Through extensive research and data gathering, I have concluded that motherhood is a leading cause of irregularity and ruptured bladders.  Ask mothers at any MOPs program, play group, or PTA meeting, "What is the one thing you miss most from your pre-mommy days?"  

Invariably someone will reply, "My time in the bathroom."
 

Every head in the room nods in agreement and eyes fill with a soulful longing of days gone by.  Days when all the people in their life respected their need to make regular trips to the bathroom, close the door, and allow the gentle urges of nature to be taken care of without interruption or a frantic rush toward fulfillment. 

But motherhood changes all of that.  Once you become a mom the gentle urges of nature must often be ignored until they become angry, screaming calls of the wild that can no longer be denied.

It is a scientific fact that the human body cycles every twenty minutes. If you are hungry, wait twenty minutes and the feeling will subside for twenty more.  If you are tired at 10:00, but can keep yourself awake until 10:20, you will catch a second wind.  If you ignore nature's call for twenty minutes, the urge will temporarily pass.  A handy piece of information to have when traveling with children, but not so handy for the mom who, due to the many demands of her life, has suffered through the twenty minute cycle at least seventeen times and knows it will be another twelve before daddy gets home. 

Such was my situation one morning a few years ago.  Mother Nature was calling, repeatedly.  She had whispered gently at first, and then slightly louder, gradually  raising her voice to a frantic, feverish pitch that I could not ignore.  The downstairs bathroom was in use, so I had to quickly devise a plan that would allow me to get upstairs.  I settled toddler into her comfy chair with a cup of juice and a Barney video, made a bottle of formula, grabbed the hungry baby and headed toward the steps. Toddler suddenly noticed my attempted get away and ran after me calling, "I upstairs too!" 

So, with a fussing one year old on my hip, I tread at an excruciatingly slow pace behind a two-year-old who took her time navigating the knee-high stairs. When we finally arrived I quickly set up the playpen within view of the bathroom door, propped the now screaming baby up with his bottle, and turned to find that my toddler had disappeared. 

I ran down the hallway, frantically searching until I located her in her teen sister's room, happily applying make-up. I wrestled the mascara and eyeliner out of her tightly clenched fists, and found myself begging, "Please, just come with mommy so I can potty!" 

I wiped her face in order to prevent lipstick from being smeared on my white comforter, and settled her on the bed to watch the upstairs Barney video I keep on hand for emergency situations. I helped the baby find the bottle he had dropped and then rushed to the bathroom, unzipping my jeans along the way and discovering that the breathing techniques I learned in Lamaze were also handy in this situation.  

The goal was in sight when I noticed that the man in my life had chosen not to lift the seat that morning.  Sometimes I think he hates me.  Why else would he pee on something he knows will eventually touch my bare skin?  Occasionally, I toy with the idea of doing the same thing to the dining room chair so I can enjoy his surprised expression when he seats himself for dinner.

I hurriedly wiped things down and breathed a sigh of relief as the long desired objective was finally achieved.  But alas, twenty minutes had passed and Mother Nature was taking a break. 

My grandmother, God rest her soul, had five children.  I think it is no coincidence that she also suffered from kidney failure.  Even though she spent the last six years of her life commuting to the dialysis center three days a week for four hours a day, it could never have amounted to the bathroom time she missed while raising her little brood. I hope God has rewarded her with an eternity of quiet lavatory time and a resplendent throne of gold.

When I learned that we would be going to Armenia I could not wait to add to my "Where in the World are Phoebe and Hudson?" photo collection.  My goal was to take my children’s picture with Mt. Ararat in the background.  To show them the place where Noah's Ark came to rest was an amazing opportunity!

We arrived in the middle of the night, but the next morning I was ready for the big photo op! Everything I had read said that Yerevan (the city in which we were staying) is in the shadow of Mt. Ararat, but we couldn't find it anywhere! In every direction were fog and clouds.

 I asked people on the street, shop owners, hotel staff, and even the girl in the museum gift shop.  They all said, "No, I am so sorry!  It is not possible to see Mt. Ararat in February."

  
I asked hubby's co-workers who have lived in Yerevan for a while.  "No," they said, "not in February. Too cloudy!"

  
On our next to last day in Armenia, we took a tour of several churches.  Our tour guide was an amazing woman who spoke excellent English.  When she found out my disappointment she said, "We will go to the ruins, and I will point to the direction of the mountain.  We are in Ararat valley, but you cannot see the mountain in February, not even if you are standing at the foot." 

 
"Not even a glimpse?"

 
"No, I'm sorry," she replied sympathetically, "not even a glimpse. Never in my life have I seen Ararat in February." 

