My Strawberry Sponge Cake

I decided to make my famous strawberry cake for a potluck dinner at church tomorrow.  I say "famous" because I have made it for a few gatherings, and everyone seems to really like the cake.  I've gotten lots of requests for the recipe, and when we have a gathering I'm usually asked if I'm making the strawberry cake.

It's always come out just right, and I thought it had this time too.  When the timer went off, it looked great.  I was surprised how it had risen clear to the top of the pan on the sides.  I shut the oven off and opened the door slightly on the oven.

I looked at the cake a few minutes later, and it had shriveled up like letting the air out of a balloon.  I couldn't believe it.  I've never had anything like this happen before.

I was perfectly willing to work with the shriveled up cake.  I already had the strawberry frosting made, so I needed to use it anyway.  I was thinking I could frost it and then cut it up and put it on a serving tray.  I decided I had better try the cake, so I cut off one of the corners to give it a try.  The consistency of it is like a very old sponge.

What looks like a big hole in the middle of the cake is where I stuck the knife in to check it.  When I pulled it out, the slit wasn't even visible.  Now, it's looks like someone gouged a hole in it.

Since the frosting was already made, I considered making a white or yellow cake.  I got out my cookbook to find a recipe, but Dh offered to go to the store to get any ingredients I might need to make another one.  (I told you everyone really liked this cake.)  I soon realized it would be easier to make another strawberry cake, so here we go again.  If it doesn't come out, I'm done!

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Giving a Butterfly a Bath

Image via Wikipedia

Cinderella came up with another wild story last weekend.  We spent the afternoon at Grandma's house.  We took a bowl of pasta salad and had lunch together.

Later in the afternoon Cinderella was sitting at the table drinking a glass of lemonade.  There was a slotted, serving spoon sitting on the table that I had brought for the pasta salad.

Cinderella started her story, "One time a butterfly fell into my lemonade.  I used a spoon to scoop it out and then I gave it a bath."

I asked, "Oh, really? You gave your butterfly a bath?"

Grandma said, "Oh, poor butterfly."

Cinderella exclaimed, "Then I took it outside and smashed it into the ground!"

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Cinderella, Her Mother, and Tornadoes

Image via Wikipedia

Dd has quite an imagination and comes up with some wild tales sometimes.  Some days she is herself, other days if you ask her her name she'll tell you that she's Cinderella.

At dinner tonight she was telling me that her mother was killed in a tornado.  I looked at her and said, "Then who am I?"

She replied, "You're Lori."

I thought for a moment about how I was going to outsmart this three year old.  I then said, "What's your mother's name?"

She looked at me with a straight face and said, "Rebecca."

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Westboro Baptist Church Plans Protest for Joplin, Mo

The controversial Westboro Baptist Church is planning to protest President Obama's visit to Joplin, Missouri Sunday.

Scripture tells us over and over that we are to love one another.  If we go to someone about their sins, we are to do it out of love and concern for that person.  These protests are done out of hate, not love. "By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another." - Jhn 13:35 NASB Owe nothing to anyone except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law. - Rom 13:8 NASB Since you have in obedience to the truth purified your souls for a sincere love of the brethren, fervently love one another from the heart, - 1Pe 1:22 NASB Above all, keep fervent in your love for one another, because love covers a multitude of sins. - 1Pe 4:8 NASB For this is the message which you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another; - 1Jo 3:11 NASB Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. - 1Jo 4:7 NASB

via Westboro Baptist Church Plans Protest for Joplin MO - OzarksFirst.com.

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Government Regulation of Light Bulbs

Please tell me where the U.S. Constitution says that our government is to regulate light bulbs. I bought a LED night light a while back.  It does not work well at all.  It shoots a single beam straight up to my bathroom ceiling.  I hunted and hunted at the store for a night light that takes an incandescent bulb.  It took me a while, but I finally found one in the baby section.  It's got  the moon and stars on it, but at least  I can see when I get up in the middle of the night. LED bulbs hit 100 watts as federal ban looms - Yahoo! News.

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Muslim Mothers Kill Daughters

I can imagine being upset with your children.  I can imagine not being happy with some of their choices.  I can imagine mourning some of their choices.  Still, they're your children and you love them.

That is, unless you're Muslim and your daughter marries a Hindu:

Two Muslim women in an Uttar Pradesh town, 40 km east of Delhi, allegedly killed their daughters because they had eloped and married migrant Bihari Hindu labourers, police said.

. . .

On Wednesday night, Khatun and Subrato, both of whom are widows, allegedly tied their daughters, 19-year-old Zahida and 26-year-old Husna, to cots and threw a rope around their necks. They then held the girls down and tightened the noose until the victims suffocated to death, police said.

. . .

"We killed them because they had brought shame to our community. How could they elope with Hindus? They deserved to die. We have no remorse,"Khatun and Subrato said Friday.

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Quebec judge orders three-year-old into daycare for ‘socialization’ | LifeSiteNews.com

What is it the government is afraid of?  Children that will turn into adults that will think for themselves! Quebec judge orders three-year-old into daycare for 'socialization' | LifeSiteNews.com.

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North Korean Prisons Hold 200,000 and Growing

We do not realize how fortunate we are to live in this great country, the U.S.A.

Former inmates at the political labor camp at Yodok, North Korea, said they were frequently tortured and had been forced to watch the executions of fellow prisoners, the report said, noting that the North's network of political prisons is estimated to hold 200,000 inmates. "North Korea can no longer deny the undeniable," said Sam Zarifi, the Asia Pacific director of Amnesty International. "For decades, the authorities have refused to admit to the existence of mass political prison camps. These are places out of sight of the rest of the world." The report says that almost all of the human rights protections that international law has tried to set up for the past 60 years "are ignored." After comparing recent satellite photos of prison camps with images from 10 years ago, Mr. Zarifi said, Amnesty International became concerned that the "prison camps appear to be growing."

North Korean Prisons Hold 200,000, Rights Group Says - NYTimes.com.

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