The Mallow Project

It's not cocaine.  It's mostly organic, zero carbon, less refined than traditional, made-in-the-USA-sugar, coated in powdered sugar that I made in my blender from the same, along with a little gelatin, salt, and corn free vanilla.  It is my first attempt at home made marshmallows, and let me tell you, they are awesome!  They are softer and bouncier than store bought mallows, which now remind me of fake sugar mixed with plastic.  These taste like marshmallows, only real, awakened, and with a purpose.  Their purpose was originally Sunday School, although I have been wanting to make them for a while since getting a hankering for roasted marshmallows.  And since I've got my baking face on for the school Fall Fest this weekend, I figured I'd give them a go.  So to possibly disagree with all my apparent crack heads friends out there, I'm going to have to agree with my other friend and say that they look like tofu. ;)  But I've never put tofu on a fork and tried to roast it over my stove before...

Since these are fluffier than store bought evil corn-laden mallows, after it roasted beautifully, it fell apart like a politician under scrutiny.  But then it tasted amazing.  So I guess if I ever wanted to make graham crackers and buy some fair-trade chocolate, we could do s'mores.  But really just scraping the mallow drippings out of the bowl was fine for me.  And to answer another home made marshmallow inquiry, they do in fact float in hot chocolate!  It was like a small island of joy floating in sea of delight.

By far the hardest part was cutting and extracting the little guys from the pan.  I've got some ideas to try for next time, but there was something kind of zen-like about the process since I was kind of mindlessly doing it while watching TV.  'Cause we've been without marshmallows for like, 8 months, and it's just about marshmallow season, and that's not gonna' fly.  We lost nuts for the holidays years ago, and this is going to be our first year without candy.  But we will have marshmallows.  Oh yes, we will have marshmallows.  We can do toasted coconut mallows, carob, chocolate, and sprinkle marshmallows.  And our marshmallows will kick your marshmallows cheap, pesticidal butts.  Unless of course you want to go camping.  Then our marshmallows will cry big fluffy organic flaming tears right into the fire! :)
Here is the recipe I used. http://www.food.com/recipe/homemade-marshmallows-no-corn-syrup-384069

My WTH Burrito

Sit around with friends, play music, and laugh.  That pretty much happened last night now that I think about it.  It was really fun.  It was a rehearsal for the church band, or at least this week's band since we have such a pile of musicians that there is a different rotation every week.  And since the regular leader isn't going to be there, it worked out that 5 of the people on the rotation this week are or have been worship leaders, so we all knew our stuff or at least worked it out pretty quickly.  Good, times.  Plus, I got some time with another tired Momma friend on the team before and after rehearsal which was double bonus.  And the nose bleed I sang myself during rehearsal was very very minor.  That's what I get for being out of practice.  Standing and breathing huge amounts will apparently do that to you if you've been a couch pillow for a couple of months.  Probably the fact that I was still recovering from Sunday's huge choir-lights migraine didn't help.  I haven't told the worship leader yet that I am quitting choir eternally, but I don't think he'll mind.  I don't think I care.  Bright lights suck, they trigger migraines.  Not sure how that's going to work being a stage musician.  WTH?

I feel like that's my mantra lately, WTH?  It's a combination of protest mixed with carrying on mixed with genuine confusion wrapped in sarcasm topped with a small dollop of acceptance, eaten every day with a scream/grunt of frustration.  My WTH burrito.  Luckily WTH is gluten free, so...at least that.  I don't know what the solution is to my constant stress and frustration lately, maybe to stop screaming when I eat?  September was...cinderblocks.  Not just hard but concrete and terrible, grotesque in a world that should be green and fluid.  So when October came there was no motivation, there was almost no recovery.  Only now past the middle of October am I thinking of recovering, reclaiming what life I had before and in August, amazing and beautiful.  Only now since the two serious migraine days this month that came during hormone week, after the devil choir-lights fiasco am I trying to place life back into the categories: With Migraine, and Without Migraine vs: Just Always Migrainey.  WTH?  It seems too much work, gaining so much beautiful ground only to have it destroyed by a lumpy greasy cinderblock or 5.  *sigh*  But slowly it grows, the hope.  I have nothing better to do with my time anyway but slowly regrow the green and the hope that still hasn't gone back in the closet, even 'though it's nearly cluttered off the nightstand by flecks and chips of cinderblock dust and papers from the kids' schools telling me about all the things I'm not participating in.  Speaking of hope, let's talk about boys.

I have been forced to talk about boys a lot lately, through no fault of my own.  I've been threatened a blind date, and people have been asking about the girls' dad.  Again, WTH?  Stupid boys...one boy I know has a friend who won't come and see him from out of town unless one boy gets him a blind date.  So one boy tries to set me up on a blind date with his friend from out of town.  Are you kidding me?!?  I'm not opposed to meeting boys.  I am opposed to going on blind dates with boys with such stipulations, call it whatever you want.  And to be stupid honest, I have hope for my life in general that it won't always completely suck; I don't have much hope that I won't always be single.  It wavers between absolutely no hope and almost no hope.  It was a long shot to begin with, me being weird and independent, a tomboy, a leader, stubborn among other things.  Then I chose an admitted complete failure (hindsight) who could not/would not keep up his end of the whole marriage bargain and after giving it my all Anyway until I had beyond nothing left and he was endangering the kids with his carelessness and feeding them things they were allergic to over and over (and over), I took them and left.  I should have left so much sooner.

But seriously, how do you hope to start a new relationship when you have to eat like a cult leader, nap like a diaper baby, and have zero energy just for starters?  It is laughable.  I laugh at the notion.  I must laugh at it and scorn it and walk all over it because to do anything else is ridiculous.  Worthy of ridicule.  But this is fine with me and not a WTH, because I don't need the drama, as much as I would love for my girls to have a Father who is present and worth his salt.  For as much as I have always found it easier to relate to boys than girls and have always had a lot of boy friends, I seem to pick real losers past the friend stage.  I guess that's a little bit WTH?  But unlike losing the wheat from our diet, this is not something I mourn.  Perhaps I trust God more with our long-term well being than our day-to-day suffering.  Hm.  So um, anyway...I finally got the action lowered on my new guitar, Heath Rogers.  I also put some new strings on him, and omg, does he sound pretty now without murdering my fingers!  So there is a boy in my life I can deal with.  I happen to be playing him next week in the church band too, possibly with sunglasses on, we'll see if I survive this week without a migraine and a nosebleed.  Because WTH?!?