Cheating at Cakes

I have many heroes these days... a world of people that I look up to from the ground as I kowtow before them. One of my favorites, right now, is Duff Goldman, baker, chef, proprietor of Charm City Cakes in Baltimore, and star of Ace of Cakes. I watch that show in awe, all the while scheming and planning how I can do that (so to speak). There are many things I am sure I would never be capable of doing, but fondant is something I'm starting to get. What I've discovered about fondant is that the scariest thing about it is the ignorance factor. Once you get over that and learn how to handle it, it's actually pretty easy. Buttercream, on the other hand is a skill I don't think I'll ever master. Beautiful roses, basket weaving and scroll work... not my piece of cake. But, fondant is like cheating, to me. Mostly because I can do it. At any rate, I'm learning... and in the interest of constant practice and skills-honing, I've now made my third fondant covered birthday cake... and here it is (and no, the smudgy red part is a doctored image thing, not a cake decorating catastrophe)...



My sweet middlest Beauty, the Princess Posh, will be five years old tomorrow! Sniff... She is having her party at a kid's gym~ hence the ball pit and the monkey bars. I wanted to put another kid on the cake, but I ran out of skin tone fondant. Sniff (again). I am mostly happy with the result... but it was a serious amount of work. Luckily, it's worth it for the fun factor. The not-fun part is the part where there is confectioner's sugar in every nook and cranny of the kitchen, ground into the kitchen floor and coating each alveolus in my lungs. For some reason, I can't control the sugar from going everywhere when I decorate cakes. However, I've lucked out in another way, in that my dear hubby gamely cleans up the mess when I'm done.

At any rate, it was a long, sweet, sticky morning, but the end result is something that I hope Posh will remember for a long time. Happy Birthday to my Princess!

Just Call Us the Griswolds

Summer is in full swing in the R. house... just 5 days back from camping and we're gearing up for our second big summer thing. Tomorrow we're taking off for a week at my parents's cottage in the mountains, or, to anyone who lives near actual craggy, summit-in-the-cloud peaks~ tall hills. I guess, technically, they do qualify as mountains, but they're the little east coast kind that barely live up to their grandiose appellation. Beautiful, but not dramatic.

We're looking forward to a quiet, less-stress week, where the big events will be day camps for the kids (Sporty to horseback riding camp, and Posh to play camps), going to the pool and enjoying the unhindered time to do whatever the heck we want. This is something we really haven't ever done before. Whenever Chris is able to take time off from work, it's usually to go visit family up North or friends down South, or go places like Disney or family reunions. All of this R. together time should be a fascinating social experiment. Lucky for us, we'll be joined by my parental units towards the end of the week~ right about when we'll have all had just about enough of each other. Perfect timing.

It'll be a quiet week, here on the blog, as well... as there is limited internet access where we'll be... i.e. there's a 20 minute drive to the nearest open wireless network. I'll be on and off, but probably won't have a chance to post again until we get back. Just so you know. Hopefully the next time I post, I'll be so relaxed that I won't be able to type because of my jelly fingers. We shall see, I guess.

Later, gators!

You Can't Really Call it Camping...

Once again we have survived a trip to the Great Outdoors. With the exception of a few skin cells from a few knees that got left behind in the woods, we are relatively intact. And the whole family had a fantastic time. For those of you who haven't been keeping up with all one of my previous posts that has dealt with this event... this was the trip we make every year with 10 other families from the neighborhood.



I'd like to say that we spend the weekend communing with nature, when we go on this annual foray out of the air conditioned environment we occupy on a daily basis. But we don't. For us, the trip is about communing with each other and our friends and moving the Block Party/Happy Hour to a new location for a few days. You could hardly call what we do roughing it. We more or less turn the campground into an outdoor house, complete with bedrooms, kitchen, dining room and living room (with a fireplace). If the "house" was closer to home, we could make a killing selling it on the real estate market.

