Sudden Loss and Heartache.

Matthew 5:4  Blessed are those who mourn for they will be comforted.

I had big plans for my spring break. An Easter holiday spent with my family here and then a trip out to Kansas for my granddaughter's First Communion. God had other plans for me. The Easter holiday was everything I'd hoped it would be, a wonderful day with family, good food and happy times spent together. And then the other shoe dropped, a couple of hours after leaving our celebration my brother in law Dave died suddenly. On the day that Jesus rose from the dead and gave us all eternal life Dave went home to his reward. Never having had children my sister needed all the support she could get. I cancelled my trip and did everything possible to help and console her. It still feels as if I did not do enough and I still wish I could take away that sadness and loss I see in her eyes.
Yesterday we said our goodbyes and I can still hear the fading notes of the taps on the trumpet and the beautiful sounds of Amazing Grace on the bagpipes. Farewell my brother until we meet again at the feet of the throne.

Birthday Cake

Growing up if it was your birthday my mom rolled out her favorite recipe for chocolate cake and topped it with Seafoam frosting. I can still see Mom baking the cake in her pans that had bars attached to loosen the cake, similar to this one:  and beating that frosting in the top of a double boiler on the stove.

My grandson J turned 5 the other day and his mom and dad are having family over for a birthday dinner today. My daughter asked me to please bake our traditional cake for him. I was happy to oblige:

Mom's Chocolate Cake:
1/2 cup butter
2 cups sugar
1/2 cup cocoa powder
2 cups flour
2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
2 tsp. vanilla extract
2 egg yolks
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 cup boiling water

1. Cream together butter, sugar, and cocoa powder. In a second bowl sift together flour, baking soda, and salt. To the butter mixture beat in egg yolks, vanilla, and buttermilk. Add wet ingredients to dry ones and beat well. Add boiling water and beat until smooth.
2.Divide into two greased and floured 9 inch cake pans.  Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for 35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
3. Cool completely. Frost.

Here's the cake cooling off:

Mom's Sea foam Frosting:
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
1/2 cup cold water
2 egg whites
1/4 tsp. cream of tartar
1 tsp. vanilla

1. In the top portion of a double boiler place brown sugar, water, egg whites and cream of tartar. With an electric hand mixer beat on low speed for three minutes.
2. Place over boiling water, cook constantly beating with mixer, for 7 minutes or until stiff peaks have formed.
3. Remove from over heat and add vanilla. Beat 2-3 minutes until frosting is at spreading consistency.
Makes enough frosting to do filling, top and sides of a two layer 9 inch cake or one 10 inch tube cake.

Here's my DIY double boiler:

 And the cake all frosted

 

 And decorated!

 

And the gift all wrapped up and ready to go:

 

 

 

 

Saturday's shopping trip & Financial Week in Review 3/17-3/24

Here is this week's accountability entry for the finances. Most of the week was very frugal with a couple of exceptions.

Sunday 3/17: Car wash $10 (I detailed the inside and cleaned wheels and rims myself but that Suv is hard to wash the top of so through the car wash we went) Gas: $50.50

Monday 3/18: $0

Tuesday 3/19: Bowling $18

Wednesday 3/20: $0

Thursday 3/21:$0

Friday 3/22: $0

Saturday 3/23: Target: $55.62  ToysRUs:$52.77  Bed Bath & Beyond: $55.05

Yesterday was quite the major shopping spree (by the way this little drawing is an accurate depiction of GF and I , lol) . I worked my cleaning job (and set aside the money for my cell phone bill in an envelope to give my sister), GF took us to lunch, and then we hit the stores. At Target I purchased two packages of sponges for $3.78, this will be reimbursed to me from the school cafeteria petty cash since they are for work. I also picked up two new bras, badly needed since I lost two favorites to wear and tear and broken underwires. I still have a minor toothache so I got a tube of anbesol as well as a birthday card for my grandson J who just turned 5 and a cake server/carrier. We are going to my daughter's house today for a birthday dinner and she asked me to bring our family's traditional Chocolate cake with Seafoam frosting. I had nothing to transport this in safely without ruining the frosting and since I have to make another one next week for oldest dd's birthday and take it to the family Easter celebration this carrier will get multiple uses.

Our next stop was Toys R Us for a birthday gift for grandson. He is going to be playing t-ball this summer and his parents wanted something for outdoor play for him. GF and I settled on a T-ball starter set (T with ball return, net for throwing practices, bases for base running practice, ball) and a Louisville Slugger t-ball bat. A roll of sports themed wrapping paper rounded out our purchase.

And then we made a final stop at Bed Bath and Beyond. We had a 20% off coupon and I wanted to get a new pillow (waking up each morning with a stiff neck gave me a  hint that it was time to make this purchase) as well as a box of my favorite flavor of Keurig coffee cups. GF also wanted to purchase a new pillow.  I spent $55.05 and came home with the coffee cups, 2 donut baking pans (for GF's house), a cup cake batter dispenser (for use next time I do a baking class with aftercare group), an a 3 pack of Stick and Click lights for under the counters in my kitchen (this way we won't have the big florescent light on all the time and will save electricity since these small lights are battery operated). You will notice I did not purchase a pillow. After 20 minutes of debate on pillow types and firmness I really wanted to buy myself the $60 memory foam pillow but did not want to spend that much money. I was about to chose a less expensive $20 pillow when GF offered to buy the pillow for me since he was getting one for himself. So my new pillow was a gift!

