Sepia Saturday

This is Sr. Rogata. She is my grandpa Jim's sister who was a nun here in San Antonio at Our Lady of the Lake.

The picture last week was taken at OLL at her anniversary.

She wasn't just here in San Antonio. She taught all over the state and Oklahoma and then retired to OLL and was there until she passed in 2005. She was the sweetest, kindest, most caring person you could ever meet.

Cake Class Final

I had my final cake class for Course 1 last night. It's amazing to see where I am now!

The decorations are a little more "traditional" than what I like, but I now know how to use the tips and translate things into how I can decorate cupcakes.

I have signed up for Course 2 that starts in March, and I am so excited!!!

Any guesses?

What do you think this could be?





This is what a strawberry plant looks like after all of it's leaves have been stripped.

A few weeks ago, I bought two strawberry plants and put them in a hanging basket. I brought them in last week because it was supposed to be below freezing a few nights. On Saturday night, we went next door for a beer tasting. When we got home around 1:30 (yes a.m.), I noticed this little pile of green in the middle of the floor. I turned on the lights, checked it out, and realized that is was chewed up strawberry leaves! OMG! I ran over to the plant and saw that there wasn't a leaf left!

I have no idea what came over my dogs. I think Bayla was the one that did it. Rylie munched on a few leaves when I first got the plant, but stopped after that. Bayla kept hacking like he had something stuck in his throat. Ugh. Maybe this is a sign that I don't need to have a garden again this year!

Sepia Saturday

I saw this on another blog and really liked the idea.

I am huge into family history and I love looking through old photos.

This picture was taken in the late '50s, I think 1959, on the steps at the Cathedral at Our Lady of the Lake in San Antonio. This is my dad (the little boy on his dad's left) and his family. They were there to celebrate, I believe, the 25th anniversary of his aunt, Sr. Rogata, becoming a nun.

In 2004, we had a family reunion in Kerrville. Since everyone was in town, we decided to drive into San Antonio and recreate that picture almost exactly. Then for Christmas that year, my grandparents and all the siblings got a frame that included the first picture and this one.

This picture includes my aunt Monica. In 1959, she was just a 'gleam in Grandpa's eye.' She wasn't born until 1961. :)

Then each family that was there, took a similar picture. We just have to remember to go back in 25 years to recreate it!

And then everyone who was there got in it.

Cake Class

For the past three weeks I have been taking a cake decorating class at Michael's. I have kind of self-taught myself decorating over the years, but really wanted to take a class to learn some of the things that I hadn't learned yet.

I completely forgot to take a picture of my cake last week, but was not going to miss out this week!

We worked on perfecting the roses, learned how to make the clowns, small flowers, and borders. These pictures really don't do it justice!

I loved my clowns!! Wilton makes little plastic clown heads that you put on top of the body, but you have to buy those and I really didn't want them. It was looking like my clown was just going to have to be headless! But as soon as I got done with the body, I decided to use some of the really stiff icing to make a round head and put it on the body. One of the other girls saw that and decided to do it as well. And then it spread around the room!! Yeah it doesn't have a face, but I think it turned out really cute!

These are the little flowers we learned to make! I love them!! The color was called 'Rose,' so I assumed it was going to be a pastel color. Ha! Yeah right, it is bright, bright pink!

And these are the roses! They leave a little to be desired, but they are getting better.

I have really had a lot of fun taking this class! I am thinking of going on to Course 2 in March!

Mardi Gras

I just had to post this pic!

Josh and I went out to eat last night because I really didn't feel like cooking anything. We headed up the road to Willie's and had a pretty good time. They were handing out beads and partying for Mardi Gras. So, when we got home, we decided to see if the dogs would wear them.

This is the one and only picture I could get.
They were having none of it! As you can see, I caught Rylie in the middle of a bark, and Bayla is thinking he saw a squirrel outside. I'm really not sure what Josh was doing! :)

Four months

It just hit me yesterday that it's been 4 months since my lay off. Ugh! This really doesn't get any easier. In fact, it feels like it's getting harder. I don't know what else I need to do to actually get a job!

I guess I should bake some more cupcakes!

Happy Valentine's Day!

This was a low key V-Day for us. We both had work to do, so we didn't get to spend too much time together. We did make dinner yesterday evening, but that was it. I am not a big fan of Valentine's as it is. I think it's just turned out to be all for making money.

I did make some cupcakes though! Red Velvet with White Chocolate Cream Cheese frosting. YUM! They turned out pretty well. The cake was a little dry, but the frosting was delicious!! And earlier last week, I melted some red candy melts and piped it into hearts and "LOVE" words that I put on the frosting. They turned out really cute!!

Josh said his coworkers loved them! And he even caught one of them throwing out the red heart from on top because he thought it was wax or something! Ha!!

Rain rain go away

I never thought I would wish the rain away, especially after the summer we had, but this week has really sucked with the cold and raininess. It has been rainy and wet, which hasn't really helped my attitude. It's pretty depressing to not have a job right now, and this weather has been helping any.

And I seriously think my dogs are suffering from SAD - Seasonal Affective Disorder!! They have been moping around the house all week! You can tell their mood is depressed. I'm guessing they are sad that they can't go out and play!

Hopefully this weather will clear out so we can go out and play!