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Showing posts from January, 2012

Becoming A Confectioner

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Oh goodness gracious! Do you see that up there? YUM! Can you guess what's in the middle? It's not fruit nuts, or chocolate...CARAMEL! (pronounced care-a-mel, not caramel)  See, I like making cakes and cupcakes but there's nothing quite like making chocolates. Partially, because it's chocolate, and partially because they're a lot harder to mess up! This Christmas, one of the lovely presents that my husband gave me was a culinary arts confections book. This is where the story begins... The amazing husband he is, it doesn't just include how to make truffles... it has all kinds of candies in it! Oh, this is only the beginning. Despite your speculations; guess who is part of the no cavities club this check up? Me! Another perk to making little candies is that they're easier to give away to friends! So, to begin my quest to the perfect chocolates, I had to learn how to temper chocolate. Tempering is a series of heating a cooling chocolate so that it will "se

Rocketown

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I almost forgot to tell you! BLAKE and his BAND played at Rocketown in Nashville. We were so surprised and blessed to see some of our sweet Murfreesboro friends! It meant a lot to me to see some of my good friends from our college ministry. We were so spoiled to get to spend so much time together! Thank you for coming and supporting such awesome music. It was so interesting to watch people enjoy the music; some contemplative, some dancing around, and some praisin' Jesus!  A few shots of the night...

Pumpkin Pie, Oreo Cheesecake, and Oreo Truffles

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Hello again lovely friends! It's been a great weekend so far! We had the chance to meet with Blake's family for an early celebration of his birthday that happens to be on the same day as his Papaw's! Oh what a blessing it is to be able to see family! I love them so much! You may find it ironic what I'm about to share with you but I HAVE to tell you about this book! At work, I'm very fortunate to have some pretty amazing women to share the work week with. I LOVE MY JOB! We decided to all read this book together about, as you see on the cover, "satisfying your deepest desire with GOD, not food." IT IS SO GOOD. See, I think we all at times can preoccupy our minds with food too much... hello, America is pretty screwed up when it comes to nutrition! If you have no idea what I'm talking about then your homework is to watch Jamie Oliver's show, "Food Revolution." CLICK HERE .   Maybe you don't have this problem, but I certainly do. With

New Year, Birthdays, and The Female Brain

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In our family, you can't celebrate New Years without celebrating Becky Roo's birthday too! We decided as the sisters, to spend time with our in-laws over the actual Christmas holiday and then spend time with our immediate family on New Years weekend. So, as you can see, we had one fabulous strawberry cake to celebrate. Don't you love her hat too? I think she looks extra special! sweet nephews helping blow out the candles Say hello to the sweetest Mallaroo, our little niece is just precious! Here's the part of the blog where I inform you of the female brain. RANDOM. SOAPBOX: Many of my college professors all tried to tell me that little girls and boys are all "socialized" to play with toys differently- I totally disagree! When I was in Nicaragua where children don't have toys, the little boys were still fighting with sticks and the little girls were cradling them.  My professors however, would claim that little boys are told that they have to play des

Hard Candy

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It's been so long! I apologize for not posting more frequently. It's good to be back, I can't wait to share some pictures and stories with you. Over the holidays, Blake and I had the chance to visit with his family over Christmas and then with my family over New Years. We traveled to East Tennessee for a mere eighteen hours and packed it full of delicious meals, gifts, hugs, stories, and we even made HARD CANDY! Can you believe it?  See, Blake's gracious Mamaw has the gift of crafting confections! Blake has grown up with a tradition of making hard candy or rock candy with his family so, it was time for me to witness this miraculous creation! We watched as she mixed together the sugar, corn syrup, and other ingredients. She had prepared her granite by greasing it lightly. Then, we waited for the mixture to reach 400 degrees... I think! Here are some pictures of the process. It was such a special time learning traditions so we can carry them on in our family! Thank you