Meaning-full Monday

I have the best husband ever!!  He loves me so much.  It astounds me some times, it really does.

My birthday is coming up in less than a month.  But so isn't my son's...his 10th this year.  He was born on my birthday, so his always takes center stage...I wouldn't have it any other way.  But that leaves my day up for grabs.  Yesterday just wasn't a very good day for me...nothing specific, just felt like sitting down and crying.  So, I started bugging Rich to tell me what he was getting me for my birthday...we do it every year...and we were having fun with it.  I am a "read the last page of the book" kind of girl!

He went and got my present for me!  A whole month early!!  It's awesome!

My camcorder died a couple months ago, so I had been eying the Flip for a while now.  I don't have to anymore!!  :-)  One small problem though...neither one of us looked at system requirements for the computer.  It doesn't playback smoothly because of the processor.  :-(  He said that I would be getting a computer for Christmas!  LOL!  Not so sure about that one...this one works just fine for everything else.  I may just have to steal his lappie for videos!

This was taken with my new Flip!  (Grabbed a snapshot from the video!)

Food Friday

This is delicious! Mmmmm....  I am not one to use the Food Network to get recipes from, but that's where this one came from after seeing the show, Mexican Made Easy with Marcela Valladolid.  I just happened upon it one day, which is why I didn't get to see the whole cake being done.  But I got the most important part...the finish!!  Oh, it looked delightful!  Piqued my interest intensely!  My husband has a wicked sweet tooth (but is picky about it), so I am always on the lookout for wonderful recipes such as this.

I did next to nothing to change this recipe, I don't feel comfortable enough as a baker to do so, but I wouldn't want to with this one!  The only change was I used splenda in the cake and I didn't have and couldn't find cajeta.  I picked up a caramel ice cream syrup, but found that it wasn't thick, as all!  So, the next time I make it, and there will be a next time, I will be looking for cajeta or a thick sauce.  But, SO GOOD!!  We tried it warm and again after refrigeration...I like it warm the best.  You just have to give this a try if you like desserts at all!

Chocoflan

Ingredients

• 12-cup capacity Bundt pan
• Softened butter, to coat pan
• 1/4 cup cajeta or thick caramel sauce

For the cake:

• 10 tablespoons butter, room temperature
• 1 cup sugar (I used splenda)
• 1 egg, room temperature
• 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/3 cup cocoa powder
• 1 1/4 cups buttermilk

For the flan:

• 1 (12-ounce) can evaporated milk
• 1 (14-ounce) can sweetened condensed milk
• 4 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
• 3 eggs
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract

For garnish:

• 1/4 cup cajeta or thick caramel sauce
• 1/4 cup chopped pecans

Directions

Put an oven rack in the middle of the oven and preheat to 350 degrees F.

Coat a Bundt pan with a little butter, then coat the bottom with 1/4 cup cajeta and put it in a large roasting pan. (The roasting pan will serve as a water bath during baking.)

For the cake: Add the butter and sugar to a bowl and using an electric hand mixer or stand mixer, beat until light and fluffy, then beat in the egg. Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and cocoa in a medium bowl. Beat 1/3 of the flour mixture, and 1/2 of the buttermilk into the egg mixture. Repeat, ending with the flour mixture. Blend until well incorporated.

For the flan: In a blender, combine the evaporated milk, condensed milk, cream cheese, eggs and vanilla. Blend on high for 30 seconds.

Scoop the cake batter into the prepared Bundt pan and spreading evenly. Slowly pour the flan mixture over the cake batter. Cover with foil and add about 1-inch of hot water to the roasting pan.

Carefully slide the pan into the oven, and bake 1 hour, until the surface of the cake is firm to the touch, or an inserted toothpick comes out clean. When cake is done, remove from the water bath and cool completely to room temperature, about 1 hour.

Invert a large, rimmed serving platter over the Bundt pan, grasp tightly together, giggle a little and flip over. Remove the pan and scrape any remaining cajeta from the pan onto the cake, garnish with chopped pecans and serve!

Cook's Notes: The batters may appear to mix when you pour them into the pan, but they completely separate while baking, with the flan ending up on the bottom when it's inverted. I like eating it warm, but traditionally, it is chilled 24 hours before serving.

Flan is a rich, creamy, cooked egg custard. It is often flavored with vanilla and baked in a water bath to retain its delicacy.

Cajeta is a thick and creamy spread or paste made with caramelized sugar and milk. It is used as a dessert on its own or as a topping. Also known as "dulce de leche," it is sold in many supermarkets, Latin specialty markets or online. It can be substituted with a thick caramel sauce.

All rolled into one!