Come see this idyllic and charming eleven bedroom home, with a large, open floor plan, fireplace in the living room, soaring ceilings, dining room that seats 50, and gourmet kitchen with 8 burner stove. Sorry, no running water, or central air, but the home is only a stone's throw from a lovely lake with sandy beach, not to mention the beautiful songbirds that will be your alarm clock each day. Side note: woodpeckers start looking for food EARLY. You will love the bucolic setting, with gorgeous 100 year old trees and nearby nature trails.

The kitchen always produces meals worthy of any gourmet kitchen... chili with spaghetti, hot dogs, macaroni and cheese, fajitas with grilled veggies and all the fixin's... scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, and pancakes for breakfast. Food always tastes better when it's cooked outdoors over an open Coleman stove fire. Especially since cooking in the great outdoors seems to require larger amounts of testosterone, so it's mostly the men who do the work. Score! The beer and margaritas are freeflowing, and the children have 30 other kids for playmates. So they stay out of the way. And there are 20 other eyes, besides your own, keeping watch over the flock. Score again!

Saturday is Beach Day... and this year, we had a the perfect beach-going day. The temperature was only in the low 80's and there was a nice breeze, so sitting in the shade was really comfortable. The water was chilly, and all of the kids had blue lips, but they really couldn't have cared less. In 5 hours, they only came out of the lake to eat lunch and ice cream sandwiches under the umbrellas. You can always recognize our group from the line of closely-clustered Costco beach umbrellas that take up half the beach. And the beach carts. We've all got those too. Something like 90% of the stuff we have to cram into the car for this 48 hour trip is for the beach day.



We really couldn't have asked for a better weekend... except for the disgustingly trashy people that we had the misfortune to be parked near (a whole other story that would be completely inappropriate to post on this blog~ leave me a comment if you want to hear it). I'll make another post with more pictures, but here's one more of my tired girls on the way home... exhausted, but already looking forward to next year!

Planning for the Great Outdoors

I'm currently in the throes of pulling it together enough for the family to go camping this weekend. It's the annual neighborhood camping trip where eleven families take off on a long weekend adventure together and come back still being friends. That, in and of itself, is probably a minor miracle. This whole adventure is probably the best microcosm I can think of for a world where "we can all just get along". It's a hellacious amount of work, but always worth it in the end.

The adventure starts with a summit meeting about a week before the trip. The summit always involves a LOT of wine, grand gestures and ann/pro-nouncements, shouting, giggling and some serious negotiations. For example, the question of who brings the bagels and in what format is an issue of utmost importance. Or who's bringing steak and who's bringing chicken for the fajitas on Saturday night. Or whether the eggs should be cooked in bacon grease or not. The fact that the NSA or CIA or TSA or some other $%A is not involved in the resolution of these issues is remarkable. It just goes to show that warrior states can resolve their issues without bloodshed. Or at least without more than a minor flesh wound. And I'd go so far as to say that none of the members of this group are Switzerland.

Once the major issues of the summit are resolved, we all go our separate ways for a week or so, to prepare our families in our own way. For me, it's the perfect opportunity for my inner OCD to come out. I'm the one who makes a new Excel Spreadsheet every year to list the categories, packing receptacle and transportation position (in or on top of the car) of each and every item we're going to take with. Right down to the goggles, hand soap and camera batteries. This year, my spreadsheet is color-coded. And there are multiple sheets in the workbook. Food and Food Related Items, Gear, and Personal Use. I'm blushing a little while I'm typing this, but the truth is, I'm also a little proud of my spreadsheets. Do you think the R. family has ever left home without the one thing we need, but don't have? The camping trip motto is: Better to be looking at it than looking for it. Seriously.

That being said, we are really trying to pare down this year. Last year, when we packed up the minivan, there was barely enough room left for the children. In fact, they whined so much on the way up due to the squooshy conditions, that we sent Sporty back in a friend's car (which had more space). So this year, we are taking the bare minimum. At last count: 164 individual items. This is us taking less. It seriously actually takes us longer to pack it all then we spend at the bloody campsite. But our car couldn't possibly handle the burden of what we'd have to pack for a longer trip. We'd have to leave one or more of the carpet monkeys on the carpet at home.

