Fighting

I have been really struggling the last month for a variety of reasons, but I am coming to an understanding about myself.  I've been dealing with anxiety and depression. The more I've thought about it, I think I am on the spectrum for anxiety disorder but I've dealt with it in a somewhat healthy way up until now. It is hard to distinguish where it ends and begins. As I've sifted through my thoughts, one thing that is clear to me is that spirituality feeds me. It really makes or breaks me, and unfortunately I have been starving my spirit. I make token measures to rekindle good spiritual habits over the last few years, but they are not part of me like they have in the past. In an effort to force myself into the scriptures, I began a scripture study class after we moved here. For a few weeks it helped me make scripture time a priority, but then I lost it as others took their turns for teaching. When it was my turn to teach again, it helped to bring me back in. My chapters focused on the Savior (as so many do) and this particular focus brought me to a conviction again but it still didn't instill a habit.

The first Sunday of December I focused my fast on me. I recognized I needed help. Having that moment to myself with the Lord in prayer began breaking down a wall. I found that I had a moment in the mornings to myself that I could dedicate to prayer and scriptures study. It really has helped to have those moments to myself and to work on establishing a habit again. Having the scripture study class allowed me to have a "reason" or focus to my study too, but then Christmas break has kind of put a wrench in it. I was able to keep up for the most part but I lost my consecutive days reading streak a few days ago and am now trying to get back on track. My reading schedule has been scripture class assignment Mon - Thurs and then the other days are focused on Sunday lessons assignments.

Today I had the quiet time in the morning to read again, so I decided to read the Sunday School assignment for tomorrow. We are doing the Book of Mormon again, so I am excited to double up on it. Since it is the first lesson of the year, it's an introduction lesson. Honestly while I was reading today it wasn't penetrating until I came to the ones from D&C 84. These particular verses stood out to me:

D&C 84:54,61

54 And your minds in times past have been darkened because of unbelief, and because you have treated lightly the things you have received—
 61 For I will forgive you of your sins with this commandment—that you remain steadfast in your minds in solemnity and the spirit of prayer, in bearing testimony to all the world of those things which are communicated unto you.

I had to read those several times, but I have no doubt the Lord was speaking to me. It's true. My mind has been darkened because of unbelief and not taking things seriously enough to change me. He gives me the answer too: steadfastness (having faith), prayer, and sharing my testimony. Tomorrow is testimony meeting. Guess I'll be sharing. But the other place my testimony that needs to be shared is in my own home. The experience I referenced earlier about conviction actually left me with the impression that I needed to do more at home to focus on the Savior and the gospel but nothing changed. I think part of the message being communicated to me today is that it needs to happen. The gospel needs to be a priority. 

I need to explore this some more and make an actual plan for fruition. But for now, my thoughts are at least turned to the Lord and on 'paper'.

NO SISSY! Weigh in Week 5

Total: 5.5 lb/6.9 lb

Week 5: 164.2 (1.4 lb loss)/164.0 (1.3 lb loss)
Week 4: 165.6 (.4 lb loss)/ 165.3 (0 loss)
Week 3: 166.0 (.9 lb loss)/165.3 (.5 lb loss)
Week 2: 166.9 (.2 lb loss)/165.8 (1.8 lb loss)
Week 1: 167.1 (2.7 lb loss)/167.6 (3.3 lb loss)
Start: 169.8/170.9

surprised myself

About a month ago Facebook was full of memes and articles in honor of infant loss and miscarriage awareness. I remember one in particular that made the point that a mother thinks of her losses often and could tell you how old that child would be in a blink. I realized I could not. I don't know if those wounds have healed with Peter's arrival or the peace that came from the Lord. Whatever the reason, at the time I was totally at a loss of how much time has passed.

Fast forward and rewind to Thursday. I host a scripture study class in our home so that children are welcome to come too. One of the moms has a five year old daughter and a thirteen month old son that come with her. Thursday the girl was making some kind of noises about not wanting to go home. I told her she could stay with me. I need a little girl because I don't have one. She shook her head no and quickly got ready to go, looking a little panicked in the process. I realized as I was saying that she could stay with me, that my first lost baby would be her age. I guess I've paid more attention than I thought.

