Thursday, February 25, 2010

Chocolate Mood

So many of us are chocolate lovers. I am certainly one of them, although I do love salty too. Today was definitely a need for chocolate day. Not only has it been somewhat stressful and absolutely exhausting at work this last month, but there have been a few things recently that have caused some emotional strain. Soooo, I was in search for chocolate today. What better thing to do when stressed? Bake!!! ;-) Or, exercise but that is certainly not happening today, HA!

Well, in December I started planning all of the different yummy treats I would bake for the holiday's. My plan was to give presents to all of my co-workers, family and some friends a taste of everything that I made. Well, I kinda went overboard with it all, and therefore did not have time to make everything on my list. Soooooo, for the month of February, I am making Chocolate Peanut Butter cookies. How yummy is that? I am actually making them for my get together with C.A.M.A (you might here me refer to CAMA every once in a while, it stands for Cara, April, Melody, and Annjeri who are former roommates of mine) and also a family gathering with my Dad and Sis this weekend.

So I started the process of my cookie baking as soon as I came home. Well, yesterday I made the dough which saved a bunch of time.






The recipe said that the cookies would take 8-9 minutes to cook, but our oven is not working properly, so in actuality they took close to 15 minutes. Ugh!
Here is my first batch. They are supposed to be a chewy cookie so I am thinking that is why they seem a bit too soft and they came off the pan scrunched up.



I think regardless of how they look, in the end they are still chocolate with yummy peanut butter chips that will just melt in your mouth. Yummmm....

Saturday, February 20, 2010

Thoughts

Ok, so I have had this image in my mind for goodness know's how long. It is a picture that God showed me during a time of worship. For those of you reading this, many of you may have seen paintings or sculptures reflecting Jesus holding someone up. Well, in this picture, I saw Jesus's hands extended, cupped, and holding a laden down women.

The only difference about this picture just waiting to be painted is that this women was broken, heavily laden, but resting with absolute peace in Christ's hands. It's almost as if God scooped her up and said "Here child, rest here". As I write this I get tears in my eyes because I know there are so so so many of us who have fealt so worthless and torn down. We ask God "Where can I find peace? I rarely have peace. I am depressed and feel very very lonely". I personally have felt this myself and the only peace that I can personally find is in Christ Jesus.

This also brings to mind situations that I saw when I was in Thailand. WOW! There is much oppression in that country. So many women are used for sex and useless things just to bring money. The sex trade is one of the biggest money makers in Thailand today. I reflect back when my group was staying in this house with girls that had been rescued from prostitution. Their ages ranged from 8-24. All of them had been sold or kidnapped into the sex/slave trade. All of them have excepted Christ and have so many wonderful dreams and goals to look forward to.

In the office at the house we were staying in, there was a picture on the wall of Christ holding up a Thai women, she looked like she had passed out and Christ was keeping her upright. I want my picture to reflect this but to show that not only does he pick us up, he holds us in His safe hands.

Friday, February 19, 2010

A little Backgrount

Since I was very young, I remember sitting at our dining room table sketching something of my moms breakables (usually a vase or teapot) and I also liked to sketch other pictures like animals or some type of scenery. I remember being very sad back in those day's and really my only outlet was to draw. I believe I still have some of those sketches to this day. There was also a time where my mom was in the hospital, I believe I was in 7th grade, and I started sketching peoples faces as well.

Looking back, I believe God gave me a way to move on from my terrible sadness and to look forward to seeing his beauty in my drawings. Since then, my interests have moved on from sketching to painting. Although I still love to sketch, I have found myself being more fascinated with painting. The medium of paint that I use is Acrylics; I haven't tried out oils or water colors yet, but I think that would be pretty fascinating.

I think that having this blog is going to help me with some accountability in painting again and to really start putting in words how I feel. I know that I am not very sure of myself with how well I am going to do. I have been successful with a lot of paintings that I have given to people (I will post those pictures later)but I want to merge out in other types of paintings as well(another blog for another day).

I have posted a few pictures on my blog of dance paintings that I would like to do at some point. Can you tell that I love dance? ;-)

Creative v.s. Writing skills

OK, OK, OK. So everyone is blogging nowadays right? I have to say right off that I am not the greatest writer in the world. I am not very good at grammar or spelling, or how many comma's I, should ,or should, not use. I can tell you that I will do my best at it and let it grow from there.



I must admit that I have wanted to blog for many years, but really, since I am not a writer, I never stepped out and did it. Just recently a good friend of mine created a blog for herself and it made me realize how much I have wanted to have a place to store things all about me (wants, interests, likes, dislikes, thoughts and things that are going on with my life).



I have a creative mind. I think in 3d. My world is revolved around pictures (Can I put that on a canvas?). Someone tells me a story and I see it in full color (which can be a bit dangerous, so please, watch how descriptive you get if you don't want me to picture it -hint hint...).



I plan on using this blog as a sort of journal, but also put in writing all of those crazy creative thoughts going through my head. I have a feeling that some of my posts may be a bit raw, depending on how I am feeling that day; or they may be very lighthearted as I ramble on about new ideas that come to me. As I am writing this, I am thinking of one of my favorite movies Julie and Julia, and how she created her blog just for cooking. Well, this will be everything rolled into one. I love cooking, baking, painting, drawing, scrap booking, reading, watching movies, visiting with friends and family, etc.



So, here it goes friends. Are you ready to hop onto the roller coaster with me??? Lets GOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!