The Cake

How is it already Wednesday?  My mind and body have kicked into full Summer mode and we still have 4 more weeks until the "real" Summer begins!  I'm in trouble.

I want to share the recipe for the cake I made for the girls' Rainbow Tea Party.

It's amazing!

Ingredients:
1 c. unsalted butter
1 3/4 c. sugar
4 large eggs
2 large egg yokes
1 Tbsp. pure vanilla extract
3 c. cake flour (spooned and leveled)
1 Tbsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. fine salt
1 1/2 c. buttermilk

Directions :

(I learned that it is very important to follow the directions exactly for the best results! Things that I thought didn't matter - DO!)
1. bring all cold ingredients to room temperature
2. in a large mixing bowl beat the butter and sugar on high until light and fluffy (about 6 minutes)
3. beat in 4 large eggs and 2 large egg yokes one at a time until combined. Beat in vanilla.
4. whisk together dry ingredients in a separate bowl.
5. with mixer on low, add 1/3 of the flour mixture and combine. Then add 3/4 c. buttermilk. Then 1/3 flour mixture, then 3/4 c. buttermilk and finish with remaining flour mixture. Mix until just combined.
Makes 2 9-inch round cakes, lightly grease pans, bake at 350 for about 30 minutes or until toothpick comes out with tiny crumbs on it (I tend to set the timer for less time and check it early - 25 min.)

The Frosting:

1 (8-ounce) package cream cheese at room temperature

1 stick butter, softened

1 cup melted marshmallows (I use marshmallow cream)

1 (1-pound) box confectioners' sugar

2 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice

1 c. coconut

Whip together the cream cheese, butter, marshmallow and sugar.  Remove 1c. of the frosting and mix in the 2 Tbsp. of lemon juice.

The Cake:

After baking and cooling the 2 round cakes, place one cake on a cake stand.  Take the frosting with the lemon juice and frost the top of the cake.  Layer sliced, fresh strawberries all over the top of the frosting.  Place second cake on top.  Use remaining frosting to frost entire cake.  Gently press the coconut on the sides of the cake. 

I swear, this might be the best cake I've ever had!

*I will be taking a blogging break until June 1st. 

I'm dreaming up some fun Summer series that I hope you'll join me for!

The Rainbow Tea Party

I have precious twin girls who just turned 6. 

Because the have a shared birthday party, I let them each decide what theme they want, and regardless of what those themes are, we make them into one party! 

For their 4th birthday, we had a Pink Pig Red Butterfly Party!

This year - A Rainbow Tea Party!

It's important to me that my girls' get to participate in the planning of their parties and help with some of the decorations.  This year they made the tissue paper rainbows (you'll see a few more of those!)  and put together this welcome sign for our front door.

 One of my favorite places in our backyard is under our lemon tree.  It always casts the perfect shade in the afternoon, so naturally it was the perfect place to set up the tea table.

 There had to be a chandelier over the tea table! 

So I made one out of ribbon and colored wine charms.

When the little girls arrived, they selected a fancy hat to wear to the party.

The the little girls decorated their own cupcakes and placed a rainbow topper with their name in it.  They their cupcakes were placed on individual cupcake pedestals (one of my favorite things of the party!)

Outside they could make rainbow jewelry to get even more fancy!  And get a rainbow painted on their fingernail.  My mom used to paint fingernails at my birthday parties when I was little, so it was fitting that she was there to carry on the tradition!

By the way, my mom's sweet head piece was her mothers!

After nails and jewelry making, it was tea time!



Our menu was simple:

pink lemonade (tea)

tea sandwiches -

turkey, ham, and pb&j

rainbow jello in wine glasses

petit rainbow fruit skewers

We had a brief intermission for Pin The Cloud On The Rainbow!

The birthday girls really wanted to play this game, so they planned the whole thing and made the lovely rainbow themselves!

Then we returned to the table for birthday cake and ice cream.

(I'm going to post this cake recipe on Monday - it was out of this world!)

Identical twin girls teach my son's Sunday school class and in regards to the birthday, they asked me, "does each girl get her own song?"  "No," I said, "We usually just sing 'Happy Birthday' once."  They gasped and demanded that we sing twice and each girl get her own song!  So this year we started a new forever tradition - each girl gets her own song!

As each little girl was served her own decorated cupcake on the pedestal, they also were given ice cream in these crazy cute ice cream cone tea cups!  I saw them on pintrist and couldn't resist!

Oh, white gloves were handed out with dessert too!

