February's Enrichment

Ever wonder what happens when a bunch of women gather around chocolate?

So what started out as 2 or 3 interested sisters turned into 12-15 signing the sheet, and ended up as 25 Sisters in all!!! I had enough cake, barely enough caramel and hot fudge, and almost enough icing. Wow. It was definitely an interesting experience for me, and hopefully a fun experience for them!

This is our hostess, Sister Gilbert, who graciously allowed the event at her house. We had to set up 2 extra tables for all who attended.This is Christie (works with me at my day job). She does professional catering and cakes also so we have a lot to talk about. She provided the munchies. Let me tell you, that little cucumber sandwich was to die for! Here are pictures of the Sisters with their cakes. No two are alike, cakes or Sisters, and they were all a lot of fun. Everyone got a 2-layer 6" cake to practice on and take home, while I did the full size 4-layer 8" cake.

If you're interested in the recipe, check it our here on my cake blog!

Women's Conference, May 2009

I have to tell you, I've been itching to do a cake in the likeness of one of the temples. I wasn't sure which one, but I loved the idea... itching I tell you, itching! I just couldn't think of an occasion to do one. I push the thought temporarily out of my mind...

Sunday I got the final word on the theme for Women's Conference this year... Joy and Happiness. I can work with that. Last year it was Hispanic themed, and it was a lot of fun! So, Joy and Happiness, what to do? Not putting two and two together...

Sunday evening we had the Richards family over for dinner and a movie; you know, good family/friend time. Rob and I were talking about his son's upcoming birthday, and being gleefully dubbed "the cake lady" at church has made me an apparent wealth of information. I can't wait to teach the class this Thursday!!! But anyway, we got on the subject of cake ideas and what I wanted to do in the future and that I couldn't figure out what to do for Women's Conference. Rob suggested.. get this... the Washington D.C. Temple.

We suddenly have four!

Lynnette, Rob, and I are going to work on planning out the size, assembly, and details of the temple for the cake. I haven't talked to them yet today, but they were going down to the temple on Monday and said they'd take pictures so that we can replicate the details as accurately as possible.

The more I think about it, the more I feel that this is the best idea. Consider this... where do you seal your family for eternity? in the temple. Where do you take the sacred steps toward your salvation? in the temple. Where do you work for the salvation of your past relatives? in the temple. Three major contributions towards... you guessed it, eternal happiness. What a better symbol of joy can be found? Even for those of us not ready to enter, the mere sight is awesome in the most fantastic sense of the word. I can't wait.

While looking for pictures and overhead photographs of the temple, I came across some nifty tidbits of information about the Washington D.C. Temple (you can go here for more info):

The Washington D.C. Temple was the first temple built in the East Coast of the United States.

The Washington D.C. Temple was the first temple to feature six spires since the construction of the Salt Lake Temple, which inspired the design.

Soaring to a height of 288 feet, the Washington D.C. Temple is the tallest temple in the Church.
The Washington D.C. Temple is the only temple outside of Utah to be built with six ordinance rooms. (The temples in Utah with six ordinance rooms are the Ogden Utah Temple, Provo Utah Temple, and Jordan River Utah Temple.)

The Washington D.C. Temple was originally named the Washington Temple.

The Washington D.C. Temple is one of five temples featuring an angel Moroni statue [18 feet tall!!!] holding the gold plates. (The other four temples are the Los Angeles California Temple, Jordan River Utah Temple, Seattle Washington Temple, and México City México Temple.)

The main lobby of the Washington D.C. Temple features a striking 30-foot-long mural depicting the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. An image of the temple was incorporated into the mural.
Following the completion ceremonies for the Washington D.C. Temple, in which a time capsule was placed in the northeast corner of the building, President Spencer W. Kimball conducted the largest press conference in the Church's history.

The highly successful public open house of the Washington D.C. Temple was attended by 758,328 guests including special guest Betty Ford—wife of then-U.S. President Gerald Ford. These tours resulted in over 75,000 missionary referrals.

During the ten dedicatory sessions of the Washington D.C. Temple, all but two of the Church's General Authorities delivered speeches.

What is this stuff anyway???

So the cold that has made its rounds through the family has finally made it to "Mommy". At times I wish I'd get sick first so I could get it out of the way, but a friend from work reminded me that mothers always get sick last so that they can take care of the family while the family is sick.

It's lousy luck, if you ask me.

So things that have been going on with the kids...

Audie is a smart cookie. He won't tell you right off the bat, but he is. We had a meeting with his teacher last week... she confirms for us that he can read... he can read very well... he's not as dumb as he tries to make us believe. It could very well be that he was shy when they did the testing, but at least we know it's not in our heads. Knowing this, we agreed that he didn't need the after-school program anymore.

Chloie made a 100% on her last word test! Proud Mom and Dad have already posted the paper on the fridge for all to see. We're working on the "W" words now. She still has a little trouble distinguishing between "where?" and "were". I can see why. Over all, she's doing very well.

Dougie got to take a trip to the doctor's office yesterday for his eye. It looked like someone had punched him in the eye and his lids swelled. It wasn't enough to swell closed, but enough to make me worry. Dr. Dave said it was a common thing (I don't know how common it is if I've never seen it), but that there are essentially infected pores or hair follicles inside his eye that caused this grief. He gave us a prescription for an antibiotic and told us to put a warm compress on it and it should go away. Here's hoping.

Hubby and I are still trying to get everything we can moved to the new house; we've got most of it there already. I'm still collecting boxes from work to aid in the packing and movement of everything in both houses. Next week we plan to get the school and daycare set up in the hopes that this will be a somewhat seamless transition. This Saturday we're planning on going over and unpacking and sorting through as much over there as we can so we'll have less to do next weekend. At least we got the kitchen done last Saturday... whew!!!

This Sunday is Ward Conference, where the Choir will sing "I Heard Him Come". I hope my cold is gone by then so I can participate. I've been working on the hymns for this Sunday's Relief Society meeting. I'm also excited about the upcoming "mini-enrichment" on 2/19/09 (Thursday) at 7pm. We've nailed down the place (Sister Gilbert's house) and it looks like we'll have 12-15 (maybe 20) sisters and friends in attendance... Looks like I'll be baking a lot of cake! So far the reigning favorite is the Triple-C so at least it's an easy cake to bake. :-)

The Cookie Exchange

Now that I've started, I don't know if I can stop...

Last night I went to enrichment at the church. Fun activities included learning to make ribbon bow for gifts, how to make cream cheese mints, and a craft session on making a "12 Days of Christmas" calendar.

The cream cheese mints... now there is a recipe. After trying one of each flavor, I've decided I like the cinnamon and the vanilla flavors best, though you can make them in any flavor/color. Curses to JaNae, now I'm making them for the wedding (if I can find a good snowflake candy mold before it's time). A word of warning - do NOT double the recipe if you are making it in your food processor or in a mixer any less powerful than a KitchenAid... it will burn up the motor!

In your food processor (or with a mixer) combine:
3 oz. cream cheese (preferably softened)
3 cups confectioners sugar
1 Tbsp. butter
a few drops of desired color
a few drops of desired flavor (to taste)

Blend until the consistency of modeling clay. Refrigerate as necessary to keep the mix from making a mess. Roll into balls, then roll in granulated sugar. You can leave in balls, flatten with a fork, decorate the top, whatever you want to do, just make sure you let them sit to harden for two hours before eating. They can also be molded using candy molds (the sugar keeps them from sticking to the mold). The mints may be stored on your counter top for 2 weeks or frozen for up to 2 months.


Now this little calendar... let me tell you that it took a little bit to do, and I ended up finishing it at home, but it was well worth it! Let me preface this by saying that I am not a scrapbooker. I have never scrapbooked. I still might never scrapbook, but this was a lot of fun; and to see the variation as each sister did her own was wonderful. There were so many ideas, colors, wow. Each little "door" on the calendar has it's own raised ornament over a frame, and inside it has a scripture and song for each day of Christmas (or a service for each day). This is a sweet idea that I might take to make for Christmas gifts next year (so if you're reading this next year, don't be surprised).


Each sister this evening brought 6 dozen of her favorite cookie for the cookie exchange. I ended up bringing home a full platter of cookies. My kids will be on a sugar rush for a week. My only regret is that I didn't get the recipes for some of these fabulous cookies.

Our next enrichment is in February, and I'm teaching cake decorating. The sisters in Relief Society are checking to see which of my Top Secret cake recipes they would like to learn. I'm hoping they will have as much fun learning as I do decorating!