Blueberry Lovin'

I just ate three of these. No joke. In, like, less than a minute...okay, maybe it took me three minutes, but still - inhaled these puppies as if it were my last day on earth with only an hour left to live and I have to run for my life while being chased by Nazi's with machine guns. Get that mental image out of your head.

Seriously, though, I love summer. I even like the heat, but mostly I like the fresh produce. Does a body good. Super happy to find fresh blueberries in abundance and really looking forward to making peach jam later this summer with my gal pal Mandy over at Stansberry Jam. Her parents have a peach farm in eastern Oklahoma - it's good to have friends such as these. *love*

For now, I'm cranking out these puppies and scarfing them down almost as quickly as they come out of the oven. Perhaps this is why my jeans don't fit. Oops!

Blueberry Scones

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 Tbs. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
6 Tbs. butter, diced
1 cup fresh blueberries
3/4 cup milk

For Glaze:
2 cups powdered sugar
1/3 cup fresh lemon juice

Stir together flour, baking powder, and salt. Using a pastry blender, cut in cold diced butter until mixture has a coarse crumbly feel to it. Gently fold blueberries in to flour mixture being careful not to burst the blueberries if possible. Stir in milk, again being gentle to  keep the blueberries in tact. Turn dough out onto a floured surface and with floured hands pat into a rectangle. Cut the rectangle into squares and then cut the squares diagonally to give your scones the traditional triangle shape. Place on an ungreased baking sheet and bake at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes or until golden brown. Let cool for about 15 minutes before drizzling with the glaze. Enjoy!!

I'm a Thief...You Probably Are Too...

I am an artist.

My husband is an artist.

Our daughter is already an artist at 12 years old.

It's mentally draining living inside the four walls of our home with all this creativity and thought processing and....mess.

Our oldest son, thank goodness, is an excellent mathematician and we receive a small break from the artist mentality by his presence....he will probably be an architect....well drat, I guess that's another artist too.  There's no reprieve - we're drowning over here, someone bring some algebra.

Unless you are an artist, or live with one, it may be a struggle to wrap your mind around a day in the life of...a Howard. As a creative soul, I experience waves of new ideas followed by moments of drought that I am certain must be similar to writer's block. Sometimes executing said ideas is so utterly exhausting the only thing left to do is mentally shut down and watch hours of Mad Men or Grey's Anatomy until my cerebrum feels rested.

Because I never want to forget a good idea, I carry little notebooks everywhere and sometimes often I lose them and then find them months (years) later.  Back in January I did a little house cleaning - not literally, who am I kidding? - but figuratively, going through my idea books and goals and coming up with a plan for my 2014. I plastered my personal agenda on all of my media outlets as a reminder to think outside the box:

Then one day, while scrolling through my Instagram, I saw where a friend-of-a-friend posted a snapshot of a book she was reading. I'll admit, it rubbed me the wrong way....

Artists are thieves?? What?  Naturally, I had to grab this book as soon as possible and downloaded it to my kindle app the very next day. We read in Ecclesiastes that there is "nothing new under the sun" and I shouldn't be at all surprised to find enlightening answers right there in the truly inspired Word - after all, isn't the ultimate artist our Creator as He alone created all the many things around us from which we draw our inspiration? Austin Kleon expounds on this reality with many helpful insights on being an artist, loving your work, and fully accepting the notion that without each other (!) our inspiration well would run a little dry.

It's true, whether cognitively or subconsciously, we mentally note the pretty things we've seen and tuck them away in the recesses of our mind, drawing on our mental supply of beauty to create our own works of art. If I'm being completely honest, the below feather cake that I felt was oh-so-original when I created it was most likely inspired from a Zoe Clark cake. The girl can rock some feather work.  The list could go on and on of artists who have inspired me.

With my nightstand remaining endlessly loaded down with books (mostly biographies or educational gems) I recently laid hands on this jewel and it quickly made it's way to the top of my pile. 

In my opinion, the biggest mental struggle of an artist is staying focused on my own work, keeping the blinders on, and taking my own personal goals head-on. Throughout the years, I've heard much skepticism regarding my business - "there are so many people making cake", "there aren't enough people ordering custom cakes", "won't it get old working weekends" - the list could go on. A more sensitive person, may hear such comments and shrink back assuming others to be right. Thankfully, my feelings don't hurt easily and the only situation that really ever gets me riled up is a perceived injustice - I will fight like a pit bull against injustice. Regardless, I have found it more helpful to remember that just as no two snowflakes are alike and no two finger prints are alike, the same rings true of artists. There is only one me. That may sound arrogant, but that is not at all how it is intended. My chubby fingers could be given the task of making the exact same cake as an artist standing right next to me and the cakes are going to be different. It's just the way it is. I don't foresee giving it up any time soon - I couldn't stop creating cakes even if I tried. My soul craves art.  For now, I think I'll stay right here by my oven and continue throwing around my eggs and butter...after all, cake chose me years before I accepted her proposal...

Photo Friday #49 - West Side Story

Meatball Veggie Soup

The end of winter is finally near and I've never been happier. While I've spent my fair share of years north of the Mason Dixon (including my birth if we're being honest), my heart sings happy tunes in warmer weather. That's not so say you won't hear me complain when we consistently top over 100 degrees this summer. Let's just say I don't like extremes - clearly,  I need to live in Hawaii. At any rate, a couple of weekends ago our temps dropped rather low again and I couldn't resist another go-round with a steaming pot of soup. We actually eat soup year round, but with exceptional frequency in the colder months. You can find additional soup recipes here, here, here, and here. 

For this meatball-veggie-pot-o'-crazy, I started with lots of good things....In the bottom of a heavy pot place:

4 TBS butter

1 large onion, chopped

5 cloves garlic, chopped

2 carrots, chopped

1 stalk celery, chopped

2 jalapeno's seeded and chopped

4 medium sized potatoes, cubed

Saute and stir often until onions are transparent and veggies begin to wilt.

In the meantime, assemble your mini meatballs. In a mixing bowl combine:

1 lb. lean ground beef
3 cloves minced garlic
1/4 cup italian bread crumbs
1 tsp. kosher salt
1/2 tsp. peper
Dash of Worcestershire

Mix well with your hands and roll into quarter-size meatballs.

Place meatballs on sheet pan and bake at 350 for about 20 minutes or until no loner pink in the center.

The meatballs will appear to be too dry - you want this. They are going into your soup and need to be slightly dry so they can absorb the liquid in the soup without falling apart.

As soon as your root veggies begin to soften add to your pot:

2 cartons of beef broth (approximately 28-32 oz. each)

1 can of tomato sauce

1 cup frozen corn

1 cup frozen green beans

1 tsp pepper

1 tsp dried oregano

Bring to a simmer and gently stir in your meatballs.

Top with fresh grated parmesan and parsley. Enjoy and stay warm - summer is almost here!!

xox,
A

Has It Really Been Three Years?

I feel as if I just shot these one-year photo's last week...but somehow three years have passed in a single heartbeat....

My fourth and final child continues to grow cuter by the minute and proves to be our silliest offspring at times. We can't help but smile at his antics and goofball nature and are already preparing for numerous visits to the principals office sometime in the future. He may just be the class clown. Here are few of my fave pics from the past couple weeks as we countdown to turning 3.....

Photo Friday #48 - Take My Breath Away

Photo Friday #47 - Macaron Madness

What the World Needs Now...

There seems to be a social problem in my world - social media that is. After swallowing some recent statistics of just how many people actually are using social media daily, my mind was completely blown and partly because I realized just how many people have the opportunity to see my crazy. I might need to tuck that back in. For a blunt instrument like myself, this is pretty dangerous. I don't intend to offend anyone, ever - but with so many people having access to my jokes, quips, and occasional political rants, it is inevitable that someone will become offended. My initial reaction is shout this from the rooftop:

When I think about it a little longer, though, I realize that I'm just a little dense sometimes and I don't want to cause anyone offense. Not really. I have a great friend in another town entirely too far away and while I was living there she would often act as my filter. In fact, in public settings she could somehow sense when I was about to open my mouth and maybe say something without thinking first. She would gently nudge me and whisper "filter". While annoying at first, I learned a lot from this -  mostly to slow down and think about how my goofy quip could be interpreted after it leaves my mouth. Sometimes I really am funny - very funny as a matter of fact. While I am a huge believer in free speech and I have a deeply veined sense of justice (I cannot stand by when someone is being openly unjust), I really do desire to live peaceably with all. I'm certain I won't stop having opinions or standing up against injustices, but at the end of the day - what the world needs now, is love after all. God's love for one, but there I go changing the subject...

What I know for sure is - I won't be able to please everyone. There will always be those looking for someone to hate. I genuinely feel sorry for those folks - what must their lives be like if focusing on hating someone is the only joy they have? It truly is sad - I can only imagine the inner turmoil they must suffer.

My point here is - if I ever caused you offense, please know I didn't mean to:

..and please DO send me an email so I know and can formally apologize...it's sad to hear about it through the grapevine...

A girl can't have too many friends...