Clearly, I Need to Make More Time for Baking

I received a copy of the book Cookie Craft:  From Baking to Luster Dust, Designs and Techniques for Creative Cookie Occasions for my birthday last month.

I first about it on Bakerella's website, which is a great one to read if you like seeing beautiful baked goods and finding mouth-watering recipes for sweet things.  The book basically takes the act of making sugar cookies and turns it into an art form.  The first section of the book contains a number of design ideas for various holidays, such as:

Thanksgiving

This is the first place I opened up to when I got the book, and I was amazed at the beauty of these cookies!  I was really hoping to make some for this Thanksgiving, but we're already going to be spending several days with family and indulging in a Thanksgiving feast.  Combine that with my desire to continue losing weight, and it seems like taking cookies along might be a bad idea.  On the other hand, there will be more people to help me eat said cookies, so perhaps I shall do that after all!  I love the turkey with the candy corn and the big turkey in profile, although I would choose chocolate brown frosting for the turkey's body instead of black for both.

Christmas

This one gives some great basic Christmas-themed cookies and jazz them up a bit.  I think I'd expand the selection of colors, especially for the stockings and the Christmas tree decorations.


New Year's

I don't know that I would have thought of making cookies to celebrate New Year's Eve, but the champagne bottle is a really cute design.  I like how they used basic circle cutters for a clock about to strike midnight and a gold bauble, and notice how they reused candy cane cookie shapes for noisemakers?  The hats are just triangles.


Easter

Again, creative use of circles!  The Easter basket is beautiful, and so is the Easter hat made from two circle cutters.  The technique on the pink Easter egg is one that was seen in the large turkey from the above Thanksgiving cookies.  You use Royal Icing to pipe the basic design and flood the piped area, then use a toothpick to pull the icing to give it that cool look.  I've only tried using Royal Icing once and failed miserably, but this book has some great tips that I hope will help me to overcome my aversion and become a Royal Icing expert.


Baby Shower

Wouldn't these be cute as party favors for shower guests to take home or as a treat at the shower itself?


They also have photos and instructions for many other occasions, including Winter, Valentine's Day, Mother's and Father's Day, Sports, Girlfriends Gathering and Pets.


Other chapters of the book cover explanation of the ingredients you'll want to have on hand for cookie crafting, equipment you'll use, tips for planning, recipes for 4 types of rolled-out cookie dough, tips on decorating both prebaking and after baking, websites where you can find tools and supplies for cookie crafting and more.  It also features helpful information in boxes interspersed throughout (such as Make-Ahead Tips, a Cookie Craft Planning Page and Suggested Color Palettes for different themes).


I find myself itching to start making these designs, and enjoying poring over the pages of the book in the meantime.

Great Website for Calorie Counters

One of my favorite recipe websites is Allrecipes.com.  I've found many wonderful recipes there, and some have become favorites that I make over and over.  But one drawback of their website is that not all recipes have nutritional information, and there's no nutritional calculator if you're submitting a recipe of your own.

When I started keeping close track of my calorie intake, I searched for a recipe calculator I could use for things like cookbook recipes and the meals I get from my monthly Make Ahead Meal group (ooh, future blog post!).  I found one on SparkRecipes.  It's a website with a huge database of health-focused recipes.  Not every recipe is low in calories or fat, but the primary focus is to provide recipes for people who are looking for healthier choices.  They have recipes in the Dietary Needs categories of Vegetarian, Vegan, Lactose Free, Gluten Free, Low Fat, Low Carb and Sugar Free.  To give you an idea of how many recipes you can find, there are 3,898 recipes in the Gluten Free category and 2,110 in Lactose Free, to name just those two.

In addition to having a big storehouse of recipes, all with nutritional information, you can also use their Recipe Calculator to enter ingredients and find out how many calories, fat, carbs, etc. are in each serving of a dish.

There's a database of ingredients to use, but you are also able to add those ingredients that you can't find, provided you have the nutritional information from their packaging.  That information is then available for other people who use the calculator.  If you only want to know the nutritional info on a one-time basis, you just enter the ingredients at Step 1, then go to Step 2 and enter the number of servings and click Calculate Info.  If you want to keep the recipe on file, you'll need to also go to Step 3 and complete the required fields (Recipe Name, Ingredients List and Category).  You may also want to input the Cooking Instructions so it's all there for you later.

