Cake!

I've started a new blog about baking cakes. Check it out by clicking on the image below.

My Mamma on her Birthday with a little "Washington Cherry" cake I made for her.

November 11, 2006

The Most Important Things Are Not Things

Marjorie Pay Hinckley

"I don't want to drive up to the pearly gates in a shiny sports car, wearing beautifully, tailored clothes, my hair expertly coiffed, and with long, perfectly manicured fingernails. I want to drive up in a station wagon that has mud on the wheels from taking kids to scout camp. I want to be there with grass stains on my shoes from mowing Sister Schenk's lawn. I want to be there with a smudge of peanut butter on my shirt from making sandwiches for a sick neighbor's children. I want to be there with a little dirt under my fingernails from helping to weed someone's garden. I want to be there with children's sticky kisses on my cheeks and the tears of a friend on my shoulder. I want the Lord to know I was really here and that I really lived."

Cheers

Mueller Park, Bountiful, Utah

"Life moves pretty fast. You don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."

-Ferris Bueller-

I really wanted to travel some place fun this Memorial Day Holiday weekend. I have three days off in a row and so many people seem to be going some place exciting or on some fun adventure. Today I slept in, then potted some plants and herbs I bought last week. I went hiking up Mueller Park this afternoon with a friend. About a 20 minute drive from my house. The mountains are still lush and green with wildflowers in full bloom and rivers teaming with spring runoff. It was a gorgeous sight, full of twittering birds and rustling creatures in the foliage. The air was warm and humid, with fresh aromas of blossoms and pine lighting across the breeze. Nature has woken up from the long, dreary slumber of winter and is bursting into life. Sometimes I forget that amazing things exist in my own back yard. I need to stop more and drink in the life that is around me.

A Day In Summer

A Day In Summer, Kaysville

LeConte Stewart - Oil on panel 1935

As a child I remember the sleepy days of summer in my hometown of Kaysville. On occasion, a kind old man could be found across the street from my house resting in the shade of the tall poplar trees. He could sometimes be seen having a bite to eat in his car or sketching in the open air. I remember having a conversation with him at some point in time, but any knowledge of topic has long since faded from recall. My juvenile mind did not realize the magnitude of this man and his talent but I was aware that he was an artist. I have always been a creative person and as I've grown older, have developed a love and appreciation of art, especially impressionism. I only wish I could have come to this realization when I had the chance to talk with him as he passed near my home.

The Utah landscapes of LeConte Stewart capture the essence of the quiet country life and remind me of my childhood neighborhood, before subdivisions and curb and gutter streets took over the local farms and pastures. The lovely little cottages and farms of the past are nearly extinct now but some continue to live in the images of the artist's creation. I wish I could close my eyes and leap into these pictures, like Burt's chalk drawings in Mary Poppins. Instead, I will have to settle for the dreams of the past that play through my memory from time to time.

To Life Lived

Provo Canyon, June 2007

May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view. May your mountains rise into and above the clouds.

Edward Abbey