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Inspiration in Our Backyard
Thomas Edison and Henry Ford Winter Estates. Ft. Myers, Florida. Thomas Edison Quotes: My philosophy of life: Work and look on the bright side of everything. Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time. I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work. All progress, all success springs from thinking. If parents pass enthusiasm along to their children, they will leave them an estate of incalculable value. I would like to live about three hundred years. I think I have ideas enough to keep me busy that long.
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The 12 Pounds of Christmas
This little carol is brought to you by my bathroom scale which insists on climbing to new heights. I’m telling myself it has to be muscle from all the weights I’ve been lifting. Those gallons of egg nog and apple cider are really heavy. On the first pound of Christmas, my true love gave to me… A bag of Cape Cod potato chips On the second pound of Christmas, my true love gave to me… Two Fudge Ritz crackers On the third pound of Christmas, my true love gave to me… Three no-bake cookies On the fourth pound of Christmas, my true love gave to me… Four pumpkin muffins On the…
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Epic Success Cake!
Here’s Kai’s birthday Epic Success Cake from last year. I just spent the past three days without home internet service and I learned three things. I don’t like checking Facebook and email on my phone. Too addicting. A part of me likes to be out of touch. Suddenly, I realized my whole life could be one status update after another. I’m not even close to being witty enough to make a trip to the gym or grocery shopping sound interesting. Although yesterday I could have contributed an interesting post as my iPhone went flying behind me twice while I was running on the treadmill. Just try to listen to “All For the Best” from Godspell without going faster and faster and…
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The Glee Project Audition Part II
I sat on the bench and pulled out my Kindle trying to pretend I was distracted and calm. Inside my stomach was churning. I had every faith in the world that Arielle’s personality would shine through but I was worried about her singing. From what I understood at the time there would be two rounds of auditions. Anyone who made it through the first round would get to sing for Mr. Ulrich. I hoped and read and hoped and read. Eventually, I got up and bought some coffee. The woman behind the counter offered to add Kahlua. I chose the whipped cream instead and headed back to my bench. Moms…
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The Glee Project Audition
If you can listen to music and read at the same time I recommend listening to River, by the cast of Glee, as you read this. It’s beautiful and fitting for this post. This is the story of how an idea, a hope, a what if?, led to a dream coming true. It began many months ago with several conversations between my daughter, Arielle, and me about a TV show she discovered called The Glee Project. I watched how her eyes lit up every time she gave me an update on the latest episode. I heard passion in her voice and knew instinctively what she was thinking. One day, I asked the…
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Pizzelles!
Every Christmas my grandfather made pizzelles. I can still picture him carrying containers full of cookies up the basement stairs. “Mangia!” he’d say in his booming Italian voice. Then he’d hand out cookies to everyone. I miss him. So every Christmas I make pizzelles in his honor. This year I decided to experiment a little. It actually turned out well – much better than my Epic Fail Fall Cake. Whew! I decided I would create different fillings to sandwich in between two pizzelles and have Eric and Arielle taste test them to see which was their favorite. Notice I wrote Eric and Arielle… not me. First let me begin with the traditional…
