The Country Barn

Thanksgiving Recipe:Pumpkin Marbled Cheesecake

2009-11-21T13:27:00.000-06:00

*From the kitchen of Christian Comedian Bob Smiley*

Ingredients :
1 and 1/2 cups crushed gingersnap cookies (When I was growing up, my family was poor, so I used sugar cookies left over from our church party)
1/2 cup finely chopped pecans ( Actually, no one liked pecans, so I used one cup of sugar instead)
1/2 cup butter (We couldn't afford air conditioning, so all our butter was melted)
24 oz softened cream cheese (To soften it, I'd carry the stick of cream cheese in my pocket while riding my bike for thirty minutes)

1 1/4 cup sugar (I went to public school, so I didn't know what a "1/4" was. I just went with two cups)

2 teaspoons vanilla extract (I didn't know how to extract vanilla from something, so I just put in one vanilla wafer
4 large eggs (I grew up on a farm, so I used turkey eggs. After all, they were large!)
1 1/2 cups pumpkin puree (Ask a french guy what puree means
1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon (Again, we didn't have cinnamon, so I used cinnamon chewing gum)
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg (I actually had my friend Mag grind up some almonds)

Step 1: Preheat oven to 350 degrees. (This wasn't a problem because our Texan oven stayed about 250 degrees even when it wasn't on)

Step 2: Combine gingersnap crumbs, pecans, and butter. Press onto pan (not, well, never mind) and 1 1/2 inches up the sides of a 9-inch springform pan (I used a metal bucket.) Bake for 10 minutes. Remove and cool.

Step 3: Combine cream cheese, 2/3 cup sugar, and vanilla, mixing at medium speed on electirc mixer until well blended (We didn't have a mixer, so I had my little brother mash it up with his hand, but he did it at medium speed, because we like to follow directions to a T) Add eggs, one at a time (or as the turkey could lay them)< beating well after each addition (the egg, not the turkey) Remove one cup batter from mixture and chill. Add remaining sugar, pumpkin and spices to remaining batter; mix well (may have to use a different family member if your brother's arm is tired) Alternately layer pumpking and cream cheese batters over the gingersnap crust. Swirl knife through the layers of the batter to create a marble effect. (Note: This won't look like a marble. The directions really messed with me the first time I made this. I couldn't get it to roll up into a ball that I could shoot across the floor!)

Step 4: Bake at 350 for 1 hour and 15 minutes. Loosen ckae from rim of pan, cool before completely removing. Chill before serving.

******
That's it! Follow these directions, and I promise you'll have a big mess- but a tasty mess!

-As seen in BRIO MAGAZINE-

Long Time, No Post.....

2009-11-18T22:48:00.000-06:00

I know that I have not posted in FOREVER, but I have been so busy! So what are ya'lls plans for Thanksgiving? Let me know! I will post about ours at home. And recipes coming so stay tuned!
Elyse

Fall

2009-09-22T13:09:00.001-05:00

Today I was looking back through my old posts, and I found this. Hope you enjoy!

Today I was thinking about God's grace, how he was kind enough to rescue all of us from death ourselves, and sending his son to die on the cross instead. His design was amazing, having Jesus rise from the dead in three days. As you can probably tell, I've been reading Matthew 27-30. It is an amazing account of how Jesus was self-less and willing to have God's will be done. In a way, it's almost like the falling leaves outside. This Faith Fire catches, like a single leave on a tree. One changes color, and then they all start to. But you may find a few that just go from green to brown a crumpled, laying on the cold, hard dirt. But rarely will you find a tree with only a single leaf. Unless you

Don't go grocery shopping
don't go to church
don't go to school
Stay in your room all day, letting no one in, and
Don't talk to anybody

You're not a single leaf on a bare tree. That leaf is solitary. You are not! Trees have at least a hundred leaves in most cases. If you're the only unique- colored leaf in your enviroment, spread the fire: Live and Testify to Jesus.

