Saturday, June 16, 2012

It's All About Me; Except When It Isn't

This week I've been preparing to go to Nationals in Mobile, Alabama. I leave tomorrow June 16. Some of you may not realize this (but most of you probably have) but at times (quite often) I tend to become a bit self-focused. I know I know, the two of you out there who haven't realized this are sitting there with your jaws dropped in shock. However, it is true. Getting ready for Nationals has definitely brought that out in me. To be fair, I do still remember to say please and thank you and even feel a little guilty about how hard everyone is working for me, but that's about it. So when Kylie reminded me that mom's birthday was the 16th you can imagine how terrible I felt.
My mother has been going to the studio with me (all while I complained), shopped for me (I complained during that too), sewed my clothes (I didn't complain during this! But I also didn't help so there wasn't anything to complain about), and even kept me motivated throughout it all. In addition to that, she has been planning on waking up at four in the morning on her BIRTHDAY to get me to my Pasco flight at 6. My mom deserves the greatest award ever made! I'm thinking that would be a statute of her. I mean really does anything get cooler than that?
I wish that I could do more to make her more fully realize just how much I appreciate the woman she has turned me into. To put it into terms everyone can understand, every good thing about me I learned from my mom through her constant care and advice. Heaven knows she does love to give out her advice... But I love her for it! My mom loves to say that she hasn't been able to be there for us because of dance but it's not true at all. Is she working at the dance studio or on dance things almost all day? Yes. But does she ever refuse to help me with something because she's too busy? No. Never. If I ever needed anything done she would take the time to help me (or just do it herself when I inevitably proved incompetent) even if it meant she was staying up late to finish it. In fact sometimes she was taking time off just so I wouldn't have to watch TV alone!
Now that I've covered everything great about her, let's make a list because there's even more!

Why you wish you had my mom!

1. She doesn't ever give up on you no matter how often you want to give up on yourself. I don't know how many times I wanted to quit dance because I thought I would never be good enough and every time she asked me to just hold it out for another year. Now I know that was just a bunch of trickery but I guess you have to love her for that.

2. She will always share her opinion. Some of you may be raising your eyebrows as in "Really? We want a mom who constantly wants to share her opinion?" Yes you do. Because she is always right. And if you didn't have that opinion, you need to change yours.

3. She will stay up until the wee small hours to work on something for you. And not only that but she'll tell you to go ahead and go to bed. You will feel like the biggest jerk of life going to bed with her still working but you will do it anyway because she insists and you realize you're useless.

4. She will perfect projects way more than anyone else will even care. But since everything she does will turn out amazing you really can't even complain. You've just got to hope that one day you will gain that trait so everything you make will be amazing. But then you'll turn in a terrible school project and realize it's never going to happen.

5. She has the ability to love all her children to the fullest. You can preach all you want that you have found her favorite child but the honest truth is, she doesn't have one. Kacey has got the perfect first child thing going for her but Kristy has her adorable dorky charm working. Brad is one of the funniest guys you'll meet while Courtney is one of the most talented girls you'll meet. Kylie is the perfect blend of pretty and smart but Bryan... Well we're working on him... It's no wonder she doesn't have a favorite! (Just to be clear, I am not bragging about how awesome my family is. Awesome people aren't allowed to brag about being awesome. We'll have to say this is just stating facts to prove a point.)

Did I mention she made me a float?! Yeah she's awesome
I made this post so that everyone can finally understand that my mom really is amazing and that she does so many amazing things for me even when I clearly don't deserve it. Thank you mom for everything! Everything I do well at Nationals is thanks to you. Happy birthday! 
BTW she is just now going to bed and she is driving me to airport at 4 in the morning... Yeah. Once again she's awesome.

Monday, June 4, 2012

Cupcakes, Ice Cream, and Graduation

I recently made those ice cream cupcakes I've seen on Pinterest and I'm sorry to say, I'm not a huge fan. To make these cupcakes all you have to do is put less batter into your cupcakes liners as usual, spread ice cream on them once they've cooled, and then stick it all in the freezer. After that you can add whipped cream or frosting to the top but personally I think some hot fudge was exactly what they needed.
What I liked about this recipe was the fact that you can mix and match any kind of cake mix with ice cream flavor. I have a seriously love affair with mix and matching different flavors to get a magical blend of taste. There was nothing I loved more when I was younger than the giant tubs of Jelly Bellys that let me make such things as strawberry lemonade and pina colada by biting into multiple beans.
Anyway, even with that I still have a lot of things I don't love about this dessert.
1. In all the recipes I looked at, they all just wrote in the instructions to spread the ice cream over it. Maybe I'm missing some common sense thing here (which is very likely seeing as I hear daily complaints from my mom on my lack thereof) but ice cream does not spread all that easily. I set my ice cream out to let it thaw at least but it seemed that it was always either too frozen to spread easily or too melted already. If someone had a quick and easy solution to this problem it would greatly improve these cupcakes standing with me.
2. Cupcakes are supposed to be a hand held food. But when the food gets melty, sticky ice cream all over your hands when you try to hold it, I don't appreciate it. Even if you eat the cupcake right out of the freezer it is still already melting all over you and by the time you throw away the wrapper, you're definitely already covered.
3. The cupcake is pretty darn frozen in the middle after being the freezer and that's kind of an odd thing to bite into. Maybe this could be solved by not making them too early so they don't have to sit in the freezer but I'm so disappointed in my unhappiness of this recipe that I cannot look at the solutions.
4. I had a whole bunch of cake batter left over after making 24 cupcakes! I couldn't waste it so I made a cake with the leftovers. Which I then forgot about baking in the oven because I had to go watch SYTYCD with Kristy. Luckily Trevor got it out of the oven before it burned. Unlucky that meant I not only had 24 ice cream cupcakes but also a whole cake to eat without even having my whole family in town to eat it. Yeah I think I need more friends who feel like just coming over to eat treats all the time... Or at the very least a teenage brother who can actually eat like a boy!
Well now I'm done complaining. It is a fun kind of treat on days when you can't decide between ice cream or cake so go ahead and try it out. It's highly probable that the only reason I really don't like this dessert is that it takes too much work. I think I'm going back to cake mix cookies mixed with random candies...

On another note, I graduated high school this Saturday!
NBD.
It was a pretty fantastic day! Bunches of parties and treats to go around. My funny story of the night is after we made a trip to Sharies at 3:00 in the morning. I made one of my friends order the southern style something or other plate which served fried chicken and waffles. Together. With syrup on the chicken and gravy on the waffles. I don't think I've ever heard of anything more perfect! I got a delicious cake shake that I loved very much. However, whether it was the fact that I had very fattening shake at 3:00 in the morning or the combined smell of fried chicken and waffles, we'll never quite be sure what caused it, I suddenly felt really sick. If I even moved slightly I was sure I was going to barf all over the whole table. As I'm driving home ridiculously slow to avoid throwing up before I got there, I was considering the fact that there were a million policemen out trying to find the kids that were drinking. Not only on my drive home did I have to concentrate on not throwing up all over my beautiful car but also how in the world I was going to explain to a policeman that no I had not been drinking but yes I had just thrown up all over him... Luckily I made it home with any policemen pulling me over so we'll have to call it a happy ending.