Baked Custard Recipe - Merry Go Round

It's Merry-Go-Round topic blogging time! Usually they blog about business stuff but this month's blog topic is a bit different. This month we choose to blog about our favorite recipes. I want to share a recipe for baked custard my mother taught me.

Baked Custard

1 egg
1/2 pint milk
1 tbls sugar
grated nutmeg
few drops of vanilla essence

- Warm the milk to body temperature.
- Beat the egg and sugar lightly together, and add the milk and vanilla essence.
- Strain into a greased pie dish and grate a little nutmeg over the top.
- Place the pie dish in a larger pan, and pour water in the pan up to halfway up the pie dish.
- Bake in a very moderate oven for 40 minutes until set.

This recipe is simple but dear to me because it was something special my mother and I did during our mommy and me times. My grandma shared it with my mom when she was a little girl and so on and so on going back in the family. I hope to continue the bonding tradition and share this with my son when he's old enough. Right now he just enjoys eating the results. Ha

So that's my recipe for the Merry-Go-Round project this month. Each month a group of creative folks get together, pick a topic and then blog about it at the same time...give or take a time zone. Wonder what recipes the other members of the Merry-Go-Round crew shared?

Agathe @ Le Bar du Vent

Andreanna @ Glamasaurus

Charlotte @ Fancy Picnic

Fabienne @ Easterya

Jenny @ Jenny Karlsson Design

Lily @ Lily Pang Art

Marian @ Florcita

Ruth @ Birdland Creations

Sara @ Sara's Texture Crafts

Wendren @ Wren

Go take a visit and see. If you make something from any of the recipes make sure to send me some!

Free Jewelry Wednesdays : Amethyst and Pearl Earrings

This weeks jewelry giveaway is a pair of Amethyst and Rice Pearl (FWP) Earrings. All finding and ear wires are in Sterling Silver. These are so cute and dainty so they're perfect to wear in the office or during a weekend outing.

HOW  TO WIN ? Easy

1) Subcribe to the Beaded Zen Designs blog thru feedblitz for an automatic entry (1 entry)

2) Follow this blog publicly (1 extra entry)

3) Follow @bzdesigns on twitter (1 extra entry)

4) Tweet about this giveaway.  Each tweet gets you 1 extra entry. Leave a comment with the link here so I can check and give you credit for each time =)

5) Stumble, Digg, or del.icio.us. this post. Leave me your id so I can check and give you credit. 

 

Make sure to leave me a comment letting me know what you did!

NOW THE RULES

Winner will be selected by random.org on or shortly after Tuesday, March 31, 2009. Giveaway entry must be completed before extra entries will count. 

Winner will be contacted by email and must respond within 48 hours or a new winner will be selected. Open to residents of the U.S. with a valid street address. If your an international friends then we'll work something out if you win =)

No Woman Should Die Giving Life

So for the past 2 weeks or so I've been trying to find a charity to support. I've looked on eBay, FaceBook and multitudes of various online sites highlighting organizations that are worthy of receiving donations. Still I didn't find what I was looking for.

Should have been an easy task considering there's literally thousands of charities to be found. Hmm. But being who I am I can never just do something easy. I had to find something that not only touched me on a personal level but made some positive worldly karmic contribution.

Well, thanks to Charity Navigator (www.charitynavigator.org) I finally found one *grin*.

As a mother I wanted a cause that either support new moms or supported infant health issues. Americans for UNFPA (United Nations Population Fund) (www.americansforunfpa.org) does all that and so much more.

As I read thru their site to learn about their mission statement, services and programs I felt more and more I wanted to join with them. I like that it's an international source of assistance. That means women from all over the world, no matter their racial background, will receive the help they need.

They even have a section where women can form a community around this idea:

Lifelines (www.worldlifelines.org) - a communal space where women can share their life experiences and learn from the experience of others.

Since I come from a multiracial family and have my own biracial son, I didn't want to pick organizations that just helped one racial demographic of women. I've always felt women are part of a single community no matter the skin tone. Going through the process of puberty and preparing to be a mother is something ALL women can relate to.

True, some women may choose not to became mothers while other women choose alternative forms ofparenting. But for those women like me that brave the birthing process, it's one of the greatest joys of life. I wanna be part of something that helps a woman have choices so she can also have a positive motherly experience.

All that's left is to contact them...2nd step

Lets Start the Free Jewelry Wednesdays!

So while organizing my jewelry I soon came to realize I have way more jewelry then I thought. Odd thing is... there's so many different styles that I can't seem to figure out how to group it all together to form a "collection".  

Bad thing for me but good thing for you cause,  I came up with the idea to have weekly giveaways. This way I get to detash and you get free jewelry. I can kill two birds with one stone...so to speak...no actual birds were harmed in making this giveaway =) 

The first piece to get this giveaway started is from my Anodized Niobium Wire collection. Anodized niobium is strong, corrosion resistant and hypo-allergenic. The colors are beautifully vibrant. This photo doesn't show the true bright blue of these earrings.

HOW  TO WIN ? Easy

1) Subcribe to the Beaded Zen Designs blog thru feedblitz for an automatic entry (1 entry)

2) Follow this blog publicly (1 extra entry)

3) Follow @bzdesigns on twitter (1 extra entry)

4) Tweet about this giveaway.  Each tweet gets you 1 extra entry. Leave a comment with the link here so I can check and give you credit for each time =)

5) Stumble, Digg, or del.icio.us. this post. Leave me your id so I can check and give you credit. 

 

Make sure to leave me a comment letting me know what you did!

NOW THE RULES

Winner will be selected by random.org on or shortly after Tuesday, March 24, 2009. Giveaway entry must be completed before extra entries will count. 

Winner will be contacted by email and must respond within 48 hours or a new winner will be selected. Open to residents of the U.S. with a valid street address. If your an international friends then we'll work something out if you win =)

Pausing the "Must Catch Up" Game

Normally the first thing I do in the morning is take out a notebook, get some tea and journal. Then I write my daily to-do-list, which is just an add on from yesterdays list. Ha. But for the past few months I found that the first thing I do...after checking my son...is get on the internet in hopes of catching up. I spend hours, yes hours trying to catch up in so many different areas. Between personal, community and business projects I can stay on the internet 24hrs for weeks if it was possible. Jewelry making e-mails alone are one of my greatest time robbers.  I have thousands of emails to sort thru daily!

You would think after spending all that time on the internet I would have found a way of managing things better. Nope, at the end of the day I'm still not where I planned to be at the start.  I might have crossed a few things off my list but not in the steady progressive way I desire.  

As I though about that this morning I became a bit discouraged. I became a stay at home mom for two important reasons. To be with my son and to develop as an artist. I can easily go back to work, forget about my projects and just go on.  But that's not where I am creatively and personally. The energy and willingness is there along with the ideas...I just need a way to balance everything so I can get more done.

I thought about it and here's what I came up with.  I've been going too fast, yep that's right too fast. I'm running through things and not finding the connection. I feel everything has connective energy and when you take the time to fully be present with something then you can follow the flow to the next thing. Does that make sense?

See, I'm losing energy and focus because I'm not being present with each task.  If I was... then I'd see the next direction I need to follow.  It's one of those buddhist ironies. Once I know my direction then I can move quicker instead of stumbling all around. So...with this in mind I want to do things different today. After taking a deep breath, I'm going to move a bit slower, more focused and result driven. Lets see how I do...

Getting Back on Track

 

I had tons to do with updating this blog today. There were many times I pulled my hair in frustration when codes broke, my son demanded bananas, I couldn't find the photos of the jewelry I just scanned and on and on and on. BUT I was determined to update things today and struggled thought it. I'm happy to say while I didn't get everything on my blog to do list done, I did get some important things done.

*letting go a deep sigh of relief*

One very important thing I got done today was the designing and actually uploading of my blog buttons. Aren't they cute? *proud grin* While the perfectionist in me wanted to hold off so I can tweak the graphics some more...I had to be realistic and just let it go. Sometimes you need to see the progress your making more then trying to achieve perfection. There's still lots more to do but it will have to wait another day. I'm taking my son outside for a walk so we can enjoy the rest of this beautiful sunny day.