I finally made round soap!  I've been making square soap for years but that round soap I see in the stores is just so cute!  I have to admit, it's taken me about 2 years just to decide how to make a round mold.  I've read all the soap sites - seen all their suggestions on what to use - but nothing ever made me say YES!  that's it.  So, I'll get to my mold decision in a minute.

Here's a picture of the two kinds of soap I made:  Peppermint Oatmeal and Lavender Rosemary.  It actually came out round - I was so surprised it actually worked. 

If you are interested in making your own soap - here's a tip: make sure you stir well after adding the color or else you get big white spots.  But, look at it this way, once you get in the shower without your glasses - you won't be able to see the white spots at all.

Well, here's the mold picture I saw and decided I could do this.  Of course, I'm not going to pay the prices they want on-line, so I got Mike to take me to Home Depot.  PVC pipe:  got it! 

Oh yeah, NAILED IT!  You can hardly tell them apart, right?  I know, the awesomeness of my home-made molds is taking your breath away.  So, let me walk you through this and you can make your own soap molds.  You need a bottom cap on the PVC pipe, but all Home Depot had was a rounded one.  That makes it kinda hard to stand up straight.  So, I pulled out a round Tupperware lid and it fit perfectly. I was afraid the hot soap would leak out the bottom, so I used a little duct tape to hold the lids on. Now this is the important part - you need a Teflon cookie sheet to roll up and stick down in the PVC pipe or your soap will NOT come out. If you forget the Teflon sheet, just throw the whole thing in the trash.

After 24 hours, just pull the Teflon cookie sheet right out and there it is - a huge log of soap.  Looks good enough to eat! (this would make a really cool Jell-O mold at Christmas)

The first strawberry cake I ever ate was in high school and my grandma made it.  I thought it was the best thing I ever ate and I've been making it ever since.  That's been around 40 years.  (I can't believe I just admitted that!)  Anyway, maybe it was just my family that didn't give a hoot about strawberry cake - I never got a big response about it.

My husband's company has loaned him to United Way for 4 months to help kick off their major fund raising campaign for 2012-2013.  He talks to other companies about their inter-company campaigns to raise money for United Way and/or employee volunteers for day of caring activities.  Well, they have a huge BBQ/cake sale every year and he volunteered me to make a cake.  I'm talking thousands of dollars raised through a bake sale!

I said sure, I'd make the ol' throwdown - strawberry cake.  I made one the week before the bake sale for a test run and sent it with him to the office.  He said everybody loved it and brought back an empty plate.  Sure, I know how that works - it's in the trash somewhere.  The 3 people who aren't on a diet ate 3 tiny slices and the rest sat there all day.

The next week I went to his little BBQ-cake sale.  There were over 500 people there!  People kept coming up and telling me how much they loved my strawberry cake - I have NEVER had anybody respond like that - it was almost embarrassing.

Here's the recipe: 

Strawberry Cake
1 box white cake mix
1/2 cup frozen strawberries finely chopped
3/4 cup oil
4 eggs
1/2 small box strawberry jello

Pour cake mix into large mixing bowl.  Measure strawberries and add water to equal one cup.  Add to mix, add oil and mix well.  Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each. Add jello; beat well.  Pour into greased and floured pans and bake at 350 degrees until top springs back when lightly touched.

Strawberry Frosting
1 box confectioners sugar
1 stick butter
4 oz cream cheese
1/2 cup frozen strawberries finely chopped 

Beat well and spread over cake.

We went to a pizza party last week at his work (yes, he has such a hard job) and more people came up and said how much they liked the cake.  Honestly -it's not that special.  You know those commercials where it shows an office setting and someone comes in and says "there's a box of donuts in the conference room" and everyone gets up and runs down the hall? If you work in an office - you know how true that is!  I figure no one had sent them a cake in about 10 years.

Here's the best part of cooking.  Getting to eat all the frosting that's left over!  Mike knows not to get in my way when I'm finishing off a bowl of frosting!
One last note, the cake sold in the bake sale for over $100.  Thank goodness there's a lot of good people out there willing to donate big bucks to charity.  I'm not getting a big head - someone bought a German chocolate cake for $2200.  

I have an addiction - I admit it.  I looked up the definition of that word....addiction.  The dictionary says:  Addiction is a persistent, compulsive dependence on a behavior or substance. The term has been partially replaced by the word dependence for substance abuse. Addiction has been extended, however, to include mood-altering behaviors or activities..

My addiction is to lip gloss.  That's right, lip gloss.  I can't go anywhere without it - I am truly dependent, just like the dictionary says.  I carry at least 4 in my purse at all times:

I know I should color code my lip stick with what I'm wearing, (that's what my mother does - and Betty looks like a magazine cover all the time), but I don't.  I use the first thing I grab out of my purse.  When I go to Walmart, there's so many choices!  I love them all!  I've told my girls that at Christmas, all I want is lip gloss, but I haven't gotten any yet...I guess they think I'm just kidding about that.  HA!  My son did give me some Burt's Bees lip gloss a couple of years ago and I still have some in my makeup drawer.  Amy and Elizabeth:  Chris is my favorite right this minute!!

Anyway, here's what I keep in my makeup drawer:

When I don't carry my purse somewhere, I panic if I don't have a pocket for a stick of lip gloss. I think that qualifies for mood altering.  I keep some in my overalls at the farm.  I might be hot and sweaty and stinky, but I've got nice lip gloss going on!

Well, if you're reading this and you truly have an addiction to alcohol or drugs, I pray you're delivered from your addiction.  I don't intend for this to minimize anyone's problems.

I gotta run now, my lip gloss has worn off and I need to re-apply.

My lemon experiment for the year is OVER! I blogged back in May or June about the Ponderosa Lemon tree I planted.  Here's a picture of it back in the spring.  I got one lemon from the plant the first year I planted it.  It was the spring all right, my plant is covered with pine tree pollen because it lives on the deck behind the house.

Here's the picture I took this afternoon.  My poor tree is giving that lemon all it's got.  I hope it recovers from the ordeal.  It must be like giving birth to a 15 pound baby.

Mike had to use a pair of scissors to hack it off - the stem was huge.  I brought it in the house and cut it open to compare to a regular sized lemon.  Wow!

Next step was to compare the juice, so I put both on the juicer.  A lot more juice and more seeds.  I tried to keep some of the seeds - some of the seeds, I only kept 42.   I don't know - maybe I'll plant an orchard.  

You know what the last step in the experiment has to be - a taste test.  Because if a humongous lemon doesn't taste like a lemon - then who cares?  I guess you can tell by my face that it does indeed taste like a lemon.  However, it's not as puckery as the small lemon.  YES - puckery is a word. I found it in the dictionary.

On second thought, maybe one lemon a year is plenty.  My teeth still hurt from the taste test. 

I totally blame my mother.  There's just no other excuse.  I was deprived as a child from eating nutella.  That's right, nutella - it's not just another cheapo peanut butter.  Growing up, my brother and I ate gallons of peanut butter and bananas  - mashed together.  We were in high school before our mother confessed she'd never tried it -she just fed it to us.

Where has this been my whole life?   I looked it up - it was created in the 1940's.  And no, I wasn't even born then, thank you very much.  I had a crepe with  nutella and bananas on the cruise. (Ok, I still eat peanut butter and mashed bananas!)  That's when I realized I'd had a deprived childhood.  It's like heaven in a jar - chocolate and hazelnuts?

OK, it's more like candy in a jar. The first ingredient on the back of the jar is sugar - and it's totally worth it.  I've become a closet nutella eater.  I walk past the jar and grab a spoon out of the drawer and take a scoop.  You know, when Mike's not looking.  :)

As a matter of fact, if you've eaten Godiva chocolates, it taste like the same thing.  And just to prove it, take a look:

Well, OK, you can't read it from the small picture.  Just take my word for it.  They have 9 (NINE) products containing hazelnuts and I'm sure they're all wonderful.

I think to make this a totally scientific experiment, I should buy all nine and do a taste test.
Mike!  Go get your keys - we're going to the mall!

Look what I found! And trust me, the pictures don't do it justice.  That's right, it's bread.  But, not just any ol' bread.  Don't get me wrong - I LOVE bread - white, wheat, Italian, French - whatever.
This bread is from Hubble and Hudson "grocery" in The Woodlands, TX. I put the word grocery in quotes because that store is SO much more.  Actually, it's like a store where rich people buy groceries.  Mike and I go by just to see how the other side lives.

It's an adventure each and every time.  A foodie's dream come true.

Look, the first one is a "Dark Chocolate & Cherry Boule".

The second one is a "White Chocolate & Apricot Boule"

Oh my gosh, this was just heaven.  Swirls of white chocolate melted in the bread. Mike and I were cutting and eating it so fast, a cherry jumped over from the other loaf into my apricot white chocolate bread.  Who thinks of stuff like this?  I've been the H.E.B. and bought the cranberry walnut.  No contest.
So, if you live any where close, take a road trip.  Plan to spend a couple of hours there.  They have a section in the back that sells ready made food from the cooking school that's located on the second floor.
Don't be afraid - it's just sugar and carbs - and totally worth it.