What!? Another post already?

So yeah, I am attempting to make a better effort to post more often. I decided this during last post when I couldn't remember all the goings on from the past few months! I find it rather crazy that January was only yesterday but I can't remember it?

This way when I finally get to my scrapbooking I can have some dates and journaling to go with it!

I really shouldn't be sitting here writing as I have so much to be doing! But I figured since I'm taking my "American Idol" break, I can blog during the commercials! (I am an Adam Lambert fan all the way!)

What I should be doing is working on the twenty super hero capes I have to make for True's birthday party at the end of this month. This is as far as I got tonight.

<---------- Yeah, that's twenty yards of fabric in that jumble of a mess! Ten yards of green and underneath that, ten yards of pink! Tomorrow I shall make a pattern and begin pinning and cutting! I hope to have them sewn by this weekend so I can applique the super hero logos onto them.

I have this really bad tendency to skip around when I've got more than one thing to get done. I do a little work on this, then a little work on that...until everything is almost done and I have burnout! Tonight, after they were washed/dried and pressed, I quit working on the capes to experiment with the cupcakes.

I asked True what kind of cake she wanted this year. Of coarse she said chocolate, all my girls are chocoholics! But she didn't want just any chocolate of coarse! This is how that conversation went:

Mom: "Hey True, what kind of cake do you want this year?"

True: "Hmmm, chocolate."

Mom: "Alright, chocolate cupcakes with chocolate icing."

True: "No, chocolate cupcakes with colorful frosting." "Oh! chocolate chips!"

Mom: "Chocolate cupcakes with colorful frosting with chocolate chips?"

True: "Nooo, chocolate chip cupcakes with colorful frosting."

Mom: "Oh, vanilla cupcakes with chocolate chips in them, with colorful frosting."

True: (sigh) "No, chocolate cupcakes with chocolate chips in them with colorful frosting."

Mom: "That's a lot of chocolate."

True: "That's the point mom!"

So I found one of the recipes I've been wanting to try from one of the food blogs I check in on, and altered them according to what was in my pantry and fridge! They are "almost" vegan chocolate cupcakes. "Almost" because I couldn't bring myself to use yogurt and tofu as the base for the frosting. Instead I made a cream cheese base frosting which complimented the rich chocolate quite well.

I of coarse threw in some mini chocolate chips (per True's request) substituted veggie for canola oil, dutch process for regular cocoa and added a touch of almond. The result was awesome! They were super dense though, I couldn't believe how heavy they were, but in a yummy fudgy-brownie sort of way!

I got instant approval from True and also Sage & Deni. True said they were perfect and "don't change a thing mom!" I can't believe we have a winner on the first try!

So that's one thing off my chest! I plan to make thin crisp sugar cookies assembled in the shape of her super hero logo to go on top for decoration. I already have a recipe in mind for those, so I'm not too worried about trying them out before hand.

I am addicted to food blogging lately! I think I love cooking and baking as much as I do crafting and the arts! Maybe because cooking and baking are an art of their own!? Although they all are forms of art, I find myself being way more intimidated of cooking and baking. I just feel so uneducated about it all. Cooking and baking can be so technical where art is interpreted by the individual so really anything goes. My paintings and crafting are mine, there's no expectations, no limitations, no rules, no guidelines. Food is different though. There are rules, there are things that don't work together, guidelines to be followed, and definitely expectation. You expect it to taste good right? Cooking does require skill and technique as well. There are so many words in the culinary vocabulary that are lost to me! There are many things I want to try, I need to just stop being afraid and jump into it!

I've been thinking about blogging a little about food along with my family adventures. I have been pretty successful these past few months with majorly altering our diet. We used to eat out way too often and what we ate in between eating out was mostly convenience food. Frozen, prepackaged and chock full of bad stuff.

I started a garden this year and though it hasn't yielded much yet, it has been an inspiration to eat fresher.

I have also cut out a lot of sugar from my kids' daily intake. I don't deprive them completely, but I am conscious of how much they have and I make an effort to reduce it as much as I can without them noticing too much.

So this means cooking a lot more than I used to! Which is good, because I really do enjoy cooking!

I plan to make one vegan item a week, one gourmet item a week, and one new dessert a week. This way I can keep things interesting at the dinner table, and keep myself from getting burned out with the cooking!

Aside from being more healthy, eating at home can be a lot cheaper too. I'm learning to make things stretch farther. This, of coarse, requires some major meal planning. Like buying an item that is too much for one meal and not letting it go to waste by making another meal out of it. This is especially important for those gourmet - like items I want to try out! One or two items that you don't regularly use can be expensive to buy for just one meal! So I try planning another meal a few days later with that item in the recipe.

I actually used this money saving tactic tonight! I made a roast on Sunday and had quite a bit left over. One of the frozen "convenience" foods I've cut out are taquitos. The kids have been asking for them lately too. So last night, I put on a pot of beans in the crock pot and set out some corn tortillas to thaw, and tonight we had taquitos and refried beans. Well, the beans weren't really refried, we just mashed them up and they tasted great without the lard!

Lemme tell ya, I don't think the kids will ask for the frozen ones anymore! At least Sage won't, she ate two helpings! Dennis ate until he felt ill and then later rode the exercise bike to make up for it!

Here's a pic of "Left over roast Taquitos", homemade (un)refried beans, guacamole and pico de gallo.

I used some onions from my garden to make the pico! The onions are about the only thing I've got growing really well right now!

We will hopefully be planting melons within a week. It's the time of year to plant watermelon, cantaloupe and melons of the sort. Did you know it takes twenty five feet for one vine? I'm really wishing I could afford that brick wall! We are gonna plant them against the brick wall on the neighbors side and hope that the neighborhood pets leave them alone!

Tomorrow night is the American Idol elimination night. Which means there very well may be another quick blog! Hopefully it means I've got some work done to report too!