Coffee To Chaos

For the past couple of years my hubby has been becoming a gardener.

It's not the type of thing one becomes overnight.

It takes work and lots, and lots, and lots of reading. Not to mention the fact that he's doing organic gardening which takes more time and more reading.

It's worth it in the long run to know that we are not poisoning our kids with pesticides and we are being environmentally responsible with any runoff that might come from our property.

I help when I can but my cake business keeps me pretty much married to the kitchen during the week and I work a part-time job on the weekends.

Given how busy my schedule is I'm rarely able to get out by myself for any length of time. Meeting a friend for coffee is such a treat that I can't really describe the enjoyment I get from it.

Last week I arranged to meet a girlfriend of mine in the evening at Starbucks for a much, much needed break. We were there barely 30 minutes when hubby started blowing up my phone with panicked messages about the corn going bad. I joked about having a big party over the weekend and he informed me that the corn wouldn't last that long.

Evidently, the bugs had gotten to it.

Bugs are an organic gardeners nemesis. We don't use the high powered deadly pesticides that others use and therefore our 'crops' are more susceptible to infestation.

So...there I sat at Starbucks, desperately trying to enjoy my caramel Frappuccino, researching methods for freezing corn while not ignoring a friend that I haven't seen in six weeks.

Fortunately, the information isn't in-depth because the panicked text messages kept coming and it was nearly impossible to hold a conversation or concentrate on what I was trying to read.

We agreed that my assistance was needed at home so I hugged my BFF and headed home to calm the hubby and get to work.

The good news is that it looked pretty simple. There are basically 9 steps and most are not difficult.

1. Pick
2. Husk
3. Clean
4. Blanche
5. Cool
6. Dry
7. Remove from the cob
8. Bag
9. Freeze

Easy? Yes.

Messy? Very.

I returned home to a wheelbarrow full of corn and a totally freaked out hubby desperate to save all of his hard work from this summer.

I showed him what I had found and got him to settle down and relax we got to work on the, more than, 6 dozen ears of corn that needed to be saved.

We make a great team!

He husked, I scrubbed, blanched and cooled the cobs in an ice bath. After they were cool hubby did the drying, cutting and bagging.

After hubby husked the corn I scrubbed that silks from the cobs and put the pots of water on the stove to blanche the corn.

Once the water was ready I put four ears in the pot and removed them after the water returned to a boil.

The ears were then put in an ice bath to stop the cooking process and then inspected for silks that I missed when cleaning and moved to a towel to dry before cutting.

After they were dry hubby hubby cut the corn from the ears and we bagged it for the freezer. We kept the best looking ones to freeze on the cob so we could enjoy a little summer during the winter months.

Once the corn was bagged, it was submerged in water to squeeze all of the air out before the bags were sealed. This will prevent ice crystals from forming around the corn which would give it freezer burn. Contrary to popular belief it is not "protective ice." 

The end result is a freezer full of delicious sweet corn that we can enjoy once the weather gets cold. 

Hopefully this week, I'll be able to go back for coffee with my girlfriend. Maybe this time I'll be able to finish a sentence! 

Bloglovin'

I'm listing my blog on Bloglovin'

Pretty cool service that lists all of the blogs that I follow and recommends others based on the one's I've chosen.

Check it out.

www.bloglovin.com

<a href="http://www.bloglovin.com/blog/14368027/?claim=cke2eu9jb7f">Follow my blog with Bloglovin</a>

I Want It All...Just Not Right Now

Two and a half is an amazing age!

The rate that our boys learn is astounding. 

Their verbal skills leave our mouths hanging open on a daily basis and their memories are incredible! 

Days fly by in a blur and no matter what I do I never have enough time. 

This was much worse when I had a full time cake assistant. 

Since I started the cake business, I've dreamt of becoming a household name and having a booming cake business. I wanted to have this amazing reputation and be sought after for every major event that could be enhanced with a specialty cake.

I did it! 

With Ismael's help we were completing eight orders a week that consisted of anything from 19 dozen cupcakes and multiple tiered cakes with oodles of flowers to carved cakes made to look like cartoon characters or trucks. 

