Welcome Chance!

I wanted to formally welcome our newest family member, Chance. He is a male read eared slider (RES) who I've known for about 3-4 years. We rescued him from my work. He was living in a classroom that seemed to have lost interest in him. RES's are a lot of work!

I first met Chance when I worked in his classroom. I was his care provider for quite sometime. He's who inspired me to get Molly. I moved on and he stayed behind. With the building of the pond it was time to move him into a better situation. So, on April 30, 2009 he moved into our life. I introduce the world to Chance Perotti.

Chance is a lot smaller and a bit more unsociable than Molly. He has very large claws, different markings, and a pointed face. It's nice to be able to tell them apart. I'd be a horrible mother of twins! After being with for a few weeks he is doing quite well. I even caught him basking with Molly one day.

Awww look it's there first meeting. I turned off the pump so I could see how they reacted to each other. She's HUGE compared to him. I think that Molly McButterPants remains queen of the pond. The look on Molly's face is priceless.

Whip Cream Adventures

Hey sicko's first off get your minds out of the gutters. Maybe I should have titled it stabilized whip cream adventures. Enough of that, let's get our minds on food! A couple of weeks ago was Mario's 35th birthday. We had a great weekend of celebrating in a beautiful hotel on the California coast. Unfortunately, the big day actually fell on Monday.

Being the loving wife I am, I had to make sure he got to blow out his candles. I ran to our local grocery store to whip up a box of cake mix. On the way I called my mom and told her all about what I was going to make. I told her how Bub had said that his favorite cake was chocolate cake with whip cream frosting. And how the "I can do that" light went off in my head. As we talked about my plan, and she said the statement that sent my brain into a tale spin, "are you going to stabilize it?" I had no clue what the hell she was talking about.

The more we talked I realized she did know what she was talking about. Mom filled me in on how by not stabilizing my whip cream that it would not be stiff and it would be a watery mess by the second day. In a panic I asked her what I needed to do? She informed me to get the ingredients I was already going to get and to pick up some gelatin. As soon as I got home I hit the computer to make sure mom wasn't crazy . And wow she wasn't, I found that there is a pretty standard method of how to stabilize whip cream.

I was able to take this standard recipe and go from this:

To this beauty:

It was perfect and lasted for a good 3-4 days tasting just as good as it had the first night I made it. I have to say that 1. this will be my go to whip cream recipe for umm probably the rest of our lives and 2. Mom you were right (she likes to hear that)!

The final product for Mario's birthday baked treats were cupcakes and I also had tried making cupcakes in cones (which Bub loved). Adorable and perfect for kids. But not so great the second day, the moisture of the cupcake destroys the cone.