Don't go grocery shopping
don't go to church
don't go to school
Stay in your room all day, letting no one in, and
Don't talk to anybody

Another Favorite Of Mine

2009-09-22T11:57:00.002-05:00

Revelation by Third Day

My life, Has led me down the road that's so uncertain And now I am left alone and I am broken, Trying to find my way, Trying to find the faith that's gone This time, I know that you are holding all the answers I'm tired of losing hope and taking chances, On roads that never seem, To be the ones that bring me home Chorus: Give me a revelation, Show me what to do Cause I've been trying to find my way, I haven't got a clue Tell me should I stay here, Or do I need to move Give me a revelation I've got nothing without You I've got nothing without You My life, Has led me down this path that's ever winding Through every twist and turn I'm always finding, That I am lost again (I am lost again) Tell me when this road will ever end Chorus: I don't know where I can turn Tell me when will I learn Won't You show me where I need to go Oh oh Let me follow Your lead, I know that it's the only way that I can get back home Chorus: Oh, give me a revelation... I've got nothing without You I've got nothing without You

http://www.klove.com/broadcast/playnow.aspx?href=/broadcast/stream.aspx%3fhref%3d/Audio/hooks/2877.rm&onespeed=true&media=listen&bt=1& <--- Click there to hear sample

2009-09-22T11:51:00.003-05:00

Lead Me To The Cross by Chris And Conrad

Savior I come

I quiet my soul remember Redemptions hill

Where Your blood was spilled

For my ransom

Everything I once held dear

I count it all as lost

Lead me to the cross

Where Your love poured out

Bring me to my knees Lord

I lay me down

Rid me of myself I belong to You

Lead me, lead me to the cross

You were as I

Tempted and trialed You are

The word became flesh

Bore my sin and death

Now you're risen

Everything I once held dear

I count it all as lost

Lead me to the cross

Where Your love poured out

Bring me to my knees Lord

I lay me down

Rid me of myself I belong to You

Lead me, lead me to the cross

Lead me to your heart

This is one of my favorite songs. It reminds me that everyday, I am living for Jesus. It has been known to bring me to tears occasionally. While other people are living for other things in the world, I live for Christ. And while they look better off on the inside, I know that it is I that really has the better road.

The Crazy Time I Had At a Sleepover On March 16-17

2009-03-18T08:56:00.005-05:00

My best friend, Leigha, was spending the night at my house. It started out normal. We talked, got on Facebook, talked, laughed, talked, ectera! Then we decided to play outside. We walked out to the barn, and we found a dead cat. That was weird. Then we decided to go back inside for lunch, and then we painted our nails crazy colors. After talking about crazy, we asked my mom if we could go to Barnes & Noble. She said yes, so we went back downstairs to change.....into crazy, mismatched clothes! Leigha had on knee-high socks with dress flats! I had on a red turtleneck with a light blue tank, and pink striped armwarmers! The pictures are above....

Be Thou My Vision (Keeping God Number One Even In Tough Times)

2009-03-03T21:42:00.003-06:00

Be Thou my vision, O Lord of my heart; Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art. Thou my best thought, by day or by night, Waking or sleeping, Thy presence my light.

2. Be Thou my Wisdom, Thou my true Word; I ever with Thee, Thou with me, Lord; Thou my great Father, I thy true son; Thou in me dwelling, and I with Thee one.

3. Be Thou my battle-shield, sword for my fight, Be Thou my dignity, Thou my delight. Thou my soul's shelter, Thou my high tower. Raise Thou me heavenward, O Power of my power.

4. Riches I heed not, nor man's empty praise, Thou mine inheritance, now and always: Thou and Thou only, first in my heart, High King of heaven, my Treasure Thou art

5. High King of heaven, my victory won, May I reach heaven's joys, O bright heav'ns Son! Heart of my own heart, whatever befall, Still be my vision, O ruler of all.

This old hymn is one of my favorites, because it reminds me that God always needs to be my treasure, not money, or education, but God, the ruler of all creation. Think about it. He made and rules everything! I am honored to serve such a powerful God, and will worship him forever.

Writing From The Country Goes Green!

2009-02-27T23:20:00.005-06:00

In an attempt to save money, and do our part for the planet God created, our family is going green by saving water and electricity, and recycling! On the side, you will see my green tip for the day, and I will be brainstorming more ideas for my blog being green. If you have any questions, please leave a comment. Save the earth! It's the only one God created that can sustain life!

Dora

2009-02-13T19:09:00.002-06:00

We have a foreign exchange student staying with us this year, and it is just like living with a friend. She and I are very close, and love to talk about all sorts of things. She is from China, and likes to explain how things are done in China that are different from America. Dora and I have so much fun together, and we are together exploring a mystery in history: Roanoke Island, The Lost Colony. She and I are going to create a blog logging our search. We will post the link later.

