A blog a day!

I've decided to try and blog every day for a year.  I know myself and I know I probably can't do it every. single. day.  So I'm going to try to do 365 blogs in 365 days.  Meaning, if I miss one here or there, I'll just catch up with a quick picture or a quick knock knock joke or something.

So here goes,  DAY 1:
Today we volunteered at the school for kids with special needs that is in our neighborhood.  This was our first time to go with just our family.  We read books to the kids, played a couple of games, and passed out snacks.  It was fun.  I'm very thankful our kids are able to join us when we do these projects.  That's a major benefit of living in Thailand, they LOVE kids here!

Reading "Go Dog Go", I will ALWAYS be a teacher at heart. (Notice Kora in the background)    

   

            

  

     

                                         

Doug teaching the kids the game.

Kees passing out snacks.

Today, I also got the chance to have lunch with my language consultant to discuss how I'm progressing with my Thai studies, and how to keep moving forward.  We meet every two weeks and it's always very encouraging to get together.  I'm thankful to have her, she is invested in what I'm doing and wants to see me succeed in every area, not just language.

Since I'd been discussing with her that I need to be getting more hours of listening to my Thai lessons, I decided there's no time like the present, so I walked home.  I stopped at a plastic shop and bought 20 baht headphones.  So, today, you will be glad to know, I got 3 hours of listening in, while I was shopping, walking, and then baking an unfortunate cake.

Now, on to the unfortunate cake.  People don't typically bake, so ovens are not common place here.  I have compromised and own a ginormous toaster oven that will basically hold ONE 9 X 13 cookie sheet.  Since Doug has been attending the weekly pastors meetings with all the local Thai pastors, he will occasionally ask me to bake a treat, especially when the meeting is being hosted at our church.  Today, around 4 pm, he brought this up, I was leaving at 6:30, so his idea (which I should have listened to) was to just take bread I had ALREADY made. Since I was high on myself because I'd listened to so much Thai, I decided I'd make a cake.  One word, disaster.   I can never just quit while I'm ahead...it's a problem.  So I mixed the ingredients perfectly for a black magic cake (no box mixes people, they're crazy expensive here, IF you can find them), the batter was fine.  It was the baking that became an issue.  I realized after an hour of baking, that the cake was completely done and getting chewy on top while the middle was still gooey.  You wanna know why?  I'm gonna tell you, cause what are friends for, if not to tell on themselves when they do ridiculous things, like for instance,  baking a cake for an hour with the broiler on.  Forgot to mention in the description of the ginormous toaster oven, that it has three cooking functions, top elements on, bottom elements on, or both.  I had both elements on and the top of the cake was cooking extremely fast.  Do you want to hear the comical part? My outside-chewy-inside-raw cake is about 100 times better than any cake I've had from a Thai "bakery". They slather some weird whipped pseudo-frosting (that tastes oddly like spoiled margarine) on top of last year's dry cake and while it's beautifully decorated and LOOKS delicious, the taste is terrible.  So in honor of my great grandma, Grandma Stevens, Doug will be serving that cake tomorrow, because I can't see wasting it, especially when it'll taste just fine to them.  The frosting I made IS delicious.  I threw away two pieces of cake so I could save the frosting portions that went with them. I'll be eating that like it's pudding tomorrow when Doug is gone and I'm trying to convince Kora that screwdrivers, in fact, do NOT go in outlets (and no, Gramee, she's never actually done that...yet).  A momma has got to do what a momma has got to do.  And this momma needs chocolate!

And every blog should end with a good word, my good word of the day is: "Be content with where God has you, he put you there, he'll move you at just the right time.  Take a deep breath, look around, drink it in.  Tomorrow's view might be different, it might be the same.  But one thing's for sure, God has a plan for YOU and it's good.  Live in the moment!"  (Just a little of what God is teaching me at the moment.)

This cake might not be pretty, it might not taste good, but those pecans are from Oklahoma, and lets face it, Oklahoma rocks!