I've found this to be really useful and have actually used it to find out the calories for some recipes from Allrecipes that didn't have that information.  I've also used it to tweak ingredients from some recipes to see if I can significantly cut calories and fat by using lighter versions of milk, cheese, sour cream, etc., or by adding vegetables or other lower calorie foods and upping the number of servings.

This Post is Just Six Words Long

Computer sucking. Using iPhone. More tomorrow.

Don't Let It Snow, Don't Let It Snow, Don't Let It Snow!

I've heard several people in the last few weeks state that "they" say it's going to be a rough winter.  I'm not sure who "they" are, but I sincerely hope that they're wrong.  I see on Accuweather that the local forecast shows 3 days with bits of snow here and there in the next couple of weeks.  That's earlier than we usually have snow, but I'm still holding out hope that it will be a fairly mild winter.

I don't mind a little snow here and there, so long as it doesn't build up in big drifts or cover the roads, partially melt, then refreeze and make it slippery all over.  We live on a hill that doesn't get plowed, so icy roads really stink.

We've only had one very snowy winter since moving here in early 2006, and that was the roughest one seen around here in some time.  People kept saying "It's never like this!"  They also said that during the previous summer, when we had a number of weeks of temps in the 90s.  We didn't believe them at the time, but after having lived here for 4 1/2 years, we've seen for ourselves that it was true.  Summers get warm, and sometimes unpleasantly so when most people around here don't have a/c in their homes, but they're generally not too bad.  And winters get cold and we get lots of rain and the occasional snow, but not usually enough to be a nuisance.

The first winter, though, we had enough snow happen that Rachel and I stayed home for 3 solid days because I was afraid of driving on the icy roads, and on the third evening, I told James we were going out to dinner or I was going to lose my mind.  That was also the year that we had a major windstorm (I think it was 70 mph) that knocked down power lines and caused transformer problems over the entire western half of Washington.  There were some areas that never lost power or only lost it for a few minutes, but many more areas that were severely affected.

We lost power for 3 1/2 days, despite being in a city of 85,000 people and situated between Tacoma and Seattle.  It just took that long for them to get to everyone and get things fixed.  After hunkering down for a day and a half and using up our firewood only to wake up to a temperature of 55 degrees in the house, we hightailed it out of here and went to stay with James' parents, who live about an hour away.  We were there for 2 nights, then came back because we wanted to make sure our cats were okay.  Shortly after getting back to town, we went to Home Depot to pick up a few things, and while there, we got a phone call from our security company letting us know that they were getting an alarm from our system.  We thought "Hey, if they're getting an alarm from the house, that must mean the power is restored!"  Sure enough, we drove back and could already see lights on in certain parts of the house - and it's hard to find many sights that have been more beautiful to us than that!

The next winter had a decent amount of snow, too - enough to cause church services to be cancelled the Sunday before Christmas because they didn't want people to take risks trying to get to church with, again, icy roads.  But it is pretty unusual for things to be that bad.

So I'm holding out hope that the winter will just be a normal one, with cooler temperatures that make us break out the winter coats, hats and gloves, some nice snowfalls to watch out the window, and rains that come along to wash the snow away before it becomes problematic.  Is that too much to ask?

Potpourri

A little of this and a little of that tonight:

