Like the sun goin' down on me

Last minute, my friend and I headed to an outdoor Elton John concert.  Yeah, it was outdoors, and yeah it was frigid.  But yeah, it was awesome.  

 The pre-game show: Two Cellos.  Their performance of With or Without You made me cry.

 There he is, on the left.  The man himself. 

And then the dessert.  Delicious chocolate piano filled with whipped cream and berries.  My heavens.

Apple Orchard

Time once again for apple picking.  We ate plenty of apples and spent plenty of time in trees.  Love this orchard.

American Heart Association 5k

 My work was a sponsor for the Indy Heart Walk in September, and a bunch of my co-workers were walking.  I got it into my head to run the 5k, something I hadn't done since college.  I dragged my friend Gwen along for the ride. 

We had so much fun, already looking forward to the next one and an improved time.

 J brought the girls down to see me finish.  They had a great time with face painting and lollipops.

Fort Ben

Fort Ben has been high on my list of things to do in Indy for awhile.  So for my birthday I talked my sister-in-law into meeting us there for the morning.

We started out happy...

...then walked/ran one of the shorter trails...

...paused to some catch a breath...

...then played at one of the playgrounds. 

 And finished off the day with some Culver's ice cream.

First Day of School - Kitty

And Kitty had her FIRST first day of school this year. She has a fun two year old class with great teachers. She enjoys it immensely, and loves it when her school day rolls around. She got purple sparkle tennies for the occasion.

First Day of School - Boo

Boo's birthday missed the kindergarten deadline, so we got another year of preschool this year. She has a fabulous prek class, the teachers and the classmates are the best I could hope for. Boo was so excited to get back to school, and has had a great year so far.

State Fair

A good time was had at the state fair again this year. The smoked turkey leg was as good as I remembered. The girls had their first cotton candy and it was a hit.

Boo had her obligatory sno-cone.

Kitty got up close and personal with the cows.

And the girls graduated.
Boo was tall enough and brave enough to try the fair rides. She loved them.

I mostly watched while she rode, but we went on the Tilt-A-Whirl together. Twice.
I used to love the Tilt-A-Whirl. And I still love it, it just makes me sick for the rest of the day.

And she went on her first roller coaster.
But my favorite part of the fair was this...
Watching a pet neutered (on the left) right next to a cooking demonstration.

Backyard County Fair

This was the year. We decided to have Boo's first big birthday party.

She has a lot of little preschool friends that have summer birthdays, so all summer she attended really fun birthday parties: a Halloween birthday party, a Fancy Nancy birthday party, a tea party birthday party, a swim party, bounce house parties. As August crept closer I became increasingly panicked about what we would do.

Boo has always loved the state fair, and talks about it all year, so we decided to go with a Backyard County Fair birthday party. It was flat out fun to plan, I was excited about it as Boo.

I will admit, however, that I got more than one gray hair in the days leading up to the party. Among other things, a big storm was supposed to roll in right at party time. We had 24 kids attending, and I spent the better part of two days staring at my downstairs rooms, trying to figure out how to have the party indoors.

But by some miracle the weather was absolutely perfect. Everything went smoothly and everyone had a great time, thanks to some great friends who helped with booths, took pictures, and took care of crowd control.

We started with fair food: corndogs, watermelon, and carrots/dip in a little cup.
Then each kid got a bag with tickets...
and we let them loose in the backyard to do the booths and win prizes. We had:

Facepainting

Bean Bag Toss

Knock 'Em Down

Guessing Jar

Art Table

And a bounce house.

Kitty was enormously disturbed that the bounce house was loud...
..and we're still hearing about it, a month later, in a pitiful little voice, "Bounce house loud" (or, "Buh-hus wuh" in Kitty-speak).

After an hour or so of playing games, we rounded them up inside to open gifts...


...and have cupcakes.
The cupcake tower was fairly easy to make. I was very disappointed in the cupcakes: the batter pulled away from the cupcake liners, and the sprinkles melted on the frosting. Oh well, they tasted good and with five year olds, really it only mattered that cupcakes were present, taste and looks are optional.