Anyone who knows me has already realized where this is going. The following is being said in stage whisper: I don't like the great outdoors. There's a reason why this trip always happens on Father's Day weekend (other than the fact that it's when the trip always happens, due to reasons beyond my own control). In my case, it's because my hubby loves the great outdoors, and it's more or less the only time in the year that he gets to be out in it. Happy Father's Day, honey!

Now, don't get me wrong... the trip is always fun (even for Great-Indoorsy-and-Room-Servicy me). I love being with my family and friends... the (cheesball alert) camaraderie that is fostered on this trip is amazing. And we've never NOT had fun. But the part I love for my own selfish reasons is the planning. Not so much the packing, set-up or takedown. Happy Father's Day, again, honey. But I love the planning. I should join the UN. Lots of planning but not so much action. I wonder if they could use my spreadsheets to help with the next UN peacekeeping mission. Probably not. Oh well.

But I digress... I know I'm the one who can take the fun out of getting ready for any big event like this one. But at least we'll have everything we need while we're on the trip... and hopefully actually USE every single item we take with us. I know you can't plan for everything, but there's nothing to stop me from trying, right?

Borrowed Dog

We're not getting a dog. Let me just make that clear from the get-go. But we're not above borrowing one every so often... as long as they fit into the compact category and the circumstances are right. Meet our current borrowed pooch, Peque:

Peque is our friend's baby. She brought her for a visit from California to another friend's house. There was a problem with the household doggie politics over there, though, and I couldn't resist poor little Peque's charms. She's the sweetest little thing... just doesn't play well with other dogs. I guess she never went to kindergarten. She loves people, though and is an old hand at dealing with kids. She's great for me as well, because she sleeps in the middle of our bed and willingly takes the blame for stealing all the covers from my devoted spouse. She's endlessly entertaining for the girls, and has been taken for more "walks" in the last 24 hours than probably in her whole life put together. We'll really miss her when she has to go home... but for a few days at least, we can pretend to be a doggied family.

Long Time No See

It's been a long time since my last post... Sorry to all two of my devoted fans. It sounds so cliche, but the plain truth of the matter is that it's been crazy busy for the last 5 days or so. I know I don't have the monopoly on a busy life, but I beg your understanding anyway. The comedy that is MY life continues. And it's not going to get any better for the next few days at least, but in the interest of not going an entire week without a post, here I am.

Here are some highlights from the last week:

Wednesday, May 30th I attempted to volunteer in Sporty's second grade class. Attempted is the operative word, because I was forced to take Baby with me (due to an overwhelming dearth of babysitting availability), and she refused to sit still. So I spent 15 minutes chasing her around the 2nd and 3rd grade Pod while I was supposed to be listening to the children read to me, before I threw in the towel and asked the teacher to be excused. After that, I took Posh and Baby on the preschool field trip to our local farm park. We picnicked in the 87 degree sun and walked through the barns and finally went on an exceedingly sweaty wagon ride through the park:


Hot as Hades on the wagon ride. It was fun, but ay caramba!

On to: Thursday, May 31st: Happy Birthday Mom (my mom not me)! Relatively quiet, except for the mad cleaning burst getting ready for the arrival of Chris's parents for a long weekend visit... oh and an evening sit for a friend. I actually had a chance to get some reading in. YAY! So, I guess really only that part was quiet. The rest was a little desperate.

Friday, June 1st: Rabbits, rabbits rabbits! Drop off at school, pick up at school... visit, visit, visit (not complaining... this was very nice!)... desperate trip to the mall (notice the theme?) to find a bathing suit that actually fit, for a pool party on Saturday. I found one, but if I tell you what I had to pay for it, you'll die, so I won't. Fast forward to evening: Stamping meeting... very fun new project. Seriously it was just what I needed to re-motivate myself in my stamping doldrums. I've been so unmotivated to stamp anything... it ends up falling into the same category as this blog. Something I love to do, but always set on the back burner. Bummer.

