Musings by Melissa

Alicia’s birthday was a couple weeks ago, and for her birthday I made her a swimming pool cake.  I even made little people for it out of frosting.  They were floating in the pool on frosting inner tubes.  It was cute!  She loved it!

She got lots of nice stuff for her birthday, too.  While she didn’t get a ls2208, she was absolutely thrilled with her new fan!  She’s also excited about her new books and all her new cake decorating stuff.  Unfortunately, it’s a bit too hot and humid to turn the oven on so that we can play with her new “toys,” but we’re eagerly awaiting cooler weather so we can transform some cupcakes into genuine works of art.

Happy 10th Birthday, a bit late, dear Alicia!

Tomorrow is election day.  We can exercise our right to vote without fear of intimidation.  What a blessing!

For many of my friends it will also be a blessing in another way.  Because their phone numbers are “listed,” they are getting half a dozen political phone calls every day.  Ugh!  That’s about as bad as dealing with most car insurance companies!  And I admit, it will be nice to not have a mailbox full of political ads. 

But then I think of my friends in Africa.  They have elections on Wednesday.  They will be voting on a new constitution.  The new constitution is not a good idea, but if it is voted down, rioting will be the result.  My friends have been warned by the US embassy to have enough food/water in their home for two weeks.

Doesn’t it make you glad to be an American?!?  So, get out there tomorrow, and VOTE!

I have the most wonderful husband in the world!  The other day he cleaned our bedroom windows for me!  This is a job I can’t do by myself because the windows all have to come apart, and they are all stuck together.  It’s a real pain.  They hadn’t been cleaned since we moved into the house about five years ago.  (How time flies!)

So, now I can sit at my desk and see clearly what’s outside.  The problem is that we still haven’t gotten blinds for all our bedroom windows.  Oh, we don’t need special, custom blinds.  Just the average, pick ‘em up at Lowes blinds will do.  That’s one of my goals yet for this summer.  To get blinds at the last bedroom window.  Thankfully, our neighbors don’t live too close and I’m still thrilled to have clean windows!  Yahoo!!!

Okay, I finally made the switch a year or two ago.  We are now digital when it comes to taking pictures.  The problem is that now I never get them printed.  I have a handful of memory cards just sitting in our gun safe.  They are full of nice pictures… wonderful memories, but alas… there they sit.

One of these days I’m going to have to go through them and have some printed so I can put them in albums.  (How people ever find time for scrap-booking, I’ll never know!)  I guess I’m waiting for the day when I can easily find digital photo albums.

I’m sure part of my problem is finding a good softward program to crop/resize, etc.  I don’t need anything fancy.  Just the basics will do.  But unfortunately, as is often the case it’s hard to find something decent without spending a lot of time researching.  Oh that it were as easy as “click here for prenatal vitamins!”  I’d click, and poof!!!  All my researching would be done, and all my pictures would be in books.  Oh, to be so fortunate!  ~grin~

So, if you have a photo program that didn’t cost an arm and a leg, and you’re happy with it, please let me know.  Maybe I’ll be fortunate and not have to spend as much time researching. 

In advance, thank you!

There are times when I really miss things about Kenya.  Now, I’ll be the first to admit that I enjoy my running water, and I enjoy my morning shower.  I’ll also be the first to admit that I don’t particularly enjoy hot days, and Kenya has more than their fair share of those!  So, what do I miss about Kenya?!?

I miss the simplicity of it all.  Maybe I missed out on something while I was there, but I didn’t see a to-do list at any of the homes I entered.  The people are not hurried at all.  In America we hurry here and we hurry there on a never-ending quest for … something.  I’m not sure quite what. 

People in Kenya weren’t nearly as stressed out as people in America.  They didn’t worry about making a car payment or about what to do if their vehicle breaks down because they don’t own vehicles. 

They don’t worry about mowing the lawn.  After all, that’s what the goats are for.  Honestly, I think Kenyans would laugh if they saw what we do to our yards. 

They don’t worry about how to loose 10, 20, or 50 pounds because they’re not overweight.  Why?  Because they don’t eat all the junk we do, and for the most part they are much more active that we are.  When they want to go to the store, they have to walk.  Then they carry all their groceries home.  Oh, we have to carry ours from the trunk of our vehicles to the kitchen.  But that’s it.  We have shopping carts to get the groceries from the store to our trunks.  And even hauling them to the kitchen can be done in many trips.

