Cake Crazed

This last week was a crazy week. It all began during the weekend when I had triple booked myself on both Friday and Saturday nights. I was supposed to celebrate a friend's bday and bring a treat to the party, I really wanted to make cake pops so I set off to bake a cake. I turned on the oven and had it heat to the proper temperature. Then put my cake in to bake and set the timer, about 5 minutes before the timer was to go off I checked the cake with the tried and true "toothpick method" it came out dripping with batter, I thought to myself, "oh dear, this can't be good" but I tried to let it cook for the last 5 minutes thinking it would possibly make a difference. It didn't. Apparently our oven had been giving us some issues for the last week or so and I hadn't used it to realize. But it was DEAD AS A DOORNAIL! So of course at that moment I realized that this next week was a busy week of cake baking/decorating for me, as I had committed to make cupcakes for a friend's bridal shower AS WELL AS a Very Hungry Caterpillar first birthday cake for my baby cousin. I began to panic. During the week none of my family members had time to have a repairman come so the oven would not be repaired in time for me to bake either of these treats.

I did what I normally do when I'm struck with great stress, I forget about what I have to deal with until I have time to deal with it. (That's what I did with my speeding ticket... still haven't called to see how much I owe on that one) Wednesday rolled around and I realized that people were counting on me, so I needed to harass ask my friends if I could come borrow their oven. They were more than accommodating and even offered to feed me dinner. I got the cupcakes made for Friday evening's bridal shower without a problem, but the big stress eating at me was the cake I had to make for the birthday which was on Saturday afternoon. 

Oh did I mention that the party was in Mississippi? So yeah I had to make it from my house to there at some point and this is what my schedule looked like from Wednesday to Saturday

Wednesday-

8 am: wake up and get ready for work

10 am - 7 pm: work

7 pm til: stuff at home and go to bed

Thursday-

8 am: wake up get ready for work

9 am - 6 pm: work

6 - 6:30 pm: mix up cupcakes

6:30 pm: bake cupcakes at great friend's house

7 pm: home and dinner and sleep and stuff

Friday-

8 am: wake up and get ready for work

9 am - 6 pm: work [during lunch break ice cupcakes for bridal shower and have panic attack about how/where/when I am going to make the looming birthday cake]

6 pm: to Hobby Lobby for an extra 8 in cake round pan

6:15 pm: home to get cupcakes and drive to friend's house for bridal shower

6:35 pm: arrive at bridal shower with cupcakes, set up and wait for the guest of honor to show up.

8:30 pm: back home to pack up stuff to drive to Mississippi where I was going to bake cake at Grammy's

9:00 pm: on the interstate where we got stuck in traffic TWICE due to construction and made it in to Grammy's house at about 12:30 am.

Saturday-

12:30 - 2 am: baking cakes

2 - 8 am: sleep

8-11:30 am: build and finish baking cakes and decorate cake

11:30-12:30: shower and get ready for birthday party

1:30 - 2:30 pm: run to BAM for Very Hungry Caterpillar plush and cardboard book for birthday gifts. Then food at Chick Fil A. Oh, and Grammy has coupons for free Krispy Kreme that are expiring in a few days? better use those.

3 pm: to the party, set up cake, help finish getting stuff out for party

5 pm: The party was over, and then we went to Grammy's got our stuff and we all headed back home with Grammy and Gramps in tow, since they were coming to speak at church the next morning.

Doesn't that look like a blast?! No? Yeah I didn't think so. But in the following pictures you can see some of my creative process and see how great the cake actually turned out.

Now you can see why I was flipping out about having time, I HAD to do the rainbow cake or else the cake would suck. At least I think it would. Thankfully, since Sunday my life has slowed down quite a bit. Well for the most part - I do have a Tupperware party at my house tomorrow night, a farewell party to go to and make a treat for on Friday, charity walk and then a relaxing hair appointment on Saturday.

I think this is quite enough for one post.
Until next time!

-FranklyBecca

p.s. I used tips on how to do this from a blog I found by googling located HERE. It is the VERY BEST rainbow layer cake tutorial I have come across.

My Rockin' Momma

This post is reposted from my other blog (Frankly My Dearest)

See that fabulous woman in green work out gear? That is my mommy, I am the one next to her wearing sunglasses atop my Nike cap. This is our most recent picture together, and though we are a sweaty hot mess I think we look great!

Mother's day is fast approaching and I have her entered in a giveaway to win a photo shoot from a fabulous photographer from Mississippi where much of our extended family lives. Suzanne Carey is her name and you should go check out her blog to see what's up.

So I mentioned my mom is entered to win her giveaway... That is where you, all my loyal readers come in.

