Habits or The Case For The Traveling Pillowcase

I have noticed that I have a few habits that I picked up from my mom and dad. My dad always wrote down the mileage, gallons and what it cost every time we filled up with gas in the car. I remember doing it for him when I was sitting in the passenger seat. So when I got married and my husband had the same habit, it was no big deal to keep it up. When we lived in Singapore I mentioned to a friend of mine that it was strange to not do that when we filled up our car. (Or "topped it up" ) We didn't own the car and the company gave us some allowance money for the gas, so we didn't have the same reasons to record it.

Okay, so that may not sound so odd to of lot of you. I'm sure there are plenty who do the same thing.

But there is another habit that I recently wondered where it started and asked my mom.

When I was a kid we would camp every summer. On these trips we would all bring our own pillows. My mom had us put different pillowcases on than the ones we used at home. They were usually made out of old feedsack fabric. (Oh how I wish I had some of that fabric to make quilts out of!)

Flash forward to my adult life... I still do that. I still think I have to put a different pillowcase on my pillows when I go on a trip.

Recently, I was pondering this phenomenon. I asked my mom why she did that and she said it was because we had mostly white sheets back then and she didn't like how our pillows seemed to get dirty when we were camping. So the feedsack pillow cases were her solution to hiding the dirt.

The bigger question is why do I still do that? My kids haven' t done it for a long time, but I still have my husband and I do it. Maybe now it's because I made these adorable pillowcases for us. Well, mine is adorable. Pete's is..... manly. Can you guess which one is mine?


I took this picture on a bed in a hotel. My main reason now for traveling pillowcases is so they stand out from the white sheets on the hotel beds and we don't forget to bring them back home with us. (Yes, we have left our pillows in a hotel room. Or I should say I have left my pillow in a hotel room.)

Orange Swirl Cake

This cake is a favorite of our Small Group. The last time I made it, we only had 2 or 3 pieces left. One lady asked if she could take a piece home. She wanted some later with coffee at home. She wasn't sure it would last until morning. :)

1 package yellow cake mix
1 1/4 cups water
1/3 cup vegetable oil
3 eggs
1 package (4-serving size) orange Jello
1/2 teaspoon orange extract
Chocolate Frosting

1. Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease bottom and sides of a 9x13 pan; lightly flour. (I used cooking spray with flour added -- Easy!)
2. Beat cake mix, water, oil and eggs in large bowl with electric mixer on low speed 30 seconds. Beat on medium speed 2 minutes scraping bowl occasionally
Remove 1 1/2 cups of the batter and set aside. Pour remaining batter into pan. Stir dry Jello and orange extract into the 1 1/2 cups of batter.
Drop orange batter by heaping tablespoons randomly onto batter in pan. Swirl batter with knife.
3. Bake 33 to 38 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool completely, about 2 hours. Frost with chocolate frosting. (I suppose you could use that nasty canned frosting if you really want. I cannot stand the stuff and always make my own. It's much better and I can make it as chocolaty as I want!)

Oh man that looks good! I think I am going to make some for our church potluck on Sunday!

19

I am a day late with this, but I need to acknowledge my girl's birthday. (We've been traveling back home and I haven't had internet access.)


We spent the weekend with her, hopefully making her birthday a little more special.



On Sunday we went to church and ate at a VERY good restaurant in downtown Lawrence.

After we finished our lunch, we found a corner of the restaurant that had couches and used that as the place for Megan to open her gifts. Then we headed across the street for ice cream. A required food in Megan's diet. ;)



I cannot begin to say how proud I am of this girl. Just look at how she has grown up physically. She is even more beautiful on the inside.

Happy Birthday sweet daughter of ours! Your dad and I are so PROUD of who you are!

Love you tons and tons and tons and tons!

Blow Out

My husband loves his shoes.

Yes, you read that right.

My Husband.

So you can imagine his sorrow when this happened to a pair of his shoes:

See how sad he looks?

This happened last month when we were in St. Cloud for a movie and dinner. Since they are hightops, he unlaced the top parts and wrapped the laces around the soles. It was really funny.

But I wouldn't think it should be totally a shock since they are at least 14 years old. I found pictures of him wearing them when we went to Switzerland in 1995. I remember (and Pete thinks I'm weird for remembering this) that our trip to Switzerland was the first time he wore them outside. Before that they were strictly inside basketball shoes. So who knows how long he has owned them?

The really crazy thing about the shoe blow-out is the same thing happened to a pair of his hiking shoes when we were in Iowa for Christmas. I didn't get a picture of that. (These pictures were actually Pete's idea. He said I should take some pictures for my blog! What a supportive husband!)

The Comments? They Are Funny

One of the things I love about keeping a blog is the interaction I get in the comments section from the people that read this. Last week I wrote about the dessert I made for our Small Group Bible Study.

You so have to click here and read the comments. (There are comments at the end of the post.)

I laughed so hard.... The Small Group Skipping Couple (Mike & Jen) have such a terrific sense of humor!

A Website Discovered

I discovered a new website I wanted to bring attention to. It's the website of a terrific restaurant that's too far away from us to visit very often. It's called Peppercorn Pantry in Aplington, Iowa. We've visited twice and had lunch there one time and dessert another time. Okay, we had dessert both visits...but the second time was only dessert. Highly recommended!

Here's the link to an article about the owner.

And here is the link to the restaurant.

Now I just need to figure out how to get one of those cookbooks. I love cookbooks.

I see on the event page that they are serving a Valentine's Day dinner. Phooey.

P.S. The owner is the mom of Megan's boyfriend Zach. :)

Lemon Poppy Seed Pound Cake

This week's dessert was a Lemon Poppy Seed Pound Cake. It's one of my favorites. And I found out it is a favorite of a couple in our Small Group. They called to say they couldn't make it tonight, but stopped by before they left town to have a piece of cake! That made me laugh.

It's a pretty easy recipe as it starts with a cake mix. The original recipe calls for a yellow cake mix, but I often use a lemon cake mix to up the yummy lemonyness.

I bought this bundt pan last year the day after Valentine's Day. Isn't it cute?


I think what really makes this cake is the use of fresh lemon juice and the lemon zest. I use two lemons for the 2 tablespoons called for. Oh and the long skinny thing in the picture? The best zester ever. But be careful, I have managed to zest my fingernails before.

Ready to bake:

The finished product with the yummy glaze. Notice the big missing chunk? This photo was taken after the Small Group Skipping Couple had stopped by.

1 box yellow cake mix
1 (8 oz.) package fat-free cream cheese, softened
3/4 cup water
2 large eggs
2 egg whites
2 tablespoons grated lemon zest
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1 tablespoon poppy seeds
Glaze:
1 cup powdered sugar
3-4 teaspoons lemon juice

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease pan. (I use baking spray with flour and alway have good results)
• Beat on low speed cake mix, softened cream cheese, water, eggs, egg whites, lemon zest, lemon juice and poppy seeds until moistened, about 30 seconds. Beat on medium speed until well blended, about 2 minutes.

• Pour the batter into a greased 10" tube pan or bundt pan. Bake until a toothpick inserted come out clean. About 40 minutes.

• Cool in pan on rack for at least 20 minutes. Remove from pan and cool completely on rack.

• Glaze: Combine ingredients until mixtures forms a smooth thick glaze. Spoon over top of the cooled cake, letting it drip down the sides.

Happenings

• My friend, Jen, and I hosted a baby shower Sunday afternoon. I failed to take any pictures. Silly me. We were expecting 6 or 7. Hoping for 10. And 19 (!) showed up! We were so excited. I was happy it all turned out okay. Can't wait to meet the sweet little boy when he is born.
  
• I cleaned out a cabinet I have in my sewing room. It's the place I stash things when I don't know what else to do with them. It was a mess. I reorganized and threw a bunch of stuff away. I have a pile of things to use to redecorate the landing on the stairway. (We stripped the wallpaper and repainted a wall in the stairway.) I also have a pile of things to burn. We have friends (Jen & her hubby) who have bonfires during the summer and we have this weird thing about burning things like old household decorations. It makes for a fun evening!
• I learned last week that it's a good idea to actually put coffee in the coffee maker otherwise just filtered hot water comes out. :) Fortunately I caught this before too long into the cycle and before the company came over.
• I'm getting ready to start a new quilt. My goal is for this to not take me a year to make. Hopefully a month.
• We saw "New In Town" last Friday night. It was supposed to be set in New Ulm, MN. Yes, there really is a town with that name. It's about 45 miles south of here. And no, the movie wasn't filmed there. Most of the movie was unrealistic, but it was funny. If you see and and you don't live in Minnesota, just remember the unrealistic part...
• Speaking of Minnesota... I decided I was a bit nuts last week when it was 35-37 and I was out running errands just wearing a sweatshirt. No coat. It felt great!
  

25 Random Things About Me

***I posted this on my Facebook. Sorry if you've already read it there. But I know some of you readers haven't. So here you go:

1. I cannot sleep with my pillow touching the headboard of the bed. Cannot. Have to wiggle myself down until there are several inches between my pillow and the headboard. I think my husband should do that too, but he won't.

2. I have to sleep with three pillows. I discovered one of those space bags that you squish the air out of so I can pack the the king sized pillow in the bottom of my suitcase and bring it with me when we fly somewhere. Makes me happy.

3.I like $5 bills. Don't know why. Sometimes I hoard them in my billfold.

