees to gather from to create a forested home for the grizzly bear.


I know we all had fun learning about bears, and I don't think Delaney is done.  She quite fascinated with polar bears. She's watched more nature movies about them and has checked out a few more books on her own about them.

Ryan "How the Book of Mormon helps me as a youth"

   I was asked to give this talk in sacrament meeting and my Mom wanted me to put it on the blog for whatever reason. I guess it was just such a good talk.    


       Good morning brothers and sisters. Recently I completed a very hard math course at the local community college. I had many hard challenges trying to learn all I needed to, what with all the equations and logarithms. Before I had my final exam the day it was to be taken I had said a prayer with my Mom that I would not be anxious and would be able to do my best. That morning I had also read the Book of Mormon, which usually helps me feel the spirit. When I was taking the exam I started feeling nervous again as I am prone too. I felt like I would not be able to continue, but then I remembered an old familiar scripture everyone really knows. That scripture was 1 Nephi 3:7. I was able to get through the rest of the exam without being nervous because I knew the Lord would have prepared a way for me to do fine if I finished it myself. I ended up getting an A on my whole class. My testimony is that the book of Mormon can help each of us if we just read it. It will help us to feel the spirit. My family is also taking Bishop Becker's challenge to read the Book of Mormon and it helps our family become closer and feel the spirit. I know it also is a testament of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.

A Walk in the Park with my Delaney Janey

We tried something a bit new this year for Christmas gifts.  We gave them "experiences" for gifts.  What do kids want most...they really want our time. We created coupons for each of them to an outing or date... one on one time with either Barry or I.  Delaney was the first to redeem her coupon, "A Walk int he Park, just with my Delaney Janey".

Her coupon gave her the option to have a simple meal from any fast food restaurant plus a walk in the park.  She chose Wendy's.  It was a bit windy but not too cold...in the low 60's or so, so off we went.
We got our food and went to Randolph Park for a lunch at the gazebo. We then walked around the pond, had races on the trails through the woods--Delaney won!!  Plus we had fun climbing and sliding on the play ground.  It started to rain so we took off for Walmart for a yummy donut and just talked and spent time together in the car before we headed home.

I had a great time....I know Delaney did too.  Her are her words  "I liked making you follow me around on the play ground Mom, like follow the leader."

Eat your heart out....we're back into the swing of things.

 Christmas break is over and we're now back into our regular routine of school.   

Cailin has chosen to learn about the circulatory system for her science studies.  She made the four chambers of the heart out of graham crackers....then said "Look, I'm eating my heart!!"

Washington, Winter, and  War--W is the letter of the week for Liam.   We're finishing up our history unit of the Revolutionary War, George Washington and Colonial time period and we're talking about winter--what happens to the earth to create the seasons.  We've also talked about animals the hibernate and we're starting a science exploration of bears, which is what Delaney wants to learn about.  

I had the younger ones decorate a black line drawing of a tree and bare branches  according to what it would look like during the different seasons.  We also read many different books about winter, most fiction, but one- "The Reason for Seasons" by Gail Gibbons, a non fiction on the earth and it's movement around the sun to create the seasons., days and nights.

Delaney and Liam have been enthralled with the story of Samuel the Lamanite from the Book of Mormon. We got the Liken movie of Samuel the Lamanite for Christmas and these two have been watching it often...and then wanted to recreate the movie on their own.  They set up chairs for the audience, us, to watch them perform.  Then....

let the show begin....Liam loved being Samuel,, telling all the Nephities to repent.  Delaney loved shrugging him off, ignoring him, rolling her eyes at him and proclaiming "All is well in Zion".  

We pulled out the letter flash cards and played a game of Memory with them.  Brianne joined in the fun of learning when we pulled out an apple for snack and taught her the ASL sign for apples.

Well, whether I'm ready or not,  (and I'm not), we're back into the swing of things.

A Twelfth's Night Evening

While looking through this book, Felicity's Cookbook--A Look Into the Past,  (Felicity is the American Girl doll and book series placed in the colonial time period), we found that they traditionally celebrated the end of the Christmas season on the 6th of January....that was in two days.  The girls and I decided we wanted to end our history unit learning about the Revolutionary War and colonial time period is a fun, fashionable, festive way.  We were going to host a Twelfth's Night party, just like our ancestor's may have done.

Cailin put together the invitations....she had way to much fun making the paper look "old" by burning the edges.  She then sealed the invites with wax...again, she had too much fun playing the the wax...and created many wax finger tips.

They delivered the the invitations to their father and brothers...and now it was time to put the menu together.

To set a proper colonial time you must have a symmetrical balance to the dishes.  A similair type  dish on each side of the table. If there is a vegetable on the right, then there is another one for the left. This also goes for all food items served, thus they had many foods to choose from to eat, two meats, vegetables, breads, etc.  We didn't follow this explicitly, but did our best.

Our Menu

Starting with a traditional tea service followed by,

Chicken Pudding

Veal Balls

Sweet Potatoes with Apples

Creamed Greenbeans

Sally Lunn Bread

Syllubub 

For dessert we had a choice of 

Almond tarts

Pumpkin Pudding

Frumentary 

Delaney wanted to make the almond tarts.  She made the crust and rolled out the dough, placed them in muffin tins for individual tartlets.

Cailin made the syllubub, which is a creamy drink made with real whipped cream (we used cool whip, which we had on hand) the juice from oranges, and ginger ale.   "Bub" was the label given by the British to any food that had 'bubbles' in them. Our bubbles came from the soda.
Liam made the pumpkin pudding.  I made everything else....I came to realize why slaves were so important to their culture and time.  Cooking all this food was a lot of work...and time consuming, not to mention expensive.  I'm sure only the wealthy ate these many dishes every night. I probably went through 12-18 eggs just for one meal...along with the chicken, veal, flour, nuts, cream, oranges, butter (oh my I used 6 sticks of butter, or more).  And that's just in the kitchen.  All the work needed to have a farm or run a household during that time period must've been grueling.

We started the night with a traditonal tea.  We had left over sugar cubes from making pyramids last year and milk added to herbal tea.  We also dined by candle light.  We enjoyed lovely conversation and delicious food.

After the meal we enjoyed dancing to minuets...the way they would have in the past.  I hoped all the kids would dress up for the occasion...only Delaney wanted to, but I did have us all get up and dance.  We had an enjoyable time and Cailin played the minuets on the flute beautifully.

Afterwards we enjoyed the many choices for dessert...our favorites, well all of them.  The pumpkin pudding was a favorite even though is was a bit different.  It was sweetened with molasses.  The frumentary was made of raspberries gelled into a pudding like dish with sugar and cornstarch.  The almond tarts of course, were delicious.
The girls had such a good time planning and preparing for the night that they wanted to know what was next...well we're on to westward expansion...the pioneers.  Delaney asked if they too had tea parties.  I told her "No, not usually, they had working bee's"     "What are they?"  --a time to combine work with fun. So, now we're planning a quilting bee. Can't wait for the fun!