This weekend was crazy and it rolled right into my week!  Agh!  So, dear readership, you get a post with everything all rolled into one!  You should have gotten Meaning-Full Monday, TAG Tuesday, and Wesley Wednesday already, so here it is!  :-)

Thank you God for keeping Rich safe!  He was in an accident on Friday afternoon.  It was totally the other guy's fault too.  Thankfully, the occupants of the other vehicle didn't appear to be hurt either.  Rich had a pretty sore weekend though.  I don't think he realized how bad a sudden stop like that would hurt!  Fun fact: airbags deploy at 186 mph.  Typically, the decision to deploy an airbag in a frontal crash is made within 15 to 30 milliseconds after the onset of the crash, and the airbags are fully inflated within approximately 60-80 milliseconds after the first moment of vehicle contact.


It looks like the insurance company is going to total our little car, so we are looking into our options at this time.  God has always and will always provide!!


Nicholas is doing well.  He's having fun with learning the violin, he's excited because they are actually playing some music now!  :-)  He was pretty bored with the exercises that they were having to do.

 He is totally in love with the TAG program.  From the sounds of it, he's feeling very different in class and right at home during TAG.  I guess there are other kids calling him a nerd and such.  *Sigh*  Why do kids have to be so mean??  He's doing really well with it though, "They don't understand that it just means that I'm so smart."  Love that kid!



Wesley is being a little super star!  He's totally got 1-7 now!  We were only working on 1, 3, and 5, but Sharon tried 1-10 and he knew 1-7!  I about fell out of my chair!  Shapes are much like that as well.  He has circle, square, heart, star, octagon (!).  He still needs just a little reminder for triangle and he calls a rectangle a door...well, it does look like it!  But he has finally mastered blue and yellow, so we added red and he already knew it!  We are hearing more and more functional speech!  Yeah!  We are pretty proud of him!


All that being said, behavior is going downhill...hopefully not for long, it makes me tired.  Mornings are being fairly rough.  I am having to fight him to get him dressed, into and out of the car and onto the bus.  By the time I get all that done at 8 in the morning, I am ready to go back to bed!  This morning, I didn't buckle him into his seat to go meet the bus (it's down the driveway), when I got out (and left the car running) he locked all the doors and wouldn't unlock it or get out.  I only had one set of keys and it was raining.  Beautiful start to my morning!  He didn't like it one bit when his bus drove off without him though, so he unlocked the door and got out after it!  We jumped back in the car (after I buckled him in!) and chased the bus down. Got to stand in the rain and talk to another mom for a while though!  It was great to see her.  Hi Cheri!  :-)


Alright ladies and gents, I am going to call it a day here.  I know these were brief, but I think I got you all caught up.  Until next time!  :-)

The Saturday Evening Blog Post

 I know, it's only Saturday morning...but that's the name of this post from Elizabeth Ester.  A fantastic idea where you can share one post from the precious month.  I am really new at this and still finding new things...I have a great guide to help me along though, thanks Alise! (I stole this from her!)  :-)

So, take a look at her blog and share a post!  Click HERE to get there!

Food Friday

Today I want to tell you about some of my favorite recipes that we had for dinner this week.  I start with a recipe from Allrecipes.com and tweak to my family's liking.

The first is something that my family has decided would be good every single week.

Asian Tuna Patties (tweaked to my family's specifications)

INGREDIENTS:

2 (6 ounce) cans tuna, drained and flaked 1 egg, beaten 3/4 cup Panko 3 green onions, minced (optional) 1 clove garlic, peeled and minced or garlic powder to taste 1 tablespoon soy sauce

1 tablespoon teriyaki sauce 1 tablespoon ketchup 1 teaspoon sesame oil 1 teaspoon black pepper 2 tablespoons olive oil

DIRECTIONS:

1.	In a large bowl, mix tuna, egg, bread crumbs, green onions, and garlic. Blend soy sauce, teriyaki sauce, ketchup, sesame oil, and pepper into the mixture. Form the mixture into about 6 patties approximately 1 inch thick.
2.	Heat oil in a medium skillet over medium heat. Fry each patty about 5 minutes on each side, until golden brown.

These are fairly straightforward, I don't use the onions most of the time simply because I don't usually have them.  I use garlic powder at times too, if I don't have fresh garlic.  I use Panko bread crumbs simply because I like them better.  The sesame oil is what really makes this!  It's a very intense nutty oil that bring lots of flavor to the party!

And this is what I made with them.  Rich had 3 helpings!  :-)

(Chicken) Spaghetti Salad (again, tweaked and explained)

NGREDIENTS:

3 ounces uncooked spaghetti 1/2 cup shredded cooked chicken breast (optional) 1/3 cup lightly fried cabbage 1/3 cup shredded carrots 1 tablespoon white vinegar

1 tablespoon soy sauce 1 teaspoons olive oil 1/2 tsp sesame oil 3/4 teaspoon sugar 1/4 teaspoon minced garlic or garlic powder to taste

DIRECTIONS:

1.	Cook spaghetti according to package directions; drain and rinse in cold water. Combine the spaghetti, chicken, cabbage and carrot. In a small saucepan, combine the vinegar, soy sauce, oils, sugar and garlic. Bring to a boil; remove from the heat. Drizzle over spaghetti mixture and toss to coat.