4. When I turned 5 I thought I got to go to kindergarten the very next day. (My birthday is in January.) I was told I would go to school when I was 5. I have a vivid memory of looking out the front window the day after my birthday watching all the kids in the neighborhood walk to school. I was very sad.

5. I love that despite the fact that I can be a royal pain, my husband still adores me.

6. I am humbled that God chose me to be His own and that He adores me despite the fact that I sin and take a long time to learn to be obedient.

7. When I was a teenager I wanted to be a figure skater. I always thought they were so graceful. But every time I skated, I wasn't quite so graceful and fell a lot. So I am content with watching the Olympic skaters.

8. My earliest memory is from when I was 2 1/2. I remember seeing my grandma in the casket. I thought it was funny she was sleeping with her glasses on. My mom says that I said, "Is Gamma seeping?"

9. I wish I liked to exercise. But I don't.

10. I love to have people over for dinner and don't mind figuring out the menu and trying new dishes. But I have no imagination for planning baby showers or bridal showers.

11. I like that I learned to quilt and would really like to make two or three quilts a year.

12. Just recently I have thought about learning to knit.

13. I love watching my son grow up and use the gifts and talents he's been given to serve God. I miss him being closer, but I am so proud of who he is.

14. I am super excited about having a daughter-in-law in July! I just love her to pieces. She is such a kind, loving person. I think she is The Best Thing :) for my son.

15. I love seeing my daughter happy. I miss her more than words can say and I wish I lived close enough to pop by for lunch or an afternoon of shopping.

16. I love singing on our church's worship team. If you would have asked me 10 years ago if I would do that I would have said never. But I really do like it.

17. I adore my daughter's boyfriend. He is such a strong man of God. I am amazed at how specifically God answers prayers.

18. I still have the Easy Bake oven I got for Christmas almost 40 years(!) ago. I have no idea if it still works. I should find out.

19. We lived in Singapore for three years. Sometimes I really miss it. I certainly miss the travel we were able to do as a family. We have such great memories.

20. I have an obsession with bags. Bags like: duffel bags, back packs, purses, suitcases, computer bags. I look and look and look for the perfect one. Lately I've been doing better at not spending too much money on them.

21. My favorite food is lobster. We were on Cape Cod about 4 days a couple of years ago and I had lobster 3 times. Yum!

22. One of my favorite things to do when I was in elementary school was to go to my friend Becky's house up the street on Friday nights to watch The Brady Bunch. Yep. It was Prime
Time.

23. I started a blog almost a year and a half ago. I surprise myself with finding enough to write about to keep it going.

24. I wish I felt rested in the mornings. I always feel groggy for at least the first hour.

25. The best job I have had is being a mom. I am sad that it is done.

Lemon Bars

This week for Small Group I made Lemon Bars. As you can tell from the recipe card, I have made this countless times. I like it because it uses ingredients that I usually have on hand.
I'll type out the ingredients in case you can't read the card:

Lemon Bars

1 cup margarine
2 cups flour
1/2 cup powdered sugar
4 Tablespoons lemon juice
4 eggs
2 cups sugar
4 Tablespoons flour
1 teaspoon baking powder

Blend together the margarine, 2 cups flour and powdered sugar. Press into 9x13 pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 15 minutes or until edges are slightly browned.
Mix together the lemon juice, eggs, sugar, 2T flour and baking powder. Pour over crust. Note the hotpad in the picture... remember to use it to put the pan back in oven. :) Trust me, sometime I forget and its' not nice. :) Bake for 25 minutes. The top will be slightly browned.

The icing is made with powered sugar combined with lemon juice. I don't have any measurements for this. I just guess. :)

Super Bowl Food: Can You Hear Your Arteries Explode?

We spent SuperBowl Sunday with some friends from church.

Fun!

One of the guys had read about an "awesome"(?) food idea and gave it a try that night. It's called Bacon Explosion. There is four pounds of meat in this artery clogger!



I had a small piece. It was tasty, but a small piece was all I needed.

What a guy thing! :)

A Get-Away AND What People Do When The Tempurature Doesn't Get Above Freezing For The Whole Month

My birthday was a couple of weeks ago. One of the presents my sweet husband gave me was a night at the Saint Paul Hotel.

I, in turn, gave him a night at the hotel for his birthday. (Which is April 8th.)

So we had a two night get-away.

We had a great time loafing around, watching a couple of movies and sleeping in. It's a beautiful hotel.

We had a sweet bonus in our stay. What do you do when it's so cold for so long? You have a winter carnival and you carve ice. The park where all the ice carvings are displayed is right across the street from the hotel. Friday morning we braved the 12 degree weather and spent about 20 minutes checking out the art work. It was pretty neat.