Three-Day Weekends

Are nice. We got together with friends and family and ate great food and enjoyed the extra day off. We went to Harrisburg Artfest on Monday with my cute parents and realized that we live in such a great area to take advantage of some fun things that Harrisburg has to offer. I always love seeing the architecture of old buildings that have been refurbished, and love seeing boats on the river. I am so amazed at how talented the artists are that bring their beautiful pieces to Artfest. Loved the jewelry, pottery, and copper and wood birdhouses.

Must have misplaced my rose colored glasses

It always seems like when I have a pretty good day, and things seem pretty on track, there will be a day when it all falls apart. I haven't got a handle on why that is, but I'm sure it is discouragement trying to take hold. Life is tiring sometimes. Trying to keep up with all the things that need to be done at home, trying to take care of family, trying to do a good job at work, trying to be a good friend, daughter, wife, mom. I know that these are times when God most wants me to call out to Him, and that's really all I can do. "Let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart." --Galatians 6:9.
God has been to good to me, and I just need to remember it is all how I choose to look at things.
So I'll keep looking for those rose colored glasses.

The Wonders of Modern Science

Let's just say I am "laundry challenged". This has been a life-long condition and it seems to come and go. In the last week I have ruined 2 of my white sweaters, and the most disastrous thing is I turned Garret's Varsity baseball pants, that he just got because he was asked to play Varsity for the end of the season, PINK! I have been trying all weekend, praying all weekend, begging God to help me with this, all weekend. I didn't have the heart to tell Garret until last night. He was such a good sport, and I told him I would contact the coach and buy a new pair. The only problem is, they only had 1 pair that was even near his size, and they are now PINK! As a last resort, I got this color run remover, Wa La, pink is gone! I have never been so glad to live in a civilized country, where some scientist, no doubt a mom, came up with this stuff. God does answer even small prayers!

Pick Your Battles

What do you say when your 17 year old comes to you and says he wants a tattoo, he has his own money, he's drawn his own meaningful tattoo, and he is willing to tell the story to anyone who asks why he chose to get that tattoo? Besides the fact that in 6 months he doesn't need our permission to get one. Chad drew this to look like the three nails from the cross and made them into a cross. I think it looks good, and it feels wrong that I have different feelings about him getting one and we made Lauren wait until she was 18 because we really didn't want her to get one ever. So, this is one of those times, we picked our battle.

Black and White Polka Dots

Last evening was a nice time of fellowship and laughter and meeting new people at the Spring Women's Event at our church. It was fun to see other hostess tables and their ideas. Our table turned out pretty much as we had hoped. We made cream cheese and mint filled strawberries, raspberry lemon cupcakes, coconut/cream cheese frosted cupcakes, and chocolate orange cupcakes. For all you chocoholics, this recipe follows.

Cupcakes:

1 Box of dark chocolate super moist cake mix

Orange juice instead of water in cake mix

1 Cup of mini chocolate chips

1 Tsp. of all purpose flour

Frosting:

1/2 Cup butter

2/3 Cup Hershey's Special Dark Cocoa

3 Cups powdered sugar

1/3 Cup orange juice

1 Tsp. vanilla

Zest from 1 large orange

Mix chocolate cake mix according to directions substituting orange juice for the water. Toss the chocolate chips with the flour. Fold them into mixture. Bake according to package directions. Allow to cool 1 hour before frosting. I freeze them to make frosting easier.

For frosting, melt butter, stir in cocoa. Alternately add powdered sugar and orange juice to spreading consistency. Add more orange juice if needed. Stir in vanilla. I used a pastry bag to pipe frosting onto cupcakes.

Weekends are for fun

This weekend was fun but busy. We met Rich's cousin Kelly and her family, Scott, Reese, Hudson, Chapman, Owen, and Davis for lunch in Gettysburg for lunch. They had unexpected van trouble, but God was good and it was able to be fixed that day, and they handled it with such grace. See Kelly's blog at http://5boysrock.blogspot.com/. Yes, they are just as cute in person. Whenever I see them I think that they look just like the family in the picture frame you get when you buy a frame, could they all be any better looking? The boys are so cute. They all got different weapons at Gettysburg, swords, knives, guns..... and spent most of their vacation spending money at the first stop. Too cute.
Then it was onto planning our table for the Women's Spring Event at our church tonight. Comedian Kerri Pomarolli will be the entertainment and speaker. My friend Karen and I are hosting a table together and we decided on a Black and White theme with some polka dots in the mix. Hopefully it will be cute. We are responsible for the dessert so we are going with "gourmet" cupcakes. Check back for photos of our table and a delicious chocolate orange cupcake recipe that I made.