#21: Famous Dave's Bread Pudding

With the year almost gone, I set out to accomplish one last VERY important goal. I needed to attempt to make Famous Dave's bread pudding. On our first visit to Famous Dave's (delicious BBQ) we were treated to a complimentary dessert: bread pudding. I haven't been exposed to a lot of bread pudding in my life, so I wasn't sure what to expect. Well, this dessert blew me away. The only trouble is, by the time you finish your delicious dinner, you don't have any room left for dessert. So I decided to try to recreate this dish at home. I found a copycat recipe online, complete with Plantation praline sauce. I was pretty sure our kids would not be interested in eating it, so I saved the recipe for a time when we'd be together with other adults who would appreciate the dessert. Today, hanging out at my parents house, I finally put the recipe to the test. And we all agree that it is a huge success.

BREAD PUDDING:

1 loaf cinnamon swirl bread (I used Cinnabon brand, since that's all I could find)

2/3 cup golden raisins (I omitted these)

1 1/2 cups sugar

4 cups milk

2 cups heavy whipping cream

1/4 cup vanilla extract

8 eggs (beaten)

1 teaspoon cinnamon 

1. Coat bottom and sides of 13-by-9-inch baking pan heavily with butter.
2. Tear bread into 1-inch pieces. Mix with raisins in bowl. Lay bread mixture evenly in prepared dish, turning crust side down, as this tends to burn easily.
3. In bowl, whisk sugar, milk, whipping cream, vanilla, eggs and cinnamon until blended. Pour over bread mixture.
4. Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
5. Place baking dish in larger 4-inch deep baking pan. Add water to reach halfway up side of dish. Bake in preheated oven 1 hour, or until all liquid is absorbed and custard-like.
6. Remove from water bath. Let stand 20 minutes.

PRALINE SAUCE (I cut this in half and it was plenty, but you may want extra on hand for ice cream, etc., because it is freakin' delicious)

3 lbs. light brown sugar (about 3 1/4 cups packed)

1 1/2 cups heavy whipping cream

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

2 1/2 cups sour cream

1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1. In small saucepan, heat 1/2 cup of the butter until melted.
2. Add pecans and mix well. Bring to a boil.
3. Cook until pecans begin to change color. Mixture will foam up.
4. Add remaining 1/2 cup cubed butter and mix well. (This will cool pecan mixture and stop the cooking process.) Remove from heat.
5. In a separate, large saucepan, combine brown sugar, whipping cream and cinnamon and mix well.
6. Cook over low heat until blended, stirring constantly. Increase heat and cook until mixture comes to 230 degrees on a candy thermometer (temperature is crucial to final consistency of sauce).
7. Stir in pecan mixture. Remove from heat.
8. Add sour cream and vanilla and mix well.

32 Things in my 32nd Year

I've put a lot of thought into this year's goals. I recently read The 7 Habits of Hightly Effective People (habits that Bree and Mason's charter school teaches), and it gave me some great insight into how to better prioritize and organize my life. So I'm "beginning with the end in mind" by thinking of what I want to be said about my life when all is said and done. I narrowed it down to 5 key roles/areas that are important to me, and I centered my goals around them. This year's list of "things" is not drastically different than those in the past, but I think that attaching them to principles that are important to me will be a great motivating factor. And I plan on finishing my 32 things by the actual end of my 32nd year: November 19th.

So here they are! My 5 areas, along with 32 color-coded things to do in my 32nd year:

