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These clouds were amazing!!

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Project 9 of 52 Topsy Turvy Cake

Okay so I was enlisted to do a birthday cake for one of the girls at work, her birthday isn't until next week but she left on vacation today and won't be back for a week. And then when she gets back, someone else goes on vacation and it's someone else's birthday.

Somehow we came up with the idea of doing the cake yesterday before all the vacations and doing the 2 birthdays together. And on top of that, both girls just said they wanted something chocolate, favorite colors, purple and green (easy those are mine and Hubby's favs too) but other than that, I had full artistic control.

This was my chance to do a Topsy Turvy Cake. Oh how I have been wanting to do one. But I'm not so great with fondant yet and this requires two or more cakes (usually with 3 layers in each cake, mine only have 2 layers each) so this is a LOT of cake. This thing was heavy.

But anyway, enough of my ramblings and on to the cake...

This was so exciting for me to do. I started baking the cake and making the purple flowers on Sunday. Due to a mishap with the top cake (I forgot one of the eggs) I had to make another batch of cakes Monday. Tuesday I made the chocolate ganache and buttercream frosting. Wednesday, I assembled the cake.

And yes, it is supposed to be tilted, hence the name Topsy Turvy Cake.

The top cake was a pound cake with mandarin coconut filling and the bottom cake was a mocha pound cake with chocolate ganache spread all over...

Yummmm...

And some of the detail...

I swear these flowers are purple in real life...

And this is the cake about 2.5 seconds after we finished singing Happy Birthday...

They loved it...

Except where some of the wax paper on one of the yellow layers was still attached...

They all swore they didn't notice...

But what are the odds that my piece was the only one with a little bit of leftover wax paper...

Oh well, they still loved it.

And I can't wait to do another one.

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And then there's Dixie

Have I told you that she's only 3 1/2 pounds??

Have I told you that she's 2 1/2 years old??

Have I told you that she rules the house??

She has the boys wrapped around her little finger.

(paw??)

I love her

She's a snuggler

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This is my Bubba.

My new camera has a red tracking light on it.

This is only a problem because one time a long time ago 

(last year)

we were playing with Bubba with a laser.

We did it for like 3 days in a row.

My poor baby.

Now, every time he sees something red,

especially a red light,

he keeps looking for the laser beam...

*Sigh*

Learn from the mistakes of others, 

do not ever show your dog a laser beam, 

he'll never get over it.

**Finally**

Happy Friday Everyone.

I'm so very happy for the weekend to come just because it means I might get to sleep in a little and I just wanted to share my joy that it is finally Friday 

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I got these daisies at work for Valentines Day, the owners gave a gerbera daisy plant to everybody.

Lunch for this week: Mini Pizza's

So this week for lunch, Hubby and I are having mini pizza's. They are good and good for you (shh, don't tell) and they are easy.

I start with these whole wheat bagel thins...

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This picture was taken using the zoom. I have been wanting a picture of this snow covered mountain in the distance for a long time but the other camera wouldn't even register that far away. I'm so happy I finally got it.

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Remember Pic 20 and Pic 21...

This is the same mountain as in those 2 pictures!! Look at the difference.

I love it.

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The clarity is amazing... The camera is a Panasonic DMC-ZS5.

I'm impressed

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Beautiful sunset

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Love the new camera, much better quality

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Great news... I finally got a new camera. Much, much better than the cheap little thing I've been using.

Thank you Hubby and Happy Valentines Day to you too :).

Nephew and the camera

Last Saturday when Nephew was here, he found my camera. Since it is a cheap camera and there is not much to break on it, I showed him how to turn it on and take pictures. When he left, I looked at the pictures he took.

This is what you get when you hand a 2 year old a camera...

Project 8 of 52 Valentines Day Cards

Nephew and I decided to make Valentines Day Cards last weekend. He had so much fun with the stickers and the hole punch, there were also some stamps in there at one point.

He turned all this mess...

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Thank God it's Friday. YAY!!

And here is yet another picture taken while out and about in the Blazer during the snow storm.

Actually this tree is special though. This is the tree that we planted in memory of my father-in-law. One of the best people that I have ever had the pleasure of meeting. I had 2 1/2 years with him before he died and I am so thankful that I had that time to get to know him before God had to take him. It has been almost 6 years since he's been gone and it is still so hard most days to realize that I'll never see him again.

