I Like To Put Thing On Maddie's Head.

 It started early.

And sometimes is very cute.

I have 28 plus photos of Maddie with things
on her head.
Too many for one post so I'll put
them up now and again.
Just for your viewing pleasure :)
You're welcome.

Chocolate Coconut Tarts My Way

Big Mary is really gonna think I

closed up shop!

Well I didn't.

Maybe a vacation?

A sabbatical?

A dry spell?

Whatever the cause, I have

been taking pictures of my food 

and anything that strikes my fancy

(mostly pictures of Maddie)

in the assumption I would get back to this

one day.

So here you go, let's start back up 

with a fun one!

My Facebook friend, Maggie,

is a cook/baker extraordinaire

she blogs about her food everyday, 

and multiple dishes everyday.

 I have made a few of her creations.

The cream horns are hers.

Actually, now that I think about it, 

she made the puff pastry. 

I bought frozen. 

A theme will develop here. 

A couple of weeks ago she made 

chocolate coconut tarts.

I love Mounds bars and this sounded 

like a glamed up version of them so I was all in.

http://maggiesonebuttkitchen.com/2013/04/23/chocolate-coconut-tarts/ 

My first stumbling block was the 

4 inch pie/tart pans.

18 of them.

I overcame that with these:

Those are paper cups for cupcakes but they are a bit 

wider and shallower. 

Perfect!

Got the shells all made.

Then for the chocolate filling.

It's egg yolks, half and half, heavy cream

and chocolate.

It demands LOTS of stirring.

And LOTS of attention. 

And, it would appear, 

strict temperature control. 

 One should NOT pour hot melted chocolate into

a custard base.

In case you can't tell, that's what ruined looks like. 

All lumpy and oily and separated. 

YUCK!!

But, a search of my cabinets turned up some 

instant pudding and pie filling. 

WaLa!

I'm sure Maggie's are way better but these are done

and pretty god in their own right. 

Hey, and the fact that they look like sunflowers

was an unexpected added bonus!

Batik-ish

Always on the lookout

for projects to keep 

one Ava busy, 

I happened across this one on 

Pinterest.

I gathered all the supplies,

pre-washed the t-shirts

and stashed it all for a 

rainy day. 

Or spring break as it turns out.

It's hard to tell from this photo but you use

the Elmer's Gel glue.

It's washable, very important. 

You just make a design on a pre-washed 

t-shirt and let it dry.

Then you water down some 

acrylic artist paints. 

And I mean 

Watered Down!

We really started to get the right

consistency towards the bottom of the 

shirt on the left.

After the paint dries you soak it in 

warm water to wash off the glue and then

toss it in the dryer to heat set the paint.

Nice!

That kept her busy for oh, 

about 1/2 hour!

Patitsio (ish)

It's a good Saturday morning 

that I can watch a little 

Food Network and 

get a new recipe to try for dinner

Saturday night.

It's an even better Saturday night

when I can call the fam and 

have a crowd to help eat

said dinner.

The only problem 

is I wind up with food pictures 

that look like this.

Um, it was good. 

It's a Giada recipe

(of course). 

She had me when I heard her say 

cinnamon and allspice.

Lamb helped too. 

I first tried those spices

 in a savory recipe when I tried

Cincinnati chili.

You also find what we consider

sweet spices in savory dishes in

 Indian cuisine.

I like that too. 

I was a little worried about the mint

in it since Mike only thinks mint is

appropriate in toothpaste

so I went a little light on it

and it was just fine.

The other point I'll note is that

this is not one of those 

casseroles that are better the next day. 

The noodles soak up all the

sauciness and it gets a bit dry.

I call this Patitsio-ish because the reviews

say it is not really legit.

That's OK, 

I'm not either :).

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/giada-de-laurentiis/greek-noodle-casserole-pastitsio-recipe/index.html

Soups!

So, when

God 

and the

devil

are messing with your mind

what's the best medicine?

SOUP!

Making it, that is.

 As my previous post will prove, 

my head has been in pretty deeps waters lately.

Today I decided it was time to get the funk out!

I love to make soup. 

It's one of my favorites. 

Today I pulled my three favorites, 

tomato, 

sweet potato, 

and asparagus. 

I decided to change things up a bit by roasting all the vegetables.

So delicious!

I also threw a bit of white wine in all of them.

The sweet potato was the only one that called for it, 

but hey, what could it hurt?

Turns out, nothing!

I also put some red pepper flakes and fresh

thyme in the tomato soup. 

Pretty, huh?

Here are the links:

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/giada-de-laurentiis/asparagus-soup-with-herbed-goat-cheese-recipe/index.html

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Sweet-Potato-Soup-with-Buttered-Pecans-1332

4

http://www.marthastewart.com/343299/creamy-tomato-soup

And then I took a long walk and started

thinking all over again.

Hence the previous post.

:)

Spiritual Warfare.

I have had some going on inside me for the past

couple of weeks.

This started it

It's the sign adopted by those who support

gay marriage.

I think. 

I think I don't understand them 

about as much as they don't 

understand me.

And I don't mean gay people. 

I mean the activists.

I think what they want is to have a

legally and societally 

recognized union.

I think that's a good idea.

We all live under a set of rules that

man has made and within

those rules

 ALL 

people should have equal rights.

What messes me up 

is when they want to take a 

God rule

and mess with it.

I absolutely believe that God

loves ALL of us and not one

group of us is better than an other.

But God established marriage

to be a commitment between

Him,

a man,

and

a woman.

You're not going to convince me that 

God is OK with

homosexual activity. 

Just like I'm not gonna be able to convince myself

that he has no problem with

gluttony,vanity or gossip.

He has no hierarchy of sin.

Just a list. 

Even a top ten.

God loves the homosexual

just like He loves 

this fat vain chick who talks too much.