Pie Social and Bake Sale

The ladies group in our church is having a Pie Social and Bake Sale.  It's an annual event and a pretty good fund raiser.  Everyone makes a pie to be cut and served/sold and several other baked goods for sale.

This year these are my offerings....

A cherry pie.  I put all my efforts into looking pretty.  It's made from canned pie filling and a ready to use crust.  It'll still taste ok but I think it really is quite attractive!  (That's me patting myself on my back!)

This is a chocolate pudding pie on a graham cracker crust.  The pretty part comes from the white chocolate that I made into a lacy design. 

It was easy to do but I had to break off a few of the loops to make it fit on the pie.  So it's kinda just so so.

These are Combining Cookies.  Butter, sour cream, coconut, oatmeal, chocolate chips.  Yummy.  Nothing really pretty here but they are a family favorite.  Especially because the recipe came from this little lady.

Grandma Lora.  DH's paternal grandmother.  I've had her knitting on here before.  And now here are her cookies too. 

I mentioned before that she raised a big family and this recipe was made to fit that family I'm sure.  It calls for 12 cups of flour and yesterday when I made a 1/2 batch, it still made 6 dozen cookies.

I'm not taking all of them to the bake sale though...we love them too much to part with all of them!

It's my birthday!

And so we celebrated it yesterday with homemade ice cream cake (1st DDIL made it. Scrumptious!) and presents.

I hated cropping the grandkids out of this picture. They LOVE birthdays and they LOVE blowing out candles but their mom & dad don't like their pictures on the web so you'll have to imagine a very excited 5 yr old boy, 6 yr old girl and 2 yr old girl, all with brown hair and brown eyes and big smiles helping Gramma blow out the candles and open a package or two. It was FUN!

This isn't a birthday picture but I love it and since it's my birthday and I want to, I'm adding it too. It's me and my older sister...can't you just see the love?

Have a wonderful day everyone! I hope your day is as good as mine.

Demo Derby Days

Yup, I'm still around...just couldn't think of anything to say!

So while trying to find a picture for a post, (the weather is dull, the knitting nonexistent and the cats aren't particularly interesting right now either) I found 1st DS's first demolition derby car. I thought it might make an interesting post and that it is summer with all the lush green grass probably doesn't hurt either!

These pictures are after the derby. It didn't look great going in but not this bad!

Right after college 1st DS got a job in a town in NE North Dakota and met new people and made good friends. One of those friends was into demo derbies. And so they concocted the idea to get a car ready for a derby.

It takes quite a lot of time, planning and effort. Certain cars are more desired than others and there are some that are not allowed because they are so durable and heavy duty.

The gas tank was removed and the plumbing redone so there was just a small gas can inside the car. Some people screwed the tires to the wheels so they couldn't go flat. The trunk was screwed to the body. All the doors were welded shut. All glass was removed. And there were probably some super secret things that each contestant did that they thought was the best way to reinforce their cars.

The fun part was deciding what paint job to give it. One of the harder things was getting sponsors to give you money so you could afford to do a derby car at all.

The derbys were held in an open field that had high dirt barriers pushed up around the area where the cars bashed into each other.

There was usually some seating provided but mostly people arrived in their pickups, backed up to the ring and sat in lawn chairs in the back end of the pickup. There was also usually an organization selling food as a fund raiser but lots of people brought their own.

The cars were inspected before anything started to make sure they had done everything they were supposed to and to have not done anything against the rules.

They were required to wear a helmet, a long sleeved shirt and have a fire extinguisher inside the car during the derby. There were several heats and if you could survive your first you could work on your car until it was your turn again. And so they always took a pickup loaded with tools, air compressor and a generator for power. It helps to be a farm boy with access to dad's shop!

But one of the most important things to bring is this:

Yea, it was a bit nerve wracking but all 3 of our boys are excellent drivers and have enough common sense to get them by and so I relaxed and enjoyed the shows. Yes. This was the 1st of...if I remember correctly...3 derby cars!

Slighty random

The cardigan is coming along. The ribbing is finished and it is bound off. I'm anxious to get the sleeves started with the lace in them. I've never done that before. But first I have

more yarn to wind into balls!

And this is a picture of me from long ago. While looking for other pictures I came across my baby photo book and this one caught my fancy. So I'm putting it in here just cuz I like it!

Mom must have liked the surprised "hunh, what's going on" look because there are a lot of pictures with that look on my face. Either that or I was slow to catch on and never knew what was going on around me... ;D