Anyway, thanks for letting me be sad for a minute. Now if we didn't live in the desert on a patch of rocks and my mother-in-law would water it more often it might grow a little faster. It's been planted for almost 5 years and is still very small.

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The trees against the cloud covered sky. During... you guessed it, the last snow storm. Ha ha ha.

What... I thought it was funny.

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Taking pictures when I have to be out in the snow allows me to pretend like I'm not really freezing my @** off. I can just look at all the pretty, pretty pictures.

Funny Movie Recommendation

Happy Wednesday All

So I watched this great movie this weekend. It's called Grown Ups. It was a funny movie. If you are into comedy movies, I totally recommend it.

Anyway, we are half way through the week, YAY!!

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I just love the dramatic black and white.

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Another one out in the Blazer snow plowing, although we weren't actually plowing any snow at this point. And yes, I know I am totally behind on my 365 pics. Things should go better now though, I can edit my pictures right on my computer and then upload them here instead of uploading to another website to edit, download back to computer and then upload here.

Project 7 of 52 Stacy's Oreo Cheesecake

STACY'S OREO CHEESECAKE

Crust:
18 Oreos
1/4 cup butter

Filling:
2 - 8oz pkg cream cheese
1 cup sugar
1 - 16oz container sour cream
2 tbsp flour
1 tsp vanilla
3 eggs
10 Oreos
food coloring optional

Get out all your ingredients and let everything come up to room temperature for about 20-30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 375.

Put 18 Oreos in the food processor (if you don't have a food processor, just put them in a ziploc baggie and beat them with a rolling pin)

Process the Oreos until they are course grounds 15-45 seconds.

This should be 1 1/2 cups of crushed Oreos.

Melt the butter in the microwave for a few seconds.

Mix the Oreo crumbs and butter and press into the bottom of your springform pan.

Line your pan with 2 layers of 18" heavy duty aluminum foil for the water bath.

Place your foil lined pan into a roasting pan and set aside.

Now move on to the batter, beat the cream cheese and sugar until smooth. Add the sour cream and combine thoroughly. Make sure to scrape the sides of the bowl and the beater each time you have to turn it off.

Then put the vanilla, flour and a drop of red food coloring.

This wasn't pink enough for me so I added another drop of red. I think total I added 3 drops to get the color I wanted.

Slightly beat the eggs and stir them into the batter.

Pour about 1/2 of the batter into the pan. 

NOTE: Normally I just fold the crushed Oreos into the batter and then pour it all into the pan at once. Because I was coloring the cheesecake for Valentine's day, I decided to just put a layer of Oreos in the middle to separate the colors.

Put 10 Oreos into a ziploc baggie. I don't do them in the food processor because I want them to be a little courser for the filling.

Sprinkle them in a solid layer across the batter.

At this point I decided that I could not make a totally pink cheesecake so I added a couple drops of blue to the remaining pink batter and made the top half purple.

Pour the second half of the batter very carefully on top of the Oreo layer and spread to the edges.

You are ready to put the cheesecake in the oven, in the roasting pan.

After the cheesecake in the roasting pan is in the oven, fill the roasting pan with water to about half way up the side of the cheesecake.

Bake it at 375 for about 45 minutes or until the edges are set but the middle is slightly jiggly. Turn the oven off and let the cheesecake sit in its bath for 1 hour. Do not open the oven during this time. 

After 1 hour in the bath take the cheesecake out of the oven. Take it out of the roasting pan and put it on a rack to cool. After about half an hour I loosened the edges with a butter knife but left the side of the pan on. 

I then put the cheesecake, still in the pan into the refrigerator to cool over night.

Beautiful and delicious.

Now, for the importance of the water bath. 

This is the first time I have tried it and I loved it. This is also the first time I have colored a cheesecake.

My friend asked me for a cheesecake, just like this one to take to her family for Valentine's day. I had to make the cheesecake Thursday night and give it to her Friday. Well, Thursday was not a good day at work and I landed up leaving an hour late and running into problems trying to make the cheesecake. By the time it went into the oven, it was 8:30 and I did not have the time nor the energy to do it in a water bath.

HUGE MISTAKE.

I never realized how browned cheesecakes get when you bake them because I have never made one for looks before.

My friend was a little disappointed to say the least. I will have to make her another one and I will never, ever forget the difference again between baking a cheesecake regularly and baking it in a water bath.