Shutterfly Photobook!

I won a free hardcover Shutterfly Photobook from Shannon at Misguided Mommy last month! I just got around to organizing the photos I wanted and it arrived the other day. It's really nice! I decided to put together a small wedding album for my prize.

These are just some of the photos:

 

 Thanks Shannon!

Hot Day in the City!

It's my 3 day Memorial Day weekend! F.B. & I headed down to Center City Philadelphia today so we could visit the Mutter Museum and the Academy of Natural Sciences! We got off at 30th Street Station and walked to the Mutter Museum first, we went early because it's such a hot weekend. It was around 84 degrees (It will be in the upper 90's on Memorial Day, yuck!) I had to put sunscreen on because it was so sunny and hot today.

30th Street Station

After the Mutter we walked down Market Street to 19th Street and headed straight down to the Academy of Natural Sciences. We got to see Logan Square and the big fountain they have there. There's also a great view of the Philadelphia Museum of Art from the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. I've never actually gotten to stop here, so it was nice to be a tourist in my own city and take pictures!

Afterwards we went to the Academy of Natural Sciences, which I've been too many many times on class trips and family trips. It's one of my favorite museums.

F.B. with a dinosaur skull!

We were planning on going to The Gallery and Reading Terminal Market but because it was so hot and I had a bad headache we decided to make that another day trip sometime soon. We took the train back home and headed to Friendly's for lunch. We shared a Reece's Pieces sundae for dessert.

Heading home on the train

I also won this psychedelic shark from the crane machine at Friendly's on the first try! Whoo hoo! My Dad has always been really good at winning stuffed animals from those machines and I've won quite a few times as well, though it's been awhile since I last played!

Wanda E. Brunstetter Books

I was Walmart one day and stumbled upon Wanda E. Brunstetter's books. I like that there's more than one story in every book. So it's like having 3-4 books in one. She writes about young Amish woman. If you like historical fiction books, you will probably like these books as well. Some are drama, some are romance, etc.

These are the ones I own:














































(I do use Amazon Associates, but not because I've made any money- because I haven't! lol! But I like that I can show a picture/link with a book or music when I'm blogging. Plus I do recommend Amazon.com for their low prices. That or Ebay!)

Let baking cakes be...

I made a lemon layer cake today, but sadly I peeked in the oven before it was done and as I was looking the air went out of each cake like a balloon. So my poor cakes had a flat middle on each layer... My Mom made up a saying, "Let baking cakes be..." and it's true, lol!

I never saw such a sad pitiful looking cake!!! As soon as we cut it, it collapsed in on itself! :-(

I had a hard time finding a recipe for a lemon cake, all of them had 3 layers or more. So I decided to take the cake recipe from The Pioneer Woman's coffee cake- literally, and replace the coffee in the cake and icing with fresh lemon juice and lemon zest. It tasted amazing, it just didn't look too pretty!

Replace the coffee in the cake and icing recipe with:

• 1/4 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice
• 1 teaspoon lemon zest
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Hopefully your lemon cake will look better than mine!

F.B. also got me a really nice heavy duty metal meat tenderizer from Walmart. It's awesome! (It's great for taking out stress/life frustrations when cooking too, lol!) I'm making beef with onion and mushrooms fried up in a pan tonight and served with mashed potatoes and peas. (Last time we tried it with steak strips).

I tenderized the beef, cut it in small pieces and then I'm letting it soak in a marinade I make myself. I don't have exact measurements. I think less than 1/4 cup for everything, I just add as I go along. My steak marinade has:

• Little bit of water 
• Olive oil
• Soy Sauce
• Worcestershire sauce
• Brown sugar
• Teaspoon fresh garlic 
• Montreal Steak Seasoning

Then after tenderizing your steak, let it marinate several hours or overnight before cooking.

Moving on...

I had been a part of the Rat Chatter forums for almost 4 years. I joined back in October 2007 when I got my first two pet rats Sugar & Spice. Eventually, I became a moderator and got to work with a lot of amazing people, like Brittney from Star's Rat Rescue.

Sadly and unexpectedly the Rat Chatter Forums closed on May 5th, 2011. We have still not heard from our good friends that ran and owned the forums and we hope they are alright.

I mentioned to Brittney it would be a good idea to start a forum for her rat rescue, somewhere to connect with adopters and our friends from the RC forums who we had gotten to know over the past 4 years. It took a few days, but the Star's Rat Rescue forum is now up and running. So rattie lovers and SRR Adopters are welcome to join us over at the new forum!