  
Well, I had been praying for several days that God would clear the clouds, just long enough for me to glimpse it.  I only wanted to see it for a moment, and I figured if God promised to move mountains based on a small amount of faith, then surely He could move the clouds covering a mountain!

 
We arrived at the ruins, and decided to take pictures of ourselves as though it were visible behind us.  Then we would put an arrow on the picture pointing to the location of Ararat. I was disappointed, but wanted to have fun with the situation anyway!

 
First, we snapped a shot of our tour guide, Tatevik, showing us the location of the mountain. 




Where in the world are Phoebe and Hudson? Standing in front of Mt. Ararat!  



Next it was Abby's turn.  Notice the vast, white nothingness?




 Of course, I wanted a picture together with Nathan at Ararat, so we took our turn. 

  
We continued to tour the ruins, but I couldn't stop looking the direction of the mountain.  "Just a glimpse, God!" I silently prayed one more time.

  Suddenly, Nathan exclaimed, "I see it!  That's it, isn't it?!"

  Tatevik was amazed! "Never in February!"

  But sure enough, God had parted those clouds and I got my glimpse! Actually, He gave me almost a full five minutes with the snow-capped beauty!  It was breathtakingly beautiful!  I stood at Ararat and praised God for all He has done, right down to moving clouds so I could see Noah’s mountain. 

   Never say never.  Not even in February!






Abby took both of these pictures!!

Having a December birthday means that I grew up having a Red Velvet Cake every year! 
Here we are on my 13th birthday.  Mom not only made the cake, but she also made my blouse and skirt! She was quite a talented woman. 



For some reason, this past holiday season, I didn't manage to make the annual Red Velvet Cake, and I REALLY missed it! So, yesterday, when I dropped hubby off at the airport, I told him I was going to drown my sorrows with a Red Velvet Cake and endless hours of HGTV. 

Phoebe and Hudson were excited about helping! 

  

Here is the cake recipe.  Please, please, don't ever be tempted to use a boxed Red Velvet cake mix! This is so easy, and tastes SO much better! The tricky part is the icing, so I will post that recipe a little further down with some pics of the process. 

Red Velvet Cake

½ C shortening
1 ½ C sugar
2 eggs
1 C Buttermilk
1TBSP vinegar
1 tsp vanilla
1 large bottle red food coloring
1 tsp baking soda
2 C flour
1/8 tsp salt
3 TBSP cocoa

Cream sugar, shortening and eggs. Add milk, vanilla, vinegar, and food coloring.
Combine dry ingredients and add alternately with sugar mixture. (if you have a KitchenAid just throw it all in at once)
Bake in prepared pan at 350° for 30 minutes. Test with toothpick. 

Phoebe was in charge of Crisco.



Sweet Hudson was in charge of pouring the sugar from his great-Grandma's measuring cup.



Fortunately, it calls for two eggs, so everybody gets in on the egg-cracking fun!




Milk curdles faster in a warm spot, so we had the brilliant idea to set it on the mantle. It was chunky in no time!  Milk mixed with vinegar replaces the buttermilk in the recipe.
 


Watching the KitchenAid work it's magic!



The red batter looks so pretty!



One more shot of the batter, but mainly just so I can show off my new stove!! Isn't it lovely?!



Now for the amazing, delicious icing!  In my opinion, this is the only icing that should be considered legitimate for Red Velvet.  Every time I see one with cream cheese icing, I die a little inside.  Don't get me wrong.  I love cream cheese icing in its proper place,  (BROWNIES or CARROT CAKE!) but it has no business on Red Velvet.   

The recipe:

Icing:
2 C milk
7 tbsp flour

Cook until thick, almost like pudding, stirring constantly.
Cover with foil and let cool. It will become very thick. It needs to be completely cool before next step. I generally wait a couple of hours. Leave it covered with foil the entire time.

Combine:
1 C shortening
2 sticks butter, softened
2 C granulated sugar
2 tsp vanilla

Add to milk mixture and combine with mixer until fluffy. Best served cold!

Okay, so basically you are combining the milk and flour to make something like a roux. It should be very thick.  VERY thick!  If it is not thick enough, the icing will flop.  Trust me on this.  It was years before I got this part right!  
 


Seven Tablespoons of flour is exactly right.  The original recipe called for less, but I can't make it work.  It helps if you have your Grandma's old measuring spoons!  


 

Let the milk mixture cool completely.  Stick it in the fridge if you want.  I put mine on the front porch.  Once it is cool, mix up the other ingredients in a separate bowl.  Butter, Crisco, sugar, and vanilla.  Doesn't this look oh so healthy?!



Mix that up and dump it into the milk mixture.  It will look like this:



Combine that together with a hand mixer, and then ice your cake!  If you make a layer cake, use lots of icing between the layers.  This recipe makes plenty!  I put my cake on my husband's grandmother's cake plate. Just for the picture, I displayed her rolling pin next to it.  I like to incorporate as many grandma items into my baking as possible!
 


Refrigerate the entire cake before serving.  I put mine in the freezer for an hour.  Or, if it's chilly outside, stick it in the van for a while. 




Isn't it beautiful?  It's enough to make any lonely gal forget that her darling husband is 5000 miles away!  Unfortunately, I over baked the cake, so you can see that it's a bit dry.  But my best girlfriend stopped by during the baking, and we got to chatting, and doggone it if I didn't just ignore the sound of the timer going off!

One more word about the icing--I remember an ongoing debate between my mother and grandmother as to whether or not you could use this icing for decorating.  Mom said no, grandma said yes.  In retrospect, I think Grandma meant you could color a bit of it and write, "Happy Birthday" across the top of the cake.  But my mother was also right. This is not traditional buttercream because it doesn't use powdered sugar. It is definitely not stiff enough to do any real decorating.  No flowers, borders, etc.  Unfortunately, neither of them are around so that I can help them come to this resolution.  But I am ever so grateful that they left me with a Red Velvet heritage!

After avoiding it as long as possible, I finally gave in to the Pinterest craze!  While there, I discovered a website featuring fun foods for kids.  So, today I made a Tow Mater sandwich for Hudson!  Here is a link to the instructions: Tow Mater Sandwich

And here is my final product!




Later, we let Phoebe choose the evening's activities and menu.  We played Candy Land, and dined on Spaghetti Tacos.  The big kids came up with the idea for Spaghetti Tacos when we had to use up our leftovers before leaving Berlin.  Since that time, Phoebe has been asking to have them again.  It will probably be the last time!!

So, I got it!  I am still a bit in shock, and totally over the moon with excitement!  Now, I just have to actually write a book.  That shouldn't be a problem because it's not like I'm busy with my five kids, or our business, or the house remodel, or life in general.  So, yeah, I'm sure I'll knock that book out in no time!  If you think of it, say a little prayer for me. 

Part of the deal is that I need to maintain my blog, and maybe even start twittering or tweeting, or whatever the proper term is. Twittering sounds like I've been drinking a bit, and tweeting sounds like I'm a bird in distress.  I attempted to set up a twitter account a couple of months ago, but unfortunately someone had already claimed the name Gingeretta, which totally ticked me off.  For years I have been the one and only Gingeretta in the entire world, (trust me on this) and now someone else has the audacity to claim the name!  So, if you think of a clever twitter title for me, let me know!

Hopefully, I can build my readership back up by blogging regularly.  So, check back often, or subscribe on the sidebar. If I set up a twitter account, I will let you know!  And when my book gets published, you won't have check my blog because you will hear me SHOUTING IT FROM THE ROOFTOP!!! 

A new teen trend, which I love!  Tights under skirts and shorts. 

This was our twelfth annual Christmas party.  It started years ago with taking a few friends to see Bethesda's Living Christmas Tree and then coming back to our house for snacks.  Over time it grew to taking fifty+ people to the tree, and trying to coordinate everything so that the food was ready when we all reached our house.  The snacks became more elaborate, and the tree lost its director and became rather dull, so it has developed into simply a food and fellowship extravaganza--our gift to friends and family, and a delight for us! 

We scaled way back a couple of years due to traveling and having babies, but this year we were back in full force with nearly 100 guests.  Our record attendance is 110, and we were hoping to top that this year, but a last minute snow kept several folks at home.  Nevertheless we were thrilled beyond measure and abundantly blessed by each and every face that came through the door!  Even the ten people that I'd never before met! 

We start baking several days ahead.  Nathan is in charge of sweets, and I'm in charge of savory.
Every member of the family gets to help!



In this picture you can hardly tell that we are undergoing a major remodel!  There used to be a wall here.  As you can see across the top, Nathan did a bit of decorating on the exposed header.  ha!


Raspberry Cheese Spread







Reuben appetizers




Brie with pesto, sundried tomatoes, and pine nuts


Crab cheesecake, Nacho cheesecake, and Warm Bacon cheesecake!


These little mice that Nathan and the girls made were the stars of the evening!


Of course he had an entire spread of homemade candies and cookies, so we set them up on our "still being remodeled" front porch!


Twenty pounds of fudge in various flavors, 200+  handmade truffles in all flavors, 300+ cookies, rock candy, etc, etc, etc.




It was a very, very good evening!  There was so much more that isn't pictured here.  We had such a good time as a family putting this together.  The best part was the nearly 100 smiling faces!  We are blessed--blessed indeed!