And then my favorite part of the party happened.  Completely on their own accord, all the little girls gathered on the grass and started dancing!  There were fancy dresses spinning all over and it was a scene of innocence, freedom and beauty.

I didn't capture a photo of the favor bags, but the girls went home with their hats, gloves, rainbow jewelry, rainbow button candy and a rainbow colored water bottle.

It was a fancy, colorfull day!

Some details:

1.  plastic table cloths are amazing, inexpensive decorations!  I used them to cover our pool equipment fence (ruffled of course!) and they made a beautiful backdrop.

2.  I made the cupcake pedestals from candle stick holders from the dollar store, wooden discs from the craft store, paint and embellishments.  Easy and adorable.

3.  The ruffled rainbow table cloth - the truth is I saw it and loved it!  I bought the fabric knowing it would be way too much work to pull off for a non-sewer!  At 10pm the night before the party I had the brilliant idea to use my hot glue gun and not the sewing machine!

4.  I made the fancy party hats and can make them for you if you are interested.

WHEW! 

I hope you have a wonderful weekend!

Embrace The Fascinators

Here is a sneak peek of our Rainbow Tea Party celebrating my girls' 6th birthday!

We had lots of fun at this fancy tea party that started with our fancy hats!

It was a magical day with lots of fancy, colorful fun!

Come back tomorrow for all the pictures of the Rainbow Tea Party.



A New Life - Medication

One thing I haven’t written about in regards to my anxiety disorder is medication.  Initially when I met with my physician, she gave me several great alternative tools to deal with the anxiety.  For me, a huge part of this is changing my life style and thinking in many ways.  Having more balance in my life, learning to relax consistently, and “dialing it down a bit” in all areas.  It wasn’t until my severe break down at Christmas that I was prescribed drugs to calm me down.  I was so terrified and desperate for help.  It was Christmas night and we couldn’t get a hold of our doctors to save my life!  We even tried my OBGYN!  We just needed someone to prescribe me something to stop this nightmare.  It wasn’t until the next day at 2pm that we finally talked to a doctor that prescribed me Xanex.  I was so scared of what that might do to me.  I kept telling my husband, “tell him I’m small.  Tell him I want the lowest dosage.”  I was afraid that one pill would put me to sleep for a few days (which I probably needed!) and that thought scared me.  When I finally got the pills, I was very hesitant to take one, but per my husband’s insisting, I did.  I didn’t fall asleep.  I didn’t turn into jello.  I didn’t feel wonderful either! 

But I did mellow out enough to go sit with the family for the rest of the day.

 When we returned home after the holidays and met with my physician again, she told me that right now I must keep the Xanax on me at all times.  I am not to go out without the medication.  For now it is a tool for me and I am to take it when I need it.  These words were like a death sentence to me.  Not leave my house without drugs?  What?  I didn’t want to tell anyone because I kept thinking, “what parent is going to let their child come play at our house with an unstable mother who must have pills in her pocket at all times?”  It was horrible.  It almost became one more thing to panic about!  “Wait, I have to go back and get my pills.”  Thankfully I didn’t need to take them again, even though there were times when I could have and perhaps should have, I just didn’t feel comfortable taking them.  My body is pretty sensitive to medicine and regardless of other’s experience with Xanax, I wasn’t confident of how my body would uniquely react.   (Sadly, this was just a huge lack of understanding of this medication and the effects it would have on my body.)

 As I wrote about last week, things have been going well and as I’ve seen progress being made, I’ve also been leery of slipping back into my old ways and falling back into an unhealthy lifestyle.  If you’ve been reading here for a few months, you know that I’ve been working on my daughters’ birthday party – something that I dream about for months and love to create!  I’ve learned to start my projects early and not leave things to the last minute so stress is kept to a minimum.  I thought I had done a good job of this for the Rainbow Tea Party.  I really have been crafting up a storm for the past few weeks.  But come Saturday, I was racing around to put it all together (with the fabulous help of my parents and the little birthday girls!) and as I watched the clock move too quickly, I started to feel myself getting worked up.  The party was at 1:30pm, and at 1pm I went to get ready.  As I sat down at my vanity I felt a wave of anxiety come over me.  “No, not now, I don’t want to miss this.  I can’t miss this.”  My mind started racing with all the details of the party and as I prayed and begged God to set me free I got up and found my pills.  This party was so important to me and my girls that I just couldn’t miss it.  I got my husband, explained what was happening, and took a pill.  He prayed for me, I asked my mom to pray for me and just pushed through, trusting that everything was going to work out.  As guests started to arrive, I was not 100 %, but when my girlfriend dropped off her daughter, I pulled her aside and asked her to pray for me.  She laid her hands on me and prayed over me.  I went back inside and we had the most wonderful, colorful, fancy, precious birthday party.  I’m grateful for that little pill that helped stop my chaos.  But most of all, I’m grateful for the power of the Holy Spirit at work within me and for the body of Christ that held me up in prayer.  My friend Hillary prayed for me throughout the party and it was so awesome to see her after the party with a huge smile on my face and peace in my heart – both physically and spiritually.  I know it blessed her too to see that God answered her prayers and allowed me to enjoy my girls’ special day.

