Some weeks I feel like I never leave the kitchen, yet I know that isn’t true. I know this because the groceries don’t seem to diminish in some ways and well, there is pizza night and scrounge night and “we’ve been in the car all day” night.
However, this weekend proved an exception in some ways. I had a lot of car time. Really, I am moving walking distance to every kid activity and their jobs ASAP-be handy if they went to school, activities, etc somewhere near the Great Lakes Commissary. It would also be handy if it was somewhere with decent weather. Ah well, I will just plot my move to walking distance to activities instead. Add in a closer nursing facility for my sister as well. Hours free in my week.
In any case, I did manage to bake this weekend.
1. Lemon Cheese Cake My great grandmoth1er’s recipe, the birthday cake requested by the newly 16-year-old. I made it in a bundt pan and used the “filling” as frosting. This got a better reception from the rest of the family this time as the cheddar didn’t “candy” and instead was smoothly incorporated in.The cake stuck stubbornly to the pan so there was some ickyness to the final look–but it was tasty.
2. TWO horrifyingly bright Halloween Bundt Cakes. Unfortunately, the one meant for the Girl Scout meeting had an untimely demise on the asphalt on the way into the meeting.
3. Liquid Cinnamon Rolls that didn’t come out so liquid this time–probably because there was an accidental purchase of a nearly identical looking can of crescent rolls that were NOT Pillsbury. They were dry and soaked up some of the liquidy goodness. Also, no one was up when the bake time was done, so they had time to set, making them more like the “Sopapilla Cheesecake” of the original recipe title.
None of these things took too much time to make, though clean up was a disaster. Not my department though! 
I did make healthy food as well though–in particular one “Oh my, I need to use these veggies and now” creation.
I took:
green onions (3)
Mushrooms
a head of cauliflower
3 yellow squash
1 pt cherry tomatoes
Fresh Spinach
1 pkg Sweet Italian Sausage
Sauteed it together, served it over whole grain pasta. It worked.
For my mother’s birthday, I knew I wanted to make a cake for her. I wanted to make a cake from her childhood, but not one of her grandmother’s cakes. Those cakes really rock and I share those recipes from time to time. I wanted something a bit different though, so I chose a classic Coca-Cola cake (a southern favorite). Yes, we had a theme.