This recipe calls to add chicken, but I was making a side dish, so I didn't.  It also calls for fresh minced ginger, but I didn't have that or powdered ginger, so the next time I make it, I hope to try it.

We are always trying new things here at Chez Chaffins so I would love to receive some new recipes from my readers!

The art of reaching out...

Today's post kinda goes along with yesterday's.

I had a great visit with Alise in the morning then I went to the grocery store.  I like going to the store during school hours because Wesley isn't with me...I love him dearly, but storing is so much easier without him!  He has been known to knock the cart completely over if he gets upset enough...and this is from inside it!  I don't let him walk in the store EVER!!  He's a big guy and strong as an ox!  All that being said, I am quite used to tantrums in the store and the looks that I get because of them.

I am about a quarter of the way through the store and start hearing shrieks...actually, I was on the phone with my husband and he asked if I had Wesley with me!  :-)  Anyway, I go on with what I am doing but I start over hearing a few people talking about this child screaming.  I'm starting to feel really bad for this mom now.  I know what she's going through.  We happen to be in the same aisle at one point and she actually apologized to me.  I continued going, but all the while thinking about this poor mom.  I decide to seek her out...it wasn't hard to find them, this poor little girl was still screaming.  Mom was really trying to keep it together and get her shopping done, but it was obvious that her nerves were frayed.

Now, before I go on, I would like everyone to understand that this is completely OUT of my comfort zone.  I do NOT do this, EVER!  The reason I felt that I must was because of one lady.  I was dealing with a tantrum in a restaurant one day and she came over to me and hugged me and told me that I was doing a wonderful job.  I will always remember that...when everyone else was looking at me in judgement, she had a kind word to say.

So, I go up to her and immediately tears start streaming down my face while I am trying to let her know that I am not crazy and I just wanted her to know that I know what she's going through.  I explain to her that I have a son with autism and we deal with tantrums on a regular basis.  While standing there talking to her, the little girl doesn't utter a peep.  :-)  She was seriously looking at me like I was completely mad!  So, I said something to her and Mom said that she's getting it a lot lately because they are new to town.  *Ding, Ding*  Light bulb goes off over my head!  I invited her to MOPS!  Genius!

MOPS (Mothers Of PreSchoolers)  is awesome!  We meet twice a month and give moms a change to have some great adult conversations!  I think she was really pleased with this idea.  I just remembered that I forgot to tell her what time!  Eek!  :-)

You know, I didn't hear that little girl screaming again.  :-)

So, how would you have dealt with this situation?  Would you have went on with your day not giving her another thought?  Would you have been someone who thought that what that child needed was a good spanking?  When have you been in this same position?

Wesley Wednesday

Wesley is my youngest.  He is 4 right now and in his second year of special needs preschool.  There is a lot to be said about Wesley and a lot has already been said.  You may want to go read the back story here, if you haven't already.

With that taken care of, I haven't posted about his therapy lately.  Wesley goes to OT (Occupational Therapy) once a week and sees an Autism Specialist twice a week.  At school, Wes gets OT and Speech as well.  There are lots of people working to help Wesley.  Right now, we are working on several things...remember through all this, we are working on speech as well...the numbers 1, 3, and 5; identifying body parts; yellow and blue; shapes; the verbs eat, drink, sleep, and cry; yes and no.  Some concepts are seemingly easy for him.  We just started with numbers and shapes and he's getting them very quickly. But other concepts seem to take FOREVER!!  We have been working on yellow and blue since March...6 months on 2 colors!  I was really beginning to wonder if he wasn't colorblind!!  But I knew that he wasn't...he would pick all the same colors out of a bowl of M&Ms and he could match colors.  HE'S FINALLY GETTING THEM!!!!!!

It's amazing how excited I can get over what would seem like a really small thing for most parents.  I know you get excited when your child starts identifying colors.  But I want to shout it from the rooftops!!  Nothing is guaranteed with Wesley.  Every new thing we get is something that we weren't sure we were going to get.  I have heard and probably said "They will be potty trained when they want to be, you don't see kids in diapers in kindergarten or college, right?"  From the looks of it...my child is going to be in diapers in kindergarten.  But that's not going to stop me from fighting like mad to change that!

Wesley is a beautiful, funny, happy little boy. I had a picture and a video that I was going to add to this post, but it doesn't seem to be working.  So click for the picture and for the video.  Thanks for reading.