Baths and Bundts

It's been a lovely last few weeks in many ways.  Although it's still warm, the summer is already showing signs of wearing down and letting fall start taking the stage.  We've been lucky to not have to run the air conditioning hardly at all this summer. 

We also just returned from a business trip in Vegas, Baby!  We went a little early and took advantage of being there, having a great time.  Tommy and I signed up for a zip line tour that was phenomenal!  We were both a little nervous, but ended up having such a great time.  Tommy was feeling pretty impressed with himself after making it across one of the lines:

What's funny is that he doesn't look so macho tough when you look at this view:

Bawhahahaha!  This picture makes me laugh every single time I look at it!  Poor Tommy. 

Anyhow, we both had a great time and are glad we did it.  The guides were great and the view was spectacular.  We also visited the Hoover Dam, which is also well worth seeing if you have the time to do it. 

As I post this, it just seems like I should mention that today is the 10-year anniversary of the 9/11 events.  There are many TV specials that have been on all week.  The stories are just so sad, but so touching, amazing and heroic, too, on many fronts.  I finally watched the movie "Flight 93."  I didn't watch it sooner, just knowing that it would be an emotionally difficult movie to watch.  That's an understatement.  To me, that movie demonstrated both the worst and best that people have the potential to be.  It is an amazing story, for sure.  If you haven't seen it yet, you should. 

Here on the homefront, we've been motivated to get a few things done here.  Mostly just regular ol' chores that lack glitz and glam.  When the weather is nice, Bender gets more frequent baths, much to his absolute horror.  I don't fully understand his disdain for them, since he displays such an enthusiastic interest in water and mud when it is outside.  He can look pretty pitiful, though, when he puts his mind to it.

 

So while Tommy was on dog wash duty, I was busy doing what I do best... Baking!   I have a dear friend that mentioned to me how much she loves, loves, loves apricots.  I don't know about other people, but when I hear someone say something along those lines, I instantly see it as a challenge of how to make something that particular person will just love.  Well, there I went, looking online for recipe ideas.  I stumbled across a recipe that sounded fabulous on about.com and thought I'd give it a try.  Blame it on being distracted or just flat out not paying attention, but I pulled a total rookie move and messed up the recipe significantly by putting the glaze ingredients into the cake mix!  The good news is, it turned out GREAT! 

 I am pretty sure that my errors ended up making the cake even more moist and flavorful than it would have otherwise been. Too bad it was accidental and not the result of intended brilliance on my part! Duh'oh! If you're interested in this beautiful, mouth-watering cake, here's the link:  Apricot Bundt Cake  And my friend, along with the rest of my co-workers, loved the cake.  It was declared her new favorite!  Yay for the occasional succesful oops! 

Also, you may have noticed by now that my recipe links zip you over to the Just A Pinch site.  It is one of my favorite recipe sites out there, so I hope that while you're visiting my recipe links, you'll poke around and check things out. 

Enjoy!

"With the right combination of passion, fearlessness and butter, anything is possible."- Julia Child

I think I've figured this out... maybe!

Two years ago this month, my PaPa (my Mom's Dad) passed away.  I miss and think about him often.  He was such an influence on me, and him and my MaMa both have done so much to help me be who I am today.  My PaPa was someone that walked into a room and demanded attention - he was larger than life in so many ways.  I have a great family - and I don't say it often enough out loud how much each and every one of my family members mean to me.  I don't want to get all crazy emotional, though, so onward we go!

It's been another day of baking, baking, baking!  I made several treats today with the full intent of taking them all to the local Ronald McDonald House.  I'm a volunteer there, although I have to admit that since I experienced a life change last November (future blog topic!), my ability to physically go volunteer at the House on a regular basis has been difficult because of work demands.  So I bake a load of good stuff and take it in every so often.  Sometimes I take a car load; sometimes I just go in with a couple of batches of cookies.  Either way, it's something I love doing.  And they never tell me to stop, unlike some of my poor co-workers, one of who blames me for her only having one pair of jeans that now fit.  Drats. 

So, here's a picture of the car load (this time) of goodies that I took in today:

There's Banana Peanut Butter Bars with Chocolate Frosting in the bottom corner, Oatmeal Raisin Cookies in the center, some Zucchini Nut Bread in the upper right hand corner, and next to that, some Vanilla Cherry Bars.  At this point, you may be asking yourself, "Prey tell, Traci! What is that glorious thing in the upper left hand corner?"  Oh, oh, oh...  you will be so glad you asked!  That, my friends, is the Chocolate Bliss Bundt Cake.  Here, let me give you a close up!

