B is for Baking

If you know me well, you'll think this was such a cop out, because I bake ALOT. The stupid red thingy keeps coming up saying its misspelled, why hasn't alot been added to the dictionary YET? Anyways, I digress.

See I was talking to my sis, Nulia. Telling her about this Alphabet weekend project and throwing some ideas out to her. Her excitement level was probably like a 6... which isn't nearly as high as I thought it should be, but I forgive her anyways. We're just talking and catching up, because her schedule has been super hectic because she's back in school (AGAIN!) and her course load has been keeping her occupied. Then randomly (as is her way) she said, "oh yeah, I have a link to send to you, it has all these recipes for food and drinks and party planning stuff, you would like it. What's your email address." I have to point out that my sister has known me my entire life, but she never sends email to my correct email address, always one of those "other" accounts that people know I don't monitor.

So she sends me the link, and she's right, I spend at least an hour on the website, just looking at all the recipes on there. And my mind starts racing, I start planning out themes and menus just by looking through the website. I was on e-cloud 9 for more than a hot minute. On the website, they have a whole section dedicated to cheesecake and I remembered I had promised to make one for someone at church at least 2 or 3 months prior and now would be a good time to make good on the promise. I bake all the time, but butter, pound and genoise cakes are definitely easy to churn out, cream your butter with your sugar or open your box of Duncan Hines and keep it moving. My track record with cheesecake is shady at best.

My first attempt circa 1997.
The recipe I had at the time called for neufchâtel cheese, spring form pan, and a water bath. What exactly is Neufchâtel????? Arooo? Yeah... needless to say, my first attempt was a dismal failure. It turned out harder than a coconut and nobody in the house touched it. I refused to let them throw it out for a solid 10 days, until my mother just got tired of this hard stone taking up space in her fridge.

My second attempt. 2007
I woke up one Saturday morning and watched Paula Deen (or was is Sandra Deen) as usual. Anyways, they made this strawberry topped NY cheesecake in like 10 mins, film trick. So I copied down the recipe and headed to Publix. I got all my ingredients, but in the meantime, I had switched it to chocolate, so instead of the graham cracker crust I got the oreo crust instead. you know what, it was probably Sandra Lee, because this is definitely some semi-homemade cooking going on. But i made this cheesecake and it turned out yummy. I took it to church the next day, because it was someone's birthday and we had a meeting afterwards. I was encouraged and in the short time made semi-homemade versions over and over again. Up until this weekend, I had yet to make the whole shebang from scratch.

So I found this recipe on the website for NY Style Cheesecake. I woke up, went to buy the ingredients. Had a proper spring form pan, no water bath in the recipe. I made it, despite the slight problem with the consistency (it was too creamy, as if that's a bad thing?!) it tasted really good. So I spent B, Baking. from scratch. GO ME.


Earlier this week when my other sis encouraged me to document this whole process and share it (she suggested I write a book eventually, I thinketh not!); I thought I should go get a digital camera (I know it's 08 and most 4 yr olds have one, and I am still on disposable camera levels, woreva pictures aren't my thing) but then I went to Target and after almost an hour, I came out with nothing. Not because they didn't have cameras, they did, but I don't think I ever made it out of their global home section, I was just walking about and oohing and aahing like I wasn't there on a mission. So another time, perhaps I'll have some documentation.

A is for Alone

Alright, so my first letter of the Alphabet. This was the easiest by far. A. Lots of places, things & activities start with A. But I knew what I was going to do. It's something I do at the beginning of every year already, so while it doesn't fall into the "something new and exciting" category. It is something I wanted to do, and more importantly, something I needed to do.

I spent time alone. A for Alone.

There was a time I couldn't be alone, I don't think I was comfortable with myself. I needed constant activity, someone to talk to, something to listen to, something to watch; I wasn't able to center myself in the midst of all the activity, just floated about. Then things happened, that forced me to withdraw and start taking time for myself, the first time I truly (kinda, sorta) lived by myself, the summer after sophomore year. I lived on F street in a great row house and had this great internship, but then after one random brief illness, I realized that I probably needed to chillax, and I introduced "ME TIME." It infuriated my roommates, because after work, I would come home, go to my room and lock the door and spend time with me. But in the "ME TIME" hour, I was able to reflect and plan, something I hadn't been able to do effectively, because I never gave myself the chance to do so. The timing was truly God, because a short while later, there were some events that really came out of left field, and had I been in that crazier whirlwind life where I was being blown any how, I know I would have truly been broken.

Well, as you know life happens, and schedules, commitments and priorities change. I no longer have the luxury of indulging in the daily hour long "me time"; so I make sure that at certain times during the year, I spend a long stretch of time with myself, no distractions, no nothing. The easiest times are New Year's and my birthday which is almost at the midpoint of the year. So this year I did the usual, waking up and staring at myself in the mirror, pulling out my notebook, making goals, writing a letter to myself and sealing it. I open it one random day in the second half of the year, to see what my priorities and thoughts were at the beginning of the year. I have to say, it's been less trivial each year.

What else did I do? I SLEPT. Spent some serious time praying and made actionable plans to go into my trusty notebook. A was a great start for me, it really fit into the time of the year and my budget of $0.

So I'm debating what should be done for B. I might not be as radically different as I thought I would be, when I first thought up this project, but either way, I'm going to see it through.

Why Alphabet Weekends?

How did this whole thing start?

I was helping my sister pack for her trip back to Nigeria, and by help I totally mean lazying about watching her free (for me) premium cable and blowing kisses at my niece and telling her :NO/Stop that/Come here/Want to go pee pee/Do you want time out? What a great help I am right?
Well I picked up a couple of books to take home with me as per usual and I happen to pick up this book, Alphabet Weekends: Love on the Road from A to Z by Elizabeth Noble. It's total chick-lit, my sister's house was filled with this particular genre, because she used it as research when she wrote her own novel, (SHAMELESS PLUG in 3, 2....) The Mrs. Club. The book wasn't anything spectacular, it was a slow read actually, but that is completely besides the point, back to the gist.

So here is a synopsis of the book:
" Natalie and Tom have been best friends forever, but Tom wants them to be much more. When Natalie's longtime boyfriend walks out on her just when she thinks he's going to propose, Tom offers her a different and wildly romantic proposition. He suggests that they spend twenty-six weekends together, indulging in twenty-six different activities from A to Z, and at the end of that time Tom's convinced they'll be madly in love. Natalie, however, is not so sure." Source

And I thought to myself
"Chica! That is such a cool idea, you should totally do that with..."

Ok, so I drew a blank. I'm not seeing anyone and there wasn't even a thought of anyone in the near future, so what to do?

Then I thought to myself again
"Bia, u this girl, aren't you always complaining about how you're not living the fabulous life you were looking forward to? Aren't you tired of turning into the dry chick, you like to complain about? Aren't you the one who comes up with all this amazing stuff to do but decide to sleep the few extra hours you have away? Do you want to turn 55 and wonder where you let your life go to? If you like stay there, be waiting for some man to come, so you can start living your life, dry yoyo! And to think some people think you're some cool chick like that, akuko! Fantasizer oshi! Yeye!"

So after being chopping insult like that, I decided, this is a new year coming up, and whether I want to or not, the clock isn't going to start reversing, so I better stop letting life happen to me and do some things I've always secretly wanted to do or purposely planned to do but never followed through. I mean what's the worst that could happen? I don't have fun, I find out I don't actually like something, what? So, during the holiday period, I scrapped the whole New Year's resolution exercise and made some alternate plans. I figure 26 weeks is just a little over 6 months, so I can spend this time getting to know myself and falling deeper in love with myself and hopefully at the end of it all I'll be changed for the better and have some new experiences that I can reflect on as an old woman. At the very least I won't have to hear insults like that again from my own self.

So I put a plan into action, and came up with some ideas for the A to Z weekends.