Over the past year and a half my mother has worked hard to lose weight and get fit. She has lost over 130 lbs. and counting! And you see how great she looks? She has totally done it right. It hasn't been 100% easy sailing though. August of last year she was having a fun time and took a ride on my cousin's Vespa and took a turn going too fast and ended up in a ditch, with her leg twisted beneath her and a Vespa laying on top her. To make matters worse, she landed smack dab in poison ivy, which she is highly allergic to. She was rushed to the ER where they did x-rays and the like and told her it looked like an ACL injury, but it was too swollen to really tell, so she had to wait for the swelling to go down and get an MRI. Long story short, her ortho doctor said she had chronic ACL tears and that she would need a knee replacement, and she had a surgery to repair her MCL which was a long recovery. She now wears a knee brace all the time, but she did not let that brace or her knee problems slow her down during her journey to get healthy! She continued to push on and has been doing aquatic workouts to build up her strength to achieve her ultimate goal of completing the Crescent City Classic in New Orleans, which we did! Next on the list of super achievements is to do the Susan G Komen walk for the cure in Atlanta, a 60 mile course done in 3 days. I'll be right along side her for that one.

Isn't she an inspiration??

Now how do you vote for her to get the rock star treatment she deserves?

First you have to go on Facebook and "Like" Suzanne Carey Photography
Next click this LINK and vote for "Beth Abel" <-- that's my Momma!

Come on peeps! Let's make her win!!!

Love,
FranklyBecca

The Photo Challenge

Well friends, I regret to say that I have fallen off the wagon with keeping up with the photo challenge, I just got busy with life and it was the last thing on my mind, and then once you fall behind by like 5 days then it's hard to pick it back up. But, perhaps I can marathon it up and catch up before the month is up. I have some unexpected free time coming up this weekend and can use it to catch up on my pics.

Just wanted to keep ya'll up with what's been going on with me.

:)

coming soon - a post about Pottermore!

Day 3 Photo Challenge

The prompt for today's picture was mail. Here is my attempt to capture mail.

This package actually arrived last night. I had checked my tracking and it was out for delivery yesterday morning at 7:00 am so all day I was stalking my mail, well as much as I could stalk it while working a full work day. My father and I have been addicted to watching Downton Abbey and were anxiously anticipating this package to come in so we could start watching season 2 on blu-ray (which I must say was worth the extra $5). I am never ceased to be amazed by blu-ray video and sound quality.

The book I added to my amazon order because I wanted it, it was on my wishlist and apparently I needed to spend an extra $0.01 to get the free shipping with a $25 order, so what do I do? That's right, I order a $12.99 book to make up that penny. Anyway I hadn't really looked at the book and I made the comment about since it was by the creator of Toms, a one for one company, that I wondered if me purchasing this book would give a book to a child in need.... and of course it does!

as always check out Leesa and Tim's blogs for their photo-a-day posts!

by the way friends, I posted an entry on Frankly My Dearest about iPhone-ography.

day 2 #photoadayapril

Here is my day 2 post for April's photo-a-day challenge by fat mum slim. Today's theme was colour (and yes it was spelled like that because the person who created the challenge is from across the pond... or she's from Australia, whatever).

Color Run Registration!!!

Check out Leesa and Tim's blogs for their photo-a-day posts!

p.s. want to join team Put A Bird On It in the color run? Let me know and I'll give you the secret word that will let you join our team. If you join the team before April 15th you can get the $35 registration fee.

The Lion King

The other day I blogged about how I got to go see the Broadway production of The Lion King on one of my other blogs. That I really should probably shut down because I am not using it.

Anyway I will not feature what I wrote here:

Last night I had the opportunity to go see the Broadway production of The Lion King at the Mahalia Jackson Theater in New Orleans. It was amazing! I honestly did not realize until about an hour before the show that it was a Disney production and that most of the music used in the musical was the music from the cartoon version. There were many times that I just wanted to stand up and sing along with Simba, Nala, and the rest of the crew. The costumes were amazing. I was so impressed by the sets as well, and the use of puppetry.

I am happy to say that me and The Lion King have come full circle. I went to see it as a kid when it was originally released in theaters. I loved it then. I then watched it over and over again when it came out to VHS (does anyone even still remember those?). Then it was locked away in the "vault" and re-released to DVD when I was in high school. I had to have it then. As many of you probably remember the "two week" release of The Lion King 3D in theaters to precede the blu-ray release. I have seen The Lion King in both of those formats as well. And of course the production at Disney World. And finally, the Broadway musical.

I must say that The Lion King is one of my absolute favorite Disney movies. I sometimes wonder if I originally became a Lion King fan because Jonathan Taylor Thomas (anyone remember him?) played young Simba. I as a kid had the BIGGEST crush on him. It wasn't until I was older that I realized that JTT wasn't the singing voice of Simba, but that's O.K. I do love The Lion King though, in all it's forms. It helps me to reminisce on my childhood. In fact last night at the show I snuck in some smarties. One of my favorite candies as a kid. I adamantly believed that eating them would make me smarter.

 Hope you all enjoyed that!

Love,
FranklyBecca

Pin-spired

Remember when I mentioned in my word heavy post about the rag baskets Amanda and I were going to make for Easter? Well, Today I had some time and I completed mine. And here she is!

 It is actually kind of smallish, but perfect for me a twenty-something who really shouldn't have an Easter basket but does... We were inspired by these baskets found via pinterest.

And remember that inspiration fabric I mentioned, well the first pic below pictures it and then below are the other fabrics I used.

I did not use the same technique the inspiration project did. I actually probably made it harder on myself, but I used this technique.

I am really quite proud of my creation. I also did a few more pinterest inspired projects this weekend, such as a DIY laptop wrap using a wood grain printed contact paper. It looks pretty fab, and I think Alejandro the MBP likes it.

Love Always,
FranklyBecca

Photo Challenge

A couple friends of mine and I will be participating in a daily photo challenge for the month of April. I partially did one for the month of March, but fell off midway through (and I think I promised you all some pics and never posted them). The challenge we are following is originated by fat mum slim details found here. Today I am supposed to take a picture of my reflection. I haven't yet because I have been working on other projects. But as soon as I get my pic taken I will update this post and am planning to post them here, as well as to my instagram account (follow me @beckward there).

 UPDATE

Wishlist

I have recently been struck with the want for something new, and something that I can use to make money. I thought for a while about signing up to be some sort of consultant to sell things, but the problem with that for me is that I have to 100% believe in a product to be able to convincingly sell it, and still I am neutral. Always neutral. My family calls me Switzerland sometimes because I refuse to take sides ever on any debate.

Anyway I got a tad off subject. I have had this item on my wish list for a while, a Silhouette Cameo die cutting machine. I know that sounds kind of lame... and what would I do with a die cutting machine? There are PLENTY of fabulous projects I could do if I had the right tools (cue Silhouette Cameo). I mean I was saving to get an iMac, and then the Silhouette, but now I know that I need to get the Silhouette ASAP.

If anyone knows of any deals I can get with this machine, let me know!

XoXo,

FranklyBecca

My Overambitious Weekend

This past weekend I made some big plans for myself.

I had a 3 day weekend as a treat to myself and wanted to make it EPIC. So It started with plans with some fantastic friends to see The Hunger Games at the midnight premiere. By the way, Me, Leesa, Lissah, Adam, and Mi Madre had a blast and were only a tad delirious when we got out of the movie around 3 am.

For the rest of the weekend I had made plans with cousins and aunts in the other H-town. I was going specifically to help my Aunt Amanda, who has a fabulous blog that she gave up on a while back, to paint horizontal stripes down her LOOOOOONG hallway.

 see how super long??

And we had also talked about making some rag baskets to use for Easter "while waiting for the paint to dry" HAHAHAHAHAHA... What in the world was I thinking when I proposed that craft idea?? Anyway, we were still delisional on Friday and went on the hunt for the supplies we would need. We were using a tutorial from here. This lady used a "honeybun" of fabric which would typically be used for quilting. We went to a little fabric store, they didn't have honeybuns or jellyrolls (which are the larger form of the honeybun). Now I would like to throw in the little detail that neither me nor Amanda are sewers/quilters/etc so we didn't really have any ideas on where to look. We went from the small local fabric store to Hancock Fabrics, where we were met again with blank stares when asking for a honeybun. So, I put Siri (my iPhone, sorry I don't have a more unique name for her) on the job. We googled and found that the average "honeybun" is 1 1/2" wide with strips approx 44" long and typically contain 20 strips (i think). So then we did basic algebra in the middle of Hancock Fabrics to figure out how much yardage we would need and got to looking for some coordinating fabrics. Talk about stressful! We didn't really know what direction we wanted to take and felt like we were on some strange project runway challenge searching for coordinating patterns frantically in Mood. We ended up going to the back of the store just mindlessly looking in the remnants and I found a few fabulous prints that worked perfectly together (they will be featured in a future blog post). Amanda and I had determined that the fabric at Hancock was entirely too expensive for us for this project. They were having a store wide sale, but we happened to choose a variety of 5 fabrics that were all NOT on sale. There was one print that we HAD to have because we knew that the Hobby Lobby fabric section (which was our next destination) had absolutely nothing like it. We went to Hobby Lobby with my fabulous remnant fabric selections in tow to match to because this one gauzy floral print had become our inspiration piece, it had the perfect colors. They were girly and springy and PERFECT. We were successful from that point on. And I was sucked in to the vortex of HobLob and also bought some circle cutters for fondant (something our HobLob has NEVER had in stock and I always wanted), and gold leaf for a nail art I saw on Pinterest.


So what else did I do this weekend? A ton! After searching for fabrics I met up with some of my family members to eat at this burger place that they love and while we were there we saw Gary Grubbs a celebrity that I had never heard of in my life. Then me and two of my cousins went to the store to but Chex mix and ice cream cones. We were going to make cupcakes in the cones, and cake batter puppy chow. We were successful on both counts. and everyone loved the cake batter puppy chow. That is a recipe I got from Pinterest. That ended Friday.

Saturday was the big day! The stripe painting day! Amanda had measured her wall, and used more algebra to see how wide her stripes needed to be. So when I got there we got started on measuring off from the ceiling and taping. This took a bit of trial and error for the first line we felt more confident with drawing the line and taping off, all the while making sure it was completely level. Then we got to where we just needed tic marks across the wall and played "connect the dots." My job was making all the tic marks, Amanda went behind me and taped. Not gonna lie, this was stressful business. When we started making headway we decided we could only worry about the task at hand and couldn't even think about the possibility of painting the stripes. The taping was completed and I took a short break in the middle to make another batch of cake batter puppy chow for us to snack on. We also made some excellent sandwiches! But we did not get to start on our baskets.

Then what happened? I went to dinner with another aunt, we ate at this amazing restaurant, Newk's. Me and her got a pizza and a salad to split so that we could have the best of both worlds. I was apprehensive to eat the pizza because in the past anytime I have had a pizza from this fine establishment I got sick within 12 hours of eating there. But this time I was fine. Then we went to Target and I got a cute chambray shirt dress. Then another of my aunts and my cousin met us at Target and we went to this fro yo place.

I am pretty sure I gained like 300 pounds this weekend from all the eating of junk that I did.

Sunday was church day, and Grammy made some country style ribs with some flaky layers biscuits. Delish! I chilled and headed home that day.

So let us recap the plans:
1. tape off and paint horizontal stripes down long hallway
2. make rag baskets to use for Easter
3. baking night with Lindsey!

and here is what actually happened
1. tape off lines for stripes down long hallway
2. baking night with Lindsey!

Hope you enjoyed going on my adventure :)

Love,

FranklyBecca

The Color Run!

First off I want to say to my loyal followers, I am sorry I haven't posted in a while! I have several ideas of blogs to do, here are some hints of what is to come:

"My overambitious weekend"

"Dystopian-mania!"

"The one where I actually do Pinterest crafts"

And now for the subject matter of this fabulous entry. The Color Run.

I was minding my own business piddling around on Facebook when I saw an ad on the sidebar. It said "Something NEW hits NOLA Nov 17th! Get ready for the funnest 5k of your life @ the New Orleans Color Run" Of course this drew me in, I clicked through and it brought me to their website.

Basically I want to do this, and it is the weekend after my birthday, which is already looking to be exciting... with Breaking Dawn part 2 coming out on Nov 16 (meaning midnight premiere on Nov 15 -- MY BIRTHDAYYY). So, I need at least 3 people to do this with me so we can get the team rate.

So dear friends and family, let's start brainstorming our team name! Leave them in the comments.

UPDATE
We have enough people committed to be able to get the team pricing which is $35 if we register before May 1 (and we need to register soon in the case that they fill up. It says there are limited slots available)

Leesa and I were talking and we like the idea of "Team put a bird on it"
Perhaps we could get some white shirts printed with an outline of a bird on it if we do go with this team name.

App Madness

My blogging has fallen by the wayside because I am addicted to another app on my iPhone. This game is called Draw Something (available in the apple app store or android market), it is sweeping the nation by storm. A friend from work introduced me to it and I introduced a few people and now I am addicted. The picture above is an example of the fine masterpieces that you can see if you choose to challenge me to a game. Which you should do. My username is Beckward and I would be happy to welcome any new challengers (mostly because I love collecting coins and buying new colors... you can see I have quite the array pictured, and that isn't even all of them!)

Of course I also play those blasted "With Friends" games, (ie. Words, Hanging, Scramble), but even those games have fallen behind... but you can challenge me there, my username on those is beckward24.

Challenge me to a game if you dare!

Apple Obsessed

I am not in the market for an iPad, I have the iPad 2 and am quite content with it... I also have the iPhone 4S, and a macbook pro.

I do happen to get giddy excited when there is an apple release, and though I am at work I have a blog up that is updating on the minute about the goings on, I almost feel like I am there.

Does this mean I am a dork? I think yes.

Unless

"Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better, it's not"

I was able to celebrate Dr Seuss' birthday last Friday March 2nd by going to see the late movie of The Lorax.

It was such an adorable movie!!! I was not expecting the random musical numbers, but I loved them, and have been listening and singing along to the soundtrack via spotify ever since.

I should probably mention that I have always had a special place in my heart for the dear old Lorax. As a child I remember watching the old cartoon from the 70's of the book. "I am the Lorax! I speak for the trees!" So when I first saw they were making The Lorax into a full length animated feature film, I got so excited! It rekindled my love. I went out in search for the book to read and re-read. I found it after searching several stores. So, on Friday, during my lunch break I read the book to give myself a refresher on what it was all about.

And in case you have been wondering why I my one day hiatus turned into a 5 day hiatus..

Thursday I think was the day I had a meltdown. It was rough, and I actually was at such a low point that I snapped and checked Facebook.

Friday I worked and jam packed some treat making into my lunch break and went straight from work to a superhero surprise party for a friend and from there went straight to the theater for The Lorax. Then went home and wasn't sleepy but then tried to watch an episode of Downton Abbey and fell asleep.

Saturday, I woke up and cleaned a little bit then got ready and headed to New Orleans to spend some time with my friends, Kay, Heidi, and Tiff. We had lunch at this little restaurant called Capdeville on Capdeville in NOLA. It was really good. Then we walked to The Ogden museum and saw a cool exhibit by Jimmy Descant. It was really cool because he used found objects to make little collages to depict different parts of his life as well as about Louisiana. They were some really neat pieces. Then we went back to Kay's house and me, her and Heidi watched some Project Runway. I then drove home and watched The Rise of the Planet of the Apes with my father.

Sunday I had church. Then after church we ate our Sunday lunch, this week we had Turkey breast, gravy, rice and LeSueur peas (the best canned peas ever). Then we hit the ground running and cleaned the house, wiping all the flat surfaces, because we had a group of the young single adults coming over for a potluck dinner and to view a church broadcast on the BYU channel. Then a few of my peeps from that crew stayed after to continue our Harry Potter movie marathon that we have had going since mid December. We watched Harry Potter and the Order of the Pheonix last night. I fell asleep, but that's ok, because that one is probably my least favorite of the series of movies, now don't get me wrong, I love the book, but I just think they could have depicted it better in the movie.

Anywho...

Now here we are today, I am working, and tonight is my Father's birthday. We will be celebrating tonight with steaks, and delicious side dishes. Grammy and Gramps are really coming this time (last time I blogged that they were coming, they ended up both getting sick and not coming).

So, you guys can now see that I haven't had a moment to blog! I even got behind on the photo challenge I am participating in via instagram. It's really cool, and so far, each day I have been able to post some cool pictures. Perhaps I'll share them here in a future post.

Love,

FranklyBecca

Taking the day off

From blogging.

You thought I was going to take off of work?! Nope! I like my money too much.

But today is an extra day. It doesn't matter. Also, did you know that February 29th is the only day of the year that it is acceptable for a female to ask a male to marry them. I guess that means I should get to looking and asking... I probably need a ring though too. I'll get one on my lunch break at Charming Charlie :)

Super Productive

So I have this full time job in a call center. I work nine hour shifts with an hour long lunch break and am tied to my phone the other eight hours of the shift. I never really understood the worth of an hour until I started here and that was pretty much my only time during the day to GTD! (that's GET THINGS DONE!, not gym, tan, dance...?).

Today I was quite pleased with my use of my hour lunch break. I made up a list of supplies I needed to make some more of those crispie rice treats for my Mother's LEAP DAY PARTY! tomorrow. This time I am making them bite sized and using bright colored nonpareils (fancy word for sprinkles). I may take pics, or may not... depending on how creative I feel.

Ok.. back to super productive lunch break. I went to the grocery store to get a lean cuisine for lunch and various and sundry things from my shopping list. I ended up leaving the store with at least a week's worth of lean cuisines (they were 5 for $10!), and my other crap, and only took about 15 minutes! Then I went to the redbox to pick up the movie I reserved there... Hugo. Then I went home, gave my cat food, washed his water bowl and gave him water (I'm sure you wanted to know about the inane details of my life, so here ya go!). Then we put my lunch in the microwave. Today I had one of those Green Giant Steamers, it was broccoli, rice, and cheese and it was quite delicious. While my food was cooking, I put clothes in the laundry, checked the mail... hopeful that my Nordstrom package was in (but it wasn't... it is out for delivery though, my UPS man just doesn't like to come until sundown, but I am always hopeful). THEN, I ate my food because it was ready. And then, I contemplated running to Dollar General to get a few things, but decided I didn't have time because I still had to make my crispie rice treats.

So recap:

• Grocery shopping
• Lunch
• Pet Care
• Making Crispie Rice treats
• + random other tasks

I think I did a good job jamming a lot of tasks into an hour and I am super proud of myself.

Love,

FranklyBecca

p.s. sorry no pics today!

CCC: In Training

Every year the Saturday before Easter the city of New Orleans hosts the Crescent City Classic. It is a 10k road race. For the past 3 or so years I have wanted to participate but either forgot to register, didn't train in time, etc. This year, my Mother has been big into walking/jogging/biking/working out. She had a severe knee injury about 6 months ago that required a meniscus repair among other repairs. She also has a chronic ACL tear that the doc didn't "fix". Since the surgery she has been in a brace. She wanted to do Crescent City Classic no matter what. In one of her first visits with her ortho doc she told him this was her goal, and he seemed apprehensive, but didn't put it out of the realm of possibility.

