This breakfast pizza is inspired by Casey's (the gas station) breakfast pizza. Their breakfast pizza is so good! I have thought about it a lot and I think what makes their breakfast pizza so good is the cheese sauce.
To make the cheese sauce I cut up about 8oz. of processed cheese (like Velveeta), and add about 1/4 cup of milk or broth, if I'm out of milk.
I stir this over med/low heat until everything is smooth and melted.
I would be willing to try jarred cheese spread like nacho cheese, but I rarely buy those products. I rarely buy processed cheese to begin with so I don't make recipes like this very often.
So many things are happening in nature this time of year. These flowers all popped open over night. I see these flowers on my walk in the morning. I'm not sure what type of shrub this is, but it's flowers sure are pretty.
I found my Bleeding Hearts! I was so happy to see them. I have been looking for them for a couple weeks. This morning I was looking again and gave up. I figured they must have been too trampled during the summer and frozen solid in the ice over winter. As I straightened up and turned to leave, my eyes landed right where they are coming up! I had been looking in the wrong place all along.
The Lilac buds are forming. I am looking forward to their sweet, sweet perfume.
The Daffodils are going to town! Pretty blossoms and more infant buds coming up still.
I finished the dress! This is 100% hand stitched. It is the first time that I have made a dress all by hand. It feels good to see what I can achieve.
This month I stitched the skirt pieces together, gathered and attached the floral contrast bit, hemmed the skirt, finished the seams and put in gathering stitches at the top edge of the skirt. I got to this point by the 18th of March.
Next I attached the bodice to the skirt with a backstitch and a running stitch for reinforcement. Then I finished the seam with a blanket stitch.
I sewed the zipper in the center back.
I sewed the collar and facing on to the neckline. I understitched the collar to help everything lay smoothly.
And that is it. The dress is done. All the seams are neatly finished. There is nothing left to do. It turned out great!
I, also, had to make a repair in my compression hose this month. I took a few minutes to stitch this hole closed.
"A stitch in time saves nine."
That's is a good quip. I hope you have had a good March and that your projects keep marching on to the finish line!
This recipe came from the back of a Reese's peanut butter chip bag. I added chocolate chips because chocolate. 😋 I have doubled the recipe quantities from the original and used a combination of butter and oil.
1 cup Butter, softened
1/3 cup Oil
2 cups Sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp. Vanilla Flavor
2 cup Flour
3/4 cup Cocoa Powder
1 tsp. Baking Soda
1/2 tsp. Salt
3 1/3 cup Peanut Butter Chips Or Chocolate Chips Or Combination
Beat butter, oil, and sugar until well blended. Add eggs and vanilla; beat well.
Add flour, cocoa, baking soda, and salt in a heap. Gently blend the heap of dry ingredients with one another (to distribute the baking soda, salt and cocoa amongst the flour) before mixing them into the butter mixture below. Stir until well combined. Stir in peanut butter or chocolate chips.
Drop by rounded teaspoons onto ungreased cookie sheet.
I wanted to use this flower print for my daughter's newest dress. I left my fingers in the picture for scale.
I didn't have enough yardage to cut the entire dress. I decided to use this blue material for part of the skirt and make a tiered skirt.
After cutting out the pieces I marked the seam allowance in pencil. Since this is a hand sewing project I need the seam allowances marked.
I stitched most of the seams with a back stitch instead of a running stitch. I learned my lesson on using a running stitch on the pinafore last month. I had stitched all the seams with a running stitch on the pink pinafore. My daughter was wearing the pinafore not more than a couple hours before someone pulled on her skirt and burst the side seam. What a pain! (I fixed it straight away, but come on! Really?)
A running stitch might not be solely to blame. The thread that I used was some old mercerized cotton thread so it is not as strong as modern polyester thread.
Anyway, on this latest dress I used a polyester all purpose thread AND a backstitch.
I finished most of the seams with a self enclosed seam.
Right about this stage in the dress project my son's coat zipper broke. So, I had to switch gears and replace a coat zipper. Sometimes it would not be worth my time to replace a zipper, but this is a nice coat and I happened to have the right size separating zipper. I also had a black or gray separating zipper that were long enough but I decided to use the red one because I thought neutral colors might be more likely to come in handy later.
First, I had to rip the old zipper out.
I basted and stitched the new zipper in place. This job was not fun and I was really happy when I finally finished. It took me 9 days.
I also took care of this little tear while I was at it
While I was on the mindset to fix coats I repaired this hole.