St Patty's Day Dinner

 Although I myself am not Irish I did the traditional thing and wore green on Sunday as well as plan an Irish style dinner. GF does not enjoy corned beef and cabbage so instead I made plans to join oldest son and his wife on Monday for that meal and turned to an "Irish" dinner that I knew GF would enjoy. I settled on Shepherd's Pie (although since I used ground beef in place of the lamb that GF also does not like it is technically Cottage Pie) and put one together. I decided on candied carrots for a side and as per GF's request chocolate pudding for dessert. I was first introduced to Shepherd's pie through a high school friend who had immigrated here with her family from Scotland. It was something her mom made all the time. I was hooked when she made it for me and it has become a staple recipe in my home. The amounts in my recipe are really just estimates since I make this the way she showed me how with a bit of a recipe from Great British Cooking thrown in.

Shepherd's Pie
 4 cups mashed potatoes
2 pounds ground lamb or beef
1/2 cup milk
3 tbl. worcestershire sauce
salt and pepper to taste
2 tbl flour
2 tsp. herbs of your choice ( I like parsley, thyme, and rosemary)
2 tbl. chopped onion
1 cup frozen peas
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese

Prepare mashed potatoes or use leftovers from another meal. Set aside. In a large skillet brown ground meat, add salt and peppers, herbs and worcestershire sauce. Mix well. Sprinkle flour over the top and mix in, add milk and cook until gravy thickens. Pour meat mixture into a casserole dish and stir in frozen peas. Spread mashed potatoes over the top and sprinkle cheese over all. I like to dot a bit of butter on the top of the potatoes before adding the cheese and jazz it up with a little parsley over the cheese.
Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes. Serve hot.

Here is how the pie looked before going in the oven.

I got the carrots started on the stove and once they were cooked drained them, melted a tablespoon of butter with 2 tablespoons of brown sugar then tossed the carrots in the pot with them before serving. I also got out a box of cook and serve chocolate pudding from the cupboard and put that together to enjoy later on while we watched Amazing Race.

 

This is not the greatest picture of my dinner plate but it give you the idea of what it looked like when all served up. Yummy!

 

Sunday Morning Breakfast

 Sunday is the one day of the week where I traditionally cook a breakfast and this week was no exception. After a couple of hours spent sipping coffee and reading the news and putzing around it was time to get started.

It being St Patrick's Day I chose to pair up my breakfast meal with a nice pot of Irish Breakfast Tea and settled on making Eggs, Ham slices, and Rye toast.

 

I love the quickness of this breakfast, ready to eat in just about ten minutes. GF went for over easy on the eggs but I preferred sunny side up.

All fueled up and ready to get to a cozy day of errands, chores, and our usual Sunday drive.

 

Week in Review:Financial Roundup

  It has been a pretty good week here! Income: cleaning job + paycheck that included some nice overtime money from working prep and setup for Fish fry!

Sunday 3/10: $40 on gas for SUV

Monday 3/11: $0

Tuesday 3/12: $18 for bowling

Wednesday 3/13: $6 for a ticket to watch my nephew's basketball team in the regional playoffs

Thursday 3/14: $0

Friday 3/15: $0

Saturday 3/16: $39 on groceries for GF's house, bought 1 dozen eggs, a package of 6 breakfast sized ham steaks, a loaf of Irish soda bread, a loaf of rye bread, a package of cinnamon raisin bagels, a bottle of Worcestershire sauce, a cabbage, two bags baby carrots, one onion, s box of Irish breakfast tea, a box of honey lemon green tea and a 12 pck of lemon flavored sparkling mineral water
$79 at Target where I bought a 6 pack of new undies for myself, disposible razors, deodorant, nail polish, Real Simple magazine, and the latest expansion pack for The Sims computer game (this is a family favorite we all enjoy playing).

Winner Winner Turkey Dinner!

It was an amazing day weatherwise on the northcoast yesterday. Our temperatures reached into the mid to high 60s and for the most part the sun was shining. A perfect opportunity to get outside and enjoy.
Car cleaning chores were tops on my list yesterday and after the trip through the carwash on Saturday I was determined to follow up with a detailed cleaning of the interior of my vehicle. After a couple of hours spent vacuuming, cleaning windows, scrubbing floor mats, and washing all the insides of the doors and dashboard, as well as applying shiny tire stuff to my tires my ride looked almost brand spanking new. GF spent that time cleaning both his car and his Harley and we were ready to take our traditional Sunday drive.
First however I needed to get dinner started. Way back at Thanksgiving GF's company gave him a turkey that we stuck in his freezer for further use. Weighing in at around 16 pounds it wasn't a horribly large bird but big enough that I knew I'd get several meals out of it.

   

 

I prepped the bird, cleaning it and discarding the innards. Then sprayed the outside with a generous coating of spray Smart Balance and seasoned it inside and out with McCormack's Rotisserie Chicken seasoning blend. Popped it into the biggest baking pan GF has in his kitchen (note to self acquire a roaster for him) and it was oven ready:

 

 



GF and I knew we'd have a few hours to enjoy ourselves since the sides I'd planned on (stovetop stuffing, homemade gravy, green beans and cranberry sauce) would only take the few minutes the bird was resting before carving to put together. We enjoyed a lovely drive into a rural area of our state with a stop at a couple of very old cemeteries for me to take headstone pictures of some of my great etc. grandparents for my genealogy research. At first GF was uncertain about this plan and thought wandering around old cemeteries was a bit morbid. However on the ride home he said he'd been wrong and that this was a peaceful way to enjoy a couple of hours outdoors in the sun and the warmth after a cold snowy winter.

When we arrived back at his home I let the turkey rest, prepared the sides and we enjoyed a wonderful 'Thanksgiving like" feast for dinner. Here is my plate all ready for me to enjoy: