The birthday girl added the princesses for me

2. And the leftovers…

Yes, there's cake in those cones

1. Yummy

When I was a sophomore in high school, I decided I wanted to open a restaurant someday. It was going to be a big restaurant in Wilmington, North Carolina. Then it was going to be a smaller sushi joint in Wilmington. Then it was going to be a small cafe (this is where Bubba started to try to talk be away from Wilmington)….something with a lot of focus on desserts, ’cause really that’s the most fun part about eating.

Over the last few weeks, I have thought it would be nice to start small, doing a desserts-exclusive business out of the home. I could consign my goodies through local restaurants and coffee shops and hire-out services for parties and weddings. Then someday, I could even open a little storefront.

Yeah, the vision has changed over the years, but the ultimate goal remains the same: I would like to open some sort of eatery at some point. Yes, I would need to narrow that goal down before actually diving into such a venture. For now it is just something nice to dream about.

Besides, how great would it be to be able to do this for a living? :

This was my birthday cake last year.

2. Home, home on the range…

Or, um, something like that. Another dream I have is to someday own a home with a bit of land. Ideally, it would be a home that Bubba and I put a lot of work into building it on our own (yeah, so looking at house plans is one of our favorite pastimes). We would like enough land to have a couple horses, a few chickens, and an alpaca or two. And also some pygmy goats. And a giant garden

Now, if I am talking really ideal, my dream is to have this house and this land in a place that has a creek or small river running through it. A creek that leads to a lake so I could row the creek to the lake in the mornings for some exercise and time to think. Also, it would be great if this place was in an area where it is possible to row on creeks for more than three months of the year. So, yeah…someplace warmer than this.

“Two For Tuesday” is a blog meme that I just made up last night when I was trying to fall asleep.

What is it? Post two of anything: book reviews, pictures, quotes, poems, songs, videos, rants, shout outs, whatever floats your boat. Just connect them somehow. That’s it.

Today, I have two pictures that inspire me. The first has to do with my writing, the second definitely doesn’t.

You might remember that I recently started rewriting Incubus completely from scratch. It is proving harder to write than anything else I have ever tackled (including earlier drafts of the same book). I have added some elements that make it a much deeper, more emotional novel than it was before. When I find myself struggling with the writing (which is near constantly these days), I just think about the bird necklace, and it helps me push on.

In Incubus, both Kyle and Jayne have a necklace much like this one. The necklaces hold a special place in each girl’s heart, and both girls cling to the necklaces as a sort of symbol for hope.  I won’t go into detail as to why, but now you know why the necklace is motivating to me. It is woven into the story and helps me remember the importance of the story I am trying to tell.

After I worked the necklace element into the story, I realized that–holy cow!–I have a very similar necklace of my own. I had forgotten all about it (though I imagine deep down I remembered, or I wouldn’t have described such a similar one in the book). So now, when I am feeling particularly stuck in writing Incubus, I put on my own bird necklace and make myself get back to work.

Okay, moving on…

My second bit of inspiration is this:

I was just asked (um…maybe 4 hours ago) if I would make a princess castle cake for a friend’s daughter’s 6th birthday. Of course!

Now, I will be honest: my cake won’t be this nice (um…this cake comes from a bakery with a minimum price of $250–we just aren’t $250 cake kind of people). My cake will probably have two round layers and turrets made out of ice cream cones. Much simpler.

But this one sure is nice to look at!

So, there really isn’t a recipe to accompany the picture this month. But, the picture is fun, so all is good!

After the cake was out of the oven I had the brilliant idea of crushing some mints and mixing them in the batter. So, if you decide to try this cake, consider doing that. I am sure it would be awesome, I just had my stroke of genius too late to try it out.

The frosting is just a basic buttercream (1/2 cup butter, 1/2 cup Crisco, 4 cups powdered sugar, 1 tsp vanilla, a splash of milk), and the decorations are pretty self explanatory. There are also some crushed mints with the frosting in between the layers. That seemed to add just the right amount of zing to the cake.

All in all, it turned out great. Or, at least the people at our event thought it did-for the second month in a row, I had no leftovers to bring home.

Our recipe this month comes courtesy of Mary DeMuth. When she shared it on her Twitter account last month, I immediately knew I would have to try it out. I was not disappointed; this cake is awesome. It was the hit of the party. Thanks, Mary, for another great recipe to add to my collection.

TWITTER CAKE

• 1 cup butter
• 1 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 cup sour cream
• 2 cups flour

Mix all ingredients in order listed. Sprinkle cinnamon-sugar on greased bundt pan. Add half of the batter. Top with 1 cup chocolate chips and more cinnamon-sugar. Add rest of the batter. Top with more cinnamon-sugar.

Bake at 350 for 55 minutes.

SOUR CREAM GLAZE

• sour cream
• vanilla
• powdered sugar

Heat sour cream (a large dollop) in a small saucepan, over medium-low heat, until fluid. Add teaspoon of vanilla. Stir in powdered sugar (oh, about a cup or so to start–add more as you go) until desired consistency is reached. I do this part by taste; when it tastes how you want it, you are done! If you want more glaze, add more sour cream and powdered sugar.

Let glaze cool a bit to thicken before drizzling it over cake. Before you drizzle, place the cake over a cookie sheet–this will get messy otherwise.

This is a really simple, quick cake to make. I recommend it for any occasion that calls for a cake in a jiffy.

In my church, the first Sunday of (almost) every month is fast Sunday. For two meals (or ideally 24 hours-if you remember the day before…), we fast. Each month, my old ward has a “Break Fast” potluck in the afternoon. Bubba and I still go, even though the ward is technically for the young NON-married kiddos. Really, the Bishop is one of my best friends, and who can turn down free food?

My favorite part about break fast is that it gives me an opportunity every month to try out a new recipe. So, without further ado, here is the recipe of the month:

turned out okay for such a quick decorating job...

SUPER AWESOME WHITE CAKE

• 2 1/4 cup cake flour
• 1 1/3 cup sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 cup shortening
• 1/4 cup butter
• 1 1/2 teaspoon white vanilla
• 1 1/2 cup buttermilk (add the vanilla to this)

• 5 egg whites
• 1/3 cup sugar

Cream shortening and butter. Mix all dry ingredients together and add to creamed butter/shortening. Add the buttermilk (with vanilla) and mix until smooth.

In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until they turn white; add the sugar and beat until meringue-like.

Fold meringue into batter until evenly mixed.

Bake at 350 until a toothpick comes out clean (ovens are all too different to be timed).

BEST EVER BUTTERCREAM

• 1 cup shortening
• 1 cup butter
• 1 teaspoon white vanilla
• 1/2 teaspoon butter flavoring
• 1/2 teaspoon almond extract
• 6 tablespoons milk
• 8 cups powdered sugar
• 2 tablespoons meringue powder

Cream together shortening, butter, vanilla, butter flavoring, almond extract, and milk until creamy. Gradually add powdered sugar and meringue powder. If it’s too stiff, add more milk; if it’s too thin, add powdered sugar until you reach a comfortable consistency.

Now, there is good news and there is bad news. Which do you want first? The bad? I thought so.

Bad news: I broke. I was determined to finish my current work-in-progress longhand. I was doing a great job. Everything was going well. Until today. Today, my mind got overloaded with the story. My brain kept trying to put more and more on the page, but my poor little cramped hand just couldn’t keep up.

Good news: I really think the writing by hand exercise has been effective. I am thinking more about the words I write, so my draft is in better form than previous first drafts were.

Bad news: Now that I am back to typing my first draft, I might also slip back to typing out the first thing that comes to mind. That is not a terrible thing-edits and rewrites exist for a reason-but I am enjoying cleaner prose.

Good news: I type much faster than I write longhand. Typing, I will be able to finish this draft way faster than using the good old pen. Which is good, ’cause I want to be done by the end of October. I fully intent to participate in NaNoWriMo this year.

Bad news: I will no longer have notebooks full of scribbles to put on the shelf labeled “First draft”. I suppose I will have to relinquish the Jo March title also.

Good news: With faster writing, I will have more time to spend on my other passion: