iNSANE iNSD

Good Morning!  Casey here and...I survived iNSD...and it was a blast!  Oh the sales, the fun, the lack of sleep, and the deals!!  There were lots of great kits, templates, grab bags and more available for relatively cheap and I got my fair share. For Mother's Day my husband told me to get what I wanted.  He knows how much I enjoy scrapping and he loves to look at my pages too.  He is so supportive of me...I am too blessed.  Then came Mother's Day and it was wonderful!  Sleeping in, pancake breakfast (prepared by the Wonderful Hubby), and then all sorts of fun and snuggling with the baby.  


One thing that I wanted to share this morning is a recipe for Chocolate Pound Cake...I tried this and it is rather yummy!!  


Ingredients



3 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 1/2 cups margarine, melted

3 cups white sugar

1 cup milk

5 eggs

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

1 can Duncan Hines Icing

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C). Thoroughly grease a 10-inch fluted tube pan. Whisk together the flour, cocoa powder, salt, and baking powder in a bowl until thoroughly combined.

In a large bowl, mix the melted margarine, sugar, milk, eggs, and vanilla extract; beat the flour mixture into the margarine mixture with an electric mixer set on Low until the batter is smooth. Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan.

Bake in the preheated oven until the top of the cake forms a crust and a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean, about 1 hour and 20 minutes. Cool cake in pan on wire rack for 10 to 15 minutes before removing pan, then allow cake to cool completely.

Ice with Duncan Hines Chocolate icing

Notice there is a slice taken out of it...even before I could get it iced;)

Monday Miscellany, Sharing Seger

Good morning everyone, Casey here and I am running late with this post.  So when I thought about a quick post that would actually be something that I wanted to write about I immediately thought about music. My husband treated me to the best concert every on Saturday...Bob Seger!  It was my first time seeing him live and it was AWESOME!!!

So just in case some of you have never heard of him I wanted to share a few of my favorites so you can be exposed to great, old school, Heartland rock and roll!  My ultimate favorite is Against the Wind.  Below is a link to You Tube that has the audio...there is no video...the song pre-dates slick music videos, and MTV.  Some other favorites are Old Time Rock and Roll,  Chances Are  (from the movie Hope Floats...duet with Martina McBride), and a more recent tune Wait for Me (with a real music video).

I encourage you to take a listen...and see if you are like me and love some Seger;)  I hope you have enjoyed Miscellaneous Monday!!  Oh and I am sure that there will be some LOs dedicated to the concert...be sure to let your music find a way in to your scraps too:)

Monday Mayhem...Pandora

Hi everyone!  Casey here to share something totally non-scrapbook related.  I am now blessed with DSL Internet.  We had previously used satelite Internet.  The satelite service had several restrictions most annoying of which was upload and download limits per day.  I was forever breaking the quota and being put in the 'Internet penalty box'.  No more!!  

With this new found Internet freedom I am loving YouTube, E-How and Pandora radio.  Today I want to share about Pandora.  This is the best thing sine sliced bread! Being a music lover and having rather eclectic taste this website is right up my alley.  The premise behind Pandora is that it is trainable radio.  In other words you can teach your personalized station what kind of music you prefer and it plays only those songs that fit your profile.  Training is so easy you wither give a song a thumbs up or down.  You are allowed a certain number of skips per session and there are details about each artist and song available.  So I may hear Bob Seger, AC/DC, Steve Miller, Bad Company, or The Four Tops...at any given moment;)

For me this is so much fun...especially while scrapping!  So check it out...it is free, fun, and easy-peasy:)

Monday Miscellany

Hi everyone!

Just popping in real quick to share a great site! It’s called Pinterest. I’m sure you’ve probably heard the buzz and it’s definitely worth checking out. It’s kind of like a giant corkboard to pin your favorite stuff too. I use it to keep track of quilts I see online that I especially love. It would be great for sharing your favorite layouts, or keeping track of layouts you might want to scraplift or even those that inspire you. You can make different boards for whatever strikes your fancy. Check it out, you just might get addicted!

Monday Miscellany

I'm going to share something very different with you today. It's not scrap related but it affects my ability to scrap, so it's important to me.

I have Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome Hyper-Mobility type. Now most of you have probably said "what the heck is that"? A few of you may have said "I actually know what that is". For the majority of you, I'm going to share. The easiest way to explain this is my tendons and ligaments act like taffy. Most everyone else's tendons and ligaments act like rubber bands. This means my joints are more likely to dislocate and be out of place. I am a chiropractor's nightmare. If you've ever heard the term "double jointed", it applies to me. People like me are the definition of double-jointed. I have a wider range of motion and the ability to twist my joints and limbs in ways that another person cannot. You know that scratch you can never reach on your back? I can.

I am a recently diagnosed ED patient. If it had not been for my daughter wanting to play basketball, we would have never known that not only did I have ED, but my daughter has it as well. It's good we're both diagnosed. Her early so she can prevent the damage that I've already done to my body. Me, because I now know why I've had certain health issues all my life and always had doctors looking at me like I'm a hypochondriac. I am an atypical patient, in that, I do not show symptoms very easily.

So, how does this affect my scrapping? My finger joints frequently pop out of place. It's pretty painful and frequent mouse usage does not help. My wrist and elbow joints don't usually dislocate but can become painful from overuse of a mouse and laptop. My neck is in a constant state of pain for various reasons. On a good day, I can scrap and be at the computer for most of the day. On a bad one, I'm lucky to be there for one hour.

There are many other “symptoms” I have that affect my daily life, but it would sound like a laundry list for whining if I listed them all here. Now that I’ve shared this with you, I’d like to also share some more information about the disease. There is also a “Spoon Theory” page, I’m going to share because it is very appropriate for someone like me. I hope I’ve been able to share something new with you and maybe helped you gain an understanding of why someone like me who is “always sick” is truly sick and not just “faking it”.

So You Think You Might Have Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome?

But You Don’t Look Sick, The Spoon Theory by Christine Miserandino