strawberry shortcake

My mother-in-law is so thoughtful.  She knows how much I love strawberries and especially how much I love her strawberry shortcake.  We get to Florida every year right at the end of strawberry season, and she always has some for us.  And I can almost guarantee that dessert at our first meal at their house will be strawberry shortcake.   Yes, there was strawberry deliciousness this time too!!

I didn't used to like strawberry shortcake, because I'm not a huge fan of the sponge cake that is usually the "shortcake".  It's too sweet or I don't like the texture.  Not sure.  I would often just eat the strawberries and cream and leave the sponginess.

But then I met Brian and was introduced to this other type of strawberry shortcake that I did not know existed.  Oh my goodness it's sooooooo good!  For years I assumed it was something his mom made from scratch and I would not be able to replicate (like the green beans - I've given up on them).  But a few years ago I just asked how she made it and......get this.....she used the recipe on the back of the Bisquick box!  What?!  It's that simple and I've been limiting my strawberry shortcake intake to once a year?  (I didn't feel so naive when I heard Beth ask her the same question last week - at least I wasn't the only one who thought it was a special recipe handed down for generations).  So for the last few years, we've been enjoying strawberry shortcake any time we want!  Even in the winter.  Although it's definitely best when the strawberries are fresh from the patch!

So, since strawberry season is quickly approaching those of us in the big M-O, 

I wanted to share this deceivingly easy recipe in case some of you are sponge dislikers like me and have yet to discover the goodness on the back of the big yellow box :)

(See I made it again the day after we got home from Florida, I missed it so much)

Strawberry Shortcake

4 cups strawberries, chopped into bite size pieces

1/2 cup granulated sugar

2 1/3 cups Bisquick mix

1/2 cup milk

3 Tbsp granulated sugar

3 Tbsp butter or margarine, melted

1/2 cup whipping cream or 1 container Cool Whip

Mix the strawberries with 1/2 cup of sugar and set aside.  Heat oven to 425.

Stir the Bisquick mix, milk, 3 Tbsp sugar, and melted butter until soft dough forms.  Drop by 6 spoonfuls onto an ungreased cookie sheet.

Bake 10-12 minutes or until they start to turn a golden brown.  Split the warm shortcakes.  Once the sugar has dissolved with the strawberries, fill the shortcake with strawberries and top with more strawberries and whipped topping.  (I did not have whipped topping the other night, so my picture is lacking that - I like it just as well or better without it, but I think I'm probably in the minority on that).

You can see the original recipe at the Betty Crocker website.  It's almost exactly the same and is probably easier to print out!

Florida Trip - Part 1

I said yesterday we had a GREAT time in Florida!  I'm still enjoying just sorting through all the photos.  I had become a little too relaxed about taking pictures and made a conscious effort to capture lots of different moments on this trip and in our lives in general.  And I'm pretty happy with my efforts.  I thought I would just share a little at a time as I sort through them.

So, this part 1 (of how many parts, I don't know - I just go with what comes to me) is highlights of the road trip down.  The trip down is always more pleasant than the trip back home, because we're all looking forward to seeing family and friends and relaxing.  The trip home.....not so much.  Mostly in bad moods cause we have to go back to "normal" life :)

So we started the trip off like we do each and every trip to Florida - a stop at Zaxby's.  Oh how I wish they would take up residence in Missouri!  Mmmmm.....I can still taste that crunchy chicken, that Zax sauce, and of course the crinkle fries.  Everyone in my family knows that we stop at Zaxby's for lunch (often as soon as we hit the closest one to us, which is in Clarksville, TN if anyone wants to know) or I will not be a happy camper!

I love this leg of the trip.  A little northwest of Chattanooga.  You travel through a small amount of mountains and it's beautiful.  Especially in the spring or fall.  We were able to catch some glimpses of pink this time and also some low lying clouds tucked into the valleys.  So pretty.

This is my friend Joannie.  

We taught next to each other for about 5 years when I worked in Georgia.  I can't remember the last time I saw her, but we are pretty sure it's been at least 6 years.  I loved teaching next to her.  She is so good at balancing work and family and was definitely my mentor for that.  And what a great friend!  I used to go house hunting with her, I would hang out at her house with her boys before I had any boys of my own, she came and helped me when I did have boys.  She's the one that first told me "little boys love their mamas".   And recently I got a surprise package in the mail from her....

It was a t-shirt from her school's Relay for Life.  She had added my name along with her sister's onto the list of fellow fighters and survivors on the back and had walked for us.  What a humbling gesture.  I love her!

And can you tell that our boys instantly became good friends?  They had a blast!  Wish we lived closer.  Wish we could have seen her oldest (who is driving now - I taught him when he was in kindergarten - where does the time go?) and her husband, too.  We missed you guys!

We usually spend one night in a hotel during the entire trip, and the boys were super excited about getting to swim.  Imagine how disappointed they were to find out the pool was outside and closed for the season :(

Bonus for me, though, cause that meant there was time to walk across the parking lot to one of my favorite ice cream places ever - Bruster's.  The status of the clientele was a bit questionable as they were apparently celebrating St. Patty's Day a night early, so we ordered and took it back to the room to avoid having to dance a jig or something.  I have to say that I got the chocolate raspberry truffle and highly recommend it if you are an Atlantan.  But don't tell me if you get it cause I'll be extremely jealous.

And that ended our day.  Watching the NCAA tourney and eating Bruster's.  It was actually my birthday, and I was pretty happy with all that I had been blessed with just in this one day.  Definitely a reminder to myself that God gives us way more than we deserve!

what is THAT?

WARNING:  You may or may not be grossed out by the not-so-flattering picture below.  Just so you know.  I debated posting it, but figured we had been through a lot together and you could handle it :)

We had a GREAT time in sunny Florida last week.  I'm still going through the pictures, but there are some fun ones!  Most of the reason I haven't sorted through them (besides the mounds of laundry) is that I haven't been feeling all that great.

The day before we left for FL, I had my mammogram (which, if you're not on Facebook, turned out AWESOME!!!).  Let me say that mammograms are not comfortable to begin with, but I wasn't even thinking that my port would bring that uncomfortableness to a whole new level!  So the next day and all weekend, I felt like the area around my port was really sore.  In fact, sharp shooting pain would come out of nowhere - you know the kind that tends to take your breath away and you start thinking something is really wrong?  It just kept getting worse, but I really just thought it was from the port being pulled on and that it would go away once I had time to relax and wind down from vacation and sleep in my own bed.

Not so.  By Tuesday I had this weird rash show up around my neckline on my left side.  Brian thought it was poison ivy.  I could not think of one instance where I had been anywhere near poison ivy.  I thought at first it was an allergic reaction to the sunscreen from the day before, but that didn't make sense since it was only on one side of my neck.  Then we thought maybe it was an allergic reaction to some bug bites that we got the night we got to Orlando.  I didn't remember getting bit on my neck, but who knows?  The rash and the pain persisted, but it wasn't enough to keep me away from all of our excursions (important places like the beach, visiting family, Universal Studios, the beach, etc.).

We stayed with Chris and Lynda on the way home.  Chris is well experienced in poison ivy and confirmed that it definitely was not poison ivy.  I started thinking maybe it was Rubella.  I've been vaccinated for it 4 times and it hasn't been successful any one of them.  I looked it up on my phone, but the symptoms really didn't match up.

This was Sunday.  I was a total grouch.  We had been in the car for close to 15 hours and I was done.  I didn't feel good and everything was pushing my buttons.  I'm pretty sure I yelled at the kids every time they opened their mouths.  I knew as soon as I opened my mouth that I should just shut it.  I apologized later.  I just didn't feel good.  By the time we got home and got unpacked, I felt achy all over.  It was very Neulasta-like.  I hadn't missed that feeling in the past 5 months and didn't care to feel it again.  But that really wasn't my choice, huh?

