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In the past couple of weeks, I have been gearing up for many things. I’ve been working on getting things ready for the garden, working on my Cemetery film and preparing for my youngest sister’s baby shower (for which I’m making the cake). This is not including any Hungry Lucy work, so my brain is a bit of a fast track at the moment!

So, I went to the Spring Grove cemetery yesterday to try (yes TRY) to shoot some video and a bunch of pics. As you can see, it was a very sunny day and I got loads of “sun beams” in pics where I didn’t necessarily want them. While I got to shoot pictures, my camera batteries in my video camera died flat. BOTH of them! I got a few panning shots of trees and such, but not much else. As I got lost in the midst of Spring Grove (which is VERY easy to do!), War-N called me on my cell phone. I had a nice little chat and suddenly, mid-sentence, my phone died. Plus, I had to pee so bad!! Knowing this may have scared War-N, I eventually found a payphone (you know they still exist, yeah?) to tell him I was ok. And yes…I found a bathroom, too It’s now 50 cents to make a local call. Crazy!! Now you can’t even tell someone “Here’s a quarter. Call someone who cares!”. You’d have to say “Here’s 50 cents. I’m awfully sorry it costs so much, but call someone who cares!”.

Blah, blah, blah…I went to cemetery #2 near Sharonville. I don’t know the name of it off the top of my head, but it’s one I frequented when I worked in the area. An old friend introduced me to this cemetery, but you’ll find out more about that story in the future film!

Anyway, I used to go here and have lunch in my car and then walk amongst the stones. I wrote a lot of poetry in this cemetery. One in particular I remember being inspired for was a poem called “Perrinne”. I thought it was a very lovely last name that I had seen on a headstone. I’ve always remembered the first line “Perrinne, you soothe me, calm me down. When things have gotten too busy…” and I sometimes go back to that statement and can find calm in the stone of Perrinne. Anyway, they have some of the oldest stones I’ve seen in this cemetery. It’s a blend of old and new stones from plot to plot. You can’t even read some of them anymore. I find this so sad. Even graves aren’t permanent. But whacha gonna do? It’s stone. It does what it wants.

Now I am preparing my seedlings indoors in a flat, in the typical fashion, under a grow light. I hope no one suspects me of growing anything of an illegal nature! We do live across from two cops and they can see my seedlings here in the library from the street. If they insist, I shall show them my tomatoes and peppers!! I had thought about starting other seeds indoors, but the other things I’m growing are all best when directly sowed. These are things such as carrots, lettuces, peas, beans and a few flowers (cornflowers, sweet peas and the like). I must say I’m absolutely dying to get out back and garden like mad! But, I must have patience. That’s the one thing gardening has taught me. As much as I may want to, you just can NOT rush things in the garden. So, I shan’t.

In my “cake trials”, as I have been calling them, I am trying to make the ultimate shower cake. I started with a Martha Stewart recipe straight from her Baking Handbook. While it was “ok” I knew I could do better. So, I replaced the cake base of Martha’s with an elegant White cake recipe. The Lemon Curd layers stayed the same and I made a straight Vanilla Swiss Buttercream instead of my first Lemon Swiss Buttercream. Cake #2 (pictured) was a definite improvement over cake #1. BUT, I still think the buttercream could be much better. It still had too much butter, which made it a bit greasy, and it didn’t have the fluffy whiteness I was hoping for. So, I shall do one more icing trial and hope for the best. I must say. Swiss Buttercream isn’t that easy! I find it wonderfully challenging. I was, however, quite pleased with the white cake I made. It was so light, moist and full of flavour. I also learned that Lemon Curd wasn’t that difficult to make. Guess what I won’t be buying as much at Jungle Jim’s?? So, in a nutshell, the cake making is going very well. We ate that one up real nice!

Ahhh…that’s better. I can’t stand having all of this stuff stuck in a deadly loop in my brain! Best to get it out and talk about it. Meanwhile, at night I’m dreaming about dried-up seedlings, lop-sided cakes that I can’t ever finish icing and a swamp of a garden that spits out whatever I plant. The brain is a weird, marvelous, quirky thing. Mine has certainly had it’s share of activity lately! I love being so busy, but sometimes my brain won’t rest when I need it to. But, it’s worth the weirdness. I’m getting things done! Now, on to a recording session for Hungry Lucy tomorrow. I’m quite excited about that, too!! But first, a grocery shop is a MUST!

May you have a splendid weekend!

With Love,

Christa Belle