Ok...lets just look at pictures of Sam and Liv. Miss them so.

Ahhhhhhhhh. I feel better now.

We had a real nice day on Saturday. I got mom up and showered and ready for the day.

Wow that really made me appreciate Rebecca even more. She has been coming twice a week to help mom with her shower, but called the other day and said she wouldn't be able to get there on Saturday till about 10:00. I told her that I could handle it so to not come that day.

I had forgotten how challenging it is to get mom in the shower!

I will be giving Rebecca an extra hug and a thank you when she comes on Wednesday!

Teina, Brenda and Leslie came down to visit mom and celebrate Teina's birthday.

It was nice to get to sit and visit with them. I wished that mom would have been feeling better that day. She was kind of out of it.

It was pretty sweet later that night though, mom and I watched the YW General broadcast on tv together. It was so good. The closing song was How Firm a Foundation and she started singing along. We sang all the verses together and she didn't miss a word. I taught the lesson in YW on Sunday. It was on strengthening your relationships with extended family. It was fun looking through old pictures to find some of things we had done together with our extended family. I was once again reminded of what a wonderful family I have! We have had so many good times together over the years. I loved seeing pictures of the kids having fun with their cousins....I sure am grateful they have the relationships they do with them.

It was suggested in the lesson that I have one of the girls tell the story of Ruth and Naomi. I felt prompted to ask Alexis. I called her and she was totally willing. I thought she would just give the basic story, but she had really studied the book of Ruth. She had even asked the missionaries to help her give a good summary.

Then she gave her own thoughts about the story too and what it meant to her. She is a pretty amazing girl.

I was also happy to have Marci back in class. It doesn't feel right when she's not there. She helped me with my lesson too and did a great job.

Candice came over and stayed with grandma all afternoon. We had fun baking and just talking.

She made a yummy banana bread that grandma loved.

I had got some nice strawberries and wanted to make an angel food cake to have them on. I haven't made one from scratch before and now I know why. It was a pain! I guess I set my expectations too high when I picked the recipe for it from Alton Brown....You have to use cake flour and superfine sugar. Didn't have either of those so I googled...how to make... and went to work. (put sugar in food processor till fine...looked like powdered sugar when I got done!...and for the cake flour, you take out some of the flour and sift corn starch into it....then sift it several times till the corn starch is all worked into it)

Then I realized it took a dozen egg whites. Luckily I had just bought some....so I started separating. I had done two and one of the yolks broke and got into the other whites. Ahhhhh. So I tried to get the yolk out but it was too mixed in. I remember something about it not working if there is any yolk in there, So I dumped that and started over again. Waste! Waste!

I got the eggs all properly separated, then mixed them with some other ingredients and had to beat them till I got peaks....20 minutes and a very tired hand mixer later, I very carefully (just dusting the tops of the peaks says Alton) folded in the flour mixture.

Then I carefully spooned it into the tube pan.

After baking to perfection, I set it upside down on the mason jar so it wouldn't go flat. Kind of risky balancing it on that little top, but I got it set and made note to self...don't' bump it!

Well after all of our baking, Candice and I had made quite a mess of the kitchen, so we got busy cleaning up. She washed dishes, I dried.

Unfortunately, as I was putting away a cookie sheet, I bumped the cake with it and it fell off it's perch and landed face down on the floor. Hardly any Lizzy fur. Ahhhhh!

Kelley heard the ruckus and came to help. He picks up the cake and tries to put it back on the jar, but that wasn't happening. It started coming out of the pan and a big chunk of it broke off. So he just dumped it out on a plate. It was looking pretty sad. I picked up a chunk that had fallen off and tried it. It was fabulous! I decided to just cover it with strawberry and whipped cream goodness and no one would know what it had been through. Ha! what a disaster! It did taste a lot better than the ones you make from a mix or buy in a store though. I'd have to be in a pretty domestic mood to try it again though.