Frosting for a Cause

While scouting the internet for some cupcake ideas, I came across this site. What a wonderful idea! And some very tempting recipes too!

The Project

Beginning January 1, 2011 a total of 365 sugar cookie & cupcake bakers/decorators and bloggers from across Canada and the United States will take turns doing a guest post here at Frosting for the Cause. Once a day, every day for a year you will be treated to a new and talented blogger who will showcase their home-made, hand-decorated cookies or cupcakes together with their recipes. Almost everyone, everywhere, has been touched by cancer in one form or another. The guest bakers will also share in a very personal manner with readers of Frosting for the Cause, about a woman in their life who had to face this terrible disease head-on.

The Goal

By signing onto this project every guest baker/blogger has committed to not only donating a batch of their cookies or cupcakes to their local Women’s Hospice but they have also committed to making a personal $25.00 donation to either the Canadian or American Cancer Society to be directed to research projects that are working diligently to find cures specifically for cancers that affect only women. If there is no Women’s Hospice in the area of the guest baker/blogger then the baker commits to donating their baked goods to their local hospital or Cancer Society office. Through the generous volunteer commitment of the 365 guest bakers on Frosting for the Cause, we will not only raise awareness of all of the cancers that currently affect women, but we will raise a total of $9,125 alone for research into these diseases.

TGIF

Yay-Its Friday!

It's been a long week at our house, but one that began and will hopefully end well. After a spending Saturday night with the Estes clan (you can check out some Kaylee pics over at Leslie's blog, we ventured over to Morton on Sunday after church to meet up with Papa and Grandma for lunch. Papa's birthday was on the 15th, so it was fun to have a birthday lunch at Cracker Barrel. Well, most of it was fun. We had an incident in the bathroom. Kaylee is deathly afraid of public restroom changing stations (I try to avoid them altogether - but very lots of different reasons). Anyway, laying flat on the changing station just freaks her out and she will scream, twist, and try to climb off. This did not go well with a dirty diaper followed by a little girl that decided to start peeing will trying to climb off of the bench. Luckily, after help from grandma, a clean up, and some yummy food, all was well and we had a great time.

Monday was a little rough. We had to be at the hospital by 6 for Kaylee to get tubes put in her ears. She hasn't had a lot of ear infections, but she wasn't responding well to antbiotics. After a visit with we ENT doctor, and a prognosis of fluid in her ears, he recommended tubes. The procedure went well, recovery was a little rough, but we headed home with Elmo doing pretty good.

Late in the afternoon she ended up with her left ear bleeding quite a bit and we headed back to the doctor. No worries, this doesn't happen often. Luckily, the bleeding didn't last long. A little extra care to prevent blood from drying up in the tubes should help prevent the need to take out and replace the tube.

By Wednesday the little miss was pretty much back to normal and excited to head back to daycare. Just another story for the baby book!

Gotta Try This

 

I think I'm in LOVE - Can't wait to try this recipe!

11 months

Whew...another month gone by (and me late getting up the monthly comparison photo). Remember when I started posting a monthly photo with Kaylee's puppy? I've been getting these monthly photos up although they maybe a little late. Remember 5 months? or what about 6? and 9 months? How I've loved seeing how much she has changed month by month and having our little reference item of the puppy. We're oh-so-close to full out walking this month. Exploring the house and pulling up on everything keeps Kaylee quite busy. Cruising along the couches, coffee table, tv stand, and kitchen chairs makes her things she is pretty big stuff. She's getting braver and letting go more and more. Sometimes she starts to stand up in the middle of crawling across the floor and changes her mind. I think she prefers to get to her destination as quickly as possible and right now, that's by crawling.

We've also got 8 teeth this month. Little miss independent is demanding big girl food. And we don't mind sharing...most of the time :)  As long as she doesn't mind sharing with us too!

My Valentines

We had a great Valentines Day this year. A trip to Peoria to check in with Kaylee's orthotist and neurosurgeon resulted in great news....helmet therapy is done! Kaylee had met the goals that were outlined when we started. Needless to say, we were one happy family!

Retro Post: - Valentines Day

Lots to catch up on from the last week. We have a well loved little girl at our house. Over the course of the days leading up to Valentines Days she received several cards in the mail. Who doesn't love getting getting mail?

Connected by DROID on Verizon Wireless

People Person

Kaylee has taken a fancy to looking at pictures. Granted, she mostly likes looking at pictures of herself, but she definitely likes seeing smiling faces staring back at her.

Today I caught her looking at some pictures in a new frame we're going to hang in the hallway.

Make Your Own Groundhog Weatherman!

A cute idea that our outreach group at work (Illinois Natural History Survey) has put together. Unfortunately, based on the weather forecast, this may be a little hard to try this year. Great project for kids!

February 2 is Groundhog Day, a day in which tradition (probably originating from the Pennsylvania Dutch people) says that a groundhog will come out of his burrow and see if winter is nearly over. If the groundhog sees his shadow, he returns to his burrow, predicting six more weeks of winter. If it is a cloudy day and he does not see his shadow, then winter is nearly over. While actual weather records show that there are always six more weeks of winter, and that the Groundhog Day predictions are actually wrong more often that they are right, it is still fun to celebrate the day. Also, while there will be six more weeks of winter after February 2, sometimes the weather does start to moderate after this date, with somewhat warmer temperatures and fewer major snowstorms.

To get your own Groundhog Day prediction, you do not need to wake up a groundhog (not a good idea). You can make your own groundhog:

1. Download and print the groundhog pattern. Use the colored version or color your own. If you use the non-colored version, color it before going on to #2.

2. Cut out the groundhog. Be sure to cut along solid black lines, including the lines around the ears, below the front legs, and above the hind feet. Do not cut along dotted lines.

3. If the dotted line is light colored, fold up towards the colored side of the paper. This is the groundhog’s tail.

4. Fold down along the black lines, towards the unprinted side of the paper. This includes the shoulders, neck, and flaps that form the groundhog’s head.


5. Roll the body of the groundhog into a cylinder, slightly overlapping the belly area. Add a piece of clear tape to hold it together.


6. Form the groundhog’s head by pulling a side of the head under the front of the face, and taping the tab to the bottom side of the face front. Repeat this for the other side of the face. Pull the ears up slightly.

 

7. Pose the groundhog by pushing the free corner in the shoulder area to the inside of the body cylinder, and tilt the upper body forward slightly. You now have a groundhog!

Predict the End of Winter!

On the morning of February 2, Groundhog’s Day, take your groundhog outside and set him on a flat surface (a sidewalk or picnic table). If your groundhog casts a shadow on the surface (if it is sunny), then you are predicting 6 more weeks of winter. If there is no obvious shadow (the sky is cloudy), you are predicting an early spring.


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