Front Porch

I used to think that front porches were old fashioned, no one uses them anymore. Now I wish I had one. I love sitting out on our front step and watching the cars, people and ice cream truck go by. Grace really enjoys it too. In fact, that's probably why I do it so often. Also, I love catching the ice cream man.

In the past I have looked at some people's yards and thought, "gosh, if they just mowed their lawn" or "if they just planted one shrub" or "if they just spread some weed killer, their lawn would look SO nice." I know, it probably wasn't very appropriate of me to judge. I have learned my lesson. I never thought I would be one of the people who LIVED in a house like that. As I sit on my front step with my beautiful baby and look at my yard, this is what I see. First here is the sidewalk that leads to our front door.

When we had our sewage line replaced they tore out part of the sidewalk. We placed some cement square pavers as a temporary fix, but haven't gotten around to replacing them with anything permanent. Now you can hardly see the pavers at all.

Next is our overgrown front planter. I promise, I have weeded this. But then I got scared away by the poison ivy.

Looking at the front planter might lead your eyes to the nice new windows we had put on our house in the spring.... the new windows surrounded by the old flaking trim...

"if only those people painted their trim, that house would be SO cute!" Which then leads me to the sad state of the front railing.

And finally, we really need to replace our mailbox.

With all these little fixes I know I could make our house so irresistible! But, alas, I have become one of those people with a neglected lawn and home. Between my new baby, my 30 hour per week job that keeps me busy every moment that baby is sleeping, cooking dinner, cleaning laundry, and my husband who is a full-time medical student, there just isn't time to do everything! So my yard and home maintenance will continue to be on the back burner. I have been humbled. I will try to not judge a family by their yard any more.

Petit fours, Grand mess

Have you heard of Bakerella? I love her blog. She's taken recipe sharing to a whole new level. Her recipes and photography make your mouth drool, your taste buds tingle and your cooking instinct heightened (I don't even like pancakes, but this post made me want to make them, eat them and wonder why I could ever not like them).

A few weeks ago I offered to throw a baby shower for a friend of mine. When I host, I like to make something special for the event and I decided after seeing the cute petit fours on Bakerella that I would try my hand at them. The shower was on Saturday and I knew I would need two evenings worth of time to make them, so I started on Wednesday night. I made thinly layered pound cake, cut it into layers, spread jam inbetween the layers, even rolled out marzipan to make the icing prettier when the time came. It went so smoothly, and the little, un-iced cakes were pretty tasty! So into the fridge to await the next night when I would be pouring fondant over the little cakes.

I had some great plans for these cakes. I was going to color half of the petit fours yellow and half of them pink and then make little orange buttercream flowers for the top. I made the poured fondant and went to work. The fondant was kind of thick and ugly, which I knew was a possibility, but what I didn't expect was how gross it tasted! The too sweet taste of a mouthful of powdered sugar totally overpowered the delicate balance of the cream cheese pound cake and the strawberry preserves.

And they were ugly. Scott and I decided it was probably a bum recipe, but I didn't have another night to devote to a new recipe. I decided to move on to plan B and just make cupcakes. Scott, however, decided it was worth it to try to salvage the second half of the petit fours.

Attempt two on fondant was from Scott. We read online that you can use the store bought fondant, melt it then pour it. Scott was very careful to do what online bakers recommended. He rigged a double boiler so the fondant wouldn't get too hot, he warmed it really slowly (really slowly) so he wouldn't break down the sugar crystals. I didn't get any pictures of this attempt, but just imagine melting chewed bubble gum and pouring it over cake. That's about the consistency we got, plus a slight chemical taste. It was nasty.

So Scott decided to make one more attempt and cover the petit fours with a chocolate shell. We were pretty optimistic about this idea. Scott made his double boiler again and melted chocolate chips with shortening and began the task. Well, chocolate is a fickle ingredient if you're not used to it, and we are definately not chocolate cooking experts (unlike our Chocolat friends). The chocolate was thick and didn't flow very smoothly.

It was fun to have this cooking adventure with Scott, but it pulled a number on our kitchen. The chocolate attempt was probably the cleanest, but it's the only one I got a picture of and it was still a mess.

Luckily, all was not lost for the baby shower. I just resorted to what I knew I could do: cook cupcakes from a box. Yay for cupcakes!

Best Ever

I have the best husband ever.

I have the best baby ever.

I am so lucky.

Funny

Perhaps it's just a stage of life that I'm in, but I find this napkin terribly funny.

hee hee! Love that face.

Tummy Time

The other end of the spectrum

Visiting teachers came at 1:00 - I was still in my pjs

Scott came home at 3:00 - I was still in my pjs

We ate dinner at 6:00 (leftovers) - I was still in my pjs

We decided to go for a walk, I changed into jeans at 6:30 pm, but still had my pj top

Pathetic.

ROFL

Oh, Gracie!

Today was a BIG day for Grace. When she was one week old Grace accidentally rolled over, but that was due to her ballistic, spastic, and uncontrollable movements. But today Grace rolled over twice, of her own accord and intentionally, from her stomach to her back. She knows that she has done something significant, too, because she'll smile her gummy smile big and wide for our approval. And boy, do we give it to her.

Way to go, Grace! No more unattended naps on the bed for you!

Picture documentation coming soon!