Sage and I had a blast making this cake. The cake itself is very chocolaty, as you can tell from this prizewinning recipe. The frosting is a ganache that I whipped up with some powdered sugar. I saved some of the original stuff for the mud puddles. The sprinkles are cows, which I thought was appropriate, because these country boys around here are always hitting them with their trucks.

The cake is for a student of mine who is turning 18 tomorrow, although he has had to grow up pretty fast, as he lost both of his parents this past year. He’s been spending a lot of time looking for a new truck, hence the truck idea, which is also partly the fault of a cake I saw on Cakewrecks.com becoming part of my subconscious cake library…

We almost went with a Lego truck, but decided the monster truck would do just fine (and wouldn’t need to be put together at the last minute.)

I’m counting down the days until school ends. At this point it is eight days. I really don’t know why I am doing this, because I have been enjoying being there, especially lately. I’m on some sort of creative roll, and I have a class that has really bonded and become a “community.”

I found this flower, which is on a big ole weed, when we were out walking the other day. I’ve never seen anything quite like it, and the plant looked like a dandelion plant–but wasn’t.

We had a blast this weekend hanging out with Greg’s cousin Sherylyn from Idaho. Frankly, she’s the first person in his family that I’ve clicked with. We went out to eat together tonight, and I’m sad that she’s going back to Idaho on Wednesday. I don’t feel that “click” feeling all that often around here, so when I meet someone cool, I really appreciate it.

I found this picture, quite possibly on Apartment Therapy, but I’m not sure. At any rate, I’d love for my bedroom to pretty much look exactly like this one.

Sage is doing excellent with the piano. He’s adding his own little bits, experimenting with songs done in different scales and all that. He picked it up really fast. I downloaded a LOT of music this weekend for him. I really believe that he is going to become a musician. He already is! While I was doing all of this downloading, I found Dengue Fever, a Cambodian band from LA that really rocks. I also downloaded a lot of jazz piano and “Play that Funky Music White Boy.” You know, cuz I got to keep it real.

I don’t know about you all, but I am really hating politics/the world situation right now. I think we should all work on saving our country and ourselves (for starters) by overwhelming the corporate “governments” with our farmer’s markets and other local endeavors. Here is a very inspiring article on that very topic: How Local Self Reliance Will Overthrow the System. I think the time is finally right for people to finally start pulling together in this direction. People are feelin’ that there aren’t any local jobs, you know?

Can’t wait to have chickens again!

First, we stuck spaghetti through pieces of cut up hot dogs. This transformed them into aliens. Sage kept complimenting me on having “such a good imagination!”

Then we cooked the little aliens. They made a variety of odd sounds as they met their doom in a boiling pot. We noticed that the aliens with lots of appendages sticking out all over the place came to a “rolling” boil.

Draining the aliens.

Aliens with butter. This is after a lively discussion on whether mustard or spaghetti sauce would be the best choice for a topping. I like them with mustard. We were out of spaghetti sauce.

An alien surfing.

Yes, I set a bad example by playing with my food.

That glistening grease? Real butter. Mmmm.

I’ve been spending the day doing laundry, which includes washing out what must be some of the reddest dirt in the entire world. This weekend, Sage went fishing, and brought home plenty of it. For those unfamiliar with East Texas red dirt, this is what it looks like before it winds up in the laundry:

Lastly, here is a picture of what Greg calls my “dismal sheep”. I love my sheep!

The chicken was a good deal, since I also used it for Tuesday’s Chef Salads, and in lunch salads for work.

Yeah, this is mundane, but I don’t want to forget that something I made turned out good enough to make again…