• My Christmas gift-buying list is coming along.  I started buying gifts in August, but only got a few and a few more in September.  October slipped by me with no purchases, but I'm really ramping up this month. I'd like to start even earlier in the year next year and buy at least 3 or 4 gifts per month so I can spread out the expense and also prevent the stress of Christmas approaching and feeling pressured to figure out what to get.
• I need to start wrapping the Christmas gifts I already have so that I don't do like I did last year and end up wrapping all of the local gifts on Christmas Eve.
• This cold rainy weather we've been having has been making me very sleepy and sluggish during the day.  It's tough to be productive when it's like that.
• I've been doing the revised Breaking Free Bible study by Beth Moore.  It digs really deep, much deeper than any other study I've done, including half a dozen other ones by her.  Really gets to the core of what keeps Christians from fully experiencing abundance in Christ.
• Today was a pretty good day.  Ben didn't want me to leave him in the church nursery when I went to my Bible study this morning, so I just sat with him and rocked for a while until he felt better.  I suspect teething has really bothered him today, but there were a number of times when he just wanted to snuggle, and that was nice.  He's big on snuggling.
• Rachel did well with her behavior today, which was great.  Some days have been a struggle lately, and it's nice to have a day without battles.  I got to spend time with both kids just playing and tickling and having fun this afternoon, then Rachel and I sat together under a blanket and read part of a Magic Tree House book.
• It's hard to believe that Thanksgiving is only a little over 2 weeks away.  And Christmas Day is exactly 1 month after Thanksgiving.  Where on earth has 2010 gone?  Why does it seem like every year goes a little it faster than the one before?
• I'm supertired right now and looking forward to going to sleep, but I already know that I'm going to still be tired in the morning because I'm not going to get enough sleep.  Tomorrow night, I really must make a point of going to bed early.
• We're winning the war on clutter in our house, and it feels good.
• Glee was only meh tonight, but I liked the music, especially "One Love."  Probably going to download that on iTunes using the gift card that James got me for my birthday, along with "Hey, Soul Sister" by Train and the new JJ Heller album, When I'm With You.
• I'm thinking about trying my hand at making a pendant for James' grandma for Christmas.  I want to create a birthstone pendant with crystals representing the months that each of her great-grandchildren have been born and put it on a nice silver chain.  The stuff I'm finding online is either pricey or looks cheap, so I'm hoping that by making it myself, I'll be able to make something that's nice in quality and a reasonable cost.  I've never made jewelry before.  Wish me luck.

That is all.  Good night.

Lose It!

Whew!  I almost forgot about writing a blog post today, and I already had my topic picked out ahead of time and everything.  It would have been a bummer if I'd missed one.  Be forewarned that I'm about to sound like I'm selling Amway.  


For a number of years, I've been unhappy with my weight.  I'd steadily put on a few pounds here and there every year until I was finally 40 pounds heavier than when I'd gotten married in 1999.  I didn't like how I looked and just didn't feel that good about myself as a result.


During both of my pregnancies, I'd been diagnosed with gestational diabetes.  Since I didn't have a big appetite for snacking in the earlier trimesters and had to stick with a strict diet for my health and the health of my babies, I ended up about 20 pounds lighter right after giving birth than when I'd gotten pregnant.  I loved being thinner and hoped to hang onto it, but I didn't take steps to do so and wasn't paying enough attention to what I was eating or making any lasting changes to my regular habits.  Gestational diabetes would go away, and I'd go back to the same bad habits.


On top of that, my willpower seemed nonexistent.  I'd want so much to be in better shape and to feel good about myself again.  Sometimes I'd think "Maybe I'm just going to be this size the rest of my life, and I need to stop feeling bad about myself," but I couldn't reconcile myself to being that overweight.  I knew it wasn't the healthiest way to live.


Some months ago, my friend Corey started to use the Lose It! app for the iPhone.  And over the next couple of months, he experienced a steady yet healthy rate of weight loss - he's still using it, and still losing steadily.  Soon, my husband started to use it, and he, too, started to lose weight and get into healthier shape.  He kept asking me for calorie counts on things I was giving him for meals.  (Frankly, I found it annoying at that point since he was the one who was using Lose It!, yet I was the one who had to hassle with figuring out calories for things he ate.)  Then Corey upgraded his iPhone, and he gave me the one he'd had.  When he formatted it for me, guess what was on it?  You got it.  So I figured "What the heck?  I'll give it a try and see how this works for me."


If you're not familiar with the app, here's how it works:

• You put in your weight, height, gender, goal weight and the rate at which you wish to lose the weight (1/2 pound, 1 pound, 1 1/2 pounds or 2 pounds a week).
• Lose It! tells you how many calories you have each day before accounting for any exercise, and it also tells you approximately when you'll reach your goal weight based on your rate of loss, if you are consistent with sticking to the recommendation. And they have a Maintenance option that you can use to keep track of your eating once you've reached your goal, to make sure you don't start going back up again.
• You track your food with the program, which has a large database of items (both generic and brandname, as well as a number of restaurant foods) and allows you to put in custom items or recipes. You also track exercise, and as you add exercise to your day, it gives you those calories back towards your eating allotment.
• If you have friends using Lose It!, you can create an account on their website and connect with friends so that you can see their progress and encourage one another.

