Saturday, February 25, 2012

Chocolate Cupcake -Eggless No Less

I am out of eggs. After going to Publix, the Food Co-Op and Sam's Wholesale in one day, I am still out of eggs. The reason is that I only get my eggs from Brighter Day, a local organic/all natural market that sell organic eggs for $2.40. Cheaper than any other place in Savannah. I haven't been there this week yet but I am soooooo grumpy that I have to have chocolate. I don't think I need to explain that. So after several google searches this is what I found.

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/eggless-chocolate-cake-ii/

This is what it looked like:

Never mind. The cupcake fell into the camera lens. Seriously. Oh well, they are very good.

Just a Name and Understanding Others

Lately, as in the last 6 months, I have been very vocal on my Facebook page, on this blog, and on any news article that I have read, how I feel about this group of Presidential Candidates. And I have also been pretty vocal and some may have thought, combative regarding social programs and the views of each side for the poor and taxation of the rich. I have not understood why some people don't see things my way even after I offer them Biblical proof. So I have been really trying to understand that little issue. My conclusion is that I don't understand them properly. I don't understand their point of view, their personal issues and their lack of or refusal of understanding of Biblical principals. What it comes down to is that no one wants to be wrong once you take a stand. Only very few people can be presented with facts and then say "Hey, I see your side of things and I believe A,B,C but maybe not D but let's talk about it more." There is something in us that cringes from that step. I know this because I have been there. I have been on the hater's side and I didn't like being called a hater because I was sure my side was right so being the type to prove you wrong, I went to the source of right and wrong. And I found out I was wrong. Now what is a Christian suppose to do when they are wrong? Did your heels in and keep arguing the same old tired argument and say loudly over  and over the same thing? Probably not.

   I had a woman who I knew as a passing acquaintance over the years get quite belligerent with me on Facebook when I started exploring the issues of cutting off the funding for food stamps and welfare while bringing the wealthiest incomes in line with middle class deductions (Her husband was one ofthe wealthy I was talking about it seems). Her argument of choice? Repeated statements of "Obama Drama". Presented over and over by me and several others the argument to consider alternative means of reform and equal taxation, she refused to engage in any logical argument. It irritated me to death I have to admit because she sounded so closed minded, not even willing to listen to an alternative view. I finally called her on it, probably not very graciously to my shame, I believe I said "why do you insist on refusing to engage in an intelligent conversation and keep throwing out the one liners like a immature bully does on the playground". Yeah I know, that endeared me to her for life I am sure. She promptly unfriended me. What is bad is that I really haven't missed her because she wasn't part of my life anyway, but I do think about her and sometimes think, was there any way I could have reached her, not to persuade her, but to reduce the animosity of the issue? This is a question I will ask myself I am sure again. I am sure there is a good answer to it, but I don't have the opportunity to try it because really, she was just a name and I never saw her but rarely in Real Life. Like a lot of people, they are just a name on your Friend Board.

There are so many 'Just A Names' on my friend board on Facebook and on this blog There are nameless people who have read it, over 500 at last count, because I subtracted out at least a 1/5 of repeat views and 1/5 of my own. So that left over 500 other views. 500 sets of eyes have looked at these silly ramblings of mine.Those eyes know about my daughter that died and that I longed for a large family and didn't win the beauty queen pageant...just kidding, I haven't wrote about that day! But seriously, it is a privilege to have someone visit this blog and to read my Facebook. I have over 300 friends that see my stupid, mundane, tired, sometimes irritable and other times bragging, posts. Some comment, most don't, like this blog but to know they read it, is astounding to me. So if you are reading this, I want you to know that I understand when you don't agree with me and I never want to be wrong either. I do want someone to let me know if what I say is not biblical with scripture backup. Because I don't want to be wrong because it means my pride is hurt, I don't want to be wrong because I WILL stand in front of God and answer for every silly word that has come out of my mouth. If it were an insult to a democrat or a republican or a blessing on my child, God hears it. And He knows what is in my heart when I say all the words that come out of my mouth. My views have changed because I searched scripture to find out what the Bible said regarding our responsibility at the polls and in the home. I fail at both. But I am concerned that I can stand and truthfully look at the Lord and say I did this (insert action, thought or deed) in Your name Lord. And I am not ashamed. But I also want to say to Him that I always tried to listen and understand others whether they agreed or not with me. And this I pray for myself, my family and for you the Reader of this silly blog. Because I appreciate you and love you.

