Sunday, November 22, 2009

SUGAR SKULLS


I got a call from the librarian in charge of the
children's programs last week asking me if I
would consider making skulls for her. Uh, O.K.?

She explained that they are doing a program
that teaches about the Day of the Dead,
among other traditions. I always thought
the Day of the Dead had something to do
with All Saint's Day, but it is a large
celebration on November 2nd that
honors the deceased people in the
family. These skulls are made of sugar,
dried and decorated, then displayed
on the family's mantel.

This is the mold I ordered online. These skulls
are approx. 4 1/2" tall and flat on the back.


The mold came with a recipe and specific instructions not
to even attempt to make these on a rainy or humid day.
That's a tough one around these parts! Today was very
cold but sunny, so I figured it's now or never to get
them done.

The recipe calls for regular granulated sugar, meringue
powder and water. You mix the meringue powder all
through the sugar and then sprinkle with the water.
Mix everything with your hands until it looks like
beach sand and when you press into it your finger-
prints remain.


Pack the sugar mixture firmly into the mold...


Scrape the back with a flat knife...


...then carefully flip over onto a clean playing card.

That guy in the middle bottom looks kinds googly-eyed.


They are placed in a 100 degree oven for 10 minutes with
the door ajar and now they need to sit overnight to dry
all the way through.

The kids will be decorating them with royal icing, paint,
sequins, beads, foil bits, etc. and the deceased person's
name is written on the forehead.

Hmm, now I wonder what these guys would look like
in chocolate...


While I was playing with skulls my younger daughter and
husband (and boxer in hunter orange) went up the
mountain a ways to look for deer. It is quite cold out, but
it is steep climbing and you sweat a lot.

Success! This is the second deer this season and we
are allowed 6 per tag. Next he is going to set a skate
for halibut so our pastor has some fish to take with
him when they visit their daughter in CA over
Christmas.

It is a busy week coming up with our older daughter's
best friend flying up tomorrow to spend Thanksgiving
with us and my niece coming home from school too.

Our younger daughter's school has a bake sale the day
before Thanksgiving and my sister and dad's birthdays
are on either side of Thanksgiving day. Plus I will start
the marathon baking for the Artisan's Market this week.

I think I will begin with the Chocolate and Pistachio
Cranberry Biscotti...


Saturday, November 21, 2009

JUST AROUND THE CORNER!


Can you believe it? Thanksgiving is in 5 days. I had a
wedding cake tasting today and since I had leftover
batter I made this 2 layer Pumpkin Cake for our
Mission's fundraiser at church tomorrow.

How do you like the stem? I made it out of fondant
and then painted it to look like it has been in the
garden.

And more orange for your viewing pleasure--check out
that sunset from a couple of nights ago. I wonder; will
the sunset be red at Christmastime?

My kitchen is pretty much finished and I'll post
pictures shortly. My husband is finishing up the
sheetrock and texture in the master bedroom
and I'll have pictures of that soon too. Can
you picture a dark red on the walls? Well,
that's what I picked out for paint. The
bottom floor in our house is just so cold
feeling that I wanted a nice warm color
on the walls. Just in case it doesn't work
out I got a nice warm beige for backup
since paint is half price right now :-)

I hate that my camera is broken. My brother
is down in Seattle and offered to take my
daughter's expensive camera down to have
it looked at since it is broken too. What
is it about the camera's in this house?!
My new hand held mixer broke too and
it was supposed to be heavy duty so I
paid extra for it. Oh, and the professional
vacuum broke too, right in the middle of
my husband sanding the sheetrock on the
walls. As a result he didn't know that it
was shooting white sheetrock dust out
the back the whole time.

{Big Sigh}


It is dark here at 4:23 pm now and dark
when we wake up.


I am a mole with a broken camera
and a dusty house.



Tuesday, November 17, 2009

PEANUT BRITTLE RECIPE


As promised, the recipe for easy Peanut Brittle from
your microwave. I don't usually eat a lot of candy,
but I just couldn't stay away from this buttery stuff!

This recipe makes a small amount, so I have found
that if you want thicker brittle you should prepare
a smaller pan, maybe an 8" x 8". We made it on
regular cookie sheets and the pieces were thinner.
It's all a matter of personal preference.

This delicious treat makes excellent gifts--the
stores are filling with pretty tins, bags & boxes
for Christmas right now that are perfect for
filling with brittle and handing out to some
very lucky recipients!



