Birthday theme

What is a "Chuck Norris themed birthday party"?

You need lots of Chuck Norris facts:


Nunchucks and aviator sunglasses:


and Squirt machine guns:

Happy Birthday

Chris turned thirteen today.

We had a Chuck Norris themed birthday party at a local park.



Happy Birthday Chris!

Cake decorating

I made a new candy cake topper and got busy decorating my grocery store cake this evening.





Ooooh, sparkly!

Candy Coated Chuck Norris

I used Wilton Candy Melts to make a Chuck Norris cake topper for Chris's upcoming birthday party.



I piped it out of a Ziplock bag with the corner clipped.



This was the practice run. The real cake decorating will commence tomorrow.

Fried Peach Pies

I made fried peach pies for the "fair food" party at work today.









They were popular.

I have about a cup of filling left over. I think I'll make ice cream out of it!

Pina Colada & Mango sorbets

The pina colada recipe is directly from The Perfect Scoop. The mix was delicious without freezing. The sorbet is really spectacular. I'll never use pina colada mix again. Fresh pineapple is the only way to go.

I had to play with the mango recipe. My mangoes were smaller and not fully ripe. I added vanilla extract and the rest of the coconut milk from the pina colada recipe. It is still nicely tart, but it pairs very well with the sweet pina colada.

Bacon!

Illinois State Fair

We spent the day at the Illinois State Fair.



Butter cow:


Pork patty and sweet potato fries:


Dennis snapping turtle:

Missouri State Fair

We went to the Missouri State Fair today. I think it was the biggest crowd we'd ever seen in Sedalia, but there may have been fewer exhibits this year. We normally go to the second weekend of the MO fair, so we may just have seen a different side of it for that reason as well.

I was very happy to have seen the mules! They're normally gone by the time we make it out there.



I also secretly have this baby pony living in my basement now. He was a little bit hard to carry, but I think he's worth it.

Chocolate chip ice milk

I find this more refreshing than the heavy cream and custard types, because it melts away so quickly and leaves a moist aftertaste instead of a creamy one.

1 cup half and half
2 cups 2% milk
1/2 cup sugar
vanilla to taste

Stir to combine, churn per ice cream machine's manufacturer's instructions, adding 1/2 of a Hershey's bar, chopped, during the last five minutes of processing.

Today is the first day of the rest of eighth grade

Chris went back to school today.



Wow. Eighth grade.

Interview with the non-vampire

Had a job interview today.

Olive Oil Ice Cream

Again from The Perfect Scoop.

I used this olive oil from Dierberg's.

The flavor is gentle and mild, like the oil I chose. Your results will be largely based on what the oil you use tastes like. The mouth feel is very rich, but without the eggs found in so many other ice cream recipes.

This is a keeper. Would be excellent with some dark chocolate drizzle.

Mini-Griptilian

Dennis got me a present.

It is a pink mini-Griptilian.

I have sat at the sumptuous tables of power, but I have not run away with the silverware.

Well, maybe he hasn't, but someone has made off with our silverware. For some reason we were down to three spoons. Three.



Sam's Club to the rescue! Now we have twelve spoons. And they all match.

We are living large. Large!

Lemon Ice Cream

Some things just don't turn out as well as you'd like. I made this lemon ice cream the day before we left for Kentucky.



It was inedible. I do not know exactly what went wrong, but I suspect my microplane grater grated off too much pith.

Oddly, now that it has aged in the freezer for two weeks, it is slightly more edible. I wouldn't go so far as to call it
good, but you could choke it down if you had to now...

What's in the fridge?

Boulevard Single Wide I.P.A.



Hoppy. Bitter. Yum!

This one needs to rest out of the fridge for a while before serving. It improves greatly as it warms.

The more things change, the more they stay the same

I've said I'm going to leave my job since the day before I started four years ago and I heard a very damning report from a friend who had just happened to work there for a couple of months.

I've threatened.

I've been upset.

I've updated my resume.

I've even been on interviews, which is why I don't have enough vacation time now to cover all of the things I have planned for the rest of the year.

This time I am really serious. I need to go because I can feel the ship sinking. Everybody is looking for something to do so badly that we've taken to turning on each other.

If I don't go now I'll be a fool.

I couldn't even make it two whole days post-vacation before the urge to walk out came rushing back.

Blah. I hate job interviews.

Re-entry Shock

I am experiencing a bit of reverse culture shock. Having spent more than a week in fairly rural Kentucky, I'm finding my fellow St. Louisians a bit on the rude side.

Back to life, back to reality

I'm back from vacation. Nine days and eight fabulous nights camping across Kentucky. I am editing pictures and blogging through the trip this week.

I've lost my sense of time.

We'll see how that works out at work today...

Vacation: Day 9 Mammoth Cave to St. Louis

We crossed the Green River Ferry to go horseback riding this morning.



Chris rode his new friend Curly:


Then we drove - forever - up through Evansville and back to Troy, where we met Dennis and Lacey.

Vacation: Day 8 Mammoth Cave

We explored Mammoth Cave National Park today. We took the New Entrance tour at 9:00 this morning.



We ate lunch at a place called TrogloBITES, where I got a Where's George Dollar in my change.

Mom, Dad and I took a hike after lunch, while Beth and Chris hit the gift shops. The deer in the park have no fear of (or even concern for) humans. I was uncomfortable being this close to them.



Our last cave tour was the Historic Tour. I'm very glad we managed to reserve our spots from home, or I don't know that we would have made it on any good tours. The park was very busy today!