Church Recap

Yesterday I got to share about the Children's Ministry at ASF during the "ministry minute" time slot.  I used to be a regular up in front of churches during that whole missionary thing.  However, it's been a couple of years since I've been doing that regularly so I was a little more anxious than usual (which leads to a fun story at the end).  Here's a little recap

These are the top 3 reasons to participate in the Children's Ministry at All Souls.

1.  The KIDS!  The kids at our church are so awesome.  I love when we worship and they're singing and dancing with their whole bodies, playing air guitar or even leg guitar.  I love when I get a drive-by hugging from a kindergartner in between services.  I love when you see them wrestle with truth or deeper meaning. I love when every time we ask what they're grateful for, they say their X-box.  I love that when we talked about thinking good thoughts the boys drew dripping brains and the girls drew flowers.  I love when they need a hug because they miss their mom and when I ask where she is they point across the hall to the 2s & 3s classroom.

2.  The ADULTS!  It's such a joy to get to work with so many other great teachers.  I love that one of our candidates for elder teaches in the classroom next to me.  I'm so thankful for the other teachers I've gotten to know, to be involved in their lives and share burdens and prayers even in little ways, as we wait for the kiddos to arrive.  And it's also fun to get to know the families of the kids better, even when those parents might not know how well the Sunday school teacher is getting to know them.  Take, for instance, this conversation from last month.

Scene: Sunday school classroom, kids working on ornaments to give away to someone since we're learning about Generosity.
Me: Wow!!  That's such a great ornament!!  Who are you going to give it to?
Kid: My dad.
Me: Really?  I bet he'll love it.  Why are you going to give it to your dad?
Kid (with great enthusiasm): He's so COOL!!  He sleeps without any clothes on!!  Not even underwear!!!
Me: Oh. Well, um. Wow. He's gonna love it!  (Inside my head - "I'll let Mr Reid do parent pick-up today").  :)

3. Faithfulness.  In our church whenever a child is baptized we (the members) promise to assist in bringing that child up in the truth of the faith.  Our pastor always says "You just signed up to teach Sunday school."  It's a joke, but it's also not.  We did make a commitment to help in the lives of these little ones and teaching Sunday school is a simple (notice I didn't say easy) way to accomplish that.  All the kiddos are gathered in one place.  There are other teachers, and lesson plans and resources and even a short little movie that the kids are really excited to watch (although, I feel like the teachers usually get a lot more of the jokes).  Mostly it just takes a little time.  And let's face it, it's way less skeevy than chasing  around random kids at Community Group to make sure they grasp the Gospel.

That's about it.  I did have one totally embarrassing moment in the first service.  I was talking about the baptism bit and listed each pastor by name "Shane or Kellet or...uh...oh my gosh...(glancing frantically at back of sanctuary where pastors are standing, including the one who's name I can't remember, who I was talking to FIVE minutes before I came up here)..."  Awfully thankful for the folks who shouted out "Seth".  What's particularly embarrassing (I mean, like forgetting your pastor's name in front of the whole congregation isn't bad enough) is that I think he's the pastor most likely to actually know who I am (although now they probably all know me as "ha ha, that girl who forgot your name in front of everybody, Seth, that was so funny).  Sorry, Seth!! I did apologize in person after the service as well. So my advice is that if you're going to name pastors in front of the whole congregation, write them down (I have so much more compassion for those Oscar winner people now) or at least bring the bulletin up with you.

Shopping Experiment Update

Earlier this month I posted that I was daring myself not to buy any new clothes for the entirety of 2012.  See post here. New clothes means brand new from stores; second-hand shopping is still quite acceptable.  I'm just going to give a brief update on what I've learned in the first month.

1. I don't really miss it all that much.  Of course, it's only been a month, and the month right after Christmas and during my birthday (not that I received many clothing items then), but maybe I've been pleasantly distracted from wanting new clothes because I did receive other new things (toaster oven! new bedding!)

2. I think it's worked out pretty good financially.  I definitely didn't realize how much was disappearing in little ways here and there from month to month last year.  Things didn't seem quite so tight at the end of the month this time, right before payday (yes, I only get paid once/month, I've actually only ever had jobs that pay once a month as an adult, I'd have no idea what to do with that whole bi-monthly business, yes, this is quite the tangent).  It'll be interesting to see if that repeats from month to month.

3. Last weekend a friend called up wanting to go shopping on Saturday evening.  I can't buy anything, but sure (actually, shoes & accessories are still possible buying items).  One of the things I realized while thoroughly perusing the racks (all that extra time with nothing to try on) was that I don't actually spend very much time thinking through clothes purchases at all.  I was in a store that I used to frequently buy things in and the longer I was there, the more I thought that the clothes were kind of cheaply made.  I had the time to notice since I wasn't so distracted by price and fit.  Also, I could pay more attention to style, what people are actually wearing (or being told that they're supposed to wear).  I'm hoping this year will make me a more thoughtful shopper when I do return to the world of clothes-buying.

4. Finally, I realized that the things I saw which did catch my eye would like much, much cuter in a smaller size (this involves other goals related to health and exercise that I haven't published for the world to see.  yet.) Having the freedom not to buy clothes actually reinforced the other goals that I'm working towards in my life.  It might just be working!  Can self-control be contagiously spilling to other facets for life?

That's the update on the Double Dog Dare of 2012.  In February, I've already set up a weekend of thrift-storing with a friend, so I'm looking forward to what I'll discover with that - discoveries both about myself and for my closet.  

Daddy's Special

Today I'm going to take the time to tell one of my other favorite stories from last week's poem.  Daddy's Special is the name of a favorite family recipe.  The "daddy" in question is not, in fact, my own father but rather my grandfather.  Daddy's Special is what we serve on Christmas morning.  After opening stockings and sharing gifts we plow into a Publix raspberry coffee cake (which it's entirely likely we went to 3 stores to find on Christmas Eve) and a big 'ole heaping plate of Daddy's Special.

So what is Daddy's Special? Only the best scrambled egg concoction ever.  It's a treasured recipe that's been passed down through generations in our family, that I shared with my "family" on the mission field as well, and that I hope one day to pass down to my own children (umm...and all of you, I'll share the recipe further down).

With all of the sweet memories and Christmas traditions wrapped around this recipe, imagine my surprise when I learned the true origins of this holiday dish a couple of years ago. Oh yes, Daddy's Special started out its life as "Grandpa's trick to sober everybody up and send them on their way at 3 a.m. after a Mad Men-esque night of imbibing at the swanky clubs."  Say what!?!?!  Oh wait, that sounds EXACTLY like my family.

Apparently, the actual story is that my grandparents were quite the well-to-do partiers in the 1950-60s.  After a night out drinking screwdrivers and highballs and other things people drank in the 60s at their country club or other fancy drinking hole, they'd invite the whole crowd back for some munchies before going to their own homes.  I can just see Grandpa frying bacon and whipping eggs while Grandma is chatting with her hair all done up and jewelry flashing.  And maybe Bob, Rick, and Kathy on the stairs peeking down at all the fancy folks having fun in the kitchen.

As much as I love Daddy's Special (and I do, oh how I do), this story made it SO. MUCH. BETTER.

And I use the period after every word with full confidence even though it is apparently becoming passe as I see more and more blog writers making fun of it or proclaiming that they've never used it or that it's really, truly their very first and only time to use it or that it's bad grammar, whatevs, it's way fun.

Here's the receipt (British terminology and inflection compliments of my recent inauguration into the wonderful world of Downton Abby).

Get some bacon.  Cut it in little bit size-ish pieces.  Fry that up in a pan.  Drain grease (maybe dab bacon a little with a paper towel for extra grease if you're concerned about that).

Get some tomatoes.  Chop 'em up.  Get rid of the gross hanging, gushy, seedy parts if you're like me and don't like them.  Sprinkle some dried onion flakes over them and stir together.  Toss in the pan with bacon.  Cook until they're warm but not all shriveled up and super mushy.

Get some eggs.  Scramble those suckers.  Add a bit of milk if you do that.  Then sprinkle Parmesan cheese (from the can, baby) over the eggs until there's a layer.  Mix it up.  Pour egg mixture into pan and scramble away.

Remove from heat when your eggs are at their desired consistency (towards the dry side, thanks).  Serve big spoonfuls to waiting mouths (alongside a nice, big slab of raspberry coffee cake).  Enjoy!!!

Behind the Scenes

A couple of nights ago I posted a poem using a template called "Where I'm From."  I had lots of fun writing the poem and thinking back through childhood and family lore.  Many of the memories dredged up brought me a smile, so I thought I'd share a couple of the best.

So for all of my non-Catholic friends out there, I'm going to take a moment to explain the "extra name you get to choose yourself"line.  You may or may not know that when you go through Confirmation in the Catholic church one of the perks is that you get to pick an extra name.  This new name is officially recorded absolutely nowhere, but in theory, it goes between your middle name and last name.  You're also supposed to pick a name of one of the saints.  I may have just made that up but that was my impression.  Confirmation happens around 7/8th grade.  I'm pretty sure mine was in 8th grade, but not 100% sure.  I started a new school in 7th grade and I feel like I'd been at school long enough to know very clearly who the cool kids were as well as to know that I was not of their rank.  There was (and still is) only one of each denomination in my town (small town, with big 'ole wealthy churches) so if you were Catholic in my grade, then you were in my Confirmation class.

Back to the name choosing thing.  The bottom line is that 8th grade is a pretty horrible time to allow kids to amend their names.  The good news is that it could have been worse a few years earlier when I would have picked something super rad like Tiffani.  No, instead I picked Katherine which really is a nice, normal, lovely name.  I told people that I picked the name because it's in my family (cousin, and then my mom is Kathleen), and I even looked up something on St. Catherine (who I just checked out again on Wikipedia and was actually pretty awesome - a princess and scholar - SCORE!!! - I might want to take a pass on the virgin martyrdom, though).

However, here comes the real reason that I choose the name Katherine.  Sigh, this is embarrassing.  In middle school I was obsessed with the book Gone With the Wind.  The book, mind you, not the abridged, watered-down, revisionist movie.  I loved Scarlett.  LOVED her.  I probably wrote 5 different sequels in my head before that horrible Alexandra Ripley dross came out (which I totally got in trouble for going out and buying even though it was on my Christmas list because I just couldn't wait any longer).  Anyway, any true lover of Scarlett knows that Scarlett was not actually her first name.  Nope, Scarlett O'Hara was actually Katie Scarlett O'Hara (Hamilton Kennedy Butler).  And choosing the Confirmation name Katherine was my secret, private nod to my heroine (ignoring the multiple failed marriages and driving Rhett away).

True confession: I even had my mom make me a Scarlett costume for Halloween (cough. in 9th grade). My dress didn't look like this one.  But I loved this dress.  When she comes down that double stairway and Rhett sees her for the firs time. Swoon.  Hmm... I guess there are some things I liked about the movie after all.  

Well, that secret's out.  And I'll wait until tomorrow to share the even juicier secret of the true origins of my family Christmas breakfast.  

Where I'm From

A fellow blogger posted her version of "Where I'm From" here. And I loved it.  I was so incredibly impressed with how she came up with this.  And then I saw where she linked to the template to create your own which I loved even more because then I could have one, too.

Where I’m From

I am from boogie boards, from Durkee’s Famous Sauce, Crazy Jane's Mixed-Up Salt and the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band.

I am from stucco walls, sultry air, crashing waves, sandy toes and swaying palms.

I am from the Sago palm, Hibiscus and retention ponds, from crab grass, Bougainvillea and swamps.

I am from collecting Christmas ornaments and curly hair, from Hauers and Erbs and Stuckies and Millers.

I am from the wine drinkers and concert goers.

From “Keep the counter clean” and “Clean plate club.”

I am from ardent Catholics, nominal Catholics and lapsed Catholics. From CCD, First Communion and Confirmation.  From memorized prayers, confession, altar serving, and an extra name you get to choose yourself.