PEANUT BRITTLE

1 1/2 cups peanuts (I used Spanish peanuts)
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup light corn syrup
Pinch of salt
1 Tablespoon butter
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon baking soda

Coat a baking sheet or pan with a generous amount of cooking spray.

In a glass bowl combine the peanuts, sugar, corn syrup and salt. Stir.
Microwave this for 4 minutes, 45 seconds on high.

Carefully remove from the microwave and stir in butter and vanilla.
Microwave again for 1 minute and 45 seconds on high.

Carefully remove and stir in baking soda just until mixture is foamy.
Don't overstir at this point--you want it fluffy.

Immediately pour onto prepared baking sheet or pan and spread just
a little to make a single layer. Don't mess with it too much--you don't
want to deflate the baking soda. Place in a cool spot to harden.

In about 20 minutes it will be cool and set. I used a very thin spatula
to reach under the brittle and pop it off the sheet. Break into pieces.

Enjoy!



Monday, November 16, 2009

HOW PUMPKIN PIES ARE MADE


LOL!



Saturday was candy making day at our church for
all the women that wanted to learn. Here I am
with the frozen insides of the Coconut Mounds.
I prepped as much as I could ahead of time so
we could spend the day just having fun.

We made Chocolate Billionaires, Mounds,
Caramel Corn, Fudge, White Bark w/Candy
Canes and Peanut Brittle.


The fudge was really popular, I think there
were 3 different kinds. Our pastor's wife
brought all the supplies for this and even
brought her microwave from home so
there was no waiting time to make the
different kinds.


This was the fun part--dipping in the chocolate!
It worked well to melt the chocolate ahead
of time that morning in crockpots.


Everybody got involved so they understood
how to make the candy, step by step.


Lots of nuts to chop...


We made several bowls of caramel corn and filled bags
to take home with the other candy.


I found white shirt boxes for pretty cheap in
the grocery store and they worked really
well to hold the finished candy to take home.
We lined them with waxed paper and the
green notecard you see on top is a recipe
book with all of the day's recipes inside.
We made them with a ring in the corner
so we can do this again next year with
new recipes and just add them to it.

We ordered pizza for lunch and everyone
said they had a great time. We had no child
care (on purpose) so the mom's of young
kids could have a day to themselves to
enjoy some time away.

Tomorrow I will post the recipe for the
Peanut Brittle. Talk about easy! It is
super buttery and makes a great gift
at Christmas time.


Tuesday, November 10, 2009

EXCELLENT READING


I thought I would share this article I read today on the site www.AmericanThinker.com
It struck me as very relevant to what is happening to our country today.

Honestly--What do you think?


Some people have a government; and some governments have a people, said Ronald Reagan. We are being turned into a nation where the government owns the people. It is the demagogic heirs to the dreadful history of slavery who are now trying to turn the tables; Obama is a slave master in the making. He looks the part; he acts the part; and behind the scenes his Commissars are making it happen.

Obama has never quite displayed his bitter, long-harbored resentment toward America quite as obviously as he did after the Fort Hood massacre. The President couldn't figure out how to respond with the dignity fitting his office.

I happened to be going through the Washington, DC airport a couple of months ago when I heard a lot of people clapping and whooping, a little demonstration. When I looked, I noticed a single, elderly French horn player, sitting on a folding chair and playing patriotic tunes to enliven a parade -- if you can call it that -- of elderly, wheel-chair-bound vets from World War Two coming off their plane: The Greatest Generation, as even Tom Brokaw called them. They looked shrunken, most of those lifelong handicapped vets, wearing baseball and VFW caps, but some of them left their wheel chairs and walked through the reception as the old horn player did his tunes. My eyes started to tear up and I walked over to join the applause as these real saviors of the West went on by. They were greeted by a little reception committee and then went on to what was almost surely their last celebration with their buddies from the War. And that octogenarian horn player kept on playing his patriotic tunes.

Some of the bystanders joined in the applause, but there were some who made a display of their indifference and contempt as well. It was an interesting lesson in our split society. One young man jauntily walked away from the little final home-coming demonstration, prancing in the opposite direction, a little counter-demonstration all by himself. Those old vets in wheelchairs had no meaning for him; just the opposite. They were just mean old white guys, or something equally bizarre. The most democratic Army in history, the one that brought together Italians, Jews, Germans, Poles, and yes, blacks and Japanese Americans and everyone else, all of them scared of dying but pretty much convinced that their country was in peril from some pretty evil characters in Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan and the Soviet Union. So they fought, and died, sometimes in great numbers. Bob Dole got his lifelong wounds in the murderous Italian campaign, just like John McCain got his shoulder bones broken in the Hanoi Hilton. Some of those World War II guys were wounded for life, and some of them were now being rolled in their wheelchairs in front of our eyes. They meant nothing to the contemptuous young man who pranced away from them.

That'a a small metaphor for this Administration. The young counter-demonstrator had no idea about the sacrifices of the Greatest Generation, the lethal dangers the country confronted after People Harbor, and the heroism of our Soldiers, Sailors and Marines. He'd no doubt been told from childhood onward how evil White America really is. Yes, those WW Two soldiers represented an imperfect democracy; it just happened to be the best one on earth. And they knew that because of their own family histories, because American history was still taught in all the schools, and because they were good and decent people who were shocked by the vile and evil regimes that were conquering Europe and Asia, ruthlessly killing millions of innocent civilians as they went. It was a huge resurgence of barbarism, and their very souls cried out against the injustice of it all. They were Americans. It wasn't necessary to explain things to them. They got it.

And so the high school girls saw their sweethearts going off to war, and were left back home. Some of their men came back, often shell-shocked, but they didn't talk about the war. They went back to their lives and tried to pursue happiness. A lot of them never came back.

And then some guy named Joe Stalin exploded the first Soviet nuclear bombs, an A bomb and an H bomb. After all of their pain and homesickness and sacrifices, another totalitarian enemy had infiltrated the U.S. Government up to and including the White House staff. Those infiltrations were real, as we now know. They were not just the wild imaginings of Tailgunner Joe McCarthy. So, Americans became angry and frightened by this new totalitarian danger, especially because the State and Federal bureaucracies, the teachers, the media, and the universities were penetrated by the Stalinist Left and their Front organizations. For the first time in human history, a single Soviet bomber could fly from Europe to New York City and drop a bomb to obliterate all of Manhattan. They were outraged and frightened by this new threat, and they supported a vigorous anti-Communist movement led by people like Harry Truman, Richard Nixon, Joe McCarthy, President Eisenhower, and a host of others. For some decades the American people defended itself vigorously and effectively against the Stalin-directed Fifth Column that threatened their lives and freedom.

Today we are seeing a Second Cold War, but the enemy is within, just as it was after World War II. We are seeing outright front organizations again. "J Street" is a classical front organization, which should be called "J Front." It's a fraud, claiming to represent people who never voted for them. George Soros, who sets up many of these phony fronts, is a man who accommodated the Nazis, among other distinctions. He has never displayed a smidgen of guilt for his role in the the disposition of Jewish possessions after their owners were arrested and sent to death camps -- men, women, and children. Normal Holocaust survivors feel tremendous guilt; Soros sounds jaunty and devil-may-care about the murderous cannibalism of those years. He made out well, and started his long road to fortune. Today he is financing Obama's "Coup from Above," with the same insouciance with which he betrayed his Jewish relatives in Hungary.

There's a story to be told there. But don't expect the media to tell it.

The American people are hearing a call to arms -- not literal arms, for our system can self correct. But we have to out-organize and out-pressure the Left. They have called us "the enemy" ever since Alinsky's little book radicalized the revolutionaries of the Boomer Left after the violent revolutionary groups were readily suppressed. When somebody really considers you their enemy you have no choice. Either you return the compliment, or you get overwhelmed by the new Chicago Mob in D.C.

The Left has shown how to fight from a position of the minority and win. American conservatives by a recent poll have a two-to-one majority. They are constantly undermined by the political Left: Ridiculed in the media, demeaned in the schools and universities, out-maneuvered in politics at the state and national level by Leftists who are far nastier and far more ruthless than ordinary, decent Americans. This is a struggle for the country. We need to toughen up.

The first lesson is to start telling the truth without fear. Shout it out. Demonstrate. Tell your truth to your relatives that you've been trying to be nice to all these years. Make it pleasant and polite, but firm. Don't yell. Just talk and talk and talk. Yes, you can stand out from the crowd. Half of your listeners will privately agree with you if you state your case well, and over time they will find the courage to speak up, too.

The second lesson is to build up a cadre of leaders -- in the media, in politics, in the educational system, everywhere. We have at least one charismatic leader now in Sarah Palin. That's why she is under constant, vicious attack from the Left. That's why they burned down her church in Wasilla. They fear her. I love her for the enemies she has made. There are many other good people, but a charismatic political talent comes just once in every generation. She needs and deserves support. So do others.

When conservatives betray American conservatism, let them know you will vote against them, and support their conservative opponents in all the ways that work. Don't get nasty and hysterical. Just be calm and firm.