Having Peter has changed a lot of things. I've aged a lot in the last eight years. I'm so grateful he is here and part of our family, and though I want a daughter, I'm not sure I really have it in me to have one more. I am tired. This week my body has been acting odd so I took a pregnancy test to put my mind at ease. It's amazing how quickly my mind shifted to disappointment. It is hard to separate nostalgia from true desire though. I decided to leave it up to the Lord and accept whatever He has planned for our family.

oh the cuteness!

Jared was up passed his bedtime tonight taking care of some things and playing with Peter. When I finally ushered everyone to bed, Jared reached for Peter. At first Peter swatted at him, but then reached for him. Jared happily took Peter from my arms. Peter have him a hug and then leaned in to his face and gave him a kiss on the lips, complete with sound effects. It made Jared's day :) this was the first real kiss Peter's given. He has done a few experimental motions to me, but they are a rare gift and none have been with such fervor. Peter was complaining because it was time to go to bed. I let Jared hold on to him, but on the condition he got him ready for bed. They both happily complied. It warms my heart to see their devotion to each other.

NO SISSY Weigh in Week 4

Week 4: 165.6 (.4 lb loss)
Week 3: 166.0 (.9 lb loss)
Week 2: 166.9 (.2 lb loss)
Week 1: 167.1 (2.7 lb loss)
Start: 169.8

I've been feeling it all week. I think my hormones are changing and bloating was setting in. Monday I was 165.3. It's crazy how I always weigh less on Mondays. I think I'm going to add Mondays weight next to that week's weigh-in and see the difference:

Week 4: 165.6 (.4 lb loss)/ 165.3 (0 loss)
Week 3: 166.0 (.9 lb loss)/165.3 (.5 lb loss)
Week 2: 166.9 (.2 lb loss)/165.8 (1.8 lb loss)
Week 1: 167.1 (2.7 lb loss)/167.6 (3.3 lb loss)
Start: 169.8/170.9

Um yeah... big difference. My feeling is that after such a big loss at the beginning it isn't logical (or good) to continue loosing at such a rapid pace. I think it is hard on the body. Yes, I've been off plan a bit but I think the weight loss has slowed just because of the big jumps at the beginning of the month. But this week would be my first freebie otherwise.

I also think it is because of the increase in milk products in my diet :/ I really think I need to cut dairy out, but I am having a hard time giving it up again. Mostly it is due to the ease of grabbing yogurt from the fridge or all the recipes that require it. *sigh* I keep tellling myself that I'm going to go dairy free that day and then don't. Jared is funny because I think he wants me to be successful more than I do. He keeps saying I need to run the track with him and go dairy free. 

Holy Grail Almond Buns

These Holy Grail Almond Buns deserve a post of their own so I can find the link quickly. They are amazing!! I've made them a few times now and done some experimenting with it.

Here are the basic ingredients:

almond flour
sweetener (I've used coconut sugar)
baking powder
eggs
oil (I've used both butter and coconut oil)

I've made it with Briana's Baking Blend in place of the almond flour and it worked pretty well also. I tend to make it with 2 parts almond flour and 1 part flax seed meal and oat fiber (about 1 or 2 TB) though. I recently used egg substitutes also. The chia seed egg makes a nice crunch to the bread.

The recipe calls for a muffin top pan to create a bun shape. The first time I made it I thought that just putting it in a round shape on the silicone mat would be good enough. I ended up with a rounded flat piece of 'bread.' It had a delicious taste and probably would have made a decent pizza crust but I ended up eating them more like cookies. Since then I've been putting the dough into a square dish and making a loaf to slice. I really like it toasted with cream cheese and jelly. It tastes very similar to real bread this way. Yum.

I love this recipe!!

Substitutions Quick Ref (eggs, fibers, sweeteners)

Go-to Substitution Chart  for eggs and sugar, as well as husks and xanthan gum

Psyllium Husks subs
Oat fiber 
THM Sweetener conversion chart

THM/low carb breads and wraps

My tabs are full of recipes for different breads and wraps that I don't want to close because once I add them to my bookmarks they get lost. I thought this might be a good place to create an easy reference.

