Author: Lois Houston

I'm a sweet tea drinkin' southern gal who loves to cook, bake, crochet, and read. Check out my blog for posts about parenting, faith, books, crafts, planning, baking, cooking, and life in general.

Seeing the sights

During our spring break this week, Mom and my step-dad wanted Big Girl to take some pictures of the historic buildings downtown. So, we headed downtown to take some pictures on Wednesday.

Big Girl was the “official” photographer of the day…

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We also went into the Cathedral – she took some great pictures:

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We’re headed home tomorrow – hopefully to have some fun with SuperMan this weekend before we come face-to-face with reality on Monday morning.

Absolutely Awesome Amaretto Cake

I told you last Tuesday it was “experiment day” in my kitchen.

This is one of the recipes I was working on.

I woke up on Monday wanting to bake a cake for the family to nibble on during the week.  The only thing was I wanted something different.  I wanted something rich like a pound cake, but light and fluffy like the Brown Sugar cake I make.  Something with the caramelly flavor that cake has, but with more. I just wasn’t sure what the more was…

So, I kept thinking about it through the night and decided on Tuesday to go for broke and just make something up as I went along. The worst that could happen was that it turned out awful and I tossed it.

So this is what I made:

IMGP3416 Big Girl had the first bite and declared it should be named “Yummy Cake” and bugged me all afternoon to have more slices, so I think it can be considered a success.

Amaretto Cake

1 yellow cake mix
2 eggs
1 cup water
1/4 cup amaretto
1 teaspoon almond extract
1/3 cup butter softened
1/2 cup All Natural Almond Accents
1/4 cup Splenda Brown Sugar Blend

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
    Grease Bundt pan or tube pan.
    Finely chop almonds.
    Mix all ingredients.
    Pour cake batter into pan.
    Bake one hour or until toothpick inserted comes out clean.
  • You can substitute 1/4 cup (4Tbs) of Amaretto flavored coffee syrup for the amaretto (that’s what I did)
  • Use 1/2 cup brown sugar if you are not using the Splenda Blend

You could probably make a glaze with some amaretto and powdered sugar, if you like.

 

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Photo of the Day: @ the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist

In front of the cathedral in Savannah

sent from my Project 365 app
http://bit.ly/5G0JwQ

April5

Sent from my iPhone

Menu Plan Monday (not)

There will be no menu plan this week. The girls and I are enjoying Spring Break and have taken off to spend the week at my mom's house – shopping, playing, laughing, and relaxing.  Little Bit is not feeling well, but our wonderful pediatrician has called in some antibiotics and she's on the mend.  

The weather down here is beautiful – sunshiny and warm – as opposed to the gloom and rain we've had in North Georgia the past couple weeks. I spent a good bit of time on the swing in Mom's backyard yesterday – getting my dose of Vitamin D the good old fashioned way.

We may make an excursion to somewhere fun – like St Augustine – or we may just decide to stick closer to home.

I don't know how much I'll post this week – these folks are not too tolerant of me being on the computer.  But I'll be back next week for sure. 🙂