I'm from Milwaukee and German/Hungarians and generations of bakers and furniture store owners. I’m from chocolate lady finger pudding and Daddy’s Special.

From the time Kathy skipped school on St. Patricks Day, the bar downtown with green beer, and Grandpa’s lunch break.

I am from shoeboxes, fire-proof boxes, recipe boxes, safe deposit boxes, cardboard boxes, and giant Tupperware.  From all these places where my legacy is stored.

** Stay tuned later this week because I'm going to extrapolate on a couple of fun stories referenced here. **

Stepping Out

A couple of weeks ago a friend sent me a link to a blog writing competition.  And while it was intimidating to try to come up with something to submit, the wonderful, wonderfully impersonal world of the Internet also provided me with enough anonymity to go for it.  I modified a section from a previous blog post to submit.  Alas, I wasn't chosen, but it was a great exercise for several reasons (in some ways like a free writing class - woo hoo).

1.  There was a topic that was really long but titled something about coming together at the Lord's table and the church and accepting other people.  But having a specific topic is good.  Of course, queen of the literal over here went more along the "I Love Communion" (because I soooo do) and less about how that plays out in the church environment.

2.  There were parameters - a due date and a word range so that was good practice for editing and for actually finishing writing something.  I'm awesome at creating to do lists but sporadic about actually crossing things off of them.

3.  There was rejection which served as a form of evaluation.  I got a very nice email thanking me for my submission but there's not enough room.  I realized I'd turn a corner (just a little baby one, maybe not a whole corner but like a really obtuse angle kind of a corner) in this whole writing endeavor when I realized that I was kind of bummed about the lack of feedback.  I, super-sensitive-hates-criticism-in-any-form girl, actually wanted someone to tear my work about just a little and provide some feedback.  Go figure.  Instead I've taken to self-evaluation (tearing it apart all by myself) which is probably also good in some way.

So, without further ado (and honestly some nervousness since I'm putting something out there that was totally rejected by a person who does this blogging bit seriously but also some pride that I actually attempted this) is my entry into the competition I forgot the name of.

The Body of Christ:  Let’s Feast Together

I’ve been involved in just about every Christian denomination at some point in my life.  I grew up in the Catholic church.  In high school, it was a Methodist youth group with friends.  At my Presbyterian (USA) college, where I finally grasped hold of who Jesus is in my life, I was Baptist. Then there was that stint with the Christian cult while I was studying abroad - oops.  I was on the mission field with several Pentecostals.  I attended a Reformed seminary and now I work for a Presbyterian (PCA) organization.  So in terms of Communion, the Eucharist, the Lord’s Supper (I don’t even know which term goes with which denomination anymore), I’ve just about seen it all.  I’m pretty sure I’ve seen Communion done just about every way it can be.  Single file down the aisle, pass the tray down your row, receive it as a family group (always fun for the single gal), intinction, wafers, real wine, grape juice, gluten free, every day, every Sunday, once a quarter, only from a priest, just a bunch of 20 somethings offering bread to each other on Christmas Eve in Asia, twice a year when someone ordained comes to visit you on the mission field, it’s the actual body and blood (so don’t drop it!), it’s only a symbol, it’s something kind of extra special somewhere in between the two. 

The bottom line in all of this is that I LOVE communion.  I mean big time.  Like "pull yourself out of bed and go to church 20 minutes late so as not to miss communion" big time.  This may mean I have some faulty theology regarding the role/effects of communion OR it may just mean that I understand it really, really well (for obvious reasons I prefer the latter). I LOVE that my church serves communion every week. Because EVERY WEEK I need that physical, tangible reminder of God's grace, of His love, of my utter lostness and utter redemption. And, guess what, it’s not only me that needs this.  All these folks standing around me in their skinny jeans and Toms are desperate for the same thing I am.  More of him. Every. Single. Stinking. Week.  

And even though I walk up that aisle on my own and even though Communion is an intensely personal part of my experience with the LORD each week where I confront my sin and begin again each week to grasp a little more of the reality that He loves me anyway, I love that in cathedrals, churches, converted school cafeterias, homes, and even prisons around the world my brothers and sisters in the faith are experiencing the same thing.  It’s one of the most beautiful expressions of corporate, communal worship we engage in as the body of Christ.  Feasting together at the table of our Father. 

Furthermore, all the Saints through all time (by “all time”, I obviously mean the 2000 years since Christ came) have feasted together at this meal.  I just love the picture of that.  Not only are all the folks at my church feasting together, or all the other PCA churches, or all the evangelical churches, or all Protestant, or Christ-acknowledging, or flat-out Christian people around the world, but all the people, all the thousands and millions of saints that we will feast with in eternity are united together with us in this meal.  And, it gets even better! Christ is with us in this meal.  Christ makes the meal possible.  The Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit not only deign to join us in this meal, not only do they warmly invite us to partake, but their love, humility and great sacrifice PROVIDE the meal.

Come let us meet our Savior.  Come, let us feast together.  

The Three Hour Chocolate Cake

I had a birthday this past weekend (which was awesome, thanks for asking!) and one of the ways I wanted to celebrate was to make the cake I remember from childhood, or at least teenage, birthdays.  So I called my mom up to ask for the recipes for this lovely, rich, made all the way from scratch recipe.  This is roughly the conversation that ensued

Me: Hi Mom!  Can you send me the recipe for the chocolate you used to make for my birthday?
Mom:  What recipe are you talking about, honey?  I don't know what cake you're thinking of.  Do you mean the cake I make for the Christmas party?
Me: (now doubting reliability of childhood memories) No, you know, the cake you used to make for my birthday.  From scratch.  With 4 layers.  And all the chocolate frosting.  I think I made it for a Girl Scout thing once.
Mom:  I make a 4-layer cake at Christmas, is that what you mean?  But I haven't made that from scratch in like 20 years (ad lib, my mom doesn't use "like" quite as liberally as I do).  I use a box mix for the cake now and then make the icing from scratch.  It has a whipped cream frosting in between the layers.
Me: No, this cake was all chocolate (...I'm pretty sure).  Well, Ok, send me a recipe for the Christmas cake, then, since apparently I've falsely built birthday memories around a fictional cake.

So my mom sent me the recipe for the Christmas Cake (I should mention that this is a Christmas party cake not a Dec 25th cake, so I'm never around in the middle of December to actually partake of this cake).  She sent me recipes for both types of icing and a Chocolate Fudge Cake recipe from a cookbook from 1983 which may be the last time I experienced this cake.

Anyway, I wasn't going to do this whole box-cake thing (although, let's be real, I do it with plenty of other stuff, and the cake I spent hours making, didn't really taste a whole heck of a lot different).

The first thing you do with this cake is put a ton of ingredients together, substituting where you didn't read the recipe correctly before heading to Kroger (see: unsifted all purpose flour instead of sifted cake flour).  Use every dish in your kitchen. You're done with the cake batter once they're all dirty. Wash. Repeat for frosting. See exhibit A and B

Exhibit A - those canisters in the back had to be wiped down after this.

Exhibit B - OK, I have no idea why the skillet is there.  Uh, breakfast, maybe?  But pay close attention and notice the coating of flour or powdered sugar or something that I managed to get all over the sink.  Fun times. 

Next, use your crazy awesome powers of estimation to equally distribute the cake batter between two pans.  Cook.  Open the oven, pull one pan out to check whether it's done.  It's not. Put it back in.  Realize that you took the slightly fuller pan out (darn you, magical estimation ability) so it had more batter and got a minute less cooking time (because that's how long it took you to realize you had no toothpicks and to use a spaghetti noodle instead to check the cake).  One cake is now "fudgier" than the other.  Have fun with that when you flip onto the wire rack to cool.  It'll be a blast.  

Next wait for cakes to cool and then cut each one in half to get your 4 layers.  A very helpful tip from my mom was to put toothpicks in around the edge of the cake where you want to cut so that you have a guide for the knife and you cut evenly.  Or if you happen to be out of toothpicks (hypothetically speaking) then organic whole wheat spaghetti noodles may also work.  Just sayin.

Note: The noodles (pictured so nicely in the back) did not live there before this day, but they made so many appearances I decided to make them more convenient and fill the empty canister.  Also, note the hand for balance on the counter while I take this photo.  I'm not above totally blaming my physical therapist (who has banned me from all exercise besides walking, swimming and her special stretch things) for my utter lack of balance at this given time.  

Next step, make the fancy whipped cream icing.  Sample.  Now, layer the cake with a splash of that icing in between each layer.  

Oh look!! New dishes to wash! And a big ole mess on that wire rack from the "fudgier" one.

All stacked up your cake will look this.  Here's a little hint for you.  You may want to think about the fact that the top half of each of those cakes from the cake pan may be a little bigger than the bottom half.  So maybe when you're stacking four on top of each other it would be better to start with those bigger ones on bottom. Maybe.  OR...if you don't think about that beforehand and stack them like I did (see pic) then maybe you'll have to "shave" your cake a bit (thanks, Buddy and the crew from Cake Boss).  And maybe that means that you end up with a little bowl of cake scraps that just might taste awfully yummy with some leftover frosting and a glass of milk.  Ya know, hypothetically speaking. 

Next up, frost the cake with the chocolate frosting.  The recipe my mom sent for icing was mocha icing.  I know this isn't the cake from my misremembered youth since I detest anything coffee-ish.  I deleted the 1/4 of strong coffee and substituted milk.  I noticed that it was a little weak in flavor so added some more cocoa powder to substitute for the missing flavor from subtracting the coffee.  Then, I decorated with fresh strawberries (only because at 3 hours into this process I wasn't about to pipe anything onto this sucker).  

However, I wouldn't recommend the strawberries in future.  There's so much sugar in the icing that in the 2-3 hours we were at dinner, the strawberries macerated (new word!!! it means get all runny and drippy and stuff from the sugar) and then strawberry juice ran all down the sides which interfered with the purity of the "put you in a coma it's so sweet and rich" flavor I was going for. 

Yum!

And here's the recipe in case you've got 3 hours to kill.  It's worth it!  Complete with little tidbits from my mom, too. :)  Although, you could probably get away with a box cake.  It's all about the frosting, right?  I'm pretty sure that's the motto on my family crest.  Both the frosting recipes are included, too.  

Best Fudge Cake

3 (1 oz) squares unsweetened chocolate

1/2 cup butter or margarine, softened

2 1/4 cups firmly packed brown sugar

3 eggs

1 1/2 tsp. vanilla

2 1/4 cups sifted cake flour

2 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. salt

1 (8 oz) carton sour cream

1 cup boiling water

Melt chocolate; set aside to cool.  Cream butter in a large mixing bowl; gradually add sugar, beating well.  Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.  Add chocolate and vanilla, mix well. 

Combine flour, soda, salt; add to creamed mixture alternately with sour cream, beginning and ending with flour mixture. Stir in boiling water. (Batter will be thin.)

Pour batter into 2 greased and floured 9 inch round cake pans.  Bake at 350 degrees for 30 - 35 minutes or until a wooden toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.  Cool in pans 10 minutes; remove from pans and cool completely on wire racks.  Split cakes in half horizontally to make 4 layers (hint: I use toothpicks to mark the mid point of the sides to help guide the cutting in half).  Spread filling between layers,; frost sides and top of cake.

Filling:

1 1/2 cups whipping cream

1 tsp. vanilla

1/2 cup sifted powdered sugar

Beat whipping cream and vanilla until foamy; gradually add powdered sugar, beating until soft peaks form.

Mocha Frosting: (it's really good even if you don't like coffee) (That's mom's note, she sets the timer on the coffee make so that she doesn't have to be awake for longer than a few minutes without coffee so I'm not sure how reliable her opinion is on this subject)

1/2 cup butter or margarine, softened

5 cups sifted powdered sugar

1/4 cup cocoa

1/4 cup strong coffee

2 tsp. vanilla 

about 2 Tb. whipping cream