After cupcakes, we had a Marshmallow Race.
The kids ran from one side of the yard to the other, balancing large marshmallows on plastic spoons, and then earned a medal.

The party was over at this point, but the kids stayed and played. Things finally wound down around nine, and we noticed the threatening clouds rolling in. We packed everything up in a hurry, and five minutes later we got hit with the rain and wind. But it was a success, and I'm ready to do it again.

I wish...

I wish the past ten years had been different.
I wish we had not reacted to violence with more violence.
I wish we had showered our enemies with love,
as did the Amish community to their children's murderer's family.
I wish we had pushed deeper past our fear and hurt and anger,
and found something more.
Found that radical idea that Jesus taught,
to love your enemies,
bless them that curse you,
do good to them that hate you
and pray for them which spitefully use you
and persecute you.

But mostly I wish it hadn't taken me 10 years to wish this.

Lemon Cupcakes

I love lemon. Love it.

I made these a couple of times this summer for J's birthday and a co-worker's birthday. I would make them again in a heartbeat. The lemon cake and lemon curd are both good enough to eat alone, but put them together and add a whipped cream frosting...there's nothing better.

I used up all my lemon zest in the making of the cupcakes, but I think a little sprinkling of lemon zest on the frosted cupcakes would make these even prettier.

Lemon Filled Cupcakes

The Cupcakes:

Ingredients:
2 2/3 cups all purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 cup butter, room temperature
1 2/3 cup sugar
1 TB lemon zest (or 1 tsp lemon extract)
2 large eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup milk

Directions:

In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder and salt.

In a large bowl, cream together butter, sugar and lemon zest until light and fluffy.

Mix in eggs one at a time, followed by vanilla extract.

Stir in 1/3 of the flour mixture, then half of the milk, then another 1/3 of the flour, then the remaining milk, and finally the remaining flour. Mix just until incorporated.

Divide batter evenly into paper lined muffin tins. I did mini cupcakes. They're so much easier to eat than regular sized cupcakes.

Bake in a preheated, 350 degree oven for about 11 minutes (for mini cupcakes) or 17 minutes (for regular sized cupcakes), until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

Cool completely on a wire rack.

I believe I got about 50 mini cupcakes from this batter. You should be able to get 24 regular sized cupcakes.

The Lemon Curd Filling:

Ingredients:

2/3 cup lemon juice
4 tsp fresh lemon zest
10 TB sugar
2 large eggs, room temperature
1 tsp vanilla extract

Directions:

In a small sauce pan, over medium heat, combine sugar and lemon juice. Add the lemon zest and stir until sugar is dissolved completely.

In a medium bowl, lightly beat egg. Whisking constantly, very slowly stream the hot lemon-sugar syrup into the egg. Beat for 2 minutes (only 1 if you’re using an electric mixer), then transfer back into the saucepan by pouring the mixture through a sieve.

Cook over low heat, stirring constantly, until the curd just comes to a boil. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla.

Transfer to a small airtight container and store in the fridge.

Makes about 1 1/2 cups.

The Whipped Cream Frosting:

Ingredients:
1 3/4 cups plus 2 tbsp. whipping cream
3 tbsp. powdered sugar
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

Directions:
Beat all ingredients (use the whisk attachment on a stand mixer) on medium-high until the whipped cream holds stiff peaks.

Put it all together:

Once your cupcakes have cooled, cut a cone out of the top of each cupcake. I like a lot of filling in my cupcakes, so I generally also scrape more crumbs out of the hole to make room for more curd.

Fill the hole with lemon curd. You can use a spoon, but I like to use my mechanical pastry bag with a large open tip. It is super fast to squirt it in.
Top the cupcake with a swirl of frosting.

Adapted from:
Lemon Curd Filled Cupcakes
by Baking Bites
Whipped Cream Frosting
by Annie's Eats

Raspberry picking

Time once again for our annual raspberry picking pictures. We went with some good friends and the kids had a great time running around together.

We went at the end of July and it was probably a little early, so we didn't get as many as I had hoped for.

But really I don't go for the raspberries anymore anyway. I go to get a big box of Anderson Orchard white peaches. And then I live on white peaches for three days. Oh how I love summer.