Fast forward and we have her on fire, working out, doing aquatics to strengthen her muscles to compensate for the bad knee. For Christmas my Santa Claus told my family that he/she would register us all for CCC, and he/she did.

My life schedule has kept me busy lately and I hate to admit that I haven't started training for this event yet, when it is actually in a matter of about 4 weeks. And as much as I would love to run/jog it, I just don't see that happening, but I need to practice walking. Tonight we begin the official training. We will be walking around the campus once tonight, it is about 2 miles. Before the end of the week we hope to be up to two times around, which is totally do-able. I know it's a fast transition but we are speed training here! Making up for lost time.

Hopefully I don't pass out tonight or anytime this week. I am pumped!!!

Love,

FranklyBecca

I'd like to thank the Academy

For boring helping me sift through good, bad, great, and awful movies over the years. Now you may not know this about me, but I am a big movie snob. I don't like watching movies unless it's a movie i really, really, really want to see. For instance right now I am dying for The Lorax (March 2nd) and The Hunger Games (March 23rd) to come out. Bee tee dubs... remind me in the future to blog about how much I love The Lorax.

Tonight, is the Oscars aka Academy Awards... I'm pretty sure it took me a good twelve years of my life to understand they were the same thing. But anyway, I digress. My family has always been big fans of award shows, my mother also enjoys the occasional pageant, just none of this Toddlers and Tiaras nonsense. The Oscars typically fall around the beginning of March, as does my Father's birthday (March 5th), that will be pertinent information in just a minute. We always like to have little award show parties whenever one comes on. One year my Father's birthday happened to fall on the night of the Oscars, so while he was taking his Sunday afternoon nap (everyone has those, right?), my Mother and myself got to decorating. We put down a strip of red felt from the room to the kitchen for the red carpet. We made up swag bags full of goodies for all of us, and the pièce de résistance was the Ken doll that I spray painted gold.


This year is no different. We will be having our annual Oscar party. I think for the treats this year we are having some burger sliders, boneless hot wings, and my white chocolate covered crispie rice treats. Should be quite delicious.

There is one difference this year, however. I have actually been attempting to watch some of the movies that were nominated that I wouldn't have wanted to see being the movie snob that I am. Last night we watched Midnight in Paris. Before starting the movie my Father had me play the preview for the movie so he would know what he was getting himself into and pretty much as soon as the preview said it was a Woody Allen movie he cast judgement. In the end he was pleasantly surprised I think. It was a bit of a bizarre movie though, but I also thought it was cool. I would definitely recommend it. I don't think it will be taking home best picture though, especially since it is up against The Help and The Artist. Speaking of The Artist, I would give my arms to see that movie. It looks so good, and I have heard great things about it.

 I hope that the awards will be good this year! Can't wait to see my favorite stars all dressed up in their fabulous evening wear!

Love,

FranklyBecca

no facebook + day off =

Me, Becca, making sweet treats all day.

Well, not all day, but most of it. I got a full weekend off this weekend so how did I spend my morning? Sleeping in of course! My internal clock tried to tell it me was ready to get up at 7:22 am, I said no. I slept until 9-ish. Then I laid around deciding when I should take a shower. I knew I was meeting my friend for lunch at 11. Snitch the cat came in (oh he has a facebook page.. not sure of the link, and I'm not getting on facebook so I can't share it with you. Sorry! but it's Snitch the Ferocious Cat if you want to go on there and become a fan of his). Anyway, he cried while I took a shower. Then followed me to my room afterward and he took a nap.

Me and Ang went to lunch at Lee's the adorable 50's diner in town. They have the best spaghetti if you can believe it. That's what I had for lunch.

After lunch I went to Target to get the baking supplies I was lacking. I knew I was going to make mini cupcakes and crispie rice treats (no copyright infringements). So I got the stuff I needed for my treats and headed home. As soon as I got home I got to baking. I thought I only had one mini cupcake pan and was going to bake 3 batches back to back, until my father came home and told me that he had 2 others on top of the one that was my pan. So I ended up still kind of doing 3 back to back batches but the last batch cooked some with the second. Anywho... While batch 2 was baking I got to making my crispie rice treats. Father swooped in and started to take over that task until it was time to smoosh them in the pan. This was our dialogue:

Father: You need to spray your hands or cover them in butter to smoosh this down flat so the crispies don't stick to you.
Me: I was just going to use plastic wrap
Father: Oh, that works too.

Now for some gratuitous un-photoshop edited photos

Forgive me for forgetting a pic of iced cupcakes... they looked average. probably a bit like this:

only no sprinkles. and light yellow icing. just envision it.

Now for the crispie rice treats!

