You Want What?!?

Every year I bake my mother in law a birthday treat.  This is the firsts year that she's requested a certain kind of cake.  She wanted a lemon and chocolate cake.  Yeah, it doesn't sound that great to me either.  So I went off into pinterest land to find a lemon cake from scratch.

So this is what I did....

I used this chocolate cupcake recipe and this lemon cupcake recipe.  I made each cake in an 8" round.  And used the frosting recipe for the lemon cupcakes.  Then I whipped up some fudge frosting for a border and happy birthday on the top.

I started Friday.  I made my batters, baked the cakes, made the frostings, lemon zest and simple syrup while Jet napped.  I had to rewatch my Knife Skills class on craftsy.  This is where I love Chromecast.  I can put the class on the big tv in and either sew or cook.  I did the same thing yesterday when I was putting the layers together and frosting it.

Yesterday, I put them together.  I watched my Modern Buttercream class of craftsy.   It's definitely helping my baking skills.  Before I would have thrown some frosting in between the layers, slapped some frosting on and called it good.  But I took notes.  And I measured and leveled.  And it came out good.  The whipped cream frosting with lemon zest was hard to get smooth.

But in the end, she loved it.  We got to her house before she got home.  I immediately put it in the fridge so I could fix any frosting melting mishaps when it set back up for a while.  ( I hate the hour drive with melty/stay cold stuff.)  Well, it had one little place where the frosting ran a bit. I got it fix while she was pulling in.  She wouldn't let me put the lid on the cake carrier and dug in with a spoon.  HAHAHA!  She loved it.  Then we took the boys swimming.  And went out to dinner.  And the big kid stayed the night after Jet told her no.

Back To School Night

Last night was a hectic one.  We had back to school night.  I also went grocery shopping, to my old workplace to get hubby's money clip cleaned, and school drop off and pick up during the day.  In the evening, we had back to school night and basketball practice.

Well, my day to day stuff is not blog-worthy.  But back to school.  That is another story.  I decided to fore go the stroller.  I only have a jogging stroller and it's pretty big.  So I used my new DIY onbuhimo.  It worked great.  My theory was to wear him during the crowded parts and let him walk when we got to the big kid's classroom.  And it worked great.  I sat up my phone and put on youtube. No volume of course.  And he sat through the principal's speech and all the other people talking.  Then we walked ever so slowly to the classrooms.  Well we got to the classroom and met the teacher.  We also signed up parent/teacher conference, classroom volunteers, and back to school night raffle.  And then we went to his desk.  Which was surprisingly clean and organized.  He's either growing up a little bit(or a whole lot) or their teacher made them have their desks neat.  Well, while I was writing down all the important information down, #2 got into #1's desk.  And he can get the lids off the pens, colored pencils, and pencil sharpener.  And once he got the pencil sharpener, there was a confetti shower of pencil shavings.  Which the lovely little girl that sits next to #1 helped me clean up.  The teacher also gave them all a bag of skittles for making it to their big event.  Well, by then, I had #2 back in the onbu.  I was wearing him in a front carry.  So this is the one time that #2 decided to share his candy.  And well, have you ever had soggy skittles down your shirt while carrying on a conversation about volunteering?  Well, it's not as pleasant as it sounds.  Anyways, we went from the classroom to the bookfair.  #1 had been there quite a few times this week.  We gave him money and he spent his own money.  I went last night for #2.  He loves the Charlie the Ranch Dog series by Ree Drummond.  And it is mostly likely because he has his very own basset hound.  After the book fair we hurried to the car and headed to basketball practice.  At that point, #2 was tired of being trapped somewhere.  So I plopped him in the front seat and we sat and listened to music.  Nothing like Pop Goes the Weasel 50 times.  I also ordered pizza while we were waiting and picked it up on the way home.  It was a late night.

And all this was done solo.  Hubby had to work.  We haven't seen him in a couple weeks besides a day here and there.  And because the car business is known for Labor Day sales, we won't see him this weekend either.  And that is part of life when it comes to being a commuter's wife and a car salesman wife.

We're All Coming Together

Well, my blogs are all coming together.  I've decided to make life a little easier and combine my quilty/crafty blog with my every day blog.  My "thinking" is that I'll actually blog more.  I doubt it.  Having a 9 1/2 year old and 1 1/2 year keeps things pretty busy around here.  And lets be honest for a second. If you know me, everybody knows that hubby commutes, I craft, and raise boys.  Might as well put them all in one place.  So if you see a random commuter rant about how hubby is stuck in traffic an hour away and I'm sending an S.O.S. out because my children are on deathcon 3 meltdown, don't worry.  Or the random tutorial of some crafty thing, enjoy the process.  So here's to the blogs all coming together.

He's Growing Up

Well, the big is growing up.   And he just won't stop.  Now matter how much I try.