The third lesson is to organize, organize, and organize. That's how the Left did it. Tea Parties are good, the Heritage Foundation is good. There are many good organizations: We need to support them with our dollars and with our voices. We need to mobilize conservatives into active pressure groups around their greatest concerns: Web freedom is a crucial one right now. So is free radio and TV. When the Left attacks Fox News or Rush, we have to raise a gigantic fuss on their behalf. The media cannot be allowed to ignore our demonstrations. We have allowed far too many good people be attacked and attacked and shrugged our shoulders.

The election of 2010 will be a major survival test. If Americans fail that test, we will become Britain in its catastrophic decline under fifty years of socialism. A new Ruling Class will arise, just as it has in socialist Europe, and they will not care one bit about the people. They will import hostile voters from Third World countries. They will forge alliances with Islamists, as they are already doing. America will be helpless, and all the hostile forces around the world will know it. They will all be trying to push us under. If we are governed by a domestic Fifth Column, then North Korea, Russia, China, Iran, Hugo Chavez, the Sunni Moslem Brotherhood, all will beat us down. Real democracy is just not their thing.

At the U.N. we see kleptocracies in charge. Behold our future if we do not act. Chicago and Detroit stand as warnings.

Conservatives are individualists, so we have to do something unusual: organize, organize, organize. Local and national. Even international. Some of our friends are in the British media, where they are looking for us to stand up and defend civilization, just as they stood up against Hitler when we were still dithering. Some of our friends are in Australia, in Canada, and yes, in France. Around the world there are millions of people who get it. We can be American patriots with allies all around the world. They need leaders and vocal support just as much as we do.

And we must militantly defend the freedom of the web. The Stalinoids will attack it viciously, just as they will attack talk radio and Fox News. We are fighting the same enemy Ronald Reagan fought. We have to do it just as intelligently and vigorously as he did.

The word "activist" used to be a media word for the Left. It's high time to make it work for American conservatives.

Become an activist or lose your country.

Monday, November 2, 2009

BIG DAY IN OUR HOUSEHOLD


Our older daughter bought her first vehicle and she
paid for it with her own money--in full! She works
for our home repair business, house sits, babysits,
mows lawns and in all her spare time she is
learning to be a pharmacy tech. Oh and she is
taking a math class at the college.

It's a neat truck, just the right size and 4 wheel
drive (very important with our steep driveway)

Right before we went and picked up the truck
our younger daughter brought home straight A's
on her report card!


Lots of progress in the kitchen to report. In fact, with
everybody helping all that is left is a second coat of
paint on the trim and then I can call the inspector.

I just know he is going to show up with the dreaded
clipboard in hand. And probably a magnifying glass.
He may even be wearing a white glove to check for
dirt and debris underneath the flooring. I wonder
if he will request a step stool so he can inspect
the ceiling for cleanliness.

If anybody needs me I will be in the hall closet
with the door shut and lights off until he's gone.

Can they be bribed with pastry?

Did I just write that?



Here is the outside entrance that I will use to bring items
in and to load up to deliver. Everything is recycled--
isn't that awesome? My husband is a genius at reusing
items instead of throwing them away. He makes
them work for what we need and makes them look
nice as well.

I still need to order vinyl graphics for the patio door
so nobody tries to walk through it. That would
be bad, wouldn't it?

Especially if it was the inspector.


Must be deer hunting season. Doesn't everybody have
antlers cooking on their barbeque?



Sunday, November 1, 2009

I SHOULD PROBABLY STOP SLACKING NOW

It's November 1st and time to get back into the swing of things!
My dumb camera finally bit the dust and only produces pictures
that are bright purple. When I was down south I looked at cameras,
but I just wasn't in the mood to spend $250-300. dollars for
another point and shoot when it doesn't seem like mine was all
that old.

By the way--do you like the new header photo? My older brother
shot that down at the beach across the road from our house. The
surfers come in droves this time of year because of the fantastic
wave action! He sells his photos too if anyone is interested in
some sensational art for their homes. His photos make fantastic
Christmas gifts for people that enjoy wildlife and the outdoors--
you should see the ones he took of the 3 bear cubs that were in
town this year!

I have lots to share and believe it or not I have been thinking
about Christmas and Thanksgiving (in that order) already! Maybe
the 33 degrees and ice on the front deck yesterday had something
to do with that.

In the meantime here is a hilarious video for you to watch. Anybody
that has ever shared their life with a cat will thoroughly enjoy this: