Grateful & Happy Birthday

To Molli & Her Family,

I am grateful for having my best friend, my lover, my wife Molli, in my life. I love her so. Molli is amazing. What a wonderful gift I have received from her. Molli’s love has made the most important impact on my life. Who has found a side of me I did not know was there. Molli does not try to change me, what she may think I should become but instead, nurtures what I have that made her fall in love with me in the first place and above all, Molli is honest. I love you Molli. I am grateful for Molli’s Parents, you did well raising such a beautiful person inside and out. I can’t thank you enough. I am grateful for heavenly father giving me this angel! Happy Birthday today Molli!

German Pancakes - So Easy a Caveman Could Do it

Mom used to make these for us on Christmas mornings. If we are lucky, we might get them this christmas.

6 Eggs
1/2 tsp salt
1 C milk
4 TBS butter/unsalted
1 C flour







Put it all in a blender and blend until smooth. Do not use mixer because your batter will be lumpy. (unless you want to sift your flour in slowly while mixing)

Preheat oven to 400*. Place an extra TBS of butter in a baking pan, large skillet, or pie tin and melt in preheating oven. When the butter is all melted, remove from oven and pour batter into pan. Place in oven for 20 min or until edges have risen and turned golden brown. Remove and sqeeze lemon juice and powdered sugar over top and serve. You can also serve with favorite syrup as well, but I love it with just the lemon and powdered sugar.

So yummy!

Lost again...

So I have been trying to get this darn weight from my vacation 2 months ago. Then not really being committed to my WL journey I just fooled around for about 1 1/2 months. I was kind of a drift. Well one of my friends said just maintain for a few weeks and then you will know what needs to be done to lose again.
Well I took that advice & I am on that losing track again

1st week of Dec - 4.4 pounds down
2nd week of Dec - 1.4 pounds down
3rd week of Dec - 2.6 pounds down

So now I only have 2.2 to lose which I am so trying to lose by the end of the year...would be even better if I could lose 6 then I would really be at 100 pounds gone! 6 pounds is kind of difficult though coming off the weeks I've had.

I just tried my 1st attempt at Spin class. It was kind of awesome. Except my booty kind of hurts, they really didn't make those seats for bigger booties! I sweated like I haven't done in a long while. I think it really helped. I'm going to try it again. People say its good to get bike shorts with the extra padding in them...yeah I wonder?

Anyway thats how I have been lately....
I am following this one person's blog that cracks me up. Cranky Fitness
She has some really good blog posts that I can so relate to.

Danny Gans

So we went to see Danny Gans a few weeks ago. I did not know he had received Entertainer of the Year for the past 10 years before we went. His show would portray why. Some say the show is overdone as far as the advertising but I really thought it was great. He entertains the older crowd and the younger generations by touching base with all the BIGs throughout history. His show will make you laugh, cry, cheer, all at once. Avery and I had a great time trying to pick out all the voices. Seeings how we are pretty young, there were some we did not know but if you looked aroud the room, everyone above the age of 50 was smiling ear to ear.

I found this link of some of his voices that you can download for your personal voicemail boxes. Have a listen. He is pretty funny.

http://www.dannygans.com/greetings.htm

Homemade Pizza

Pizza Dough (hand tossed):

1 packet of yeast (1 TBS)
1/4 C lukewarm water
3 C AP flour
1 tsp salt
1 C lukewarm water
1/2 tsp onion powder
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1 1/2 TBS granulated sugar
1 TBS olive oil

Mix together yeast and 1/4 C warm water. Let sit and become foamy about 5 min. In a seperate mixer, combine flour, salt, onion powder, garlic powder, and sugar. Using the dough paddle, mix on medium speed until dough crawls up paddle. Mix 1 C warm water with foamy yeast mix. Leave dough on medium speed while pouring yeast mixture onto dough. When dough forms a ball remove to freshly floured surface. (If dough does not form a ball, add one tsp of water at time until it does) Flour your own hands and kneed dough for about 5 min. In a large bowl, add olive oil and make sure it coats all sides and bottom. Roll dough into a ball and place in middle of bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and leave in warm dry area. Dough should rise to double its original size in about an hour.

After dough rises, place back on floured surface and kneed again. Dough can be used right away or wrapped in plastic and stored in refridgerator or freezer until use.

How to hand toss pizza dough: Start with a small ball of dough about twice the size of your fist. Flatten the ball with your hands and start stretching the edges until you have a frisbee size flat bread. Place your hands in a fist side by side under the frisbee letting the dough wrap down the sides of your fists. While rotating your fists around each other, toss the dough in the air creating a centripical motion on the dough in the air. Catch with the tops of your fists so as not to poke a hole in your dough. Repeat 6-7 times. Place round dough on a greased and floured pizza baking sheet. Stretch dough edges out as far as possible to fill baking sheet. Make the dough as flat as possible. Lightly brush the edges of the dough with olive oil, add sauce and desired toppings and bake at 450* until top of pizza starts turning golden brown then remove from heat.

Awesome Homemade Pizza Sauce:

Combine and mix the following in a med sauce pan-
28 oz can tomato paste
1 crushed garlic clove
1 TBS olive oil
Dried basil, chervil, and tarragon
1/4 tsp chili powder
Dash of cayenne
Fresh ground pepper & ground sea salt to taste

Bring it all to a boil. Cool and serve or use whenever.

Enjoy!

Niece & Nephews... new pics :)

This is baby Sean..had to update my post to include him :)



This is my niece Zoey she turned 5 today...can you believe it? This is a new dress she got...isn't it cute :)


Opps another of my nephews Jacob needed to be shown also :) Oh my gosh if he ever grows his hair out long he will really look Steve :) (this is my sister-inlaw, Stephanie's child and well she looks a lot like Steve only female but shorter hair then him)

Secret Santas in 3 states spread cheer, $100 bills

This story is so wonderfully uplifting to the spirit! When I read it of course I cried. I try my hardest to pass to others who need it too. Either volunteering my time, giving some money or even donating items I buy. So this story was so touching to me.
What a wonderful man Larry Stewart was. I'm so glad that one of his friends also got into.
Give me hope for humanity.

Secret Santa story

Playing for Change was something I first saw on PBS. The documentary is about this guy who traveled the world to see how music unites us. No matter where you live you listen to music. By focusing on what brings us together we can have hope that things aren't as bad as they can be if we go through life alone. Check out the website:

www.playingforchange.com

Life in the Left Lane, Part 11

Theory #11, Limited Space

I admit this really isn't a theory. Perhaps a better description would be a qualifier. The underlying assumption to all of these posts is that driving in the left lane can be irritating to other drivers if you are doing so outside of the unspoken rules. But those same rules say that there are times when driving in the left lane isn't all that bad.

Any road will at times get so loaded with traffic that no matter what lane you are driving in you are going no where. There's just so much space. In crowded conditions no one really cares who is driving in the left lane because they are just frustrated they aren't moving. I guess you could say that there is no distinct target of frustration in a traffic jam except for the traffic as a whole.

So traffic may cause people to drive in the left lane, it happens.

Life in the Left Lane, Part 10

Theory #10, Keeping up with the Jones'

Well, so far all of the theories have had practical explanations. Quite simply, this one doesn't. The theory is that people just want to be cool, like everyone else. Like the Ego theory, somehow driving in the left lane conveys a level of status that people want to have. Driving a BMW, Hummer, or Mercedes is not enough if you aren't driving in the socially hip lane.

Maybe they just want to be part of the herd. Here's an article that could apply to this theory: Understanding the Herd Mentality

I really don't have much to comment on this theory, because if this is why people are driving in the left lane they are just stupid. There's a whole road to drive on to look cool. In fact, I've heard that the really cool people actually drive on the right side. Yeah, seriously. Tell your friends.

White frosted donuts

I know I am messing up my on-going rant about driving in the left lane with this post, but I think it's worthy of the interruption.

Tonight my roommate and I went to the grocery store. At Shoppers they have the most wonderful donuts. Think Dunkin Donuts only twice the size. We had to get some. They didn't have the Boston Creme filled like we both like, so he settled for a blueberry filled. I grabbed about 5 more white frosted donuts (two white frosted with Christmas colored sprinkles, a white frosted buttermilk, a marble frosted, and a plain white frosted). I don't usually prefer chocolate frosted.

I made a comment about how all of the donuts were white frosted. He responded, "Hmm. What are the odds of that?" I thought about that for a moment. After realizing I had selected all of the donuts I said, "Actually, pretty good. I did choose them." He then realized why it was funny too and we both laughed.

I think he meant that having only white frosted donuts to choose from would be odd. When you say it that way it's not so funny.

Life in the Left Lane, Part 9

Theory #9, Quest for Stability

While only a few states have left lane exits, all states have right lane entrances. At least in the United States most traffic will get onto a roadway from the right side. This means that if the left lane is meant for speed and passing, the right lane is meant for slowing and merging.

Understandably, people who intend to travel a distance on the freeway may want to drive on the left to avoid the congestion and starts-and-stops of the right side. In theory, the further left you go the less interruption you would have. Well, in theory. The problem is when people choose to only drive on the left or right. For freeways, which most likely have more than two lanes, the lanes in the middle are options too. However, you have to cross through those lanes to get to either side.

Is the left lane more stable? Possibly. Should you camp out there to avoid other traffic? No. When the lanes on the right are less crowded than the lanes on the left, it's time to spread the wealth of the road real estate.

Life in the Left Lane, Part 8

Theory #8 - Is Big Brother watching?

I'm back from the break. Time to finish out these theories. You'd think I have nothing better in life to do than to ponder why people love to block traffic in the left lane. My commute is about a half hour each way, so I spend an hour a day driving in traffic. Plenty of time to evaluate driving habits... but I digress.

This theory starts with a story. A friend and I went to his hometown of Erie, PA. I'd never been, so I was up for a road trip. In Maryland because so many people drive in the left lane you often have a better chance of passing on the right. I'm used to this by now. However, a weird thing happened once we crossed the state line... everyone moved to the right. If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes I wouldn't have believed it. To say the event was shocking is slightly exaggerated, but gets in the realm of what I was feeling.

You might chalk it up to a one time thing. I commented about it and my friend responded that driving in the left lane when you're not passing anyone is illegal in PA. Interesting thought. We spent a few days in Erie, then headed back. When we got back to the state line another interesting thing happened. Once in Maryland everyone moved to the left. WHAT!!! Again, if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes I would have never believed it.

Odd behavior, eh? Why would a state line make any difference, much less one so dramatic? Obviously laws and regulations can make a big difference. More importantly though, enforcement of laws make all the difference. People jam on the brakes when they see a cop because speeding tickets can be expensive. Imagine how people would drive if they got tickets for hanging out in the left lane. I'm not saying there should be a law that prevents everyone from driving in the left lane, but how about driving in the left lane with a line of traffic behind you? When I grew up in Arizona I was taught that if you had more than 5 people driving behind you cops could give you a ticket. I've never seen that law, or seen a cop pull anyone over for that. I'd love to.

Props to Oklahoma for actually cracking down on this.