Rosemary Focaccia Rolls

My visiting teacher, Vanessa, brought me a loaf of this fantastic bread once, and both Husband and I keep wishing we had more, so I asked her for the recipe.  And I didn't have it for more than 48 hours until I broke down and made them (more like was bursting at the seams to make it).  And we enjoyed them with some olive oil and balsamic vinegar.  Yum.  It was heavenly!

The Sprained Ankle

Two blogs ago I listed all the races I am wanting to participate in this year.  And even though I never did find a spot for the Utah Valley Half Marathon, and the Park City Half Marathon is full, I am still planning on the rest....hopefully.

Last Saturday I was doing my weekly run, with 5 miles to go and I was trying to figure out my ipod whilst running - and I wasn't paying much attention to where I was running and I stepped off the asphalt where it dropped 3 inches to the gravel and sprained my left ankle something fierce.  I kept walking on it thinking that if I just walked for a few minutes it would be okay.  So when I got to the point where I wasn't necessarily limping I started running again...and continued to run for the remaining miles.  Afterwards my ankle wasn't so bad...until I sat down and didn't walk on it for an hour, and then I really couldn't walk on it.  It wouldn't support any weight whatsoever.  I even had to pull out Husband's hiking stick to support my lack of left leg, at which time he so lovingly began to refer to me as "Gandolf".  Needless to say I ditched the "staff" as soon as I could, the next day. 

I found that once I iced the ankle on and off for 15 minutes, it started to get better immediately.  Though better is not best.  With today marking a week after the bad sprain, I can walk okay, but running is not yet an option.  All week I've been missing being able to run.  I'd get home from work and think, "boy its a great day, I wish I could go running" instead I've made my way through 2 seasons of Gilmore Girls.  Quite pathetic.  I'm hoping this coming week the ability to walk will turn into the ability to run.  Cross your fingers!

My First

Yesterday I decorated, really decorated my first cake.

We learned how to level, fill, frost, smooth and decorate a cake.

For the class I had to bake a 8 in. x 3 in. cake, bring all my supplies, and a batch of decorator's frosting (which when made from the recipe isn't too bad...but if you were to buy the actual Wilton's Frosting from the store, its quite disgusting, so recommend making it yourself or no one will eat your cake once they taste your frosting).

At class we learned to level the cake (cut it in half), then fill it (which I did with Nutella), then we learned the right way to frost a cake without getting crumbs in the frosting and then how to smooth out the cake.

We learned about adding coloring to frosting, how the color affects it, how to make different consistencies of frosting and when to use them.

We then decorated the cakes using a piper gel pattern transfer, I decided to decorated a the cake with a tie because I was making it for Father's Day.

I learned a lot and I must say, my first cake turned out pretty good....for a first.