I have done a pretty poor job of keeping up with this blog, but occasionally something special happens and you've got to take a few minutes to JUST BLOG IT!!   I am at the Erma Bombeck Writer's Workshop in Dayton, Ohio.  I was thrilled to see Steve Doocy of Fox & Friends in this year's line up of speakers!!

I am so behind! (The date on this post is wrong.  It is actually June 7)  These pictures were taken in Panama over spring break.  (the country of Panama, not Panama City Beach!)
Since that time we've spent three weeks in Germany, and I am currently in Belize.  I also managed to fit the Erma Bombeck Writer's Workshop in there somewhere.   Anyway, I will upload a few pics here and there as I have time!  

Originally printed in The Lebanon Reporter, The Paper, and The Weekly--2-15-10

Of the 21 Valentine’s Days that hubby and I have celebrated, this year was by far the most romantic! Our first Valentine’s Day was spent in a snowstorm, without electricity, in a smelly cow barn complete with cow patties underfoot. Since then, it’s been pretty much downhill.

On our first married Valentine’s Day we were too poor to splurge on a restaurant, so I made a special dinner of Chicken Tonight. While dinner was simmering on the stove, we flipped on the local news and watched a segment showing a dead rat in a skillet, covered in sauce. It slid right out of some poor, unsuspecting woman’s jar of Chicken Tonight. I don’t think you’ll find that particular product on the shelves anymore.

I’ve spent Valentine’s Day waiting for hours in an unheated van while hubby made emergency HVAC service calls. I’ve spent more than one Valentine’s Day sitting on the sidelines of a bluegrass jam. And one year we spent Valentine’s Day thousands of miles apart.

Last week I attended a training conference on counseling. I learned an incredible amount of information that will help me help others, but I also learned a lot of stuff that I can apply to my own life. One session I found particularly helpful was on the subject of marriage. I was so inspired that I bought a recording of the session, and asked hubby if he would listen to it with me on Valentine’s Day. Amazingly, he agreed! He probably figured it couldn’t be any worse than standing in a heap of cow manure, or eating rat infested chicken sauce.

On Valentine’s morning we attended our Sunday worship service. In retrospect, perhaps our previous Valentine’s Days would have been better if they’d started with God. After the service, hubby made spaghetti and meatballs, and we spent time enjoying the meal with our five children. Then we got away by ourselves and listened to the CD.

The speaker began by telling a story about how his wife is always late, and how he has made many unkind remarks to her about it. I sheepishly admitted to hubby that this was the first time I’d heard that story because I was actually late to the session. Needless to say, the speaker’s words hit home in many areas.

Afterwards, we grabbed a pen and notebook and headed to our favorite restaurant, Parky’s Smokehouse. We spent a couple of hours setting some goals, discussing the future and arranging the calendar. Then we laughed and chatted while enjoying fried mushrooms and Buffalo wraps. Our time spent together was sweeter than the Comfort Bread Pudding.

As we walked to the car, hand in hand, I had a flickering thought that maybe hubby would open my door even though I usually have to be in labor or wearing a tiara for that sort of special treatment. I didn’t meet either of those criteria, so it was a no go.

I had just settled into my seat when hubby said with a certain amount of flair, “Whew! That’s a bad one!”

Almost immediately the nasty smell wafted up my nostrils. “Really?” I inquired. “You couldn’t have done that outside?”

He laughed, “I couldn’t help it. It just sort of snuck up on me when I was getting into the car.”

I hesitated. Continuing the discussion would mean having to breathe more, and I wasn’t sure it was worth it. Finally, I pulled my scarf away from my nose just long enough to say, “You know, if you had opened my door, that would have happened while you were still outside.”

“Well, you have a point there,” he snickered, “but this is so bad it probably would have followed me into the car.”

How is it you can be so deeply in love with someone one moment and then the next you are thinking about starting an all-out war over something that is going to dissipate much faster than the conversation itself? In a matter of seconds I could have convinced myself that if he really loved me he would have remembered how much I like it when he opens my car door. If he really loved me he would apologize for irritating me instead of joking about it. If he really loved me he would want me to breathe fresh air!

But then I remembered the new definition I learned at my conference: “Love is willing self-sacrifice for the good of another, that does not demand reciprocation, or that the person being loved is deserving.”

Obviously, his need to relieve painful gas pressure was much greater than my need for a rosy smelling vehicle. And he had sacrificed his desire to go to a movie in order to indulge my desire to listen to a CD lecture on marriage. So, I decided to forego that silly argument that was stewing around in my brain, and enjoy every minute of a Valentine’s Day that, in spite of it all, still smelled considerably better than our first!

Drop Ginger a note at ginger@gingertruitt.com or visit http://www.gingertruitt.com