Saturday, June 2nd: Woke up completely crabby. Sorry to all and sundry who had to put up with me for the day. Blush. I do reserve the right sometimes to be a crank, but I always feel like a heel afterwards. Stupid hormones. Anyway... part of the reason I was so crabby was because I had to drag all three kids to the soccer field by myself. Not so heinous, but I hardly ever have to do it, so I was sort of bummed about it. And it was hot again. Been there, done that, soaked a tshirt. And I felt guilty for not wanting to do it, because plenty of mommies do it all the time and really I'm very spoiled in that regard. But I still reserve the right to be crabby about it. The game went well. Sporty made a few good moves, and Posh and Baby ran around with all the other tag-along siblings. All in all it went pretty well... then the coach declared that he had seen not one but TWO ice cream passes (pass pass goal) and he promised to buy all the girls an ice cream. Very sweet of him... but that left bitchy me in a little pickle. No lunch yet... three whiny girls... and a sugar rush. Oh well. Off to the frozen custard place we went. We ended up milling around for about 15 minutes because the place wasn't opened yet. That good old desperation started to kick in a little again. Finally we got in there and everyone got their ice cream... except Her Highness, Baby Spice, who threw a fit when I tried to put the ice cream in her mouth. Oh well.

That afternoon we went to a very lovely pool party for Chris's sister's boyfriend's birthday. His parents had kindly agreed to host it at their home, where they have a beautiful pool.



We all had a great time... a few minor injuries aside. The last injury brought back our old friend Mr. Crank, but can you really blame me? Baby could have gotten a concussion. Enough said, as there was no concussion. But, I was very grateful for my nice soft bed that night, let me tell you.

Sunday, June 3rd:

Rain. And rain. And more rain. Probably just as well. We had a nice quiet day in the house, except that Sporty got to go to a birthday party for her friend from school. The whole day was nice, because it was so laaaaaaaazzzzzzyyy, and then in the evening, Chris and I got to (drumroll, please).... go to the movies. I almost feel like I have to whisper that phrase. It sounds like sacrilege to my ears. For a pair of people who used to go to the movies at least once a week, this once a year thing really sucks! Thank you, Chris's parents for taking charge of the girls for us while we saw POTC: At World's End. Very confusing sometimes, but extremely funny and ahhhh yes... the eye candy was worth the three hour tour (for both of us, I think). The ship wrecked a little at the end (SPOILER ALERT) when my eye candy had to walk into the sea for a 10 year tour aboard the Flying Dutchman. What a waste of pure male yumminess~ ferrying the dead to the Other Side. There better be a sequel. I'm (still) feeling a little verklempt about it. Waaaaaahhhhh.

So, now that you can see for yourself that I wasn't any busier than you (only whinier about it)... the saga-of-an-excuse as to why I have been MIA is done. Hopefully things will go better this week. Wink. Later alligator.

These are the Days of our Lives in Digital

We got a new toy this week... A Canon Rebel XT (digital SLR) camera. You just can't take good pictures of a soccer game with a point-and-shoot. Of course, since I'm still learning how to use the SLR, we can't get good pictures of a soccer game with the new camera, either. But they're getting better. This picture was taken from across the field, on the SPORTS setting... so I was just holding down the shutter and continuously shooting. It's not even remotely as focused as I'd like. Someone's going to have to show how to do that better. But I love the action in the picture.


I LOVE this picture of Shorty. It was shot from across the room and I cropped out a bunch of stuff around her (yay 8 megapixels!) . She was trying to cute-bully me into letting her watch more "Blue's Clues".


My poor Middlest Beauty was sick as a dog when I took this picture (strep and 103 degree fever), but she still found a sparkling smile in her so Mommy could practice with the portrait setting.