 It’s hard for me to write this.  Even now as I know I’m going to do a Birthday Party post later this week, I’m afraid of what you might think of me as you look at the pictures of the party, “oh yea, she had to take medication before that party.”  I’m nervous for the moms who had daughters at the party to read this!  I feel a little bit like a failure.  I know I shouldn’t, but I’m embarrassed and feel weak at admitting such a huge struggle I have.  Adding the medication fact to the story only seems to make me look worse.  It’s really hard for me to admit that I don’t have it all together.  Not that I think it is important to “have it all together,” but honestly, as a follower of Jesus I truly believe that His promises to us are our inheritance and we can claim those promises and the power that is freely ours through Jesus.  So why then am I struggling with anxiety when I’ve given Him full control of my life?  Why am I stressed about things and consumed by them when I know the Prince of Peace gives peace, not as the world gives, but the peace of God to guard my heart and mind?

 On the other hand, I know it is important for me to share this story honestly.  I know that while I laid on that bed on Christmas, losing my mind, God spoke to me and said, “you will share this story and others will be healed because of it.”  I know God can completely heal me from this anxiety.  Just like I know that Jesus could have come down off the cross and saved himself – he totally had the power to do that!  But God had another plan.  A plan that included extreme suffering of his son and a plan that included extreme freedom for his daughter – me.  I would never say that God is causing my anxiety for a reason.  But I would say that God is using my anxiety for a reason and he is redeeming what is being taken from me.  For this season of my life, and I pray that it is just a season, I will keep the medication in my purse at all times and see it as a mere tool if I need it.  And I pray that I don’t.

*This will be my last post in the "A New Life" series. 
I'll give updates from time to time.  Thank you for your prayers and encouragement through this series.  I hope that in some way God has spoken to you through it.

Birthday Parties - God's Gift To Me

April is a very special month in our family - it is the major BIRTHDAY month!  Grandmas, Aunts, Uncles, Daddy, Sissys... it seems that most babies in our family were born in April!  We've been in full party planning mode for the little ladies' 6th birthday and we just can't wait.  I have to say, birthday planning is one of my favorite things because it is a season when I have a project to work on and I get to do all the things I love - create, craft, cook, decorate and play.  As much work as it is, it really is one of the stand out times as a mom when I really get to be "me." 

We've all felt it and said it - sometimes we totally loose ourselves when we become a mom.  We are last on the list.  Our every moment is so much about our children and very little time is spent on us (at least not on a daily basis).  We quickly forget who we are and what makes me me.  Emily over at The Anderson Crew mentioned this yesterday.  I myself have written about it several times on this little blog - like here.  It's easy to feel like we've lost our identities when we become moms.  Sometimes we want to scream, "WHAT ABOUT ME?"

I feel like my children's birthdays are a huge gift to me!  Of course it's all about them and we celebrate them and give them gifts... but I feel like it's God's faithful, 2 times a year, gift to me when I get to be reminded of the many things I love to do and the things that make me me.  Birthday party planning is my excuse to do all the things I love that I truly don't have time for during the rest of the year (or the energy - let's be honest!).

There is a lot of crazy talk surrounding children's birthday parties these days - the over the top, super expensive fetes where everyone is flow in by helicopter, given a new wardrobe to wear and goes home with a party favor pony after selecting their diamond tiara.  I've heard moms say that it's all a big competition between women.  I've heard moms dig and dish about money spent.  But for me, it is so much more about living into who God created me to be and giving me the green light to dream and create.  I'm so grateful that God loves me enough that He would use something crazy like a birthday party for my children to remind me that I am not forgotten - He knows me, He knows what I love and although my life is mostly spent on others, I get to really do the things that I love to do when I get to throw a birthday party!

Crazy.  I know. 

So get ready for the Rainbow Tea Party reveal in a few weeks.  It will be very girlie (our first birthday party only for girls) and very colorful!