A Picture of Contrasts

Posted on December 4, 2012 by funnygurl2

I love this picture. Always have.

Just a couple of youngin’s walking down the street, up to no good.

This picture used to be on my bulletin board. Now it is in one of my special picture albums that does not conform to chronological order, as the rest of them do.

This is a picture of my asbestos friend and I walking down the street in front of my house while we were in high school. My mom shot it out our front door. My asbestos friend and I were probably heading from the small village grocery store back to her house. (I think she still stops at that store at least once a day, every day. I don’t know what she did when she lived 2,000 miles away in Arizona.)

To me, this has always been a picture of contrasts.

First of all, there is snow, but also puddles.

I am wearing a scarf, but no winter coat.

We are not children, but not yet adults.

We look like we are deeply engaged in conversation, when we were probably talking about nothing.

That isn’t true.  We were probably talking about boys.

I love this picture.  I love the purple boots I am wearing in the picture.

I still own that cream-colored hoodie and that scarf (I knew the hoodie was that old, but not the scarf.).  That hoodie can be found in the lower left of a picture in my post from April of 2012 called You Give Hoodies A Bad Name (https://imnotstalkingyou.com/2012/04/01/you-give-hoodies-a-bad-name/)

I look like I am almost skipping, probably just happy that someone stopped by and I got to leave the house for five minutes. At that time in my life, my friends were in sports, band, modeling, had boyfriends, etc. Me, well, I had television. An active imagination. Lots of markers to draw with. Ya, that was about it. My existence was pretty dull at that point.

But I don’t even mind that my mom secretly captured all that. It makes me yearn for more innocent days (but not boring days. Or high school. Or being sad, lonely, depressed, unloved, suicidal.)…ok, scratch “innocent days”.

It makes me yearn for my friend’s kid-free day, when we go roaming about as we please, willy-nilly, with no one to feed or take care of but ourselves.

Maybe what I see most in the picture is freedom. Freedom from school. Freedom from winter. From winter coats. From snow. Freedom to just be.

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What I Learned This Week – 12/2/12

Posted on December 2, 2012 by funnygurl2

This week learned that the Fearless books are being re-released in new editions.

Simon Pulse, All Rights Reserved


FEARLESS! I FRICKIN’ LOVE FEARLESS!

To remember how much, please click here: https://imnotstalkingyou.com/2012/03/14/fearless/

Simon Pulse, All Rights Reserved

I saw these at Walmart and left a big puddle of drool on the floor. The new covers are hauntingly cool, although I hate change, so I will always like the first generation of covers the best.

I almost bought them for the sake of having them and supporting the series, even though I already own them all. What stopped me was the typeface. In the original editions of the series, there were no actual chapters, just a typeface change that signaled a character, location, or time shift. This was AWESOME!

In the new books, they have converted that unique typeface, and now the only thing that sets it apart from the rest of the page is that it is bold. Bold? How lame.

But sooo excited to see these re-released, although they might feel a little dated to new teen readers.

I severely hope that this means a movie is on the horizon.

Remember, I already have the soundtrack selected;)

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I Love Cheap Jewelry, But It Doesn’t Love Me

Posted on November 29, 2012 by funnygurl2

You would be correct to assume that a great number of these items are non-compliant.

I love cheap jewelry. You know, the stuff 12 year old girls buy featuring rainbows and sunshines and Hello Kitty. Bracelets, rings, earrings, especially necklaces. I love them all.

And life was all fine and dandy until I was in 10th grade. Then I got oozy ears.

Earrings I had worn on many occasions, for extended periods of time, were suddenly causing my ears to ooze yellow puss. It was gross. My mom took me to the doctor. I always remember that the doctor had a giant red bulbous nose (whose daughter incidentally has been my anesthesiologist on two occasions since then). I got the dreaded diagnosis: I had a nickel allergy.

Now, if you haven’t experienced this yourself or know anyone who has, you are probably just thinking of the U.S. currency coin in the amount of 5 cents, commonly known as a nickel. But nickel is in a surprising amount of items. Not surprising, if you realize that it is a cheap metal to add to other metals as filler. And for those who are allergic, it is an itchy nightmare.

The scientific name for nickel allergy is allergic contact dermatitis. I am guessing the cream the doctor gave me that day was some sort of corticosteroid, because it cleared that particular episode right up. Of course, I had to change my earrings. And overnight 95% of my earring collection I could no longer wear for fear of reaction. You can’t tell, but in my first drivers’ license picture I had oozy ear. The puss would literally drip off my earlobe, so I sat there dabbing at it as I took my written test at the DMV.

For a while (maybe a year?), I had had odd incidents that infrequently occurred of my upper lip being swelled up when I woke up in the morning. I figured it must be some sort of allergy, but I didn’t know what. I tried to trace it to some food I had eaten the day before, but no pattern emerged. After I found out about my nickel allergy, I realized that is what was wrong with my lip as well. I had one necklace, a souvenir from my gramma from Garden of the Gods. Every time I wore it, I sucked on the charm. Which was apparently made of my enemy nickel. Other women have to put collagen in their lips for the full look. All I need to so is rub some cheap jewelery on mine.

My Garden of the Gods Colorado necklace that triggered my first nickel allergy.

Then I noticed as I wore necklaces, the back and sides of my neck (where the chain touched my skin) would get irritated and itchy. I could no longer wear watches. Not because of the metal on the back of the face, but because of the metal in the buckle. One day I took a bike ride and I put my house keys in my sock as I usually would. By the time I got to my friends house, my ankle was already red and itchy and developing a rash.

Probably the worst time was when my glasses started to bother my face. I had metal frame glasses that sat on my nose. So, where they touched on either side of my nose, my face just turned to red itchy ooze. I learned I could put baby powder on it, and that would not only soak up the ooze, but also turn my bright red skin to a more normal pink. Imagine trying to study in college and all you want to do is claw your face off. I got to where if I was at home and wanted to watch TV, I would remove my glasses and just sit very close to screen. Someone suggested putting clear nail polish on the frames, maybe a layer between the metal and my face would stop it.

NOPE.

It did not stop the reaction and then where I had put the nail polish on the glasses it reacted and turned green. No wonder I never had any dates in college. I was quite the catch. Not.

When I went to get new glasses, I expressed this concern to the eye care professional helping me to pick out frames. Ones without nickel were so expensive that I let her talk me into ones with nickel, but she said the nose pads would keep them up off my face. Even though it looked as though there would be no direct contact, that pair irritated me as well. Now I go titanium all the way. It is worth whatever I have to pay for it.

You would be shocked at how tiny events in your day could lead to a rash. One afternoon I had like an hour between when I got home from college classes and when I needed to be at work. So, I pretty much took my winter coat off and fell over on the couch to sleep, using the coat as my pillow.

I go to work later, and someone asks me why I have a circle on the side of my head. I crawled up on the stainless steel sink to try to look at the side of my head in the mirror on the reusable fabric towel holder that hung above the sink. There it was. A perfect bright red circle with a pink hole in the center, roughly the size of a quarter. Like a rash donut (Yum?). I was befuddled, until I remembered the nap.

My coat had metal snaps with a plastic center.

At least it was on the side of my head, where it could be slightly obscured by my hair. It could have been worse. The bright red donut could have been in the middle of my forehead!

When I started my first real adult job, I went from standing for 8hrs a day to sitting for about 9 1/2hrs. Ya, it sucked. The good thing was, it was a casual work environment, so I got to wear jeans every day.

And then a new issue surfaced.

The metal snaps or buttons that make up jeans? Yep, you guessed it. Made with nickel. I would get a rash on my stomach right never my belly button (I ❤ Mom Jeans, remember?) I suffered that way for a while, before I got my BRILLIANT idea to put electrical tape over the metal buttons. It is sturdy, you can continue to use the button with only minimal addition of bulk, and it survives multiple washings (but not dryings:).

My husband bought me real diamond earrings from an actual jewelry store and I can’t wear them because they contain nickel. Boo to you Kay Jewelers.

Then I got a patent leather bracelet I loved. How to cover the back of the snaps? Electrical tape. I got a very awesomely goth dog collar at Hot Topic. I was careful to get one that snapped instead of buckled. The electrical tape trick was slightly less effective on that, as there were other metal studs on the outside. But it helped.

An Edward Cullen bookmark/bracelet purchased at a bookstore? Oh, that doesn’t give me any irritation at all. Seriously.  Go figure.

I was at a Good Charlotte concert on Halloween in Toledo, Ohio several years ago. I was trying to bounce with the kids around me who were like 10 years younger. My dog tag kept flying up and hitting me in the face. So I tucked it between my breasts (I was wearing a tank top). I even stopped to think,”This won’t give me a rash. It is my dad’s official WWII dog tag. They wouldn’t put nickel in that.” Oh, Uncle Sam, you did. I truly hope that is no longer the case, for the sake of all the poor soldiers with sensitive skin.

As bad as that rash was, the worst was a concert at an outdoor theater where it rained on my green-haired friend and I. If I was with anyone else, I probably would have sought out some rain-free shelter. But she wanted to walk around, so we did. In the pouring rain. And I had change in my front jeans pocket. I learned that night that, when that white lining of my pocket gets wet, I can get a nickel rash right through the pocket onto my thigh:( (Have I mentioned that quarters and dimes contain nickel as well?) *sigh*

So, that is my story. For anyone who has suddenly found out that they are allergic to nickel, here are a few tips:

1. Avoid nickel at all costs.

2. When you can’t avoid it, electrical tape makes a great barrier. It comes in a variety of colors.  Clear nail polish does not.

3. If you have an outbreak of rash, you can try to manage it with over the counter hydrocortizone cream and antihistamine.

4. Wikipedia says you can try cleaning the area directly after it comes in contact with nickel with soap and water and lemon juice or vinegar. [I have not tried this. I would love to know if it actually helps.]

5. Avon claims that all of their jewelry is nickel-free. In my limited experience, I have found this to be the case. (And sometimes they have Hello Kitty jewelry:)

6. Stop looking at the jewelery tables at craft shows (usually about 50% of the total booths) because you will never be able to wear that stuff again.

7. Transfer charms from chains that contain nickel to nickel-free chains or black rope.

8. If you wear glasses, buy titanium frames. Titanium is your best friend.

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Beginner’s Luck (The Post With The Thomas Cake)

Posted on November 27, 2012 by funnygurl2

I have beginner’s luck. I may have first realized this while bowling.

I make it a policy never to throw warm-up balls when I bowl, because all the throws after that will be worse. So I save those for my first few frames that count. It works every time. I always have a better score in my first game, than any game that follows.

My son turned two recently. We were to have a Thomas & Friends-themed party. I was counting on this to be the case with cake-making as well. I think I assumed correctly.

I have never made a layered, sculpted, shaped, character cake or used fondant before. May I present to you, the most elaborate birthday cake I have ever made in my life.

My finished Thomas The Tank Engine cake

Once I came up with this idea in my head, I just knew that a flat sheet cake with a Thomas picture or toy on it just wasn’t going to do. I must give credit where it is due. I would never have attempted this if I had not found a great Thomas tutorial online by Wendy Lindsey at http://thomasthetankenginecake.blogspot.com/ .

I did make some deviations from her directions, mostly due to budget constraints. Then I was dead-set on using fondant, so I probably spent any money I saved on that:P

This is what I used for my recipe:

2 boxes of Duncan Hines yellow cake mix
2-3 boxes of Wilton Buttercream Icing Mix (more on this later)
2 boxes (24 oz each) Wilton Rolled Fondant, pastel blue
2 dowels
1 8″ lollipop stick
1 very strong cake board or several weaker ones bound together
wax paper
aluminum foil
fondant shaper
food coloring in yellow, black, and red
clay shaping tools
small paintbrush
toothpicks
Crisco
powdered sugar
rolling pin
1970’s aluminum cake decorator w/tips (feel free to substitute piping bags and tips)

I highly recommend if you are going to make this cake to study Wendy’s 14 pages of highly detailed directions and tips. What follows is my experience and deviations from her great work!  All measurements given in inches. (Click any picture to see it larger.)

The picture I used for the face and the toys I used for the body

This is what I based my cake off of. Thomas is a little different in every toy, so that can drive a person nuts.

This is Thomas’ face made out of fondant. Make it at least 4 days ahead of time so it has time to dry.

First I made Thomas’ face out of fondant. I didn’t want to have to color my fondant to be blue later (which would have been impossible anyway), so I only purchased blue fondant. I knew that after adding black, the face would look gray and not blue. I was sure to put the stick in before the face dried. Because I was being cheap and didn’t buy any white fondant, I finished the eyes, mouth, and pupils later with buttercream icing. I made the face on Tuesday for a Saturday party.

9″X13″ metal cake pan with paper pattern

9″X13″ glass pan with paper patterns

I don’t have a sheet cake pan, so I baked two 9″X13″ cakes. I created paper patterns ahead of time to visualize how I would stack my four layers. I used these patterns to score the cakes before I put them into the freezer, wrapping them in wax paper, then covering with several layers of foil. I baked and froze the cakes on Wednesday for a Saturday party.

Assembling the frozen cake

On Friday, I prepped my cake board. I taped three 14″X14″ boards together, covering the top with wax paper for easy removal of stray frosting and crumbs later. I lined the edge with blue electrical tape because, well, that is what I had in the house.

Here you can see that the third layer is actually made of two long pieces

Then I removed the frozen cakes from the freezer and assembled them according to my pattern. Using two 9″X13″ cakes did not leave me very many scraps to work with. But you will see I did have enough to make a funnel and steam dome. These are fragile, small pieces. Note that I made my third layer out of two long pieces of cake. It would have been more stable if that layer had all been one piece.

My kitchen floor slants downhill, therefore my oven does as well.  I was too cheap to buy a cake leveler, but now I see that a cake that is more level will yield a better result (and be easier to stack).

Crumb coating

Then I covered the whole cake with the buttercream icing, to form a crumb coat.

After days of watching Cake Boss to try to figure out what the f*** to do with fondant, I attempted to cover my cake. I have never used fondant before. I have never eaten fondant before. I have never even seen it used IN PERSON before. Frosting would have been more cost effective and perfectly acceptable. But in my head my Thomas had a smooth finish I knew I could never achieve with icing.

I used Wilton pre-made rolled fondant. I have no idea if it was good or not because Wilton codes their expiration dates. (If someone knows the decoding secret, please let me know. Thanks.) I bought them at Hobby Lobby. Never having used fondant before, I have no idea if it was the right consistency, but it seemed very stiff to me and I didn’t know what to add to fix that. At this point I was glad I bought the fondant pre-colored, as there is no way I could have kneaded it enough to have ever added my own color. I almost sprained something trying to roll it out with the rolling pin. Even then, it was still a little thicker than the 1/4″ inch thickness it was supposed to be. I wished I had one of those rolling machines that the Cake Boss uses.

Because the fondant was so thick, it cracked when I put it on my cake. A LOT. I made many patches using Crisco and powdered sugar and additional fondant, which actually turned out REALLY well. I was afraid of losing my funnel and steam dome putting on the fondant. If you just frosted a cake, I don’t think they would cause any problem. If I had modeling chocolate like the Cake Boss, I think that would have been a better solution for my fondant-covered cake.

And here is the result…

Fondant covered cake. After it set up for a few hours, I used a paint brush to dust off the excess powdered sugar.

It wasn’t as smooth as the Cake Boss, but I think damn good for a first try!

At this point it was late and I was tired. I was unsure then (and still am unsure) what I was supposed to do with the cake once it was covered in fondant. I put it in the fridge uncovered overnight, and then took it out in the morning to finish the decorating. (If that was wrong, someone let me know.)

Side details with colored buttercream icing

This is where I was glad that I had an extra box of buttercream icing mix. I probably could have gotten by with only using two, but one of them I mixed too thin, and there is no way I could have used it for the fine detail of decorating. (And be sure to leave out your margarine or butter to soften ahead of time! That almost bit me in the ass at the last minute.)

I just decided what details were important to me to include and which weren’t. I actually put in more than I had planned. Being budget conscious and lazy, I also tried to control the amount of colors I needed to use. I only decorated with black, red, and yellow. The wheels on the toys I have are actually blue, but I liked the ones on the cake as black (and I didn’t have to mix up any blue!).

I was too cheap to buy piping bags & tips, so I used my mom’s ancient aluminum cake decorating kit that I last saw her use in 1982.  The frosting holding part of the tool blocked my vision sometimes, so that is why some details are a little messy.  (Yes, that is my excuse.)

The face, with white and black buttercream icing added

Here is the face, with the eyes, eyebrows and mouth filled in with icing. The face really does make the cake. Mine almost came out too big, so that should be a caution to the next person who tries to make this. When the lollipop stick got trimmed, it got cut too short. It is important that the bottom of the lollipop stick touch the cake board, so that it can support the weight of the face. (I didn’t fully understand this until I reached this step.) I ended up cutting another small piece of stick and taping it to the too short face stick with white electrical tape. (I LOVE electrical tape!)

I was afraid to put the face on because I thought the weight of it would make it fall forward into the red frosting. I didn’t buy any piping gel (which I was supposed to use to stick on the face), so I just used buttercream frosting instead. It stayed on just fine!

Top view

Back view showing the roof, the coal, and the rear light

Here is the finished cake. It ended up being approximately 10.5″ long by 5″ wide by 6″ tall. The face is approximately 3.5″ across.

Finished product next to the toys I used as a guide

Here is Thomas after the party…

CAKE!

The fondant was kind of chewy. As I have never had it before, I am unsure if that was due to the age of the fondant, not enough kneading, too thick, improper storage, or if that is just normal.

After we cut off the rear, I realized that by turning it upside down, it looks like a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle!

Raphael?

So, I guess if you want a Ninja Turtle cake, just turn Thomas upside down. Hahaha.

It was a lot of work, but I think it was worth it to prove to myself that I could indeed do it.

Unfortunately, this all made me have lots of anxiety and I had trouble eating or sleeping the last two days of cake making and party preparation. Every year, I ask my husband if he wants to have a birthday party for my son. He says yes. I tell him he will have to do all the work. And then I make all the food and clean the house and drive myself crazy trying to make it all as seamless as a television sitcom.

It is stressful trying to live by television standards in the real world. Thank God for my beginner’s luck.

Anyone else out there gotten in over their heads with a birthday cake?

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AAT

Posted on November 26, 2012 by funnygurl2

The Skelton brothers have been missing from their home in Morenci, Michigan for 2 years today. TWO YEARS!

In honor of that, today I am going to re-blog a post I wrote about them and the reason I feel connected to them from August. But I also wanted to add a few new notes.

When I wrote the blog in August, I wrote it from the perspective the police had, that they must be deceased by now. But I have changed my mind since then.

Because of a girl named Jaycee Dugard. She was missing for 18 years and, against all odds, was found alive. Damaged, but alive. She lives the life today she should have had all those years. But she is alive. This gives me hope that Alexander, Andrew, and Tanner are too.

Yesterday, my husband, my son, and I attended a remembrance ceremony for them in Morenci. In a way, it all felt pointless. But another part of me can see that it is not.

A fraction of the crowd that showed up at Wakefield Park in Morenci, Michigan for a plaque dedicated to the three missing boys.


Q. Why release age-progression photos of them when it has only (ONLY!) been 2 years and they have not changed that much?

A. Well, because it has been 2 whole years, they have changed some, and most important, it gets the news media to cover it again.

Q. Why have a ceremony? The boys aren’t going to walk by as all those people are in a park honoring them, a park that has been searched many times over…

A. It reminds the community. There are power in the number of people that still care and came out to show it. And it gets the news media to cover it again.

New search materials from the 11/25/12 activities


The point of all this is to keep those three smiling faces in the front of everyone’s mind.

I guess I feel like I have to justify to myself why I care about these missing boys I didn’t know and had no connection to, except that they probably camped at the same campground as my mother-in-law. But the justification can be found in my blog of August.

Why blog about it again?

…to keep those three smiling faces in the front of everyone’s mind.

Click here: I thought they would have found the missing boys by now https://imnotstalkingyou.com/2012/08/28/i-thought-they-would-have-found-the-missing-boys-by-now/

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