I ended up taking some Nyquil just so that I could sleep.  I couldn't get out of bed the next morning.  Thank goodness Brian didn't have to go in till later that morning.  When I finally did crawl out of my stupor, I called the nurse at my surgeon's office.  She called back later to say that they didn't think it had anything to do with my port or my mammogram.  So I got an appointment with my dermatologist for Tuesday morning.

"I hate to tell you this, but you have a case of the SHINGLES."

Huh?  I thought only older people got that.  Nope.  Apparently, it's common in cancer patients because of their lowered immunity.  Which I thought my immunity was pretty good since it's been 2 months since radiation ended, but I'm finding out that I'm wrong about that (first the never-ending cold/sinus/virus thing that lasted from December to February and now this).  

Anyway, she said that it comes on due to stress or an illness.  Hmmmmm.  So the week before vacation was a bit stressful, and I think we all agree I've had a bit of an illness.  Note to self:  stress is BAD.  Pray.  Relax.  Take care of yourself.  Eat right.  Exercise.  Enjoy life.

So I have this lovely horse pill to take every meal to keep the shingles from spreading any more than it already has.  I have pain meds to help me sleep (which I'm not sure I had enough of last night) and still just generally don't feel good but pretty functional.  One of the icky parts is that I can't really be in close contact with other people.  Especially kids or anyone with suppressed immune systems.  Since I don't know who that might be, I've just been trying to lay low.  I did sneak out to lunch and little window shopping with B this afternoon, but that wore me out and I napped the rest of the day.

Is it just me or does anyone else think there is something just funny about the word "shingles"?  Not funny like, Tommy Tuberville or Shaka Star or any other fun sports names like that, but funny in a negative way.  I don't really even like to say it.  I may as well be saying "the plague" for some reason.  That's what it seems to me.  Maybe because you kind of have to quarantine yourself.  I don't know.  And they don't look like shingles one bit.  I may have to consult my pharmacist about all of that.

seeing nothing

I know I've been bad about keeping up with this lately.  I'm sorry.  I'm not sure how to do better at it, but I promise I am trying to figure that out.

Tomorrow (Thursday) is my follow-up visit with my surgeon along with my first mammogram since chemo and radiation ended.  It's not technically a diagnostic one, but more just to get a new baseline.  I've known this was coming up for months.  Three different doctors have talked to me about it.  But I guess I had other things on my mind at the time.  I really hadn't thought much about it, except that I didn't want to forget the appointment (which is so unlike me but I've done it twice in the past few months at the dentist - yet they still act like they love us - yep, that's the kind of people they are there).  But in the past week or so it has hit me that this really means a lot more to me. 

It means getting to actually SEE that the tumor is gone. 

I trust my doctors 100% when they tell me that it's gone, but actually seeing it NOT THERE will just be icing on the cake for me. 

It also means getting to see NO OTHER tumors or signs of cancer. 

That's our prayer right now. 

That all of the surgeries, chemo treatments and radiation treatments have done the jobs that God designed them to do and that they've done them really well! 

So we're asking for prayers for tomorrow's mammogram to be clear of anything negative and to get a good report.

zoo trip

The boys and I headed to the Zoo last Monday while they were out of school for Presidents' Day.  They have had so many days out of school lately, due to illness, holidays, work days, etc.  I knew that for all of us to be sane by the end of the day that we had to get out of the house.  For some reason they didn't really want to go at first,  but we went anyway with the agreement that we would eat lunch, see the 3D movie and a few animals and go home.

So we ate lunch (FYI, the Lakeside Cafe is closed for renovations so the Painted Giraffe is the only place to eat right now and it is incredibly busy!) and came up with a game plan.  We would head to the monkeys' winter house since we rarely see that and then back to the movie.

On the way to see the monkeys, we stopped to watch the prairie dogs.

