Supermarket Yellow Cake for Strawberry Shortcake

This week I was up for snack at our small group. We are getting to be a pretty big group, so I needed something that would get around to all of us. Strawberry Shortcake sounded heavenly…but I don’t like biscuits for my cake-blah. I found this recipe (with a really long name) and cooked it up yesterday. It turned out heavenly! Kind of like a pound cake only really moist, and it was really vanilla-ie…

I doubled the recipe (i.e. this recipe IS the doubled recipe…don’t double it again. If you want less cake, cut this recipe in half) and put it in a pretty bundt pan to make it look nice. Oh and as usual…this is NOT good for you. 🙂

Supermarket Yellow Cake for Strawberry Shortcake

1 Cup unsalted butter, softened
2 Cups sugar (finely pulverized or use the Baker’s Sugar that’s extra fine)
2 Lg eggs
3 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
3 Cups all purpose flour (i use unbleached)
4 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 Cups warm milk

1. Preheat oven to 350, generously spray pan and if using a bundt with a design, flour it also. (You may want to put something underneath the pan too as you might get a little overflow-I did)
2. In a mixer bowl, cream butter and sugar until fluffy. Add egg and vanilla and blend well.
3. Fold in flour, baking powder, and salt. Drizzle in milk, blending well and ensuring that nothing is stuck in the bottom or sides of the mixer.
4. Pour into prepared pan and bake 35-40 minutes, or until cake tests done when gently pressed with fingertips. Let cool 15 minutes. Remove and place on a serving plate, dust with powdered sugar.
5. Serve with fresh whipped cream and sliced strawberries!

I’d show you a picture…but I need batteries for the camera! Just trust me, it’s pretty and really, really, rich and tasty!

I Wanna Win TOO!

Hey all you moms, check out five minutes for mom before May 9th and you could win some fabulous prizes! They are giving away the following;

An HP Mini 1000 PC

Purses from Coach and Elliot Lucca

A Kodak Wireless Digital Frame

A Kodak Digital Camera

A Blu-Ray player and Blu-Ray Pride and Prejudice gift pack

Jewelry from Things Remembered

Crock-Pot® Smart-Pot® Slow Cooker

So click on over and get the skinny! All you have to do is post a comment and you’ll be entered in the running.  Happy Tuesday!

It’s Starting To Be a Bit More Real…

This past week we were given a date for Jeremy’s deployment. We are not supposed to communicate it though. I know it’ll change a little (give or take a day or two, maybe a week), but it still solidified this whole thing for both of us. Jeremy is looking at our babies a little more longingly and hugging them a few extra times.

Right now, Jeremy is upstairs packing one of his bags that will be put into storage until they deploy. It’ll be sent over probably before he is and there waiting for him when he gets there. Seeing him pack and put books and such in there is troubling to my heart-just in that “wow, we are already counting down” kind of way. I just keep pushing the seriousness of it aside. (I’m eating strawberry pie right now…a habit I probably shouldn’t continue if I’m gonna lose this baby weight.)

I want you guys to know that I don’t tell you this so that you can make me feel better, tell my “I told you so”, it’s going to be ok or any of those kinds of things. I just say this because this blog is my written account of our journey as a family through these years. I want to remember how I’m feeling and what I’m experiencing and I want to be able to look back at this when it is all over and see what God has done. I’d also love for it to be an encouragement to other women who are approaching a deployment themselves.

I first started a blog (QG 1) in April of 2006, just a few months before Jeremy joined the Army and left for bootcamp and shortly after he found out that his 9-month interview with the Chesterfield Police Department was done-because someone else was chosen. When I looked back after Jeremy finished bootcamp, I was amazed at some of the things I had written. It was as if I was on autopilot as I wrote; I hardly recognized my own words at times.

So as our journey gets a bit more serious, and as this deployment becomes more and more of a reality, I hope you’ll allow me the freedom to express both my highs and my lows. I do it for myself as a stone of rememberance. I do it knowing God is faithful and will continue to remain as such.

Our Little Champ

Today, Chase was playing on his little play matt/gym. He has a little mirror that I set up next to him and it has all kinds of fun things on it to touch and see.

Cooper and Chase under the play matt/gym earlier in the month

Well, today, when he was playing, he grabbed the mirror and clasped onto one of the toys on it! AH! He’s getting so big so fast. I can’t believe it. He is smiling and cooing and laughing and kicking a lot. It’s just adorable.

Laughing at Great Grandma when we were in St. Louis!