And just for fun, a shot of a bellflower (which is approximately 1 cm from the top of the stem to the tip of the petals). A teeny little flower that I shot from 6 feet away. Again, nowhere near the focus I hoped for, but still a pretty picture, I think.


I guess there's no chance I'll ever give up my day job, but I figure there's no harm in trying to get great pictures, right? To quote one of the great philosophers of my generation: "Life moves pretty fast... if you don't stop to look around once in awhile, you might miss it." I want to remember it with as much clarity and color contrast as possible. So I guess I'd better start learning fast. Or I might miss it.

The Lazy Housewife Life

Ahh, the unexpected quiet of Monday afternoon. Quiet because all of my daughters are absent at the moment (one nap, two playdates). Unexpected because both the playdates were last minute deals and the nap should have been over an hour ago. I'm not quite sure what to do with myself. I think these little gifts of time are great. I'm sure there are a hundred things I could be doing, but why? I'd much rather do those things to the soundtrack of "Mommy can I have some juice?" "So-and-so stole the remote!"or, my personal favorite: "She hit/kicked/stuck-her-tongue-out-at me!". It's like I need the additional stress these phrases provide as incentive to move my butt. Or maybe when the girls are going on like that, I get loads of stuff done in order to avoid dealing with them in that moment. Hmmmmm...

I wish I had a good book to read. I've read all the ones currently in my possession... but wait, I've got an Iron Chef America stored in TiVo right now. Couch and remote, here I come. All I need now are the bon-bons. Buh-bye!

A Taste of Summer

We had some uncharacteristic (for May) close to 90-degree weather today, so I pulled out the old kiddie pool from the garage and let the girls splash around for awhile. By late this afternoon the water was quite warm, and they were in the pool for close to an hour. It was Shorty's first time in the splash pool, and she had a great time. (if the shrieks of protest when it was time to get out were any indication).

A Wii Confession

Here is my Confession for the Week:

As of today, I am not in the running for the Housewife of the Week Award. In fact, if I had a boss and a paycheck, I'd probably have been called into the office for a serious hand-slapping by now. Call it the home equivalent of spending the work day on the computer playing Solitaire, but I can't help it... I'm officially addicted to Wii.

I finally got my paws on a Wii system yesterday, after months of fruitless searching, and now I can't stop playing. My arms literally ache from playing Wii Sports (Bowling appears to be the family favorite). I actually broke a small sweat playing Wii Tennis yesterday. And today I bowled two games against Middlest Daughter and got roundly schooled by her Mad Skills. Seriously... she bowled a 162 on the second game (6 spares and a double strike in a single game). All the curve correction and stance strategy in the world can't compete with a 4.75 year old on a mission.

The only good thing that can possibly come out of this is that I may actually get some exercise by playing a video game. If the ache in my triceps is any indication, I should have great tank top arms within a few days. I may actually be able to wave goodbye to someone without having to do the Beauty Queen Parade wave. No more wrist palm wrist palm wrist palm for me.

The possibility of upper arm fitness aside, I am going to quit playing for today, before someone refers me to a 12 step program. The bathrooms really can't wait any longer for the attention they deserve. Not that they're going to get the scrubbing they really need today. I don't think my arms can take it.

Bad Megan, no biscuit.

"A Naughty Little Breeze"

Tonight the Bigger Girls and their Grammie put on a little "play" with some little creature figurines and a few props. The Big One was the narrator and Middlest One was the figure-mover. All persons involved were the "naughty little breeze"... you can see them blowing the breeze (with the feather), and moving the little turtle into his place. Then Grammie singing and The Big One narrating while Middlest One creates the action.

Off on an Ice Cream Adventure

Hi ho hi ho to Baskin Robbins they go...

The two bigger ones are off on a quest with Grammie and Grandpa Jack to find that Holy Grail of Kid-dom... the Ice Cream treat. Yum-o!