Botox treatment, adult acne treatment, liposuction, etc.  Vanity, vanity…  From my brief experience in Kenya, these things aren’t even worries.  Yet in America, people concern themselves with these things every day.  To the point that many people are on depression medication just because of the stress of it all.

Yes, there is room for improvement when it comes to life in Kenya, but I hope the Kenyan people pick and choose what they are going to adopt from America and what they aren’t.  And I hope their simple lifestyle is one thing they choose to keep.

It finally happened!  We don’t need  to resort to testosterone cream or nest eggs (at least for now)!  Yesterday morning when I got back from my bike ride, I thought I’d check on the chickens and open their vent door.  I peeked into the nest boxes, just in case, and there was a nice, brown egg waiting for me!  Yahoo!  We must be doing something right!

After gathering all the kidlets together (thankfully they were all here for this big occassion!), we ventured out to the “Coop d’ Poop” together to gather the egg!  They were thrilled.

And then last night when I went out to tuck the chickens in for the night, I peeked into the nest boxes again, and lo and behold… another beautiful brown egg!

Yahoo!

Alicia and I recently took a cake decorating class, and we fell in love with decorating cupcakes.  To us a beautifully decorated cake is one thing, but a beautifully decorated cake that tastes good is another.  We read through a bunch of recipes that were about as exciting as reading a life insurance dictionary!  But here’s the recipe we eventually stumbled across that definitely qualifies as “Tried and True!”

CHOCOLATE-FILLED CUPCAKES

3 C flour
1 1/2 C sugar
1/3 C baking cocoa
2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
2 eggs
1 C milk
1 C oil
1 C water
1 tsp vanilla

Combine the first five ingredients.  Add the other ingredients.  Beat until smooth.  Fill paper-lined muffin cups half full.  Bake at 375 degrees for 15-20 minutes.
CREAM FILLING

1/4 butter or margarine, softened
1/4 shortening
2 C confectioners’ sugar
3 Tbs milk
1 tsp vanilla
pinch salt

Combine all the ingredients for the filling.  Beat until fluffy (about five minutes).  Use a small tip (a bismark tip) to fill each cupcake.  Frost tops as desired.

Yes, I know.  ‘Tis July.  But Christmas is six months from yesterday.  Believe it or not!  It’s time to start thinking about what I’m going to make for Christmas gifts.  Wayne and I usually try to give homemade gifts to our kids, and I’m beginning to run out of ideas.  So, any input would be appreciated… greatly!

Along with Christmas gifts comes Christmas parties and Christmas food.  Now I haven’t received any holiday invitations yet, but it never hurts to keep the December calendar up-to-date.  Nor does it hurt to stock up on holiday food when it goes on sale.  Granted I wouldn’t buy the ham now, but pineapple juice would be just fine six months from now.

So, enjoy the rest of your summer, knowing that old man winter is just a few short months away!

Well, we’ve had four chickens for about five months now, and we keep waiting and hoping for that first egg.  I know we didn’t get chickens that are constant egg layers.  So, I have to be a little patient, but we are anxiously awaiting that first little egg… lopsided and tiny though it may be!

We’ve heard that using a nest egg may help.  But I’m not sure where to go to get one of those.  Personally I’ve been wondering about some natural testosterone or something.  Hmmm….  On second thought maybe it’s not testosterone I need.  Isn’t that for boys?!?

And so, we wait.  The appear to be full grown to me.  The last three that we got still aren’t full grown, but they’re getting close.  They all seem to get along, yet we can tell we got them in two different groups.  Each group tends to have around itself rather than mingle with the other group, but they are better at that than they used to be.

All in all, keeping chickens has been a delightful experience.  But stay posted for news about our first egg!

The past weekend was spent with Wayne’s family. We were together to celebrate his Grandma’s 90th birthday.

We thoroughly enjoyed spending time with Wayne’s cousins and their two kids who live in North Carolina. We had fun making pizza over the fire and chatting. And we enjoyed our trip to Lake Michigan, even if it was storming as we entered the water. Hey, the water temp was a blamy 78 degrees! Who would turn that down because they didn’t want to get wet?!?

And even though Wayne’s cousin is a doctor, we never once talked about North Carolina health insurance! Although the guys may have ventured into a discussion of politics when us gals were busy talking about something else.

All in all, it was a fantastic weekend!  It’s always great to reconnect with people, especailly those who are a joy to be around!