If you are looking for a coffee cake recipe that is moist, buttery, and has an irrestibly good crumb topping, this is the coffee cake for you.     (My sweet tooth has been getting to me lately!)



I found this recipe here.

Easy Coffee Cake
Cook Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/3 cup shortening
• 1 beaten egg
• 1/2 cup buttermilk
• Topping (below)

Preparation:

Sift together flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, and soda. Cut in shortening until mixture resembles coarse meal. Combine egg and buttermilk; stir into the flour mixture. Spread into a greased and floured 8-inch round or square cake pan. Sprinkle with topping and bake at 350° for 30 minutes.

Topping

• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon
• 2 tablespoons melted butter
• 1/2 cup chopped pecans

Combine topping ingredients; sprinkle over coffee cake batter just before baking.

(I added 1 1/2 cups of chopped pecans instead of just 1/2 cups)

Enjoy!

My children love chocolate chip cookies the best... and we love the Nestle Toll House recipe.   But I prefer to use that same recipe and eliminate the chocolate chips to make "Chocolate Chipless Cookies".  They are really buttery, and I just substitute pecans where the chocolate chips should be.   They're so much better that way to me.

What is your favorite cookie recipe?

I'm sorry if these images take a long time for some of you to download. I know some of them are really big.  
Here is what the backdrop looked like when it was finished today. I would have liked to have added more but ran out of time.  This will work though!   I will post another picture once it's in church!

Inside the house, it's just too large to take a picture of all at once.   Here is the right side (Bonnie wanted to look like she's looking into the kangaroo's eyes):


And here is the left side.  


This is what you can barely make out in the left corner in the above picture:


Some more close-ups:

Just a quick post to share an update on the VBS backdrop!

I can't believe I actually did it.  

I did something I've tried to avoid doing for years....I have to tell you, I have long adored Bonnie's beautiful, long locks of hair.  She has hair I have always thought was gorgeous (my husband too), and so it was very hard to do this.

For the last few years, it has gotten harder and harder to brush Bonnie's hair. I can use all of the detangling spray, and all of the conditioner I want- those tangles and knots aren't coming out unless I work with her hair for an hour or more each time.  And she cries the entire time because it's pulling so hard on her head and I hate doing it, and try avoiding it a lot of the time.

 And her hair ends up looking really messy if I don't work with it like that... if I do brush it and take the time to work with it, it looks great, but the next morning, it's all matted again.  She always begged me not to brush her hair.  It was just miserable trying to get her hair looking good every day.  

Bonnie has been asking me for a long time, ever since I got my hair cut (It was almost down to my waist before I cut it), if I would let her get her hair cut too...and I kept telling her, "We'll see..."

But finally, I decided to go for it.

Here she is in the chair, with her beautiful hair draped over.  I kept thinking to myself, "I sure am going to miss that beautiful hair!"...





Bonnie was just thrilled about the haircut, and she couldn't wait to see what it would look like.


And when it was over, she was just so delighted with the results.
Look at the smile on her face. She was just beaming the whole way home.


She loved the way it looked, said that it felt so much lighter, and was easier to brush, and just felt great-  She was tickled pink.    And WOW, she looks so much older now.   I can't believe how big my little Bonnie has gotten.


I think that it was a good decision...i'll still miss that beautiful long hair, but I'll probably have a lot of fun with the shorter hair too.   Maybe she'll actually LIKE letting me play with her hair now.


Oh and I came across this picture of Bonnie when she was 4.  Wasn't she just adorable (speaking as a mother who is obviously biased)?

 

It seems like it wasn't that long ago when she looked like this!   She's definitely growing up. 

Chef Michele, from Ripening on the Vine, let me know that she had  awarded me with this nice blog award the other day.   
Thank you so much, Michele...that was so nice of you.
 

The "rules" for this award are that you list 7 things that you love, link back to the person that gave you the award and pass the award on to 7 other bloggers. So here is my list of what I love and who I would like to bless with this award.

I love...

1.  Getting to spend time with my husband.  I look forward to getting to be around him..he's my best friend.   I was very blessed when God chose to let us be together.

2.  Seeing my children treat each other nicely, playing together and running up and down the hills around our house.    Or seeing them give each other an unexpected huge or do a nice deed for each other. 

3. Doing something new and creative, and sharing it with others.   Whether it's a mural, or some kind of little crafty thing, I absolutely love working on a new project and seeing it to completion. The feeling of accomplishment after it's over is one thing that keeps me going.

4. The encouragment of fellow believers in Christ- many of whom I have met through this blog.  We lift each other up.  

5. Seeing a beautiful scene and being able to snap a picture of it so I'll never forget it.   What would I do without my camera?

6. Cooking something that I've never cooked, or even heard of before sometimes.  I love experimenting with new recipes and sharing them with others.

7. Having a clean house, as rare as that is these days. lol    I always feel happier when the house is clean, although it rarely gets to a point where I'm completely satisfied!

Here are 7 blogs that I would like to pass the award onto, and who have been an encouragement and inspiration to me because of their creativity.

1. Debra at Days of Grace

2. Carla at Four by 40

3. Sandra at My Inspired Heart

4. Rose at The Shabby Shelf5.  Warren at My Home Among the Hills

6. Melody at Handmade for Life

7. Mommy the Human Napkin

Thank you to all who responded in my last Poll!   I have closed the poll now...there were 53 respondants in all!  

I have a little surprise for all of you who commented in response to the poll- Every one of you was entered into a drawing for a free pencil portrait from my website, Bethany Kerr Fine Art!

(Example of my pencil portraits- a picture I drew of my daughter a few years back.)


I used Random.org to select the winner.   The randomly chosen number was 9.    FRAN, from "Fran Takes 30 Minutes" was the 9th commenter, so she won!    CONGRATULATIONS FRAN!    



What was the reason for this?  I wanted to do something to celebrate the new beginning of my website, Bethany Kerr Fine Art.   It  was completely redesigned this month!   My sister came up with the beautiful design for the front page, and a man named Travis Almand (my friend's husband) reprogrammed the entire site and built it back up from scratch, removing all of the unnecessary things I had put in there, and making it very clean, professional, and organized!      It looks so much better than it did before.

I am so very thankful for the work that he put into putting my website together.    I love the way he has made thumbnails on the left side (of the drawings and murals pages), and when you click them, the image shows up on the right.     I was never able to do this myself, as I only know the bare basics of HTML...and my site before was full of unnecessary of unworking links- he removed them and made it look so much better.  Please visit Travis' site if you're interested in having your site redesigned.    He does some great work. 

To all of the others who commented on the poll, I am giving a 50 percent discount on my usual portrait prices if you choose to ever have a drawing made!     This offer will last for 3 months, ending on September 24, 2009.     

I will be adding new drawings to my site very soon, so be sure to check in when you can.

If you get a chance, please comment below to answer the poll...
********************************************************************
Do you:

a.)  Get all of my new posts through the email.

b.)  Check out my blog every so often, but don't have it bookmarked. .

c.) Have my site bookmarked in your favorites and visit frequently.

d.) Other.

Curious minds want to know!

Sheriff Noah's in town!

I posted about the Vacation Bible School backdrop I'm working on the other day, and I thought I'd post and update on how it's coming along.  It's moving along much more quickly than I expected it to.   



This sheet (actually, a fewsheets sewn together) is about 13 feet high, and is 22 feet long!


I'm playing it by ear right now...I've got a few clipart images that I'm using for reference...I'm not sure what I'm going to put to the left of the train yet... there are Kangaroo pictures, pictures of a water tower, a dingo, some rocks and trees...  i'll just have to see if I can somehow fit them all together.