This beauty is LOADED.  It has chocolate pudding, chocolate chips, chocolate ganache, some caramel sauce, and just to make it over-the-top, a chopped up Snickers bar on top!!  A friend of mine at work (lovingly) calls it "The Diabetic Coma Cake."  Ya wanna know how to make this decadent creation?  Here's the link!
Chocolate Bliss Bundt Cake

This recipe originated from Betty Crocker, but originally used a cake mix.  I modified the recipe to be a from-scratch cake because I just don't keep cake mixes around, but I always have all the makings for an improptu bake-off. 

As I wrap this up, I do have a horrible confession to make.  My Weight Watchers effort has not been so successful.  I'm not giving up...but, my initial enthusiasm seems to have left my being.  Double Drats.  Oh, and as a sidenote, I have made the Chocolate Bliss Bundt Cake several times, but have never tasted it even once; I'm diabetic and I at least try to be careful about the sweet treats that I taste.  I've steered clear of this one so far, out of pure and unadulterated fear that I will cave and it will live up to it's nickname that my co-worker has coined for it!  I felt like I should add that little bit in, as it seems kinda funny that I'm showing such an insane recipe followed by my woeful cries of WW failure.

Ok.  Enough of that.  Back to the good stuff!  I also planted a garden for the first time in forever and have been getting a few lovely zucchini squash from it.  Isn't it just amazing how things always just taste better when they come straight from your own labors?  Once long ago, I remember having zucchini boats, and I thought they were fabulous - so I was adequately motivated to go get some ideas on making my own delicious concoction.  The husband doesn't like squash, so I'm on my own with this one.  Who would have thought that his dislike for squash would be stronger than his love for bacon?  I, for one, am shocked. 

I personally think that the bacon and the onions are key to the flavor, but the bacon could be left out for a nice vegetarian meal.   And for anyone wanting the link, here it is:  Cheesy Bacon Zucchini Boats

Enjoy!

"With the right combination of passion, fearlessness and butter, anything is possible."- Julia Child

Summer's here, finally. Kinda. I think.

Summer has been a long time coming for those of us in the Pacific Northwest.  While I'm hearing reports of crazy heat in other areas of the U.S., we're still having very nice, mild, and sometimes even chilly weather.  Today, though, we were in the mid-80's and it meant a day outside for the whole family!  Tommy mowed the yard, I messed around in my little bitty garden, the cats sunbathed, and Bender had a pool party! 

Oh yeah, we live the high life here!  This pup loves his pool and is very content to lay in the frigid waters from the hose with his tennis ball floating nearby.  And, this is the new hard shell pool that we bought for him after his pool from last year sprung a leak.  Oh, and after we returned that monstrosity that the husband purchased a couple of weeks ago. 

With it being oh, so warm today, I opted for the simple dinner dish of taco soup. 

Tommy (aka "The Husband) was quite uncertain about this, thinking that taco in soup form sounded not so appetizing.  After giving it a taste, he has given it his own personal seal of approval.  I know a lot of times taco soups are served with tortilla chips and a dollup of sour cream, maybe cheese.  This had such good flavor that I went with a sprinkle of cheese and called it good!  If you'd like the recipe, you can find it here:  Fiesta Taco Soup

Enjoy!

"With the right combination of passion, fearlessness and butter, anything is possible."- Julia Child

 

What Am I Doing?

I'm not real sure what I'm doing; blogging is 100% new to me.  So we'll see if I end up typing a lot of things, only to not save them right.

So,  I sit here in the comfort of my living room, dog at feet, "The Glee Project" on the tele, and feeling a little disappointed that the weekend is coming to an end.  We have had a busy weekend.  I started off Saturday morning with homemade jumbo blueberry muffins, and then later that day made a lemon-blueberry bundt cake. 

Here's the recipe for ya, if you're interested:
Quick and Easy From Scratch Blueberry Muffins

And one more blueberry-icious recipe for your liking:

Lemonysnickety Blueberry Bundt Cake

It's how I releax and relieve stress:  baking. 

Saturday afternoon, Tommy (my dear and crazy husband) bought a HUGE above-ground pool home when he was making a store run to buy a small hardshell pool for the dog!  O-M-G.  We tried setting it up and even started filling it with water, but we're both pretty sure that our backyard has too many sloping areas to make it possible without a significant amount of work being done.  So, today, we started draining the water so that we can wrap the pool back up and return it.  Bummer, bummer, bummer.  Bender (the pup!)  loved it while it lasted though. 

On a more personal note, I've restarted Weight Watchers and going to the gym today.  So...Day 1.  Oh what fun for me!  Actually, I'm excited about the gym because they have some water classes that I am very interested in.  Aqua Zumba?  We'll see!  Seems that could work out well since I'm not a good dancer and mess ups won't be so obvious!  I'm actually also excited about getting back on track with WW.  I had good success with it about a year ago, and I hope that I can jump back into the program pretty quickly.  Fingers crossed.  Despite my "oh what fun for me" comment, I really do feel positive about these changes. 

So, I know this is short, but it's my first step.  A small step, but a step nonetheless.