There's a Bun in the Oven!

Most of you already know our news, but for the few that might not - we are expecting! And as many of the other food bloggers out there who are pregnant, I went through the stereotypical "drought" of baking when I was feeling nauseated and absolutely NOTHING sounded appealing. Thankfully I have Lovebug who was willing to forge on and do the cooking for us (or take me to taco bueno when I most needed it!) I am going to attempt to create a "ticker" for the blog so you can follow along with the progress of our little one. I've just been excited to finally announce our news to everyone! I will be starting Week 15 in just two days!

And I have been baking... I made a peach pie on Sunday and hope to share it with you soon. As well as the ice cream recipes that were made for July!

To life... full of new life!

Where is her Sweet Tooth?

It may seem like I've dropped off the face of the baking world, but indeed I haven't. I even have photographic evidence to prove it! This isn't a complete listing of what I've made, but it will give you a sampling of what's been going down in my kitchen :o)

Using my new processor to make Strawberry Blueberry Jam!

I made it on the 4th of July so I thought it fitting to have a red, white, and blue shot.

Ready for the freezer!

I also endeavored into the homemade ice cream world for July's theme! I made blueberry cheesecake ice cream. Cooking the berries...

And baking the graham cracker crust

Delightful!

For an easy night, I made brownies with Peanut Butter M&Ms.

My friend had found the idea on a blog and I jumped at the recipe! They were good and my friend was glad I shared :o)

I'm working on baking something else too... something brand new. But I may take another post to share all about it.

To life... full of a seeming summer baking hiatus.

August's Theme

It's August 3rd and I haven't even announced what August's theme will be. After several suggestions - including those thrown out by several people while we were waiting hungrily at a Mexican restaurant - I am going to go with... COOKIE DOUGH! One of the girls at work sent me a whole page of recipes that were based around cookie dough, another of my friends and I share quite the love of all things cookie dough, and my sister recently made cookie dough topped cheesecake bars. Those were enough reasons to convince me it was time to feature the wonderful, lip-licking, sugar-induced-can't-stop-eating cookie dough theme.

Previous cookie dough recipes that I have made and would love to repeat:

The Cookie Dough Cheesecake I made for my most recent birthday.

Cookie Dough Balls - Tara keeps asking to make these again!

Cookie Dough Dip - Several varieties, every single one is great!

Recently I've seen some recipes that my friends and I are considering trying for our upcoming bake day. One of them that jumps out to me are these Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Brownies.

What will you make?

To life... full of cookie dough!

Today... in bullet points

• I have completed 275 miles in my challenge for the year. I have exactly 300 miles to go! I know, that's still more than halfway, but I am encouraged!


• I bought new walking shoes on Saturday. LOVE THEM! They are pink and gray Aasics. Now I want to walk all the time-- can't wait for the cooler weather.


• Our anniversary is in two days -- this year we bought new pillows as our gift for each other. Hooray!


• We leave in two days to visit my family in NE and MO. I'm so excited! It's been 7 months since we've been there-- so long!


• It rained for like 2 minutes this morning-- I hadn't heard rain in weeks!! I'm guessing at least 8 weeks! It was loverly :o)


• I made brownies with Peanut Butter M&Ms on Sunday night. My friend saw it on a blog, I checked it out, they were made -- DELICIOUS!

To life... full of bullet points.

Anniversary Thoughts

Lovebug and I are less than a week away from celebrating our 4-Year Wedding Anniversary! In some ways I feel like that was such a long ago day... still in college, naive about the effort that goes into building a solid marriage, just plain young. On the other hand, it feels like just days ago. Where have the past 4 years gone? Not to say they have been wasted - at all - but how does life just pick up and fly by and you hardly seem to notice until you look back and reflect? It's been an awesome, exciting, frustrating, hilarious, tough, prayerful, self-reflecting journey and I look forward to many, MANY more years! I love you, Lovebug!

To life... full of our love's journey!

Ice Cream Recipe Ideas

Guess what?!? I've already made my recipe for this month! At least one of them. Aren't you proud? I made Blueberry Cheesecake Ice Cream from Brown Eyed Baker. It was absolutely wonderful! Very creamy and dreamy and fairly easy to make! It has inspired me to make more! I'll post more pictures and comments when I do the wrap-up at the end of the month.

