I love Spring!

 JOY:  Being a wife and mother

Tyler came home from Provo for the weekend, so all of us were together on Easter Sunday!

A quick photo on the golf course on our way home from church provided me with a precious, tangible reminder of how much I love to be with my family.

And how cute they are when they are all dressed up! :)

One of the things that makes me happy in the spring time is that I get to celebrate two of my favorite special days:  

1. Easter

2. My middle son's Birthday

  

I made carrot cake for each of these celebrations this year.    

The Easter carrot cake was just sooooo yummy, that Todd requested I make another carrot cake for his Birthday, which was two weeks after Easter. Encore!  

About this carrot cake.... 

It has divine cream cheese frosting.  Lots of it.

First of all, I could eat cream cheese frosting every. day.  

I could eat just about anything if it were smothered in cream cheese frosting. Including maybe even a tumbleweed.  

This particular cake recipe came from the American Classics cookbook that I have mentioned in a previous blog post.  

The frosting recipe I used is my favorite.  

It is absolutely delish.  

Because it includes not only cream cheese, but also melted white chocolate. And almond extract.  

Wow.

Todd's 16th Birthday was a special milestone, so I wanted to make sure he felt really spoiled and loved by his family and friends.  

David and I took a Super Heroes lunchbox to the Seminary building at the high school during lunch hour on his special day.  

The lunchbox was tied with balloons, and filled with his favorite fast food: Taco Bell. 

I spent the afternoon in the kitchen (my pleasure!) 

preparing Todd's birthday dinner:

Lasagna 

 Parmesan and garlic breadsticks

Fresh garden salad with homemade croutons and homemade dressing

Carrot cake and vanilla ice cream for dessert

Our house was filled with 16 happy, hungry teenagers on Saturday night as we celebrated Todd's Birthday some more!  

I made 5 large pizzas, using my bread dough recipe (tweaked just a little for pizza crust), and lots of cheese, sausage, pepperoni, 

and veggies for toppings.

I was so proud of Todd for his awesome "party host skills."

David and I prepped him beforehand by telling him that we would be around and in and out to supervise, but that we weren't going to "run" the party like we did when he was younger.  

Together, we came up with several ideas for fun group games, helped him gather supplies, and provided the food (lots of it!)

Besides lots of good food and conversation, the party included team Charades, another group game without a known name, and then Frisbee outside in the park/our backyard.

It was a super successful, super fun party, judging by the comments, laughter, and no-casualties or "issues."  

I love my 16-year-old!!!

Happy Birthday Todd!

My view in April from my front living room window includes my pink Cherokee Princess Dogwood tree, which David planted for me on Mother's Day a few years ago; Vinca (Periwinkle), pansies, and tulips.  Also the lovely green lawn that my hubby does an amazing job with.  

This spring-time view makes me soooo happy!

 Birdsnest evergreen shrubs, Japanese Maple, tulips, and pansies 

in my flowerbeds.  

My daughter has a knack with photography.  

She captured these beautiful close-up images of some of the spring-time flowers in our yard:

Delicious-ness!

Recently, I purchased a new cookbook.  I paid like $4 for it, used, in good condition, on Amazon.  I haven't bought a cookbook in years, but I have checked out probably hundreds of them from the library.  I love to browse through cookbooks, look at the photos, and make lists of the recipes I want to try out.  I have a few tried-and-true favorite recipes that I've used for years, but often what my family gets for dinner is something I'm trying out for the first time, or tweaking for the 10th time.  I pride myself in being a great cook, and it brings me a ton of joy to feed people great-tasting food!  Meal-time is hands-down my favorite part of the day.  I spend a lot of time planning menus, shopping for ingredients, and preparing meals from scratch.  We hardly ever eat a meal from a box, can, or jar -- it's way too much fun to put in the extra effort to avoid those.  Meal-time is not only about filling up tummies with delicious food, it's also about nurturing my loved ones with values-based conversation (that's a whole other blog post waiting to happen).  We guard our family dinner time with tenacity -- there is rarely a night that goes by without our entire family sitting down at our dinner table to eat a full meal together.  It always begins with a prayer on our knees.  And it ends with family chores, which we usually do while loud, fun music is playing.  If you come to my house during dinner time, especially if you are hiding in a closet, you will hear laughter...there is always laughter, thanks to my awesomely funny husband.  More on that in a future blog post!

Anyway, back to the newly purchased cookbook... which is what I set out to blog about in the first place, but kept getting side-tracked out of the pure excitement I feel whenever I talk about dinner time at my house.  My friend, Robin, was baking the yummiest cookies ever when I was at her house recently.  I asked her for the recipe, and she told me she got it from a friend's cookbook, American Classics.  I looked it up on Amazon as soon as I got home, so I wouldn't forget.  I was delighted to find a used copy so cheap.  When it arrived, I began reading it (and I mean reading it, because it doesn't have a lot of photos).  It is what I would call a "nerdy" cookbook, because the premise is that the team/staff of cooks conduct thousands of kitchen tests in order to find the best ways to prepare America's favorite recipes.  The front cover of the cookbook says, "Would you make 28 lemon meringue pies to find the best version?  We did.  Here are more than 300 exhaustively tested recipes for America's favorite dishes."  I find it so intriguing to read about the processes they went through to come up with tastiest versions of these favorites. It's like combining science with aesthetics and taste buds!  I have had so much fun trying out these recipes after reading all about how they were derived.

Soon after I purchased the cookbook, my friend Kristin asked if I could help her out with Teacher Appreciation treats at the high school.  I was excited to try out the recipe for Seven-Layer Bars (also known as Magic Bars) from the American Classics cookbook.  This has always been one of my favorite indulgences.  Hands down, this is the best recipe I've tried for this amazing, rich jumble of magic yummy-ness!

Seven-Layer Bars (makes about 25 bars)

Place the graham crackers in a large zipper-lock plastic bag and pound them with the underside of a measuring cup, a rolling pin, or a smooth meat mallet.  The result should be an assortment of crumbs, bits, and chunks that measures about 1 1/2 cups.

1 cup sweetened flaked coconut
8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter
8 whole graham crackers (4 ounces) crushed -- see note above
1 cup finely chopped walnuts
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
1/2 cup white chocolate chips
1/2 cup butterscotch-flavored chips
1 (14-ounce) can sweetened condensed milk

1. Adjust an oven rack to the lower-middle position and heat the oven to 350 degrees.  Spray a 9 by 13-inch pan with nonstick vegetable cooking spray.  Fold two 16-inch pieces of foil lengthwise so that one measures 13 inches wide and the other measures 9 inches wide.  Fit one sheet in the bottom of the greased pan, pushing it into the corners and up the sides of the pan (overhang will help in removal of baked bars).  Fit the second sheet in the pan in the same manner, perpendicular to the first sheet.  Spray the foil with nonstick cooking spray.

2. Spread the coconut on a baking sheet and bake until the outer flakes just begin to brown, about 8 minutes; set aside.  At the same time, place the stick of butter into the lined baking pan and put it in the oven to melt, about 6 minutes.

3.  When the butter has melted, remove the pan from the oven and sprinkle the graham cracker crumbs over the melted butter.  Toss lightly until all the butter is absorbed and the crumbs are evenly distributed.  In order, sprinkle the walnuts, chocolate chips, white chocolate chips, butterscotch chips, and coconut over the graham crackers.  Pour the condensed milk evenly over the entire dish.

4.  Return the pan to the oven and bake until the top is golden brown, about 25 minutes.  Cool on a wire rack to room temperature, about 2 hours.  Remove the bars from the pan using the foil handles and transfer to a cutting board.  Using a sharp knife, cut into 2 by 3-inch bars.