Everything bagel dogs 

(mozz cheese, almond flour, xanthan gum, cream cheese, eggs)

Paleo Bagel 

(coconut flour, chia seeds, psyllium husk powder, coconut milk, applesauce, ACV, oil, baking soda, salt)

low carb pumpkin bagels 

(coconut flour, flax meal, eggs, oil, milk, pumpkin, sweetener, ACV, baking soda, salt, vanilla, pumpkin spice, cinnamon)

Basic psylli wraps 

(whole psyllium husks, baking powder, salt, egg whites,spices)

Coconut flour oat fiber psylli wraps 

(whole psyllium husks, coconut flour, oat fiber, baking powder, salt, egg whites, ACV)

Coconut flour, oat fiber, psylli buns and wraps 

(whole psyllium husks, coconut flour, oat fiber, baking powder, salt, egg whites, water, ACV)

Coconut Wonder Wraps 

(coconut flour, psyllium husk powder, water, egg whites)

Gluten free tortillas 

(almond flour, psyllium husk powder, salt, eggs, water)

*Almond flax tortillas 

(almond flour, flaxseed meal, water, salt)

*Holy Grail Almond Buns 

(almond flour, baking powder, sweetener (opt), eggs, butter)

Pita Bread (not low carb) (flour, salt, sweetener, yeast, water, oil)

*have made and enjoyed. Experimented with baking blend and has worked well

NO SISSY! Weigh-in Week 3

Week 3: 166.0 (.9 lb loss)
Week 2: 166.9 (.2 lb loss)
Week 1: 167.1 (2.7 lb loss)
Start: 169.8

I weighed less the day before. I'm thinking Thursdays just aren't my best day. But, I did make my .5 lb loss. Julie gave me a .1 oz grace when taking in to account I hadn't nursed Peter yet, so I don't owe a $1 this week :p I really was better this week at being good. I ate on plan pretty much all week. We had the Freschetta pizza again Wed night, but I was good!! I made an on plan bread that I used for the crust and took the toppings off. It actually tasted really good, so I ate three pieces of it! Today (Thursday) I didn't do as well by the end of the day. I think I ended up giving in to stress eating because the day was so out of my norm. By the end of night I ate three fully sugar laden pumpkin cookies with real milk on top of a s'more and two roasted marshmallows, as well as jello salad. I was pretty sugared out just after the jello, which I'd had first, but I gave in to the temptation on the other things. 

I really need to up my exercise routine, which is really nothing at this point. My left heel/foot has been bothering me for weeks now and it is the biggest reason (excuse). I couldn't sleep this morning after getting up at 3:18 to potty. I thought about doing an exercise video but didn't want to wake myself up too much b/c I have a late night, but the longer I laid in bed the more awake I felt until I decided to get up and do this. I'm hoping I can go back to bed and get a little more sleep though because part of me is really tired.

NO SISSY Week 2

Week 2: 166.9 (.2 lb loss)
Week 1: 167.1 (2.7 lb loss)
Start: 169.8

I didn't do so great this week. Monday I had dropped another pound, but by today's weigh in I had had too many crossovers the last few days. Wed nights have become pizza night, and I bought a new brand this week. Oh man. Freschetta crusts are just the way I like it. Bad, bad.... under the original rules of the competition, I should have been eliminated but Julie has allowed one freebie week so I am still in the game for now. I owe $1 to the pot as well. So, is time to be good.

NO SISSY weigh in Week 1

Week 1: 167.1 1.6% and 2.7 lbs lost
Start: 169.8

Not bad for my first week. I guess THM is working for me. I have upped my activity level a little bit as well, but it really is a little bit. Two of those pounds came off between Thursday and Monday but I started adding a twenty minute walk to my day the week before. I've also been participating in our family sit up and push up challenge every night. My arms are still pretty flabby but they are getting stronger. The most I've managed to do is 25. It's rough. As part of the contest I've participated in a plank challenge as well. Today was 1 minute. I only dropped a knee once at like 45 sec which is pretty good considering I also did the 25 pushups earlier and my arms were still sore.