Happy Late Birthday, Caitlin!

2009-01-28T20:53:00.003-06:00

Happy Birthday to you! You are now 13, how does it feel to be a teensy bit older than me? You know you love it! Ready for your cake? Here it is: Here is your dress: And your shoes: Close your eyes, so that I can lead you into the dining room. Welcome to your tea table: Want to see your present from me?: Hope you like it! Here's how it was wrapped: Happy birthday!

Standing Before God

2009-01-15T19:38:00.002-06:00

Tomorrow, I head out for a church retreat at a Great Wolf Lodge resort, and I am crazy-happy! We also get to go snowboarding. But the highlight of the trip for me will be the devotional sessions. Our youth pastor is a wonderful speaker, and I can't wait!!!

Elyse

Happy New Year!

2008-12-31T19:56:00.005-06:00

As the New Year comes, I will be doing some renovations to the site, so sorry for the inconvenience! My 6 New Year's Resolutions are:

Keep my room entirely clean
Keep my closet entirely clean
Keep my bathroom entirely clean
Make sure that I do not treat my sisters unkindly
Make sure that I treat my parents with respect
Exercise at least 3 days of each week.
Go further in my walk with Jesus

What are your New Year's resolutions? Tell me by posting a comment, and have a great New Year! P.S: Make sure you watch Taylor Swift on A Rocking New Year at 9/10 CT :D

SSA (Super Secret Angels)

2008-12-11T22:16:00.002-06:00

I'm sure all my followers have seen the SSA badge that I have recently posted to my sidebar and have said to themselves, "Huh?" and scratched their heads. Scratch your heads no more, loyal readers, because here is the explanation. SSA (a.k.a Super Secret Angels) is for girls ages 12 to 22 where they have monthly sessions and you get assigned another girl to pray for, to send gifts and letters to, and leave a comment encouraging them on the site signed "From Your SSA". The girl that you are assigned has no idea who you are, which makes it sound like mucho fun! I like the idea of Christian girls being able to send prayers and gifts to other girls like them anonymously. Unfortunately, I only found out about it after this month's session started, so I have to wait until February to join. *Sigh* And at the end of the month, you reveal yourself to your recipient. Meanwhile, you have your own SSA! Here is the form that you can fill out and email to Amanda Dixon, the founder and manager of the group. Her email is: supersecretangels@yahoo.com

Submission Form to become an SSA:

Full Name:

Email Address:

Blog Address:

Mailing Address (not required):

Birthday:

Nickname?

Interests:

Favorite scripture?

Favorite color?

Favorite animal?

Favorite book?

Favorite scents?

Favorite season?

Favorite outfit – from top to bottom:

Describe your style of dress (casual, dressy, frilly, jeans & t-shirts, modern, 70’s, hippy, etc):

What are your hobbies?

Do you have a craft that you like to do?

Do you scrapbook and if so what are your favorite layouts and colors?

Do you read magazines? If so, which ones?

Are you allergic to anything?

Do you like sweets (besides chocolate which won’t mail well) and if so, what kind?

Do you collect anything?

What color is your bedroom?

Do you wear a lot of jewelry? If so, what?

Do you drink coffee or tea? Tell us your favorite beverages…

What does your favorite kitchen mug or glass look like?

Do you have any prayer requests?

Home Educator Nomination

2008-12-10T20:36:00.003-06:00

I am nominating our family to win the award, mostly my mom! I appreciate my mom teaching us because she is amazing to be able to deal with all of our curricula. She takes good care of us, and even though I do not like to do the chores she assigns me, I try to do them with a cheerful heart, because I know God would like that, and also because I love my mom! Even when I am grumpy and she is trying to teach me math (Not a good subject on my part), she is persistent and patient. Our family has home schooled for 12 years, and I believe my mother has done a tremendous job, considering the amount of effort she puts into our education. We are not only learning academics, but also life skills (as in how to not burn ourselves taking baked goods out of the oven, etc!) My two sisters and I have a great teacher in mom, and we are very proud of her and how we are homeschooled. I just hope that someday, I can be as neat and good at teaching as my mom. If you would like to link to our homeschool academy website, the address is: http://quietwatersacademy.blogspot.com Thanks for reading my nomination!

GGM book giveaway!

