Category Archives: My Life

50 for 50 #45 – Juniors Cheesecake

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(Photo credit: karendotcom127)

For Bill’s birthday we ordered a Juniors Cheesecake. When we were in Brooklyn we enjoyed Juniors Cheesecakes and we brought a couple back to Utah with us when we moved from Brooklyn so I thought it would be a fun way to also celebrate my 50th year. We have invited his mom and brothers over for a birthday dinner, so that will make it a fun day for him. I need to make some sort of fruit sauce for the cheesecake. We have a bunch of pomegranates so I might try that. But I should probably have a more traditional flavor too. I think I might pick up some birthday candles too. We haven’t had birthday candles recently and I think it would be fun.

A Basic Pup-date

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Zodiac curled up under my desk

Nothing major going on with the pups but plenty of little stuff. First off Zodiac is part of a three-way puppy swap this weekend. He has gone with Stacey. She is a Jr. High Drama teacher and I wanted him to get some practice being around animated kids and clapping more. He can easily get over excited by such things. Stacey’s puppy Trapper has gone with Karen so he can experience what it is like on a college campus. We have Karen’s pup, Nairobi with us for the weekend. He was transferred to Karen about a month ago and he has made great progress under her care. Nairobi has a good personality and responds well to commands.

Nairobi

I was hoping that Yakira would show up on the phase report this week but she still isn’t there. A couple of weeks ago a fellow puppy raiser was on campus for a graduation and took a picture of the kennel assignments in the kennel kitchen and sent it to me. It was so nice of her to do that. I love getting any bit of info on her. None of the other pups in her kennel have shown up on the phase report either. Next week for sure she will be their. Today Yakira turns 15 months old. It is probably good that it has taken a month for her to get into training. You don’t want them too young when they graduate.

Yakira’s kennel assignment on November 3rd

We will get Zodiac back on Monday at puppy class. Beacon will come home with us that night too. His raiser is going out-of-town for Thanksgiving so Beacon will be with us until Friday. One of the good things about having only one puppy in training is that we are available to puppy sit for other raisers when needed.

Frosty Update – the minature stuff

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mini Frosty the Snowmen

The last few days I’ve been working on the houses and the figures for the two little scenes that I’ve planned on each side of the large Frosty. The one on the left is about Frosty being built and the one on the right shows Frosty and the kids that built him marching over the hills of snow. I’m so glad that I’m getting to make these two little scenes. I think it will be nice to have something more to look at one people get close to the window.

My original plan just had kids but I’ve added a dog to the scene and a little dog house. He was challenging to make because he is only about an inch tall. A Google search lead me to a couple of great videos on how to make a dog out of fondant. It was very helpful.

I ran into some trouble in making Frosty’s black hat. I bought a box of the natural colored fondant but the black was missing from the box. It looked like someone and purchased the box, removed the black, then resealed the box and returned it to the store. I don’t have any black food coloring and didn’t really want to buy any. Plus getting a really dark color can be hard. But I decided to take the dark brown fondant and add some of the food coloring I had. By mixing in orange, green and purple I got a satisfactory black. Yeah!

I decided to use some licorice snaps from my candy stash on one of my houses but then didn’t have enough. I spent a couple of hours of three days looking for snaps but everyone seemed to be out of them. Finally I went to the Candy Barrel in the South Towne Mall. When I asked about snaps I found out that they had been recalled because of high lead content. So I gave up trying to find any and figured out a way to work with what I had.

50 for 50 #44 – Dark Shadows

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One of my memories from my childhood when we lived in Ogden is watching Dark Shadows and eating chocolate frosting. It sounds a little crazy but me and my sister used to make frosting by taking Nestle’s Quick, some butter and a bit of milk and mix it up. It looked like frosty and it tasted yummy to my six-year-old sweet tooth. My mom was one to buy much in the way of candy but we usually hot chocolate milk mix, ice cream and graham crackers. I don’t know why we didn’t put our frosting on the graham crackers but I don’t remember it that way.

Anyway, for this weeks celebration of my 50th birthday I decided to get some of the old episodes of Dark Shadow’s from my childhood and eat chocolate frosting while eating some chocolate frosting. I checked out “Fan Favorites” and “The Best of Barnabas” Dark Shadows – The greatest Episodes Collections from our local library. But then Bill came home with the new Dark Shadows for Red Box, so we watched that. I should mention here that I’m not much of a fan of Johnny Depp or of Tim Burton so it wasn’t much of a surprise that I didn’t much like their version of Dark Shadows. It was interesting in some ways to see a modern interpretation of the story but one watching is enough for me. I definitely prefer the original even with its own short comings. It was a fun trip down memory lane though.