My three year old has been begging me to fix this hole in the hood of his coat for a month.
He had been standing in the vicinity a brush fire when a hot ember must have landed on his hood melting this hole.
Now he his happy!
Back to sewing on the dress.
I have finished the sleeves and the base of the bodice. I am working on the skirt now. Hopefully, in March I can finish the skirt, install the zipper, add the collar, and do the hem. Check back in March to see far I get!
I am so inspired by this story! It is a story about sacrifice, gratitude, and finding joy. The way she tells it makes it exciting. She draws you in and makes one feel invested in their goal in a way that makes one cheer them on.
The Rich Family In Our Church
By Eddie Ogan
I'll never forget Easter 1946. I was 14, my little sister Ocy 12, and my older sister Darlene 16. We lived at home with our mother, and the four of us knew what it was like to do without many things. My dad had died five years before, leaving Mom with seven school kids to raise and no money. By 1946, my older sisters were married, and my brothers had left home.
A month before Easter, the pastor of our church announced that a special Easter offering would be taken to help a poor family. He asked everyone to save and give sacrificially. When we got home, we talked about what we could do. We decided to buy 50 pounds of potatoes and live on them for a month. This would allow us to save $20 of our grocery money for the offering. Then we thought that if we kept our electric lights turned out as much as possible and didn't listen to the radio, we'd save money on that month's electric bill. Darlene got as many house and yard cleaning jobs as possible, and both of us baby sat for everyone we could. For 15 cents, we could buy enough cotton loops to make three potholders to sell for $1. We made $20 on potholders.
That month was one of the best of our lives. Every day we counted the money to see how much we had saved. At night we'd sit in the dark and talk about how the poor family was going to enjoy having the money the church would give them. We had about 80 people in our church, so we figured that whatever amount of money we had to give, the offering would surely be 20 times that much. After all, every Sunday the Pastor had reminded everyone to save for the sacrificial offering.
The day before Easter, Ocy and I walked to the grocery store and got the manager to give us three crisp $20 bills and one $10 bill for all our change. We ran all the way home to show Mom and Darlene. We had never had so much money before. That night we were so excited we could hardly sleep. We didn't care that we wouldn't have new clothes for Easter; we had $70 for the sacrificial offering. We could hardly wait to get to church! On Sunday morning, rain was pouring. We didn't own an umbrella, and the church was over a mile from our home, but it didn't seem to matter how wet we got. Darlene had cardboard in her shoes to fill the holes. The cardboard came apart, and her feet got wet, but we sat in church proudly, despite how we looked. I heard some teenagers talking about the Smith girls having on their old dresses. I looked at them in their new clothes, and I felt so rich.
When the sacrificial offering was taken, we were sitting on the second row from the front. Mom put in the $10 bill, and each of us girls put in a $20. As we walked home after church, we sang all the way. At lunch, Mom had a surprise for us. She had bought a dozen eggs, and we had boiled Easter eggs with our fried potatoes!
Late that afternoon the minister drove up in his car. Mom went to the door, talked with him for a moment, and then came back with an envelope in her hand. We asked what it was, but she didn't say a word. She opened the envelope and out fell a bunch of money. There were three crisp $20 bills, one $10 bill, and seventeen $1 bills. Mom put the money back in the envelope. We didn't talk, but instead, just sat and stared at the floor. We had gone from feeling like millionaires to feeling like poor white trash.
We kids had had such a happy life that we felt sorry for anyone who didn't have our mom and dad for parents and a house full of brothers and sisters and other kids visiting constantly. We thought it was fun to share silverware and see whether we got the fork or the spoon that night. We had two knives which we passed around to whoever needed them. I knew we didn't have a lot of things that other people had, but I'd never thought we were poor. That Easter Day I found out we were poor. The minister had brought us the money for the poor family, so we must be poor.
I didn't like being poor. I looked at my dress and worn-out shoes and felt so ashamed that I didn't want to go back to church. Everyone there probably already knew we were poor! I thought about school. I was in the ninth grade and at the top of my class of over 100 students. I wondered if the kids at school knew we were poor. I decided I could quit school since I had finished the eighth grade. That was all the law required at that time.
We sat in silence for a long time. Then it got dark, and we went to bed. All that week, we girls went to school and came home, and no one talked much. Finally on Saturday, Mom asked us what we wanted to do with the money. What did poor people do with money? We didn't know. We'd never known we were poor.