I don't know if I'll be able to continue losing at this momentum. I think it's normal to see a big drop in the beginning when you make big changes. Today was harder for me to stay on plan. We had pizza for dinner last night and I was fine with being off plan to eat it, but then we had it again tonight and I couldn't quit eating from lunch on. So I need to do better tomorrow.

Ponderize

General Conference was fantastic last weekend. Three new apostles were called. Pres Monson seemed to really struggle by the end of his talk. I am not sure how much longer he will be on the earth. Between his loneliness with his wife gone and now the most recent losses of Pres Packer, Elder Perry and Elder Scott, they must have weighed heavy on him besides his health issues.

One of the new apostles came from the Sunday school presidency. In his place is Bro. Durrant. Bro Durrant gave a talk with two pieces of advice: 1) save money and 2) ponderize. The challenge of ponderizing is to choose a scripture each week to ponder and memorize. For family home evening, we did just that. Matthew would have liked to have a family scripture to ponderize, but the boys wanted their own do that's what we did. Here are this week's scriptures:

Me: 1 Nephi 3:7
Jared: D&C 6:36
Aaron: 1 Corinthians 15: 21-22

Matthew sat down with the boys yesterday and asked what thoughts they had about their scripture. Jared just basically recited it, but Aaron brought up the garden of Eden but accidentally called it Gethsemane. Matthew realized that for both aspects a garden played an important role. I believe Aaron also was able to explain the meaning of the verse.

Later last night Jared asked if he could pull out his trumpet and work on putting his verse to music. He was supposed to be in bed so I wouldn't let him, but tonight he kind of sang it to me so I could hear what he's come up with. I've heard him throughout the afternoon singing it. It makes me smile. I asked him what he thought his verse meant or something similar and he still didn't have any input, but he shared an experience with it.

We had a discussion with the boys recently about the amount of money we'd receive in life insurance if Matthew were to die while on assignment. Matthew often implies that we'd be better off with the money than his physical presence which is far from the truth. So we asked the boys if they had to choose between money or dad, what would they do. They both said money, not realizing the implications. When I explained why we would get the money, they both immediately changed their answers.

So tonight, Jared told me he was thinking of that money and wondered about his dad dying. He said he immediately had the thought, "doubt not, fear not" come to his mind. I shared with him how when I was younger I'd always say "I love you" when I prayed and the immediate responding thought was "If ye love me, keep my commandments." I explained it was the Lord's way of telling me that obedience was the proof of my love (although I think I just wrote it more succinctly than I said it to him). He nodded in understanding. I should have also validated his experience by pointing out that he heard the Spirit.

We changed the topic when he brought up his friends, but it led to a discussion about my experience in choosing to live here. I told Jared how worried I -we- were about him and the prospect of living on this side of town. I told him I cried a lot, and we prayed hard on his behalf. I shared that after feeling that here was where we should be, I was driving around after just looking at the house.  An airplane flew over head and the thought came, "They will be happy here."  I told Jared the Lord is looking after him and knows him. There are five other kids he rides the bus with and three of them are our neighbors. It's pretty amazing odds. They get along really well. This has been the easiest experience with making friends for him.  We agreed that he is happy here. 

Jared's scripture and mine make a pretty powerful team. His is the invitation and mine is the example of application.

N) SISSY Weight loss contest

It is that time of year again. Instead of the usual annual Lettuce Eat Cake contest, Julie is trying a NO SISSY contest. Weigh in is every Thursday for 12 weeks. Each week you don't lose at least 1 lb, you owe a $1. If you don't lose at least .5 lb, you're out. The winner is the one with the highest percentage lost and gets the pot. We start today.

Weigh in - 169.8

I have been wanting to kick start my health habits, so this should help. I am attempting to follow the Trim Healthy Mama program. I was following it last year this time and was most successful once I cut dairy out of my diet. I added it back in for my birthday and haven't slowed down since. I am hoping that maybe I can try again but be more reasonable and not have to cut the dairy. However, I am prepared to do dairy free if I need to.

