Teacups and Toasters

This is a post about faith and what faith can do. There will be more posts about cakes, cookies, and other such things soon enough. Today though, I need to relate my morning reading to you – my readers. Before my feet hit the floor this morning I read the words from Romans 8:31-39. They, my friends, are powerful words.

Verse 31 begins, “What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who is against us?”

Verse 32 continues, “He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?”

Verse 32 relates that God sent His Son, Jesus, to die and to rise again for our salvation (an act that is so completely full of selfless love) and that since God would cause the ultimate sacrifice for us, He will also give all things freely to us along with the salvation through Jesus.

Why? How? Our world is an absolute mess. Sure, our nation is a mess, but it’s not just about our nation. Our world needs, craves, and calls for salvation. The world-wide economy is in shambles. Famine, disease, natural disasters, mass slaughters against innocent lives; the list could go on and on. Our world is in need of repair.

Verse 35 states, “Who will seperate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?”

People cry out that God must have left us long ago because it makes no sense that a loving God who is full of mercy would allow such things to occur against His creation. The truth is that God never left. He never stopped loving His creation. We, His people, turned our backs and walked away. It’s been happening since the days of Moses. We get distracted and turn to things that we can get a better grip of. We get immediate satisfaction by making believe that material goods can truly fulfill our lives. At the end of the day though, we’re going to come up empty.

Imagine.

Imagine what could happen if we let a little bit of faith slip back into our daily life. Jesus said that all we needed was faith the size of a mustard seed in order to move mountains. A mustard seed is so incredibly tiny. With a small portion of faith we could move the mountains of famine, disease, depression, and so on. If we truly included God in our daily lives and truly sought after Him and His plans we would see a difference beyond our imaginations.

It’s okay to seek. God wants us to seek Him. It’s okay to ask God, “why?” Check out the book of Job. It’s all about asking God, “why?”

The people of all nations must come to the realization that selfish pursuits and desires lead to nowhere. They lead to barren, dry, and hurtful places. I know I sound preachy, but I am passionate about this.

Verses 38-39 read, “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing will be able to seperate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

There is absolutely nothing in this world that can come between His love for us and His gift of eternal salvation, so long as we accept it. Our world is a mess, but there is a solution.

No matter how hard you try, you just can never quite be prepared for everything in life.

Holding fast:

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.

Psalm 23:1

This is a seriously delayed post. Oh yes, remember those tye dye cupcakes that I made? You know, the ones from the weekend before last? Yes, well when I made those I got to try out my brand new Cup-A – Cake holder!!!! Oh yes! How long had I wanted one of these?  I think I’d been dreaming about them for at least a year. I never really had a good excuse for purchasing one though. My daughter is only 2, so it’s not like she could use it in her school lunchbox because she doesn’t even have a lunchbox, and doesn’t yet go to school. We pretty much eat at home every day, so there was no cause for me to dish out the cash for a Cup-a-cake.

Then, one day, I was cleaning out my wallet and found a gift card for Williams-Sonoma that was left-over from our wedding. We got married in December 2004. I called up the number on the back to see how much was left and was happily told by the automated voice that I had a five dollar balance. So, of course I bought a Cup-a-cake for $3.95 and some pretty cocktail napkins causing me to go over the five dollar balance by only sixty-one cents. Not too shabby. Note, that if you plan on purchasing Cup-a-cakes you can get a three pack online for $10.50, but of course with shipping it could be just as cheap to buy them instore.

Finally, I got to test out my Cup-a-cake holder with the tye dye cupcakes and- TADA!!! It worked beautifully!

If you’re wondering, the purpose of a Cup-a-cake holder is to keep your cupcake from getting messy during travel. You can turn them all around and the only icing you lose is an eensy bit on the claws that hold the cupcake in place.

Next on my cupcake accesory wish list: The Cupcake Courier!

This past weekend I made Tye Dye Cupcakes inspired by Rainbow Cake that was suggested by my friends Kelly and Heather. Heather is posting soon on her blog, Dinner Cakes, about her Rainbow Cake making process and here’s a link to Kelly’s nifty pictures of her Rainbow Cake.

