Sylvia's Scenario

We spent our Labor Day weekend celebrating Bruce's birthday.  His actual birthday isn't until Wednesday but it was easier for everyone to get together this weekend.  So, we picked Saturday to celebrate with dinner, cake and presents at Lauren's house.  Since she lives so close to the zoo, we also decided to go to the zoo on Saturday.  But the festivities started on Friday when we picked up the grandkids for another sleepover at our house.  We all absolutely love sleepovers at our house.  We get so much more time with them and there is no rushing to get them back to their house.  We love it.  We took them down to the beach at Alki and spent most the afternoon there.    They can play a very long time there. We are getting better and better at knowing what to bring as far as snacks, toys, and now we also have a beach umbrella to provide us with some shade.     We were there so long that we took them home and went straight int...

Yesterday was Bruce's birthday and I decided to make his usual favorite cake - carrot cake, only gluten-free...and nobody could tell the difference. I used a recipe from the same blog that I used for Lauren's birthday cake called Downshiftology . It's a Paleo food blog. I've discovered that Paleo people really like their sweets. So, if you want a good gluten-free recipe, check o ut the thousands of Paleo food blogs. After reading The Plant Paradox book, I decided to try out the diet and see if it helped my achy joints that I have from arthritis. Unfortunately, the P.P. diet is more than just gluten-free, although gluten-free is a large part of it. I'm finding that the gluten-free part is the easiest part of the P.P. diet. The P.P. diet's philosophy is to improve the bacteria in your G.I. tract by feeding the "good" bacteria and to starve the "bad" bacteria. Lectin, the protein in many foods (like grains), feed the "bad" ...

Yesterday was Bruce's birthday and we celebrated Monday by inviting my family over for our first official family barbecue at our new home in Seattle.  After all our moving, unpacking, re-organizing, figuring out where things should go, we were ready for a celebration. It feels so good to be moved in.   My kitchen is in great working order now so I was able to make Bruce's favorite cake for his birthday -  carrot cake . Everyone in my family was able to come since it was also Labor Day so we had 16 people here to break in our house. Bruce and I were very happy with the way everything flowed, lots of room for everyone to enjoy themselves whether it be to enjoy the view or to enjoy the smoked salmon that Bruce made or play a friendly game of ping pong in the basement or play with toys I've saved over the years, now for the next generation to enjoy. Our menu included our favorite  barbecued ribs   which we hadn'...

Carrot cake is a popular cake and many people's favorite kind of cake including my sister-in-law's so I decided to make one for her birthday party last night.  When making a cake, the first decision is what kind of pan to use, a 9 x 13 inch rectangle pan, round layer cake pans or a bundt cake pan. At least, those are the three kind of cakes I usually make.  When it comes to birthdays, I always picture a round layer cake with candles on top!  It just seems like a tradition.  Carrot cake is often made in a rectangle pan but since this was a birthday cake, I made it in round, layer cake pans. This shape is also a little more fancy for a special occasion…like a birthday.  This recipe is from  Martha Stewart  who makes it just the way we like it, a mildly spiced multiple layer cake with a generous amount of cream cheese frosting.   And I just happened to have some cute little carrot cake sprinkles to decorate the top.  You can usually fin...