Baking results

We are having a ladies meeting tonight at a neighbors house.
The women from my village bring something sweet to eat and the other village's ladies bring something salty. I'm always glad to be in the sweet group, as the salty potluck foods intimidate me:) (sandwiches, enpanadas, chipa, sopa paraguaya and things like that.)

I decided to try and see if my favorite angel food cake recipe would work today, as the last few times I made it, it failed. I have so many eggs now, that I don't see it as a waste if I use 1 1/2 cups of egg whites on this wonderful dessert. I also needed a backup recipe, in case the angel food cake didn't turn out, so I picked a refreshing looking Key Lime Poke Cake from Betty Crocker. Instead of the boxed white cake mix, I used Betty's own recipe for Silver White cake. I also omitted the frosting on top, as I thought the filling was enough. Come and take a look at my results:

You can find the Chocolate Angel Cake here and the Key Lime Poke Cake here.

I hope you try one of these some day!

Here is the Pretzel Recipe from my last post, especially for Ellie! Or this one.

I'll see you all again soon, Brenda



Choco-Lavas, Snickerdoodles, and Teacakes!

One of my favorite Christmas traditions is spending a whole day at my parents house and baking cookies until we're sick and tired of them:)

(sick and tired of cookies, not of my parents:)

When we got to town yesterday morning, C's boys were busy working...

So we all donned our aprons and plunged into the various cookie doughs.

 Cindy and Nicole making Never Fail Sugar Cookies.

 Jopi was tasting the dulce de leche while making Alfajores.

Chocolate Peppermint Stars

 Choco-Lavas, Chocolate Crinkles or Holstein Crinkles.

Syrupskuchen

Gingersnaps, a lot of them!

Snickerdoodles

"Date Rolls" (I don't know what they're really called, my Mom had baked them before we got there)

Russian Teacakes (or Mexican Wedding Cakes)

 Never Fail Sugar Cookies with Royal Icing

 12 different kinds of cookies in one day!

(baked and frosted by 7 kids, 3 grown-ups and taste-tested by my Dad!)

 I took this picture after we were done. We were very tired by then, and I usually don't look quite like this! (It's me on the right side, C is on the left)

We had fun, but I don't feel like baking today...

Christmas preparations

I haven't posted anything in a while, but maybe you're too busy to read too many blog posts now anyway:) So I'll make my post like a children's book today: a lot of pictures and a little bit of writing! Here goes:
I started baking some goodies for pre-Christmas snacking. These little cookies are a Mennonite (German maybe even) favorite called Peppernuts or Pfeffernüsse. We all love eating them while drinking Terere.

These cookies are called Lebkuchen. Something like a soft gingerbread cookie with royal icing and sprinkles on top.

Last week my two closest friends in my village brought me a gift. It's an advent's wreath. I didn't get around to lighting any candles yet, it's just too hot! It was 43 C (108 F) here today. We are really waiting for rain by now.

This is a close up. (From up close, I was going to write...) Isn't that straw angel just adorable?

Last night, a few friends and I went to the neighbor colony (Neuland) to participate in a little crafting course. We learned how to make origami stars. :) If you make them big enough and out of strong paper you can even hang a light bulb inside of them. We had a lot of fun crafting and taking a break from our hectic lives at home.

This is how mine turned out. I'd love to make another one soon, but they don't have the right paper in our colony right now.

This is our Christmas tree this year. For the first time we have a tree with a theme:) Purple and gold; Amy made some gold and white angels out of clothes pins. We have them on the tree for now, but we want to use them to attach our Christmas cars onto some ribbon and hang them up.

We set up our inflatable pool this week, and the girls have been enjoying themselves. I think I'll go for a cooling dip before going to bed tonight. :)

What I also wanted to write about is this new (for me) excersise plan my sister found on the internet. (Don't worry, they are not paying me for this ad!)

You can find the site here: http://www.c25k.com/

They have some great resoures here on this page too. The one I like the best is the podcasts that you can download (for FREE) for each week, for 8 (in some cases 10) weeks. I like DJ Beatsmith's podcasts, because the music is upbeat and almost totally instrumental (no singing). You can find his download page here: http://www.djsteveboy.com/1day25k.html

My walking buddy and I started a few weeks ago, and since we don't always have time to do the programm 3 times a week, it'll take slightly longer than 8 weeks. The goal is to get up from your couch to running a 5 k(m) distance in 8 weeks. (Not that it takes you 8 weeks to run 5 km, but it should take you about 30 minutes to complete this distance)
 
When you listen to the first week of the plan, you start out pretty easy. It's about 3 minutes of the host talking, during which you start walking already to warm up. Then the music changes and you start running/jogging to the beat for about a minute. The music always lets you know when to walk or run.
 
I love this program! Since it's so hot here at 6:00 pm, the time we usually walk, I've set the alarm at 5:30 am to start out as soon as it's light enough outside. I recomend this program for everyone who wants to get in shape and needs a little bit of help. Since we started walking in August, I've felt so much healthier. My acid reflux is totally gone. (I had it every night before going to bed) My bladder is stronger (I know, TMI). And I lost 4 kg (8lb). YAY!!!
 
So, I'm not promising myself that I will continue to lose weight throughout the Christmas season, but I'll try:)
 

A WARM hug from Paraguay to anyone reading my post. Comment if you want, I love getting feedback!

Baking like crazy

We are having my in-laws over for a barbeque tomorrow night. So today I baked a Zebracake (german recipe here),

 a chocolate cake with the Pioneer Woman's frosting
(so delish: here) and a Fress-mich-dumm Kuchen ( a similar recipe is here at my fellow paraguayan blogger: Betty)

I'm also making a simple Bonnie Butter cake with mini chocolate chips just for us to enjoy for the weekend.

If you realize that I baked all of this with a broken oven door (I have to put a chair up against the door, so that it stays closed while baking), I might get a pat on the back:)

At the beginning of each year, we put the names of my parent-in-laws, my sisters- and brothers-in-laws and our own all into a hat, and everyone picks a name. I picked my MIL's name, so I am hosting her birthday party for the rest of the family this Sunday. It sounds complicated, but it's actually fun.


Ann from over here sent me an email yesterday, telling me that I was the first in place to receive her heart-shaped-rock. Ann has this great idea... read it yourself:


Last summer we started The Heart-Shaped Rock Project. The "little gem" got lost in a house along the way, so... due to lovely requests... I'm going to start it again. And we have a first few stops lined up!
Next week I will be mailing our little gem to Brenda "The Chaco Girl" in Paraguay. How cool, right?

So, I'll be waiting for a package in the mail soon! I hope to have a camera by then to take a pic of me and the cute rock:)

Have a great weekend, everyone! Love ya!

Winter Vacation

This week was the second and last week of the girls vacation. We had to go to the capital for Brianna's check-up, so we made a family trip out of it. We had a lot of fun while driving there, except for the ever-present question: Are we there yet?

We went to the Expo first thing, because the weather was still a little warmer than the past days and then we didn't have to drive back and forth as much. We saw a lot of stands with doodads and whatnots. (I wasn't paying attention:) We saw some cattle and some horses.

We liked going to different shopping malls and supermarkets. The Casa Rica is always worth going to. I found some fresh raspberries there. (Andrea, don't compare them to BC-berries, these are a poor excuse, but welcome anyway) I baked some Raspberry Streusel Muffins this afternoon with them. They're yummy!