I didn’t have a lot of time this past weekend to make a cake from scratch, but after seeing Kelly’s flickr pics I sure was craving some cake. I took out an ever trusty box of Duncan Hines Lemon Cake and whipped up the batter, seperated it out into bowls and added some colors. I didn’t make a whole rainbow of colors, thus mine are only tye dye. After I had my colors ready via some help from Partycake (my daughter) we poured them layer by swirly layer into a muffin cup and baked them up. Once done and cooled we added some lemon frosting with Partycake’s favorite – star sprinkles!

Now, I like frosting. I do. Sometimes, though, it’s just a little too sweet for me. One bite with a dollop of frosting topped with sprinkles is tasty, but I can’t eat a whole piece covered in frosting.  Really, I think this holds true to just about everything that is sweet. For example: I was recently on a flight home from Orlando and looking out the window during take – off I could see the fireworks that were coming up over the Magic Kingdom. We were too far away to see the castle, but we could see these fireworks so seeming silent and so seemingly small and they were just so darn pretty. It was a sweet moment because;

A. I don’t like to fly.

B. I knew I had a lot of work to do when I got home.

C. Well, a lot of things in the near future were uncertain.

Yet, these fireworks caught me and made me feel so appreciative to be sitting where I was on that plane, at that moment.  Now, if I had that experience every single night, I’d probably get over it really fast and focus more on all the bumps and sounds of take off. The sweet moment would quickly fade into a moment wherein my stomach is churning and I’ve worn the fabric off the armrest from gripping it so tight. What I’m getting at is that we should take the cake. Frosting is sweet and looks pretty and definitely should be appreciated. However, the cake can be just as satisfying. My cake is being with my family every night going through our loose routine of dinner, play time, and baths. Cake is sweet in it’s own right. It’s much more satisfying at the end of a meal than the frosting by itself.

After the fireworks had faded from sight, I turned and looked at my daughter’s face and the way she was holding her daddy’s hand. It was a beautiful piece of cake.

Alternate Title: My Daughter Notes that I’ve Lost My Mind

Alternate Alternate Title: My Husband States, “What’s that smell?”

Yesterday was fun. It was productive. It all started in Kroger’s while pushing my happily, joy riding in a blue car cart, daughter along the salad dressing aisle. I wanted some Creamy Italian dressing for dipping baby carrots. I found that. AND THEN I found a closeout item! The bottle read, Thirty Minute Marinade -Thai Curry Ginger with Coconut. It looked pretty. SEE!

So, I took it home. It was a buck and ten cents. I also picked up some other new things to try. Like This!

No worries, I don’t like to look at raw meat either, so we’ll cook it up in a second. After you see my next never before eaten item!

Tada! Before yesterday, I’d never had an acorn squash. It was hard to cut. My knife got stuck.

Alas, I finally unstuck the knife after some seriously funny moments in which I was thankful to be the only one in the kitchen. So, whilst jamming to the SpiderMan2 soundtrack I made a dish that I had never afore made. It turned out like this:

I thought it was tasty, but the kitchen does still smell like curry.

Grab a bottle of the closeout marinade at your local Kroger and kick it up with this recipe:

YOU WILL PERHAPS NEED:

1 acorn squash cleaned, peeled, and sliced

Approx. 4 cups of brown rice

2 cups chopped and washed broccoli florets

1/2 bottle of Thai Curry Ginger w/Coconut marinade from Kroger by Kroger

1lb of ground lean turkey

HERE’S WHAT YOU DO WITH IT:

1. Pour 1/2 bottle of marinade overtop of turkey and place in fridge for 30min or more

2. Prepare the rice (prep differs depending on whether it’s instant, or not) Follow the directions you have at home

3. Set the rice to the side

4. Place sliced acorn squash and broccoli florets in a small pot of water and let them soak about 15 minutes. You can turn the heat on under the pot if you wish to soften them up a little more. It’s really a texture preference.

5. Once 30 minutes have passed cook the turkey on medium heat in a large skillet sprayed with no stick spray.

6. Once turkey is fully cooked add in the rice, acorn squash, and broccoli. Be sure to drain the water out of the acorn squash and broccoli before adding it to the skillet.

7. Toss and add some more marinade.

8. Cover and cook on low heat for about 8 minutes.

9. Eat it up.

10. Don’t be offended when your two year old asks for tomato soup instead.