We didn't want to go to church on Sunday, but Mom said we had to. Although it was a sunny day, we didn't talk on the way. Mom started to sing, but no one joined in and she only sang one verse. At church we had a missionary speaker. He talked about how churches in Africa made buildings out of sun-dried bricks, but they need money to buy roofs. He said $100 would put a roof on a church. The minister said, "Can't we all sacrifice to help these poor people?"
We looked at each other and smiled for the first time in a week. Mom reached into her purse and pulled out the envelope. She passed it to Darlene. Darlene gave it to me, and I handed it to Ocy. Ocy put it in the offering plate. When the offering was counted, the minister announced that it was a little over $100. The missionary was excited. He hadn't expected such a large offering from our small church. He said, "You must have some rich people in this church."
Suddenly it struck us! We had given $87 of that "little over $100." We were the rich family in the church! Hadn't the missionary said so? Deep down, I knew that we were actually a rich family.
Last week the moon was full. One morning I saw the moon setting it looked so amazing. The picture doesn't even come close to showing how pretty it was.
At the same time the sun was beginning to rise.
It was a memorable experience. On one side of road to the western horizon the moon was setting and on the other side of the road to the eastern horizon the sun was coming up.
I imagine that the timing of the sunrise this time of year made this possible. I don't think it happens every full moon.
I like to use the site Date and Time to look up sunrise and sunset times. They have some other handy tools and astronomical information on that site.
I took this picture while out walking on the morning of February 1st. The frost was so pretty that morning. I was hoping for a good photo opportunity. This picture turned out better than I could have imagined. The sun rays must have pasted through some ice crystals and split into colors just as I snapped my shot.
The verse is from a memory passage that was part of the five-a-month verses that our church does. This was actually from the first month we began attending back in May of 2023. I had some heavy things on my heart at the time. When I looked up the memory verses after the first service that we attended I was so amazed at how well they articulate what I wanted to say to the LORD. I was able to put them to a tune and commit them to memory within a day or two.
Here is the resulting Bible verse song. Perhaps it will be a blessing to you.
A self enclosed seam is one way to finish a seam and keep the raw edges from unraveling.
#1. Trim one side of the seam allowance down to about 1/8".
#2. Fold the long side of the seam allowance over twice to enclosed the short trimmed side of the seam allowance. Pressing is advisable. (I didn't.)
#3. Pin or baste the folded edge to keep the seam enclosed while you stitch everything in place.
#4. Stich the folded part in place. This can do done on a machine or by hand. The stitching is not seen from the outside of the garment.
You can barely see my stitches in this picture. I am going to have to take another picture using a darker thread so you can see what I am doing.
That is better. There are few stitch choices to choose from if you hand stitch this. A running stitch, ladder stitch, or slip stitch would all work. What I am doing here is a whip stitch.
Have you ever used a self enclosed seam technique? What is your favorite way to finish seams?
"The aim and final reason of all music should be none else but the glory of God
and refreshing the soul.
Where this is not observed there will be no music but only a devilish hubbub."
- Johann Sebastian Bach
I never knew a whole lot about Bach or his music, although, there are a few pieces of Bach's music that I have loved over the years. I, also, had heard a little of his testimony as a Christian, which endeared me to learn more about his works.
I recently have listened to a series of lectures from The Great Courses by professor Robert Greenberg. I also listened to and audio version of Johann Sebastian Bach by Rich Marschall. What information I am going to share in this blog post is based on what I can remember of this course and book.
Johann Sebastian Bach lived from 1685 to 1750. He composed a massive amount of music. His compositions were in the highly ornamented baroque style. Most of his works were for church services. Bach was a devoted Lutheran. He lived in Germany his whole life and never traveled over 300 miles from his place of birth.
His Bible has been discovered and preserved. It is a German Bible translated by Luther. Bach made notes in the margins of his Bible so historians are able to get an idea of how personal his faith was to him.
At the top of the page of a vast majority of his compositions he wrote Jesus, juva meaning Jesus, help me. And at the conclusion of his pieces he wrote the abbreviation for to God alone be the glory in Latin: S.D.G.
Not only did Bach write religious music he also wrote music for birthdays, weddings, and entertainment. One of my favorite pieces of his compositions (Sheep May Safely Graze) was written for some important person's birthday.
