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8.31.07
these are photos of the final project my art kids did this last spring. they had to incorporate concepts from our units on transparency/translucency, composition, color as mood, and collage. the kids who helped complete this were 6th graders from our afterschool program.
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8.31.07
a friend at work gave me three huge bags of ripe bananas becuase her afterschool kids wouldn't eat them... so i spent the afternoon looking up recipes for bananas. i'm trying to somehow not waste these. i came across this recipe and wanted to post it because it's quite clever. so for all your bakers, enjoy this recipe for "banana nut bread baked in a jar."
INGREDIENTS
2/3 cup shortening
2 2/3 cups white sugar
4 eggs
2 cups mashed bananas
2/3 cup water
3 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground cloves
2/3 cup chopped pecans
DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C). Grease insides of 8 (1 pint) straight sided, wide mouth canning jars.
In a large bowl, cream shortening and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs, bananas, and water. Sift together flour, baking powder, soda, salt, cinnamon, and cloves. Add to banana mixture. Stir in nuts.
Pour mixture into greased WIDE MOUTH pint jars, filling 1/2 full of batter. Do NOT put lids on jars for baking. Be careful to keep the rims clean, wiping off any batter that gets on the rims.
Bake at 325 degrees F (165 degrees C) for 45 minutes. Meanwhile, sterilize the lids and rings in boiling water.
As soon as cake is done, remove from oven one at a time, wipe rims of jars and put on lid and ring. Jars will seal as cakes cool. Place the jars on the counter and listen for them to "ping" as they seal. If you miss the "ping", wait until they are completely cool and press on the top of the lid. If it doesn't move at all, it's sealed.
Jars should be eaten immediately or kept sealed in refrigerator for up to a week.
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8.21.07
i'm blogging from work. parties are slow now that school is back in session.
i was browsing the blogs i have linked and was starting to wonder when anyone was going to post anything new, then i realized i should probably post something if i was gong to complain about other people not posting... so here i am, posting.
sadly, i don't really have anything interesting to say.
maybe i'll leave this post open by asking you to comment on your favorite hang out spot in
fayetteville (that's all i could think of).
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8.17.07
Random 8's:
1. every day i pray for a different chinese city or people group from my IMB china flip calendar. today is the city of Shenyang. i think matt and michelle lived there at one point...
2. i love to carve my own stamp designs out of rubber pads using cutting tools.
3. i collect really fun magnets and unusual postcards. i like to randomly send postcards to my friends, or put them on my refrigerator with one of my fun magnets.
4. sometimes i like to say the phrase "jump back, kiss myself!" when something crazy happens. i think this is from a james brown song.
5. i am missing my appendix. it exploded when i was 9, was promptly removed, and i haven't missed it since.
6. my list of dream jobs, in no particular order, are as follows: national geographic photographer, fabric and/or wrapping paper designer, operation world field researcher, running an art-education non-profit for underprivileged children.
7. i know random baseball statistics and have potentially memorized more than half the answers from the early version of trivial pursuit (in any category other than "arts and entertainment").
8. i am currently reading information on children with sensory processing disorder and how to treat it in a classroom setting. exciting stuff.
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8.15.07
things i've been enjoying lately:
-i google+ google calendar. i just started using these, and its great. a personal calendar/planner that i have access to from any computer with the internet.
-swimming at FAC. meredith's encouragement helped me to utilize the clubs facility. we swam today and although my arms are killing me, i feel great.
-2 weeks off from preschool until fall starts. i welcome the break from 2 and 3 year olds.
-anticipating fall. despite the triple digit temperature, i can still feel it coming (i think)... at least with the arrival of school supplies.
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8.6.07
happy august, everyone. (although, august is my least favorite month due to extremely barely-bearable heat conditions...)
meredith is now linked. welcome, many mumbling mice.
oh, and french wine makers love global warming. read about this interesting perspective
here.
