Keep Calm and Carry On

I was talking with a friend after Wednesday night prayer meeting this week and the subject of the phrase "Keep Calm and Carry On" came up. Einstein's Bros Bagels just opened up a store in my town and they were giving away t-shirts that said "Keep Calm and Eat Bagels". Then I was informed that the original phrase has a really unusual story behind it. When I got home I searched the internet to find out the history. And this is what I found:

Pretty neat, right?! I've always thought "Keep Calm and Carry On" was a comforting phrase but not a source of complete encouragement in itself. On Pinterest you can see other takes on the quote that say things like, Keep Calm and Eat Chocolate, Keep Calm and Drink Coffee, Keep Calm and Eat a Cupcake or Keep Calm and Love Yourself (oh boy, we don't need anymore help with that one!). Anyway, you get the picture. Pretty much, calm down and do anything that makes you feel better. But none of those things bring ultimate comfort. Only GOD can give you the peace that passes all understanding. (Philippians 4:7) ... and that if you know Him as your personal Savior. Have you asked Jesus Christ to come into your heart and save you from your sins? You can do nothing in your own power to spend eternity with Christ in heaven and you can do nothing in your own power to take away your sins. John 3:16, Romans 3:23, 6:23, 5:8  What will you do with Jesus? Receive Him today by trusting in Him. John 1:12

I've been meditating on Psalm 56 this week. Here are some of my favorite verses from that chapter:

v. 3 "When I am afraid I put my trust in you."

v. 4 "In God, whose word I praise, in God I trust I shall not be afraid"

v. 8 "You have kept count of my tossings; put my tears in your bottle. Are they not in your book?"

v. 10 "In God, whose word I praise in the Lord, whose word I praise,"

v. 11 "in God I trust; I shall not be afraid. What can man do to me?"

v. 13 "For you have delivered my soul from death, yes, my feet from falling, that I may walk before God in the light of life."

God is greater than all my problems put together and He cares about me deeply and is on my side. What greater comfort?! God who saved me before will do it again. (Romans 8:31) Figure out the object of your fear and remember the truths about God. It's so important to go to your source of confidence...the LORD. (not chocolate, coffee...or even best friends). Jesus is enough. Determine within yourself to trust God. Psalm 55:22 "Cast your burden on the Lord, and he will sustain you."

..."But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you." Mathew 6:33

Getaway

So, apparently I've taken a bit of a vacation from blogging since my last post was March 3rd! We've been busy homeschooling and last month our calendar was full. My husband had to take a hunter safety course near CO Springs so we had a little 3 day getaway. It was a fun time as a family and we got several 'field trips' in for our daughter's K5 school year. We found some tasty restaurants and one of them I was really excited about ( a Tapateria...nothing but tapas from SPAIN.) =) It was definitely exciting to explore Colorado a little more.

 

 

At America's only mountain zoo

Beautiful CO Springs

Tapateria in Old Colorado City (CO's original capital)

Patatas Bravas with Alioli sauce....YUM!

Cafe con leche... SO good. ;)

Manitou Cave Dwellings

Dinosaur museum

Old western ghost town

Happy Saturday!

Sigh: Paris...

Black Bottom Cupcakes

These are chocolate and banana cupcakes with cream cheese and banana topping. OH MY...they are so good! I'll start with a picture by Bakerella because mine simply don't do them justice. If you ever get around to making these, here's a tip: warm them up in the microwave for 15-20 seconds and they're like little molten cakes. These cupcakes are best when warm! It's too bad most of them didn't stay at our house. I made them for a dear lady from our church that just had knee surgery this past week. 

Photo by Bakerella

Here is the recipe:

Black Bottom Cupcakes

Cream Cheese Mixture
8 oz cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup sugar
1 small banana, pureed
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
8 oz. semisweet chocolate chips

Chocolate Mixture
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1/3 cup cocoa
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 large bananas, pureed
1/3 cup oil
1 teaspoon vanilla

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

For the cream cheese mixture:

• Beat cream cheese and sugar until nice and fluffy.
• Add banana, egg and vanilla and mix together until combined.
• Stir in chocolate chips and set aside.