2008-11-03T16:49:00.001-06:00

GGM is having another giveaway, and for books! Yeah! I love books :) I am entering. Here is the icon:

The Simple Woman's Daybook

2008-10-26T18:13:00.003-05:00

FOR TODAY: October 26, 2008

Outside My Window...trees changing colors, and leaves floating by.

I am thinking...of how I really need to get my homework for my outside of homeschool classes done.

I am thankful for... My family

From the kitchen... The smell of apples.

I am wearing...A highschool football sweatshirt over my green SOS shirt from church, jeans.

I am creating... my essay on Kate Shelley

I am going... to give a speech to about 60 people on Monday.

I am reading... Brisingr by Christopher Paolini

I am hoping... that I will be sick tomorrow, and not have to give my speech

I am hearing...my parents talking

Around the house... Coldness!

One of my favorite things...books

A Few Plans For The Rest Of The Week:Not much, no big plans

Here is picture thought I am sharing..The picture thought is the football tackle above- football is weird!

Hmmmm....

2008-10-10T22:57:00.000-05:00

Don't go grocery shopping
don't go to church
don't go to school
Stay in your room all day, letting no one in, and
Don't talk to anybody

Giveaway at GGM!

2008-10-02T21:51:00.000-05:00

They're are having a giveaway at my favorite online magazine www.growingingraceonline.com! I am entering!

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Birthdays...

2008-09-30T17:12:00.000-05:00

Today it's my older sister's birthday! Happy birthday, girl! I will post pictures later. Guess what? I'm writing a novella! (mini novel.)

Today....

2008-09-28T22:23:00.000-05:00

Today I'm so busy, I could barely write this! My speech, my creative writing, my homework, cleaning my room, doing dishes... wow! But here I am, typing away. I think this is like a sacred time, where I get to write without interruptions. But that's enough of writing about writing. It was amazing outside today. It wasn't quite cool enough to be called Autumn, but the shades of green on the trees are amazing. Well, exciting news! We had an exciting weekend! My younger sister knocked out her two front teeth on her scooter, and my older sister nearly burned herself by setting paper on fire. What a wonderful weekend! ;) But I survived without a scrape, missing teeth, broken bone, or a burn. Lucky me!

My Life

2008-09-27T10:10:00.000-05:00

I decide to do a little show and tell to tell you what my life is like :)

The first picture is the front of our house. My mom likes to decorate with flowers ;)

The second picture is of our other kitten, Stripey.She's a female. Betcha can't tell what she looks like!

The third is our adorable elderly dog named Gunner. She's a girl, and NO we didn't name her. The guy we bought her from did.

The fourth is our sweet, attention hogging dog named Honey. You'll be sitting there petting her, and she'll be angelic, and then you get up to pet her mother, Gunner, and she'll be jumping all over you, trying to get you to stop petting Gunner and pet her again. Does that make sense?

The fifth picture is of our driveway. So very fancy, is it not? ;)

The sixth is the horsebarn that the original owners built. We don't have any horses, although that would make me very happy. My parents say they're too expernsive to feed and keep up with the vet bills.

The seventh is the very back part of our property. Our house sits on 8 acres, so there's plenty of land.

The eighth is the front part of our back yard. All the stones are gathered around the fire pit and arranged as benches so you have something to sit on while you roast your marshmallow.

The ninth is one of our kittens, Mittens. Ha, ha, I'm a rhyming master. He is a male, and loves to sit on your shoulder while you walk around. He also likes to ride in the pouches on our heavy duty scooters that go on gravel while we go down hills.

Well, that's the outside of our house view. I'll post the inside tommorrow when my room is clean :)

Mt. Sherman Trip 2008

2008-09-27T09:01:00.000-05:00

It's school time again, and I'm having fun remembering my summer. Here's some pix. We went to Colorado to climb mountains. Aren't the mountains amazing? We were driving up there(really long drive) and finally, we see these giant green very tall, pointy mountains, rising up out of the earth. Driving got a little interesting (especially when we had to turn the great big, white van around), but it was worth it. We stayed at a lodge where this man turned his home into a place to stay with different rooms, and he made AWESOME food (Maybe it's the altitude, because my mom's pancakes are never that good. Shhhh!) I miss Colorado. In these pictures, we are climbing Mt. Sherman, and it is very hard to climb. It was late June, and there was still a lot of ice. It was slippery with rough terrain, and sometimes nothing but dust. I was so scared. But we made it! I will post more about the Mt. Sherman trip more later on probably, because that was the most awesome time I've ever had!