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Tonsils and Adenoids

My youngest daughter had her tonsils out last Wednesday. That was a rough surgery. Both of my other kids has theirs out before but this child, 9 yrs old, seemed to not recover well. I started feeling guilty the minute they took me to the recovery room. They said she was not awake but was combative. Hmm, that made zero sense to me.  How can you not be awake and still be combative? Well, that means that your child is snoring and screaming at the same time, kicking so hard it takes 2 -4 nurses to hold different parts of her body down. Now, she immediately calmed down when I whispered "You are in the hospital, you had your tonsils out and Mommy is here, don't kick, it is okay" 30 times in 12 seconds while gathering the kicking child in my arms. Mothers can penetrate anesthesia. It took her 2 hours to wake up and she was in pain. The nurse, male, who really needed to have a desk job, kept trying to wake her up. I finally told him to leave her alone if she was safely breathing and all her vitals were fine. So we sat there for 2 hours and then she threw up everywhere. Poor baby. Things have really not improved until today. She did not drink more than 1 cup or so of liquid a day for 5 days and looked like she had been attacked by a vampire. Pale, red lips, sunken eyes. Several times I thought of taking her to the ER but her pulse was normal and I told her if she didn't drink the gatorade I was going to take her to get an IV. Without being put to sleep. I know that sounds cruel but it is amazing how quickly she sucked down that gatorade. Oh yeah, I was the recipient of a migraine the day after surgery so we both lay in bed with an ice pack on my head and one on her throat listening to "39 Clues" and being waited on by my 20 and 12 year old. Thank the Lord for those other kids!! But we are on our way to recovery here and I just turned in most of my last weeks homework. So I am semi caught up and hitting the hay!

Saturday, February 11, 2012

Are the Republicans the "Christian" Party?



  As the "Christian Party", we should be the leaders in social programs that are run efficiently and without crippling our budget. We should be the ones who are the first to say, "Take care of the poor, then the road ways". We should be the ones who espouse alternative programs and fund them properly with strict oversight. We could take the nation in both the House, Senate and every state would be a Red State. Because people really are voting against greed. They are voting against a corrupt legislature and politicians who are looking for a silver spoon paycheck. The government was meant to be the protector of the people and their tax money. It was established against a corrupt monarchy who believed the tax revenues were there to keep the rich in luxury. We have allowed that same system to flourish here in America. It is appalling the tax shelters, the benefits and perks given not only to our politicians and their cronies but to corporate America under the guise of "they create jobs". Yeah, right. They create them in third world economies where the workers are paid slave wages.. We all know this to be true, if for no other reason than we have had these tax perks and cuts in force for the last 12 years and during this time the economy has continually spiralled downward with corporations moving their companies overseas where the profits are astounding yet they get to keep all the tax cuts and benefits of being an American company. Where are the jobs if they are the reason America needs to keep all the tax cuts and benefits? The tax benefits have been in place for years, so according to that argument, we should have no unemployment and no deficit. They have had the opportunity for years and yet our economy is floundering.

   As "The Christian Party", the Republicans have taken the Christian hostage with their battle cry "End Abortion", yet they care nothing for the man who can't feed his family that he didn't abort because he was laid off while his company moved overseas. It is a travesty that the CEO of that same company will then say "the American Dream is still there for anyone who wants to work". Bull, the American Dream was when there were penalties for moving an American Corporation overseas yet still retain the American Owned label. There use to be tariffs on foreign products that made buying American more feasible and reasonable. THAT is when there was an American Dream.