For the chocolate mixture:

• Sift together flour, cocoa, sugar, soda and salt using a wire whisk.
• Add bananas, oil and vanilla and mix together on low until combined.
• Use a large scoop to fill cupcake liners with batter.
• Repeat topping the cupcake batter with the cream cheese mixture.

Bake for about 30 minutes or until done.

Makes about 18 cupcakes.

A week in pictures

Finally got our puppy

Bentley is 10 weeks old

Burning off some energy at Jumpin

Actually sharing the ipad ;)

My new favorite gelato place in town.

Eating chocolate, chocolate chip gelato is serious business!

Setting up his army men for battle.

Only a few casualties

Found a heart in Loveland that I thought said 'Mommy loves princess Emma' Actually it said Mammy...but we'll pretend it said Mommy. ;)

Goobers in Sunday school. =)

Not pictured:

• Very high winds: 55-75 mph
• Puppy training
• Many walks with the dog
• Cleaning up messes
• Potato and corn chowder
• Ladies bible study
• Lunch with a friend at Sophia's Bistro (new fav)
• Planning Luke's pirate birthday...stay tuned for that one!
• Warm cozy slippers
• Favorite Scentsy smell: Sticky Cinnamon Bun
• Children's church: always fun =)

Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss!

Happy Birthday, Dr. Seuss!

We had a Dr. Seuss themed day at school to celebrate his birthday. Here are some of our activities that don't require much prep work but still make the day fun for your child.

 You can print off your free activity book {HERE}

 Emma really enjoyed the activity book.

Take a break with some delicious parfaits! Layer equal parts of red jello and cool whip

 Enjoying their 'Cat and the Hat' parfaits.

 Little bro really liked this part of the day. ;)

Finish off the day reading your favorite Dr. Seuss books!

'

 Emma has 'The Cat and the Hat' Tag Reader and loved reading the story like that.

Stories of Grace

God's grace is always sufficient. What's your story of grace?

Lemon-Blackberry Cheesecake

On Valentine's Day our kids were sick. We didn't get a babysitter to have a night out so we decided to dine in. The menu included steak, creamy mashed potatoes, broccoli and to finish it off, some lemon-blackberry cheesecake.

My hubby loves cheesecake and I love anything lemon...so this was the perfect combo. It's a bit time consuming but not complicated. It's very worth the effort! It's from the cookbook "My Family Table: A Passionate Plea for Home Cooking"  by John Besh

Ingredients:

3 tablespoons butter, softened		1 cup sour cream
1 cup graham cracker crumbs		1/4 cup all-purpose flour
2 pounds cream cheese		1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups sugar		1 1/2 pints blackberries
3/4 cup milk		Zest and juice of 1 lemon
4 eggs

Directions:

• Preheat the oven to 350˚. Grease a 9-inch springform pan with 1 tablespoon of the butter. Mix the graham cracker crumbs with the remaining 2 tablespoons butter in a medium bowl. Press onto the bottom and halfway up the sides of the pan.
  
  
• In a large bowl, use a handheld mixer to combine the cream cheese with the sugar until smooth. Blend in the milk, then beat in the eggs one at a time, mixing just enough to incorporate. Mix in the sour cream, flour, and vanilla until smooth. Divide the mixture between two bowls.
  
  
• In a food processor or blender, purée 1 pint of the blackberries with the lemon zest and juice. Pour the purée into one bowl of the cheese mixture along with the remaining 1⁄2 pint of whole blackberries and mix well.
  
  
• Pour the blackberry filling on top of the prepared crust. Bake for 10 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven and pour the remaining filling over the top. Return to the oven to bake for 1 hour, until the topping is set. Chill in the refrigerator until ready to serve.
  

Pinkalicious Pancakes

My daughter loves the Pinkalicious books by Victoria and Elizabeth Kann and the color pink of course. Last Saturday I thought it would be fun to add some food coloring to my pancake batter to make them 'magically' transform into Pinkalicious pancakes. Needless to say...they were a success!
All you need is your favorite pancake recipe ... I like Martha Stewart's basic pancake recipe...find it {here}, some pink food coloring and your favorite toppings. We used bananas, strawberries, walnuts and syrup, of course. Naturally, they turned out pinkatastic! =)