Bach was born into a musical family, which no doubt contributed to his skill, but there is no denying that he had a special musical genius. He was truly gifted by God. His music transcends time and language. Those who hear the beauty in his music can hardly help themselves from thinking of their Creator, regardless of personal faith or religious beliefs. At least that is what I see in the comment section of Bach performances on YouTube. And that is how I feel about many of his most famous pieces. Bach strove to glorify God and I think he was supernaturally blessed to be able to make music that lives on after himself and points the listeners to a Being greater than themselves, the only Being possessing the power to create life and all things lovely: God Almighty.
Bach was a devoted father and by all accounts lead a happy family. The Bach family was very large. His first wife, Barbara, gave birth to 7 children. After Barbara's early death Bach married Anna Magdalena. Anna had 13 children. Sadly, infant mortality being what it was in those days only 10 Bach children survived to adulthood. Bach taught his children music and how to play the organ and maybe other instruments that I can't remember. Bach's wives and children helped him to make hand copies of music to pass out to the all singers and musicians every week. There were no copy machines back then!
About a hundred years after Bach's death someone cataloged what works of his that could be found. (This is still an ongoing project.) Much of his music is lost to time, but well over a thousand compositions remain to this day.
Random facts:
>Bach was big fan of coffee.
>When renovations were done on the Church where Bach's body had been inturned they measured his skeleton and said he must have been about 5'7" tall and had a large head.
>Bach's music has been sent to outer space. The Voyager space craft carries a golden record to represent mankind's best musical art and three of Bach's compositions were included.
Here are a few of my favorite pieces of music by Bach. Please tell me if you have any Bach favorites in the comment section!
Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring This is a part of Cantata BWV 147 This is the song that I walked down the aisle to during our wedding ceremony.
This is an arrangement for guitar and cello.
Sheep May Safely Graze This is a part of Cantata BWV 208 This song was also played at my wedding!
This is an arrangement for piano.
Prelude from Cello Suite No.1 in Major BWV 1007
This is only the prelude. The whole suite runs about 18 minutes. The prelude is so pleasant. It makes me think of all the beautiful things in the world; the people who I love, babies being born, sunsets and mountain peaks, the sound of the ocean, green leaves unfurling, and the way fresh clean air feels in your nostrils.
Cantata BWV 140 also known as Sleepers Awake
I was introduced to this song by the lecture series. At first my favorite part was movement 4, and then I really liked movement 6, too, and then I listened to the whole thing and decided that I like the whole thing altogether. This cantata was written to be sang during a church service. The scripture reading for the particular Sunday was the story of the ten virgins waiting for the bridegroom to come. The words of the Cantata parallel the message from the ten virgins story. All the words are in German but I was able to find a video with the English translation written on the screen. After reading the translation the vocal music seemed to come alive for me, even though I still can't understand exactly what they are saying. I am able to catch on to the spirit of what they are singing.
Last year I bought a gingerbread house cookie cutter set. The recipe on the back of the package worked well. I used the same recipe this time.
I made a triple batch and it was the perfect amount. We made 5 houses and had a few spare parts. If we hadn't needed our spare parts we could've made 6 houses.
Gingerbread Triple Batch
1 1/2 cups Butter, room temperature
1 cup Sugar
1 cup Molasses
1 TBS. Ground Cinnamon
1 TBS. Ground Ginger
1 TBS. Baking Soda
3 Egg Yolks
1 TBS. Vanilla Flavoring
3/4 Salt
6 cups Flour
Place sugar, molasses, cinnamon, and ginger in large sauce pot over medium low heat. Bring to a boil, stirring frequently.
Remove from heat.
Stir in baking soda.
Stir in butter one tablespoon at a time, sitting well after each addition. (Room temperature butter is really helpful for this step.)
Add egg yolks, vanilla, and salt, stirring to combine.
Add flour, a cupful at a time, stirring to combine.
Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until dough comes together and is no longer sticky, adding flour a tablespoon at a time of necessary.
Place dough in refrigerator for 2 hours or until thoroughly chilled.
Divide dough into 6 sections. Working with one section at a time, to each section to 1/8 inch thickness. Cut out cookie and house pieces. Place on cookie sheet.
Bake at 325°F. for 12-18 minutes or until edges are lightly brown.
Remove from oven.
Cool on cooling racks.
Once cool assemble with royal icing.
Royal Icing (AKA Construction Glue)
3 Egg Whites
3 1/2 - 4 cups Powdered Sugar
Beat with whisk to form thick icing. Spoon into plastic bags. Snip a small hole in the corner of each plastic bag to make a piping bag.