Frosty Update – final base shaping

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I finally got the base of the shadow box that is being built to hold my candy sculpture. Even though I had done some shaping of the base there was lots more to do to make the whole thing work. It was nice outside on Saturday while I was working on it on our driveway. It looked like we had a snowstorm with all the little white bits of Styrofoam that collected around me.

It was exciting to put most of the pieces together and get a feel for how it was all coming together. I had some concerns that maybe Frosty wouldn’t fit in the window. But though it looks to be a bit tight in a couple of places I think we are going to be fine. I’m happy with how things are coming together and I feel like there is real hope I can get this done with out pulling some all nighters. Just 3 1/2 weeks to the unveiling!

50 for 50 #43 – Utah Lake

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This week a took a walk along Utah Lake to celebrate my 50th year. It reminded me of our pet dog Shadow and the many hours the two of us spent walking along the road that runs between the Lake the airport. For many years Utah Lake was our most common place to go for a walk. Most of the year we would walk the dirt road together, but in the cold winter, Shadow would trot along the road while I drove really slow in the warmth of the car.

It was here that Shadow took his first swim. He thought the reeds pushed up along the edge of the water were solid and he walked out on them. Of course they couldn’t hold his weight and he fell through to the water. It was here that we came to feel nature and expend his excess energy. It was here that we came late one summer when the lake was really low. The water was so far from the road that there was a huge expanse of sand. Bill was with us that day. The three of us walked for what seemed forever along the sand and out into the shallow water. It was one of those perfect kind of days that stick in your memory.

The fall is a lovely time to come to the lake. The trees looked so beautiful as I pulled off the main road. And I love the coppery color of the reeds in the fall colors. I felt close to Shadow today as a took a few minutes to come back to this favorite spot from my past and think about the future.

 

News on Yakira in Oregon

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Yakira at the top of our stairs with Zodiac in the background

We got word this week that Yakira is being spayed and will start training to be a guide dog when she has recovered. So, while I’m a little sad that she isn’t going to be a momma dog and we won’t be raising one of her puppies, I’m excited to have weekly update on the phase report. I know she could make a wonderful guide dog, as long as that is what she wants. Here is hoping that we have another graduation to go to in Oregon, probably around the first part of the year.

Frosty Progress Report

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Frosty’s hat

It has been awhile since I posted about my candy sculpture project for Christmas. While I’m behind my original schedule I think it will be ok. The biggest obstacle as the moment is getting the box structure and backdrop for the window. I need it to properly size the base and to do the sky that goes in one panel of the backdrop. It is too bad that I’ve missed the nice weather this week to get the base and the sky done. I’m using silicone caulk at I prefer to do it in the garage so the fumes don’t stink up the house. I’ll soon be stopped from progressing if I don’t have the box.

almost finished broom with pins to hold the licorice in place

The status on all the parts and pieces:

  • Frosty (finished)
  • Hat (finished)
  • Bow tie (finished)
  • Broom (almost finished)
  • Trees (started)
  • Small figures (ready to start)
  • Village (need to design)
  • Base (ready for final sizing – waiting for box)
  • Sky (need black caulk and backdrop)
  • Large snowflakes (need to design) (this is my last priority)

I’m hoping that putting the Jelly Belly’s on the base and the backdrop will go pretty quickly. They don’t need precise placement and if needed I can recruit some helpers. I would like to wait to design the village until I get the box and exact sizing for the base. It feels good to have Frosty done. He is the most important part of the window. The rest is support for him. I now know I will find a way to get this done even if I don’t get all the parts I’d like to get done.

 

The M&M’s

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Raelyn, Bill and Zodiac – the M&M’s

This year for Halloween we decided to dress up as M&M’s. We had a church party last night and a Guide Dogs for the Blind party today. It has been several years since we made costumes for Halloween. I was an original M&M, Bill a peanut M&M and Zodiac was a mini M&M. I bought M&M’s to hand out to trick or treaters next week. I thought it would be fun to answer the door in our costumes. Today’s party we took brownies with lots of M&M’s stirred into the batter instead of chocolate chips. Zodiac did good and both parties and doesn’t seem to mind his costume at all. We took third place in one of the categories of the costume contest and one a new leather leash.

Bill, Zodiac and Raelyn walking the red carpet at the GDB Halloween Party
photo from Karen Fuller

Are you dressing up for Halloween this year?