   Then you have the man eating a steak out with his family complaining about all those lazy blacks who are on welfare and foodstamps. I hear it every day because I eat out alot. Yet they don't know that those mothers decided against abortion and then could't feed them on her $7.25, minimum wage job at Walmart, so she had to do something to feed the kids. Yes I know there are lazy people, both black, white and hispanic but those kids do get food when that mother gets stamps. And you better remember that the Lord said that the "poor will always be with us" and He also said that who ever wants to get into Heaven better take care of them. Not the corporation. So if you use the name Christian and Republican in the same breath to describe yourself, you better pick up that Bible and find out what is important to Christ on election day, and not what is important to your tax return. Those consequences are a little more long lasting than Bush's Tax Cuts.

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

My Secret Disappointment

Look at this blog by the Maxwell's, homeschooling family with 7 children who have all grown up to praise and worship God. This is the family that when I became saved and then 2 years later when I was called to homeschool, I longed to emulate. They were my perfect vision of a "Homeschool Family"

.http://www.titus2.com/blog/

In my rosy dreams, I would start  having a baby every 2 years, and my husband would miraculously get saved, because wasn't it a miracle that I was saved? And then we would both gather our large family of 5 or 6 children with my oldest son in the lead, and march off to church every time the door opened. Somewhere, in my longing, I actually pictured my husband as a Deacon in the church, with me meekly and quietly encouraging him while our children joyfully obeyed him in everything. He would lead us in devotions at night and we would have hymn sing a longs because somewhere I had learned to dream of this life.

So, what really happened was, when I became devoted to the church, he became devoted to everything else but the church. He did not embrace the Lord with a joyful smile and thank me for getting saved first to save our family. No, he kinda liked where he was in the world, like most people do, and that is when I started to learn about the sovereignty of God. I still had people sending me encouraging notes in the mail that preached the verse "you shall win him without a word", "have a submissive heart and he will come to Christ" etc... Yeah right, 'cause I am in control of someone else's salvation. No, I am not, God is. I finally learned that lesson.

And while all this was happening, the babies every 2 years didn't happen either. It took 7 and 3/4 years for my 2nd living child to be born and that was after 4 years of fertility treatments that I had to practically threaten my spouse to have. He was happy with one child. Why wasn't I? But I was crushed in my soul, as any woman who longs for a child understands. It doesn't matter if it is your 1st, 2nd or 5th, that longing is painful and it obsesses your mind and heart. And it took 3 more years and another year of fertility treatments to have my 3rd and last child. And 7 weeks after she was born I knew the marriage was over too. But I refused to give up my dream. Even knowing in my heart that I would never live my dream life, I still longed for the family like the one on the above mentioned blog. I would do anything, and I tried. I read every marriage book, I memorized every verse on marriage and while I was doing this I realized that God was the author of salvation and the director of my life.  When a life becomes worst to live in than to live without, when the damage is too great to risk pursuing a dream that only you hold, well at some point you have to give in, and I did. Finally, but really too late to save the damage.

And here we are, a dysfunctional, functioning, sometimes happy, always believing in God, and searching for His will and purpose, family of a Mom and 3 kids. And I see that the dream that I had, blinded me to the dream that I have. The one in front of me everyday, wanting help with their math and for me to make those chocolate peanut butter oatmeal cookies at 9pm. The one where my ex- husband takes care of us for absolutely no reason except that it is God directing his thoughts, and protecting me. He takes care of us so that I can continue to homeschool and he gets his kids any time he wants. He eats dinner with us and takes the kids in the river and to the mall. Something that several years ago he would have been too busy to do, and the kids love it. Amazing, that my dream, when it died, opened up my eyes to provisions that I could not have imagined. I just had to let go of what I wanted for my life and let the Lord give me what He wanted. I still wish I had that family, but then who would lead this dysfunctional one and keep it together? Because there are a whole lot more of the dysfunctional families than those perfect Godly homeschooling ones and someone has to be the Mother in those families. God calls us to different purposes, I am privileged to know He thought I was strong enough to meet this purpose. 

Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies

I grew up in a small town in North Carolina. Every day we would check the school lunch menu by looking in our small town newspaper. I always loved seeing the words "Snickerdoodle Cookies". But when I moved to Georgia I found out that the Snickerdoodle Cookies of my childhood is not the same one that they called Snickerdoodle Cookies in my home town. The Georgia version was a soft sugar cookie with cinnamon sugar sprinkled on top. The ones that I grew up calling Snickerdoodle Cookie is a chocolate peanut butter oatmeal no bake cookie. In Georgia this is what they call it...Choco Peanut Butter Oatmeal No Bake Cookie. I liked my name for it but as they say.....when in Rome..... so here is my favorite Chocolate Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookie recipe.


Chocolate Peanut Butter Oatmeal No Bake Cookies (what a terribly long name for such a little cookie)

1     Stick Butter
2     Cups Sugar 
1/3  Cup Cocoa Powder
1/2  Cup of Milk
1 tsp  Vanilla extract
1/2   Cup Peanut Butter (I use creamy but you can use crunchy)
3     Cups Quick Oats

Boil first 4 ingredients for 1 minute
Take off burner and add the last 3 ingredients (do not cook)
Mix well and then drop rounded spoonfuls onto parchment or wax paper
Let set for at least 15-30 minutes


These are my youngest daughter's favorite cookies. We eat the entire batch within 3 hours. Bad Mommy.

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

On Meeting Gay People

My best friend from college's uncle is gay. He was 20 yrs ago when I was in college and he paid for the champagne at my wedding and two hotel rooms on the river. One for my honeymoon suite and the other for all the people who followed us all night to crash in. He has been there through my friends marriages and divorce, her two kids and my 3. He cried when my daughter died and held my friend and her boys together when her ex husband went crazy and left her. We called his partner of 25 years Uncle Frank and were sad when they broke up. I mean really what were we suppose to do all these years. We love her Uncle and just because he is gay, doesn't mean we are going to leave him out of family get togethers. It is not like he makes out with men at the Thanksgiving table.  I told my 20 yr old that he was gay when he was 18 and he was shocked but not surprised. Funny how that it huh? Because just like you know whether a family member is saved or not, you know if they are gay too.  It is just instinctive. My son says that the homosexual was the only group of people never mentioned in the bible as a group approached or spoken to by Jesus. I am going to google that. But I think he is right. Homosexuality is only spoken of as cursed and profane in the bible. But I cannot shun someone who kinder than most Christian men I know. And more humble. My heart breaks at the sin but I so love the sinner. I have several homosexual friends, yes friends. I don't hang out with them, but I would go to dinner with them if asked, or to the coffee shop or an event of some kind. I don't know how to not be kind to them. I would rather go to the movies with a gay person than a man who professes to know Christ and then cheats on his wife all the time, or beats his kids. I am of the same mind as this young man that is spoken of in this girl's blog, confused as to why  some people are gay. Why is it so seemingly impossible for them to change. An alcoholic, a drug addict or a mean person can change, why can't they? Why are some gay men born effeminate and seemingly like you can tell at age 5 they are different. They are children for crying out loud, but some of them are already showing signs. This is something I don't understand and it grieves me. I will trust God and believe that He has the answer for all and that this is something that is not mine to understand (one of those Duet 29:29 things) because I do trust God. And I believe that His was is perfect and above my understanding. And I hope He understands when I don't shun the gay people. I think He will because Christ was kind, to everyone except the "religious leaders" translate 'Hypocrite". 

This article inspired today's post:     http://allshehastosay.blogspot.com/2012/01/people-like-me.html