They were really fun to watch.  I don't remember them being so active before - either I don't remember right or they really inactive during the warmer months when we usually go.  It's most likely that I just don't remember.  They would jump in holes, out of holes, wrestle with each other, chatter.  The whole time we were watching I was wondering what they were saying to each other, because during our trip to San Fran a marine animal expert was talking to us about the sea lions out there and how they aren't sure exactly how they communicate with each other but that there is a guy who has been studying prairie dogs for over 20 years and can tell that they are communicating things like "the coyote is coming back", etc.  I found it fascinating, but I'm not sure my trip-mates did.  But they will appreciate that that's what I was thinking about while watching this!

We saw the monkeys (and I will add that I enjoyed watching them in their winter house much more than in their summer outdoor environment because they were so much more active and interactive) and then it was off to the 3D movie.

Yeah.....what to say about that?  Let's just say that we've now learned to always ask to make sure that the 3D machine is actually working before we buy tickets now.  Elliott was about to drive me crazy asking where the 3D glasses were.  I don't know what I was thinking - maybe you didn't need them for this particular movie?  I finally let him go ask the lady but he didn't make it to her before she closed the doors.  So I notice that no one else has theirs on so we must be ok.  But just to make sure I asked the girl behind me if they got any.  "No, she said something about the 3D machine being broken".  Hmmm.....would have been good info before we bought the tickets.  Oh well.

Then we hurried through the penguins' habitat - you have to hurry cause it smells so bad in there!  And then were on our way home.  Not without some complaints about not getting any Dippin' Dots, though.  I said it was too cold and they didn't need it.  So we stopped and got FroYo on the way home instead.  Because it was cold and they didn't need it :)

We had never been there before, but will definitely be going back!  We tried a few different flavors and decided that the Thin Mint was our favorite and really didn't care for the Strawberry Banana much.  As you can see, the boys prefer gummy worms with theirs.  I do not.  

Such a fun day with them.  Reminded me of summer when we can usually just pick up and do things like this.  Already collecting ideas of things to do this summer - can't wait!

a few faves

I found this at Trader Joe's about a week and a half ago and have already been back to get more.  I think I pretty much ate the entire bag myself.  And then I did what any good friend would do......I told Nyla about it so that she could become addicted too.  Sorry!!  It's just so good!  Something about the salty and sweet combo along with the crunchiness.  Mmmmmm.....

Words with Friends and Scramble with Friends.  

We're addicts.  

All four of us.  

I've been playing Words for a while, just not regularly.  It especially gave me something fun to do during those weeks of recovering from chemo.  But I only just introduced Brian and the boys to it in the past couple of weeks, and they can't get enough of it either.  So fun!

Eye-Fi

This is one of the best inventions in my opinion.

Amber gave it to me for my birthday last year, but I didn't set it up until after Christmas.  I know!  Ridiculous!  But I LOVE IT!!

It's a memory card for your camera, but it works wirelessly, so anytime I take a picture, once the camera is in range of my wireless network it goes ahead and uploads it to the computer.  I don't have to do anything! This is what it looks like on the screen when a new image is uploading.  Then I get an email saying I have a new batch of images uploaded so that I don't forget about them.

I know there is more to it than that - you can upload to your iPhone, iPad, view online, etc. but this is as far as I've gotten.  Thanks Amber!

nerf night

While I was having fun with the girls in CA, all of the boys at our house were gearing up for Nerf Night at church.  I believe that this has been the single most talked about event amongst the elementary kids the whole time I've been involved in any way!  At least that was the case at our house.

As you can see, we are serious when it comes to Nerf Night.  This is our friend David, who was definitely prepared for the evening of attack! Maybe gives another meaning to being "dressed in the full armor"  Ha!

This was Elliott's team behind Matt.  He's the one with the sunglasses on, just in case he needed to go into spy mode I suppose.  Love all those boys on his team!

And here they are reloading I guess.  I probably should have asked Brian about these before I started blogging about them.  

Ethan must have been getting some advice from Brian.  He looks a little intimidating with all of his warpaint, don't you think?  And see how Brian was in battle gear also?  I think the guys were really hoping to get in an adults round, but so many kids showed up that there was no time for that.

Love this picture of Ethan and Ty!  Don't mess with those boys!

Thank you Trudi for taking the fantastic pictures and sharing them!