I attended networking events as often as I could. Invested in being the sponsor at the Southern Chester County Chamber of Commerce monthly Network at Noon Luncheon and provided cupcakes and cake pops for the WSFS Bank After Hours Business Card Exchange and the Hotties for Humanities fundraising nights. We were booming! 

My dream had come true!

Woohoo!!! 

I was miserable...

I was paying my assistant to make cakes, I was paying a teenager to watch my kids, I was working 2-3 times harder than ever and I making less. 

My kids couldn't understand why I wasn't available. The house was always a mess, I was cranky and sleep deprived and my hubby was taking the brunt of my lousy attitude.

It was obvious to everyone that I had overdone it, and despite my very big mouth, bitten off more than I could chew. So I decided to go back to what I was doing before: 2-3 orders a week and more time for the family. 

I'd like to say that my house is spotless, it is not. But the laundry is finished and put away. The kitchen is clean and the beds have been made.

More importantly, my family is happy.

I'm no longer cranky all the time and, despite being an insomniac, have actually gotten some rest.

The orders are still coming in just not as fast, and that's ok.

I am a little bummed about the timing of all of this. But at the same time, this is the second time I've slowed things down and the business is still coming in.

The good news is that I didn't fail! I quit my full-time marketing position to invest in my cake business and it was and is still succeeding it was just growing faster than I could keep up with right now.

I love to be the supermom who can do it all: full-time domestic engineer who oversees the family finances while raising twin boys and running a cake business.

I want it all!

But, sometimes I want to sleep too. 

Withdrawal from the Susan G. Komen 3-Day Walk

Since my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer and has undergone surgery, chemo and radiation my breast cancer awareness has been heightened.

I, like most people, wasn't overly worried about the breast cancer issue until it hit a loved one. So, when a friend contacted me to say that she would be walking again this year and wanted me to join her I decided that I would.

I emailed my friends and requested donations, began taking frequent walks and even got the treadmill hooked up in the basement to train for the walk. 

I have the best friends in the world! Almost overnight I raised close to $1000 and within a couple of weeks was up to 4.5 miles on a daily trek.

To be honest, I did know that SGK donated to Planned Parenthood but I've had many friends who have used PP, not for abortions but for general gynecological services. For this reason and because of my desire to do something to help with breast cancer research I was willing to move past my concerns and do The Walk.


Then the Planned Parenthood videos came out.

I began thinking about The Walk and where the money would go and I knew that I would have to withdraw.


As a woman who has struggled with fertility I cannot fathom the idea of killing a child because it was perceived as a mistake. There is a lot of crap out there about a woman's "right" to kill her child, also referred to as "a woman's choice." How about making the choice to not have sex or to use birth control rather than having an abortion as a form of birth control? A little responsibility up front would be nice to see, but I digress.

Abortion is by no means a black and white issue. While I believe that killing a child is wrong, I do understand that in cases of rape, incest and a true medical threat to a mother there may be few alternatives. My heart goes out to those ladies as it can't be an easy decision. However, to use abortion as a means of birth control is wrong and for an organization to profit from the sale of the aborted babies makes me want to puke.

Since being outed Planned Parenthood has been less than contrite. Their way of dealing with it was to take The Center For Medical Progress to court to block the release of additional videos, not to apologize for committing an illegal act.

It's bad enough that they are considered to be an abortion factory, with 149 abortions being performed to every 21 adoption referrals (see Lies, Corruption and Scandal), but to be a willing participant in the trafficking of aborted baby parts is abhorrent.

Since there are "8,735 licensed mammography facilities in America and Planned Parenthood operates exactly zero," (The Federalist) I see no need for Susan G. Komen to provide Planned Parenthood with one penny never mind millions of dollars.

For the Susan G. Komen Foundation to know about Planned Parenthood's illegal organ trafficking and not sever ties makes them as guilty as a man who watches a rape and does nothing to stop the rapists.

For me to participate in an event that will raise money to eventually end up in the hands of people who kill babies and then sell their body parts for profit goes against almost everything I believe in.

For that reason I have withdrawn my registration, contacted all of my donors to let them know what I have done and why, and have sent them the contact information of the person responsible for refunding their money should they wish to do so.

I have no doubt that I will sleep much better tonight.