Cooking, Calling, & Closing the door!

Other than going to Miss Fran's to study K'ekchi' in the mornings, we have been around the house all week. It's been nice. I have been cooking a good bit this week (which I love). Today, for the first time, I made a pecan pie. David's mom had brought down some Karo syrup when she visited. She does not eat dark syrup so she brought her own with her. She left it with us. We do not normally use it and the only thing I knew to cook with it was a pecan pie. So, I called my mom today and got her recipe. To me, she makes the best pecan pie ever! I tried it out and it turned out okay. So, thanks to our moms, we had a great dessert tonight after dinner!!

I love baking! I enjoy making pies. The only problem here though is the fact that you can't buy pre-made pie shells like in the States. You can't buy any refrigerated things like canned biscuits, crescent rolls, cinnamon rolls, etc. That's a bummer! If I bake a pie, I have to make a shell from scratch. It's not too bad, it's just more work. Here's a photo of my pie shell. It doesn't look so bad, huh.

And here's my pie baking in the oven

We got a new Internet phone this week. We had to order a new part and in doing so were able to change our number to a local Mississippi number. It's been nice getting calls from friends and family. We use a Magic Jack (http://www.magicjack.com/). We pay $20.00 a year for unlimited calling! It's a great deal and we love it! Check it out! We are soo thankful for technology that helps keep us in touch with loved ones back home.
While buying groceries this week I found this cool new cake pan in our grocery store. I just had to buy it! I can't wait to bake my first cake in it.

And, not that this has anything to do with the rest of this post, but as I was typing this post, I heard something in the yard outside my door. Unless it's raining, we leave our doors, windows, and curtains open all day. It's nice being able to do that pretty much year round. Well, since my door was open, I was able to hear something stirring around. I thought it was the dog, but when I got up to look this is what I saw-It doesn't look that big in the photo but he was LARGE! We have big ones here. He was bigger than my fist. I got to looking around and there were 3 in our yard just like it! yuck!!!