Today, I want to share some ice cream ideas for you as you start looking for recipes for this month.

I'm just going to go ahead and recommend her entire archive of Ice Cream recipes. Check out her variety of flavors and she even explains how to make ice cream without a maker! I think any of these ideas from Brown Eyed Baker would be excellent choices! I haven't gone wrong with any of her recipes yet.

Here's a cake from Picky Palate that looks wonderful! It's been on my must-try list for a long time.

I believe I bookmarked this one for Lovebug. He could totally eat this Strawberry Yogurt Sherbert. I should probably try to remember this one!

This Butterfinger Ice Cream Cake looks... beyond words. Does someone want to make this FOR me?!?

Finally, I thought I'd add in an ice cream pie. And to stay consistent from month to month, why not PW's Ice Cream Pie with Easy Caramel Sauce?

Hope these give you some ideas and/or starting off points for your creations this month. Enjoy!

To life... full of so many ice cream options!

A Work in Progress: June's Pop Recipes

You may not have noticed, but I am delinquent on my wrap-up of June's recipes. The embarrasing truth: I haven't made my recipe yet! *Gasp* I know, it's quite pathetic. I mean, it's my challenge after all, what am I thinking? But instead of making you wait any longer, I'm going to go ahead and post the recipes of those people who DID in fact get their ducks in a row and actually met my challenge! Once I do make mine, I will come back and add it on to this post. So you may want to come visit this one from time to time to see what updates I have made.

Mom's Strawberry Ice Cream

She made up her own recipe! I'm always amazed by people who do this. The recipe--3 whole eggs and 2 egg yolks, 1 3/4c. of sugar, pinch of salt, 1 pint of cream, 2 c.diced strawberries, 1 can of strawberry pop and finish filling w/milk 1 gal ctn 3/4 full. Her review: If you like strawberries, then this homemade ice cream will fill that craving especially on a very hot day. Ahhhhhhh, so yummy!!

My sister made Root Beer Float Cupcakes! She even got to share them with Mom and they both seemed to really enjoy them. They were very moist, but didn't have as much root beer flavor as she was expecting. Check out her review at her blog: My Strongest Life.

Tara made PW's Perfect Pound Cake.

Here are some pictures of the process - Mixing it up

After mixing up the batter -- a long process with all the ingredients and just a hand mixer!! - she popped it into the oven.


Bake, bake, bake, and then out it comes!


Question of advice from our more experienced bakers, how long are you supposed to wait before removing a bundt cake from the pan? Right away? Or do you wait for it to cool? Or just wait a certain amount of time? Does it stick if you wait too long? Or not long enough? The cake tore some, but it didn't affect the taste!


She served it with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. It was very sweet the first day, but after it had a chance to sit a while, it mellowed out and was a really nice pound cake.

There you have it! Maybe these will inspire you to try a new recipe this summer. I think all of these would be good for just about any hot summer day!

I was going back and forth about my decision for July's theme. I discussed it with my sister and my friends. Then I read somewhere that July is National Ice Cream Month and that decided it for me. ICE CREAM shall be the theme for July. Check out what Wikipedia has to say: Ronald Reagan designated July as National Ice Cream Month in 1984.[1] He also appointed the third Sunday in July as National Ice Cream Day. Reagan recognized the popularity of ice cream in the United States (90% of the nation's population consumes ice cream) and stated that these two events should be observed with "appropriate ceremonies and activities."

I just couldn't pass it up. Sorry Mom, I know you just made ice cream, but maybe you won't mind making a different kind? Or even a different variation? Be free with your ideas this month. This is not restricted to making just homemade ice cream -- although that is a great option and everyone might choose to do so! But you could make ice cream cake, a pie that calls for ice cream, I saw a cake that included ice cream in the batter. There are many choices! I'll come back with a post in a few days giving you some possible options I have run across. I hope you have fun with this month's theme! Maybe it will help us all stay cool during this summer heat :o)

To life... full of ice cream!