The basic premise of Trim Healthy Mama (THM) is that you separate your meals by 3 hours and into carbs (E or Energizing) and fats (S or Satisfying). As a general rule, the two fuels should not be combined. It is a whole foods, no sugar, eat until you're satisfied 'diet'. In place of sugar, stevia, xylitol, and erythol are recommended. I choose to use coconut sugar and monk fruit for my sweeteners though I will occasionally use stevia packets. Wheat based flours should be ground from sprouted grains or sourdough.

At this point I am not in 100%, but the basic premise of separating fuels and 3 hrs between meals is my goal.

As for exercise, we have been doing pushups and situps at the end of the day as a family. My arms and stomach muscles are getting stronger but my legs want to be strengthened too. I am dealing with a painful left heal (probably plantar fascias or whatever that term is) which makes it challenging. I bought new running shoes a couple of weeks ago and did not want to use them for every day use, but I broke them out today because something needed to change. It has helped my foot feel better to be in good shoes today. Now I just need to figure out how I will use my time to exercise.

So, for better or worse (hopefully better) time to up my game in all areas of my life!

Let's bring it!

Deep (cleaning) Thoughts

Wed, Sept 30:

As I was attempting to mop my house today with Peter trailing me and trying in his limited skills to help, but slipping on the wet floor and both of us getting frustrated instead, I figured there must be a lesson in this. Here is what I came up (and it's far from a perfect analogy) - How often does the Lord try to clean our living space but we won't let Him? He warns us of the danger and directs us to safety, but all we can think about is what we want RIGHT NOW. Sometimes we return again and again to the same muck because it's what we're comfortable with instead of what is best for us. Or in our limited knowledge we fail to understand what the Lord has in mind so we assert our own thoughts on the situation instead of trusting that the Lord knows what He is doing.The trouble is the Lord can't clean where we are standing until we move. When we listen and obey the Lord's guidance, we can see Him work in our lives and learn to trust His words. As we wait patiently 'on the carpet' for a time instead of walking on the wet floor where we could slip and fall, He cleans our hearts and homes and allows us to dwell in a better place in the end.

Thurs, Oct 1st:

How can someone have a really spiritual experience and still deny God (ie see an angel or other miraculous thing)? It's a consistency issue. Just because you cleaned your house really well one time does not mean it will stay clean. It requires consistent daily effort to maintain it.

*******************************************

In an effort to motivate myself to read the scriptures. I began a scripture study group. Today was the first day. There was a tremendous response of people interested, but in the end 9 adults were in attendance and four children (including my own). I think it will be a good thing. I'm already feeling more motivated to read and prepare for next week as well as to do my Sunday lessons. It has been a good umph to finish working on putting the house together too. The house looks pretty good at this point. Maintenance... that is the key.

Starting Anew

I am being sustained today in a new calling. I have greatly enjoyed the break from responsibilities. It has been especially nice to sit in Sunday School and Relief Society. (Well, when I can, since Peter has reached the age where we have to wander with him. But Matthew has taken the role of wandering which has also been nice.) My spiritual (and physical) habits have been greatly lacking and my spirituality has suffered. It has been dwindling since New Jersey, but especially while in Utah. It is quite the contrast to who I was four or even three years ago.

The first Sunday of the month the Relief Society presidency chooses the topic of the lesson. Ours this month was on having The Holy Ghost as our constant companion. She created a chart comparing the way we feel/act when The Holy Ghost is with us and when He is not. The 'not' side pretty much nailed me. He has been nudging me in my thoughts to do better, but I honestly didn't care enough despite knowing it made me miserable and lonely to not have that spirituality. The lesson helped, and I began striving to listen to the scriptures again and praying more often. I am still far from creating a regular habit. One thing I did to motivate me was to reach out to the sisters and suggest meeting once a week for a scripture study group. The response was minimal, but enough that we are going to do it. The first class is this Thursday. I am hoping it will be a life-line for others as it was for me in NJ and will be now.

I have served in Primary in some capacity almost consistently for the last twelve or thirteen years. I did have a few breaks here and there, but it has certainly been non-stop since Aaron was in nursery. When we moved to NJ, my heart was in Primary and my emotions were raw. I had no desire to be with adults. By the time I was ready to be among the sisters, I received my calling as a Primary teacher. I was really kind of upset about it and it took awhile to learn to love my calling. I was grateful for the opportunity to see 'the other side' since I had served as President so often. It also prepared me to lead the Primary a few months later when I was called as the President. When we moved to UT, again I was happy to be in Relief Society but was quickly called to the Primary as the chorister. My heart certainly wasn't in it. After Peter was born and I had 6 weeks off I had no desire to return. But as the depression eased, my heart grew as well and I learned to love that calling. I love being in Primary. I love knowing what my children are learning and singing. I love having that time together too. I love getting to know the children in the ward. This time though, the Lord is not returning me to the Primary.

I am grateful for our loving Father who knows me intimately. He knows that I have used Primary as an excuse to not read my lessons. He knows I am wandering without direction. He knows it is time to rebuild my reservoir because I am not doing it myself. He also knows what I can give. I recognize that as I pull myself up I will lead others to the light as well. I have a feeling he is preparing me for another leadership position, but one step at a time. I look forward to serving in my new capacity.

Overwhelmed

We hadn't heard back from the transportation office about our move date, so yesterday we got up early and went since Matthew had the day off. They weren't thrilled with the short notice but by noon we had a carrier and notice that the packers would begin Thursday, the 13th. ACK!! That one extra day put my stress levels through the roof because it is causing me to cut my house hunting trip short and I am not sure how I'm going to get all the pre-move things done now. I feel like I don't have time to go to Vegas and house hunt unless I don't sleep for the next twenty four hours :p

On a positive note, I have over 125 houses to sort through and to my shock and amazement the house we saw in June that we really liked is still available! The one from our most recent list before this had an application submitted just on the sixth :/ maybe it won't go through but it is likely to be gone. Oh well...

Jared's Pokemon Dive Ball Cake

Jared's birthday is Friday, but one of his friends is only around on Weds, so we decided to celebrate early with a Pokemon Battle Party. This is really Jared's first official party, though it was not pitched as a birthday party at all. Some of his friends brought gifts, but most did not. In our head, the party would consist of a tournament style event. Eight boys were invited and everyone drew a card. Matching cards were meant to battle each other. Unfortunately half the group had no idea how to battle and a good hour or so was spent teaching them so only a couple of boys managed to do more than one battle. As a party favor, everyone received a Pokemon card from a booster pack. At the end we went swimming for about a half hour. I hope everyone had fun.

Like Aaron, Jared chose a Pokemon themed cake. He chose a Pokemon Dive Ball, making it another year of a water theme. I decided a poke cake would be a fun way to prepare it because I could use blue jello and have a water effect all the way through. So although he didn't have the jello pool like in year's past, he did have jello in the cake. I debated a white cake or a lemon cake and ended up with a blend. I added lemon juice to the cake batter and frosting but it really wasn't flavored much. I used the Jolly Rancher Blue Raspberry jello, strawberry cream cheese frosting to layer and stack the cakes, and a cream cheese/whipped topping lemon frosting dyed blue for the design. I think it turned out pretty well.

Jared wanted characters on top and I had originally planned on creating some water characters for it, but it was delusions of grandeur. I ended up making the cake within hours before the party which is a bad thing for a poke cake. It is best to let it soak overnight. I ended up putting it in the freezer to chill and most of the boys didn't eat their slice. Oh well. But I digress.... While I worked on the cake, Jared and Aaron made Pokemon characters from marshmallows: Cleffa, Igglybuff, and Execute. There were just enough that I could put them around the cake.

Recipes Used:

Nathan's Lemon Cake base (subbed whole milk w/ vinegar and 4 TB lemon juice. I dyed 1/4 c sugar blue thinking I'd use it as sprinkles on the top of the cake, but added it to the batter instead. The cake turned a greenish hue as it mixed with the yellow butter, but it looked fine once it was done and the blue jello was absorbed. I also only had one egg, so two of them were THRIVE eggs. Instead of water I added lemon juice.)

Raspberry poke cake (referenced for making and adding the jello)

Lemon Poke Cake (Recipe is basically the same as Nathan's cake but uses sour cream instead of buttermilk. She adds sweetened condensed milk instead of jello. I based my frosting off her cream cheese frosting and the traditional cool whip frosting for poke cakes.)

Strawberry Cream Cheese Frosting (Used the leftover frosting from Aaron's cake to layer and dirty frost Jared's cake)

My frosting:

8 oz tub of cool whip
8 oz softened cream cheese
powdered sugar to consistency (at least one cup)
about 1 tsp lemon extract (I didn't measure, just poured)

We want cake! Give me some chocolate cake!

Aaron's birthday was on Wednesday. This was no ordinary one though, this was his 8th birthday! He had the privilege of being baptized that day as well, due to the timing of the move and grandparents being in town still. It was a great experience. Matthew gave a combined talk on baptism and the Holy Ghost. He asked Aaron questions throughout, as he answered each of them with assurity. Afterwards, Sharon said she was very impressed by him because she would have had to whisper the answers to Eliza.

After the baptism everyone came to the apartment and Matthew cooked hamburgers. Only the Blacks and the family attended, but we were prepared for as many as fifty people. We have a lot of hamburgers left :p Mike and Tran left as we pulled out the cake because Gen was getting fussy tired. Aaron chose a Pokemon theme this year, so I made a Master Ball. Simple enough - round cake with purple and white frosting. Unfortunately I ended up having to make his cake twice because my flour tasted too metallic from the #10 can. But it was so much better the second time. I added chocolate chips to the batter and tried the trick of coating them in flour so they don't sink. It worked, but since I forgot to put them in the batter until they were already in the pan, they just sat on top and didn't melt into the cake. I ended up getting the chips off the bottom cake so it would be flat enough to stack. Oops. I left them on the second cake and used it for the top layer. It worked.

I also decided to make the strawberry cream cheese frosting from scratch. I made a strawberry reduction and went the extra mile to sieve the seeds out so Mom could eat it. It was very time consuming but Aaron was happy to do that for me. I'd wanted to make the cream cheese frosting as well but bought one just in case which is good because I used it.

Overall I think it turned out well. It wasn't pretty or very creative, but all the stress and effort are worth it when I hear the words, "I love it!"

For future reference, these are the recipes I used:

The Best Chocolate Cake is a great reference for the 'why' of each ingredient
Chocolate Cake (ended up adding three eggs instead of 2 plus 1 yolk)
Strawberry Cream Cheese Frosting (I used probably two cups of strawberries, half frozen and half fresh. I still have a lot of the reduction left and have used it to flavor yogurt and other things.)

The strawberry cream cheese frosting was still kind of runny after using the sugar amount listed, so I added another cup or so. It hardened up well in the fridge though. Had I realized the implications of that, I would have added more to the middle layer but it was still ok. We ended up with three flavors. Purple was vanilla, white was cream cheese, and pink was strawberry cream cheese.

Here and There

Last weekend the boys and I traveled to Manassa, CO to meet the family and celebrate Gma's 90th birthday. All but one sibling group and Matthew were there. It was so wonderful to be together. We visited the Great Sand Dunes an hour from there, as well as attend the Pioneer Day parade and rodeo. The drive was beautiful and the boys were amazing. Great memories. The girls have grown so much! Peter really took a liking to Hannah which was surprising and delightful. Occasionally he'd go to Sarah, but Hannah was chosen even over me by the end. We only had two whole days together. Much too short, but still so grateful for the time.

Dad traveled back with me because I was having car problems. It was really helpful to have another adult in the car. We only had to turn the car off once, and that was in Price when we stopped for gas. Thankfully Mark took his car battery charger and let me borrow it so we were able to get the car going again after waiting for it to charge a little. Peter did not want anything to do with Gpa until the last hour before he left. Sad, but at least he did finally warm up to him.

Monday Peter decided to try his legs at walking. He is officially a toddler now. He riddled across the living room to where Aaron was playing with his walker. He hung out there for awhile with Jared and his trumpet and then he decided he'd come over to me. He did it and giggled all the way!! We clapped and cheered. He's been walking off and on since!

Friday we finally received our official orders. Let the chaos begin! Matthew reports on the 10th. We were both released from our callings today. It is bittersweet and surreal. We have been in a good place. The Lord knew what he was doing when he directed us here. I trust He will have the best place picked out for us there as well.