Wife/Mother
Spirituality/Service
Homemaker
Individual
Blogger/Historian

1. Go hiking with the family
2. Go camping with the family 
3. Family vacation to Washington state
4. Go on a date with Chad to somewhere new (not that there's anything wrong with a Redbox DVD and our living room couch...)
5. Redecorate Bree's Barbie house with her (the plain white one she got from Santa two years ago)
6. Volunteer in Mason's kindergarten class (he LOVES having me come to his classroom)
7. Organize a play-date just for Lincoln (without the older kids)
8. Donate blood
9. Read the Book of Mormon
10. Make a Family Home Evening assignment board (so I'm not the only one giving the lessons)
11. Go to the temple at least 8 times (our new temple opens in March, and is only 20 minutes away!)
12. Update the RS email directory (I had so much work to do when I became the RS Secretary, that I organized everybody's info until it was just functional enough...time to step it up)
13. Know all the sisters in my ward by name (I know so many names, but I cannot always match them to a face yet)
14. Recover the high chair with scraps from the dining chair makeovers
15. Display family photos in the house (new house, new photos)
16. Plant something (hopefully citrus trees)
17. Make a chalkboard message wall in the kitchen
18. Decorate with a thrift store find
19. Furnish the loft with more light
20. Reupholster the couch in the loft (one of its arms used to be just threadbare...now there are chunks of foam missing)
21. Make bread pudding like the kind served at Famous Dave's
22. Can butter
23. Make a tablecloth for the kitchen table (it's an odd size--difficult to find in stores...we finally found a fun yellow vinyl one, but Chad melted it with a hot pan)
24. Sew or refashion an article of clothing
25. Do 20 real pushups with good form
26. Stay at or under my goal weight for a month
27. Read 52 books
28. Read a biography
29. Read War and Peace 
30. Publish my 2012 blog book
31. Scan and digitize my bin of old photos
32. Take pictures every day for one week

32 Things Progress

So I'm about half-way through with my 32 Thinks in my 32nd year...and I only have three months left if I want to finish them before my birthday marks the beginning of my 33rd year. It's been an interesting year, with plenty of ups and downs that have derailed my from my progress. I'm determined to do my best though.

Here's how the list is looking as of today:

1. Go hiking with the family
2. Go camping with the family
3. Family vacation to Washington state
4. Go on a date with Chad to somewhere new
5. Redecorate Bree's Barbie house with her (the plain white one she got from Santa two years ago)
6. Volunteer in Mason's kindergarten class
7. Organize a play-date just for Lincoln
8. Donate blood
9. Read the Book of Mormon (working on this one)
10. Make a Family Home Evening assignment board (so I'm not the only one giving the lessons)
11. Go to the temple at least 8 times (I've been twice so far...and almost made it two more times.)
12. Update the RS email directory
13. Know all the sisters in my ward by name (I know so many names, but I cannot always match them to a face yet) (working on it...it's been more difficult since my calling has changed to Stake RS Secretary)
14. Repair my living room curtains
15. Display family photos in the house
16. Plant something
17. Make a chalkboard message wall in the kitchen
18. Decorate with a thrift store find
19. Furnish the loft with more light
20. Reupholster the couch in the loft (one of its arms used to be just threadbare...now there are chunks of foam missing)
21. Make bread pudding like the kind served at Famous Dave's
22. Can butter
23. Make a tablecloth for the kitchen table
24. Sew or refashion an article of clothing
25. Do 20 real pushups with good form
26. Stay at or under my goal weight for a month
27. Read 52 books (I'm on book #29)
28. Read a biography (currently reading one)
29. Read War and Peace (I only got about a fifth of the way through...I think I might give up on this one)
30. Publish my 2012 blog book (barely started)
31. Scan and digitize my bin of old photos
32. Take pictures every day for one week

Wife/Mother
Spirituality/Service
Homemaker
Individual
Blogger/Historian

Taking a break

We took a trip to the valley for a couple days to visit Adam and Heather, and to use the Christmas present my parents gave us: passes to the Arizona Museum of Natural History! Bree is fascinated with history, and this museum has a lot of fun things for kids, including a courtyard where they can pan for gold and "dig" for dinosaur fossils.

We really enjoyed it, and look forward to using our passes much more.

We all went to Famous Dave's for a delicious BBQ dinner. We got the big feast, which is a great value, and we got to try tons of food, including a super-tasty complimentary bread pudding for dessert (something they do for first-timers). And Lincoln exhibited his love for country music.

More December Highlights

1: Bree got hit square in the face during her soccer game on the 6th, but kept right on playing. When I complimented her on it, she said, "A few tears were shed, but eh, I'm fine."
2: Candy making day! Caramel nut clusters, toffee, brittle, truffles, oh my.
3: The first casualty of the season. I was feeling so proud of myself for getting some early wrapping done. The next morning, Chad's gifts were open and strewn across the floor. Lincoln!
4: I started a Mary Kay page on Facebook. I've been trying to widen my client base, and it's been fun to post about makeup and skin care tips! This post was about applying sparkle eye shadow.
5: The latest version of the kids' chore list is up on the chalkboard. Because they can't seem to remember the basics, and I'm tired of sounding like a broken record. Their allowance depends on how many check marks they have, so hopefully they'll stay motivated.
6: Phineas and Ferb Christmas episode. Dark house and twinkle lights. Love it.
7: Pinterest success! Buckeye Brownie Cookies. Uh-MAZING.
8: At the ward Christmas party with my friend Reyna. I made her put on some of my red lipstick, cuz that's the kind of friend I am.
9 and 10: Chad and I celebrated our 13-year anniversary with a night at a resort. We ate out, saw a movie, and generally enjoyed quiet one-on-one time. I finally got to experience the magic that is a movie theater recliner seat. Yes, it is as awesome as I imagined it would be. We watched Interstellar...movie was weird, but I had a great time anyway.
11: How does she do it all? The baking, Christmas wrapping, running kids around, all the while looking fabulous? This is how. Plenty of crap gets left undone. Thank goodness for Chad, otherwise we'd have no clean laundry either.
12: We went to walk around the Loop of Lights this year. A nearby neighborhood goes all out with Christmas lights. This was the Cinderella house. One insane house has millions of lights, all programmed with music. It was awesome.

1: I helped out in Bree's classroom for their Christmas party! I taught the kids how to make 3D snowflakes. She loves having me there.
2 and 3: Bree and Mason both played their final games of soccer, and received their medals! They stuck it out, played hard and with good attitudes, and we're so proud of them.
4: My mom took Bree and I for some much-needed pre-Christmas pedicures. Toes need to be ready for Christmas too.
5: As Emmit from the Lego Movie would say, "Follow the instructions." So we are sorting all of Mason's legos. Building anything is impossible unless we do.
6: Bree loves helping out in the kitchen. Grandma let her pierce the apple-blueberry pie before it went in the oven.
7: I THINK Santa brought us enough DVDs...maybe...
8: Mason and Bree went shopping with their Christmas money from Grandma and Grandpa Wallace. Bree chose a CD and Ever After High dolls, and Mason chose Legos, of course.
9: Lincoln saw Grandma wearing her glasses to work a puzzle, so he went over to the end table where extra glasses are kept, and put these on. I am dying from the cuteness.
10: Copycat Famous Dave's Bread Pudding. Enough said.
11: We got a record-breaking number of Christmas cards this year. Seeing them fill up the chalkboard made me happy. Does this mean we're getting more popular?
12: This might have been Bree's last visit to Smaland at IKEA. Sad.

20 of My 32 Things: Not Bad

I didn't give up on the idea of accomplishing my 32 Things list in 2014, but I didn't let it depress me when it became obvious that I wasn't going to make it. And 2015 is a new year.
 
Completed:

• Go hiking with the family (San Tan Mountain Regional Park) 
• Go camping with the family (in Payson; Lincoln got a wicked burn on his hand) 
• Family vacation to Washington state  
• Go on a date with Chad to somewhere new (Olive Mill for wood-fired pizza al fresco)  
• Volunteer in Mason's kindergarten class 
• Organize a play-date just for Lincoln (Owen came over for "swimming" in the blow-up pool) 
• Donate blood  (I actually attempted 3 times, but was rejected twice: once for a high pulse, and once because I was on antibiotics)
• Read the Book of Mormon  
• Update the RS email directory (back when I was still the ward RS secretary)
• Know all the sisters in my ward by name (I came pretty darn close, though there are still some I've never seen) 
• Display family photos in the house (the beloved collage-frame has since been broken by a toy thrown off the balcony)
• Plant something (herbs in pots on the kitchen window sill totally count) 
• Make a chalkboard message wall in the kitchen (done, though I still need to patch the nail holes)
• Decorate with a thrift store find (I found a cute fake herb-looking plant at a yard sale. I painted the pot yellow, and it looks cute on my kitchen island)
• Furnish the loft with more light (Chad and his dad installed a ceiling fan and light, both of which were sorely needed)
• Make bread pudding like the kind served at Famous Dave's
• Make a tablecloth for the kitchen table (I totally made one, but have never used it, because I used a thick, cheap vinyl that I can't get the wrinkles out of)
• Sew or refashion an article of clothing (I have altered several cheap men's t-shirts from Walmart to have a more feminine fit and neckline)
• Read a biography (Mary Poppins, She Wrote: The Life of P.L. Travers. It was terrible.)
• Take pictures every day for one week (easily accomplished during our vacation to Washington)