The we did something special... (that is vanilla flavored Candy-Quick that I bought at Target)

PLUS SPRINKLES!

I'm obsessed with these sprinkles... I got them at Target in their easter section. They always have the best holiday sprinkles. I pretty much normally hoard them.

And because I am always being asked how I make my butter cream icing this is what goes in it. (the butter is softened by the way.)

Don't ask for a recipe, I don't have one. I just mix it up to consistency. However for the batch I made today I used that whole bag of sugar, the whole stick of butter, maybe half of that water and a capful of the almond extract.

Hope you enjoyed! and that my pics don't send you in to a sugar coma :)

Love,
FranklyBecca

Obsession

This isn't the first time I have mentioned them, and it won't be the last.
Toms.
I got an email today "sneak peaking" the new spring line. and I saw this:

 

 I got super giddy and did a little more research on them and found that they make them in women's too! in a variety of colors! I fell in love with the burlap with the burnt orange stitching around the top. So stinking cute, I had to order them. So I did. And flash forward about 8 days and they arrived on my doorstep. I never saw them there... because my parents brought the package in to meet me before I got home from work.

They look amazing on! I would definitely recommend this style.

tgif

This week has been the busiest week. It started out with a holiday or holidays (Lundi Gras on Monday, Mardi Gras on Tuesday, and Ash Wednesday on... well you guessed it, Wednesday). I mean yes, I had to work on all of these days, but I also somehow got roped into doing all manners of other activities.

Monday was my most relaxing day. I worked a 9-6 shift, then went shopping at Target for some food. I got some Bertolli's pasta dish that I then went home and cooked up in the skillet. I then served myself dinner and sat down at the couch to watch Gossip Girl.

Then Tuesday comes around, I was scheduled to work from 10-7, but it was dead so we decided to shut down for 6. Since I was on the closing shift I had to stay to whatever was closing... which was not fun since work was so dead. I found out during the day that we were invited to go to my uncle's for a fish fry. He lives in Baton Rouge which is about a 45 min drive from where I live.

Wednesday, another day of work. Then afterward I had committed to a co-worker that I would teach her activity days girls how to make rings out of a hershey kiss and pipcleaner, an idea I found on pinterest and then created for work as valentines. We finished up really early, and I somehow got roped in to be a chaffer for the young women's heart attack by my mother.

Thursday. Work again. Then back to Baton Rouge for my cousin's baby shower. Good time. Good food. Not the best cake, but hey... they didn't even ask me to make it, so that's what you get.

Whipped frosting = gross. 

Homemade Butter Cream frosting = DELICIOUS.

Today is Friday!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am so happy. I rented a couple of redbox movies, Midnight in Paris and Puss in Boots to help me in my quest to watch as many Academy Award nominated movies before the awards as possible. Grammy and Gramps are coming tonight. They are going to the temple in the morning. I am excited to spend time with them.

Toodles lovies!

Love, 

FranklyBecca

Party Gras and Lent

Growing up in the deep south as a kid I always thought that Mardi Gras was a national holiday. Where I come from cities shut down for the festivities. Schools close, banks close, everything closes. You are left with a ghost town. Then you take a little trip to the city, 'Nawlins of course and see where everyone is hiding. People line the streets to scream and wave their hands for strands of shiny plastic balls, stuffed animals, feather boas, and in some instances, panties.

A typical float in a Mardi Gras parade

from New Orleans Ladder

Everyone pretty much has a fair and equal chance at getting the beads. It's the stuffed animals, feather boas, and dare i say it again... panties, that you really have to work for. If you have a kid, just stick them on your shoulders and you are golden. You'll get whatever you want, and then some. At the time you think you want all this glorious loot, and sure that feeling lasts through the parade, on your walk back to your car, but somewhere between the end of the parade and your trunk you realize, "oh dear, I have this massive fifty pound bag filled with plastic beads, what the h* am I going to do with this?!"

The crap you get at the parades

But, the fun doesn't end there! You go to one parade, have a blast, and you are hooked! You want to go to every parade. I know, I have been there. The party in 'Nawlins goes on for days. The city is filled with people having a grand ole time. Dancing in the streets, drinking 'til they pass out, and living care free for just a few days, because you know what happens once Mardi Gras is over? Ash Wednesday. The beginning of the Lenten season. Some of you may now be asking yourself, "wait, but what does that mean?"

Mardi Gras means Fat Tuesday, and is always the day right before Ash Wednesday, where Lent begins. Growing up here in south Louisiana I have always been exposed to the tradition of Lent, our area is rich with Catholics, so to me it has always been acceptable for me to give something up for Lent. Lent lasts for the 40 days of the passover until Easter. I know, I am a Mormon and don't have to give up anything for Lent, but this year I gave up Facebook.

I have been wanting to quit Facebook lately, but didn't want to delete my account. I figure that the first few days of no Facebook will be difficult, right now we are starting day 2, and honestly, until about the time of posting this I haven't been tempted to try to sign on. I have gone to their url a couple times and then remembered that I'm not getting, but that was just out of habit.

I am thinking that rather than "microblogging" my thoughts on Facebook or Twitter, I will devote my time to actually write out meaningful posts to share with you all, my lovely readers, of which I think I only have about 0. So please friends, comment me! I need you to cheer me on, so that I can keep this up!

TH1RT3EN REASONS WHY

I finished reading TH1RT3EN REASONS WHY by Jay Asher just a few days ago.

I mentioned in a post a couple days ago that I would let you all know about it once I finished it.

Now, as with any of my reviews, I am not a pro. Take the review for what it is, entertainment.

Now before I say anything about the book I just want to let you know what the book is all about, this boy Clay receives a package filled with cassette tapes from a classmate who had recently committed suicide, named Hannah. There are 7 cassettes, each side of the cassette tells a story of one person who played a part in why she took her own life. It was a powerful read.

I found it a bit hard to read at times since in my personal life I have been affected by a love one committing suicide. It's one of those things that you want to know what may have been going through their mind to make the decision to do such a thing, but at the same time you don't because it's too painful and heartbreaking.

However, one thing that stood out to me from the book. It was really just like one line where Hannah made a comment about how she wonders if some people are like genetically preconditioned to have suicidal thoughts. This thought came to her because in one of her classes where they regularly had group discussions on topics chosen by classmates she anonymously suggested the class discuss suicide just to see if her classmates would be understanding and what not. Hannah did not get the reaction she was hoping for. Her classmates basically wanted to kill the subject, sweep it under the rug, as if they were ashamed anyone would think of such a thing.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone who asked. In fact, just go ahead and get it on your kindle/ipad/nook/comment me and i'll ship you my copy.

Love,

FranklyBecca

p.s. Leave me some comments and recommend books to me!!! I am currently stuck re-reading Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (which is an amazing book! but it's like my 5th time through it)

The Woman in Black: A Review

Let me preface this by saying that I am by no means a movie fanatic, so my review basically should mean absolutely nothing to you except for the sheer entertainment value that it will produce.

So let's get this started. Last night I went to the movie with my friend, and co-worker, Blaise. I was his beard last night as he is gay and we went on a date. We went stag, but we called it a "date" (tongue in cheek).

So I met him at the theater and apparently while I was driving there he called and said something about the movie being riddled with prostitots. I had to ask him what that is, but you can probs figure it out.

So, We went to the theater to see 'The Woman in Black' starring Harry Potter, or Daniel Radcliff, whatever you want to call him. It was really weird when the movie started to get used to him playing another character but I got over that quick. The movie was a little frightening because this ghostly woman in black kept making random appearances at unexpected times (as shown in the gif above -- p.s. not a spoiler b/c if you watch the trailer you would see this exact scene!). I mean the movie was good, I'm no expert, but I'd say it was well made. Just a tad bit predictable though if you were to ask me. One of my favorite things about this movie though was the fact that there were long bits of time where Arthur Kipps/Harry Potter/Daniel Radcliff would be on his own, interacting with himself and quite possibly responding to noises heard in the haunted mansion, but there would be no dialogue.

Anyway, if you want to see this movie, I say go for it!

p.s. but the ending kind of sucked.

Hope you enjoyed my non-review movie review!

Love,

FranklyBecca

shock and awe

Remember how yesterday I was so excited to get my hands on some of those Toms ballet flats? So, I stayed up until twelve o'clock midnight last night (not really for the Toms, but to read... more on that later) As soon as I realized the clock struck midnight, I got out my iPad and went to the Toms site to see them live and in the online retail flesh. I looked at the price and about passed out. $79 for most pairs?! What?! I didn't even pay that much for my wedges! So, as of now, I will NOT be getting a pair, even though the cause is great & they are adorbs. It just doesn't fit in my budget right now.

Oh well...

I am reading this book right now, TH1RT3EN REASONS WHY by Jay Asher. I am almost done with the book and you can expect a review as soon as I am done! Anywho, I should get back to watching House, and making Pinterest crafts, and reading my book.

Busy, busy day off :)

Love,

FranklyBecca

TOM-orrow

Guess what is coming TOM-orrow...

(picture borrowed from here)

TOMS BALLET FLATS!!!

I have been waiting for this day ever since I saw these pinned on pinterest. And yesterday I got my email from Tom himself telling me that they will be out starting FEBRUARY 1ST!!!!! Imagine my excitement. I actually may stay up until midnight to order mine. Maybe not. I'm kind of broke.

Anyway, I am kind of obsessed with Toms. I have three pairs of the basic kind, and a pair of the wedges. So I totally need ballet flats.

Oh - and p.s. this is my new "random, day-to-day, rambling blog" Get ready for some AWESOME!

Love,

FranklyBecca