It's been a real wake-up call to me to see what my daily calorie allotment is, compared to what I was probably eating even when I thought I was doing well. I've also been much more conscious of portion sizes and how much I'm putting on my plate, even using measuring cups and spoons for some things like carbs (potatoes, pasta, rice) and salad dressings.


And it's been something that has given me a concrete goal and a super-easy way to keep track. I'm pretty lazy about that, so having to write down amounts and keep track of it myself would be much harder for me to maintain. It's also a challenge to come in under my daily calorie goal, a challenge that's been surprisingly motivating for me! i started to think "Dangit, I can DO this!"


Best of all, the program is free! The creators said they want it to be free so that it's available for anyone who wants to be healthier, which is just awesome.


I've actually started viewing fat as the enemy to be vanquished, and I'm determined that it's going down.  I'm done with being overweight.  Now that I'm more aware of how much I'm eating and what a burger is really going to cost me, I'm much more likely to make a better choice, or I adjust my other meals so that I can enjoy a higher-calorie meal here and there.  Nothing has ever motivated me in the same way before, nor have I been able to stick to any other kind of plan previously.  If you're searching for a way to lose weight and have had trouble finding something that works, I highly recommend you check this out.

It All Seems to Hit the Fan at Once

We got hit with a one-two punch in the last 24 hours.  First, late last night my husband noticed that a sizeable section of the ceiling in our laundry room was bowed out and cracking.  We suspected it was connected to a problem in the master bathroom above, where we had been feeling a portion of the floor that seemed spongy, like water had gotten underneath the linoleum and softened the subflooring.  James called American Home Shield, and as they considered it an emergency, they planned to have someone contact us on Sunday morning and come out that day if possible.

James stayed home from church and waited, and the call came just before 10:45.  After talking with James, the plumber said that he was pretty sure the culprit is a leak in the seal between the bathtub and the floor or around the tub drain, and that it was slowly leaking down into the drywall of the laundry room ceiling.  He didn't seem to feel it was an emergency and set an appointment to come out on Monday morning at 9:30.

We're pretty sure fixing the leak is going to involve pulling up the floor and subfloor in the bathroom.  We don't know if more will need to come out, but at the very least, bringing everything back to normal afterward is going to require replacing the subfloor, and replacing the flooring through the whole bathroom, in addition to taking out the drywall in the laundry room and replacing that, too.  We're hoping and praying that it doesn't snowball into any bigger kind of problem, like mold.  I don't know if the toilet or bathtub will need to be pulled out to fix things, but this could turn into something big quickly.  And in the month before Christmas, so it would be hard to find worse timing.

So that's problem #1.  Problem #2 occurred tonight, when the washing machine showed an error code that translates to "Contact for service."  It's not like the other minor codes we've seen that just require unplugging the machine and letting it sit for a bit, then plugging it back in, and everything works fine.  We bought our machine when we moved here over 4 1/2 years ago, so it's way past the warranty, and we didn't buy the appliance coverage from American Home Shield (DANGIT!) since we didn't think we'd need it any time soon.

James is currently downstairs with the machine partially taken apart, working to try to fix it so that we don't have to pay someone to repair that, too.  I'm trying to remain calm and not freak out thinking about all the "What ifs?"

Especially since my car has also been sounding really strained, and I'm going to be taking it in soon to see what's wrong.  Hopefully something minor, but it never seems to turn out that way with car repairs, does it?

I'm starting to feel like a really tightly-wound ball of stress and have to seriously work on committing this to the Lord before I end up with stomach pains, as I tend to do when I hold onto stress and internalize things.  I'm reminding myself of Philippians 4:6-7:

Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. ⁷And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.


Praying about things probably isn't going to magically cause my car to stop making that sound, or the washing machine to put itself back together in working order, or the laundry ceiling to move back into place and the bathroom floor to feel normal.  But it will allow me to deal with all of this without wanting to pull my hair out, and with the assurance that God knows it's all happening and will bring us through while granting the peace that I really desperately need right now.