Not Completed:

• Redecorate Bree's Barbie house with her (the plain white one she got from Santa two years ago)
• Make a Family Home Evening assignment board (so I'm not the only one giving the lessons) 
• Go to the temple at least 8 times (I've been twice so far...and almost made it two more times.)
• Repair my living room curtains
• Reupholster the couch in the loft (one of its arms used to be just threadbare...now there are chunks of foam missing)
• Can butter    
• Do 20 real pushups with good form 
• Stay at or under my goal weight for a month
• Read 52 books
• Read War and Peace (I only got about a fifth of the way through...I think I might give up on this one) 
• Publish my 2012 blog book (barely started) 
• Scan and digitize my bin of old photos

Goal Categories: (at least I didn't completely neglect any categories)
Wife/Mother
Spirituality/Service
Homemaker
Individual
Blogger/Historian

It's great to be eight!

When did I become old enough to have an eight-year-old? My first baby is a big girl. It's a bit overwhelming. Don't get me wrong: parenthood has been overwhelming from the get-go (This newborn depends on me for everything!...This toddler will form most of her neural connections before she's five!...Which school should I choose to help shape who she is as an individual?!). But turning eight means she is a full-fledged accountable person, ready to make baptismal covenants. And all we can do as parents is teach her the best we can, and hope we did okay.

This past year we've been focusing on helping Bree prepare to be baptized. Our daily scripture reading has moved out of "Book of Mormon Stories" (illustrated version) to the actual Book of Mormon. We've talked a lot about our testimonies, and Bree bears hers in Sacrament Meeting every chance she gets (although she has been doing that for years). She has taken an active role in our Family Home Evening discussions, and blows me away with her knowledge of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 

She really was ready. Ready to turn eight. Ready to be baptized. Ready to make the choice to get her ears pierced. And ready to party.

The morning of her party, my mom and I took her to get her ears pierced. She had previously chosen the biggest, sparkliest pair of stones she could get. She was pretty brave. I think it surprised her how much it actually hurt.

For her party, she chose to have a birthday lunch at Panda Express with the family, then a trip to the theater to see a movie (When I first asked her where she wanted to go for her birthday, she said, "Disneyland!" When I asked her what her second choice was, she said "Go to the movie theater!" Done.).

Afterwards we went back to our house to enjoy the birthday dessert Bree had designed. Chocolate pie with layers of fudge, Snickers, pudding, and whipped topping, all in an Oreo crust. My teeth are aching a bit just thinking about it.

 

Then it was time for presents. Books from Adam and Heather (Bree LOVES to read). Earrings, a baby doll (with brown eyes and blonde hair...virtually impossible to find) and a white tiger (she is still in a stuffed animal phase) from Chad and me. A white sweater and a homemade personalized scripture case from my parents.

Bree is kind, thoughtful, smart, curious, empathetic, brave, and so loving and helpful. She can be precocious, moody, and dramatic. She certainly keeps life interesting. I look at her today, with her thick ponytail and pierced ears, and hear her spouting random facts using big words, and I think, "Who are you? My little girls looks like this:"

But the years ahead, though they scare the heck out of me, are going to be great. 

This was a big year for Bree. One to remember.

 Bree's 8-Year-Old Interview:
What is your favorite color? blue

What is your favorite toy? fashion sketch book

What is your favorite TV show? Animal Atlas

What is your favorite movie? Harry Potter

What is your favorite thing to wear? Shorts and tee-shirts

What is your favorite animal? giant panda

What is your favorite song? "I Like to Look for Rainbows"

What is your favorite book? Charlotte's Web

Who is your best friend? Cassidy (girl in class at school)

What is your favorite drink? strawberry lemonade

What is your favorite food? spaghetti and meatballs

What is your favorite breakfast? fry bread

What is your favorite game? Disney Trivia

What is your favorite thing to do? sketch in my sketch book

Where is your favorite place to go? the mall

What is your favorite holiday? Thanksgiving

What makes you laugh? when I'm tickled...I only laugh when I want to laugh

What do you do really well? draw pictures

What are you afraid of? rattlesnakes

What do you love to learn about? history and science

What do you want to be when you grow up? archaeologist

If you had one wish, what would it be? to always be with my family