I’m hoping to complete at least one large order (120 or more) a month while we’re moving through Joshua’s infant stage. I have an order lined up for September and am awaiting an order for October… let [...]]]> Well, here are some wedding cookies that I was working on this afternoon. They’re awaiting final details…

I’m hoping to complete at least one large order (120 or more) a month while we’re moving through Joshua’s infant stage. I have an order lined up for September and am awaiting an order for October… let me know if you’re interested!

Although we didn’t adopt from Burkina Faso, the ease with which Joshua joined our family emphasized to me that America is a land of opportunity, provision, and health, especially compared to Burkina Faso. I only feel more strongly about doing what I can, no matter how little, to help a country that cannot get orphans into waiting families or provide mosquito nets to its vulnerable people.

I still have a lot of projects to show you that I just never had time to post before Joshua was born. As we’re easing back into a school routine and I’m picking back up with exercise and other disciplines, I’m also hopeful that I can begin posting again on a weekly basis or so.

Now, for what you really want to see… our 10 pounds of preciousness:

Oh, and the middle guy is pretty cute too. He was the only one up the other morning (for once!!!) and I asked him what he wanted to do with me. He wanted to do “school time”! So he’s working on an S worksheet here

She gave him life.

She gave him his name – Joshua Lee.

She gave him perfect features.

And now she has given us the responsibility, joy, and privilege [...]]]> In the state of Maryland, a birth mother has 30 days to reconsider her intention to place her child for adoption. Here’s Joshua on this very significant 30 day birthday.

She gave him life.

She gave him his name – Joshua Lee.

She gave him perfect features.

And now she has given us the responsibility, joy, and privilege of raising Joshua as our own precious son.

We give her, and will teach Joshua to give her, honor and thanks.

Tomorrow – the 31st day – we meet with a lawyer to begin the finalization process. If all goes smoothly, that will still take a minimum of six months.

Our third son was delivered on July 9, 2010

by a birth mother whom we hold in the highest honor and to whom we owe our deepest appreciation.

6lbs, 13oz, 20 inches

Named Joshua Lee

Home as a Hadeed July 11, 2010

Praise God!

I was standing hunched over my laptop when I received this request, too rushed to sit down for a quick Inbox check – skim, delete, skim, set aside to read more carefully, skim, quick response… Then I read the email containing this cookie request and stopped cold. Here is what it said:

“…I’m looking [...]]]>

I was standing hunched over my laptop when I received this request, too rushed to sit down for a quick Inbox check – skim, delete, skim, set aside to read more carefully, skim, quick response… Then I read the email containing this cookie request and stopped cold. Here is what it said:

“…I’m looking to place another order – a very special order. We have heart parents who sadly lost their little girl at 4 months of age and they are celebrating what would be her 1st birthday on Saturday, May 22nd.”

I panicked a little bit. In truth, every time I hear about the death of a child, I panic a little bit, because I know how easily it could be any child, Jack or Marcus in particular. I also panicked a bit because I didn’t think I could do justice to this event, and even if I could, would it be awkward? Would a gift of flowers and butterflies on such an sad occasion offend the grieving parents?

I was thinking about Carsyn’s parents and about this order while on a run one morning. From somewhere within my memory came the verse Psalm 116:15, “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints”. The grief of a parent testifies to the pricelessness of a child. Carsyn was everything to her parents that my children are to me. And she is so special to God that even her death was precious in His sight. How foolish of me to imagine that a gift honoring her would offend her parents. Of course not! It makes perfect sense to, in the donor’s words, “celebrate” Carsyn and the very short months she had with her parents.

The donor shared more about Carsyn and I’d like to honor her by sharing it with you:

Carsyn Presley Buchmann was born on May 22nd, 2009 with a congenital heart defect called Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrom. Carsyn was born with 1/2 of a heart. After Two open heart surgeries, Carsyn was listed for a heart transplant which she received on July 27th, 2009. After fighting for nearly four months, She passed away from complications of a stroke. Carsyn spent her entire life in the Cardiac ICU at Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin.

Please pray with me for comfort for Carsyn’s parents and for the donor too, who herself lost a child to congenital heart disease. Carsyn’s parents have set up a foundation named “The Wings of Angels”, which you can read about or donate to here.

Thanks, Stephanie, for the lesson you taught me, that it is always comforting for a parent to honor their child. And thank you for the donation, which purchased two nets that may save other children from malaria, and save their parents from the grief that Carsyn’s parents suffer.

This picture depicts a cute, quick little project doesn’t it? Ahh, my friends, if only that were true… I would have been a lot less tired at Jack’s preschool graduation.

The project started just like any other – an order of 80 cookies from an absolutely delightful and encouraging staff member at Chapelgate PCA, the [...]]]>

This picture depicts a cute, quick little project doesn’t it? Ahh, my friends, if only that were true… I would have been a lot less tired at Jack’s preschool graduation.

The project started just like any other – an order of 80 cookies from an absolutely delightful and encouraging staff member at Chapelgate PCA, the church that graciously allows me to use their licensed, insured kitchen, and invited me to speak about malaria and Child Alive at a recent event. The order was for Sunday School teachers so we worked from a “sowing the word” theme – hence the watering cans and seeds.

If this were in a gallery, we would title it “World’s Most Impractical Cookie Cutter”. Can you imagine what happened when I attempted to lift cookie #1 of 80 onto the baking sheet? And consider the baking time differential between that skinny spout and the rest of the cookie. Even if I properly managed those difficulties, how in the world would I transport 80 of those ridiculously delicate cookies from Chapelgate to home for decoration, back to Chapelgate for the the donor, and eventually to the final recipients?? What was I thinking when I ordered it??? As we tell our kids sometimes – I was NOT thinking.

I really had no choice but to reshape each of the watering can cookies into the final shape above before transferring them to the baking sheet. Generally I can cut out 300-400 cookies in an evening at Chapelgate. This particular evening, I barely managed 120.

Believe it or not, the cookie cutter fiasco was my *second* major mistake on this project. The first was all too typical for me – I spoke before thinking. When brainstorming ideas, I mentioned that if we chose this theme, I could do 80 bags of two cookies each – seeds and watering cans together. “Wouldn’t that be cute?” I thought naively. For an order of a dozen or a couple dozen, doing a complementary cookie is not a big deal and I often do it. But that flippant offer turned an order of 80 cookies into an order of 160 cookies! To quote Dana Carvey quoting George Bush, “Not prudent”.

As I type this, it occurs to me that there is a third major mistake going here – I never got an invoice out on this order! But… when I get it out and the check comes back, we will have earned about 8 more nets for those who desperately need them. No matter how poorly a project goes, whenever I write that last paragraph, it all seems worth it. It is.

Bonus pictures that were mixed up in this batch of downloads:

This was an order that I rushed through in about 12 hours… and I think you can tell. I was a little overly excited about the new technique that saved the day on the Yoder HVAC cookies. But in this case, the swords would have been better piped free-hand. Also, there just [...]]]>

This was an order that I rushed through in about 12 hours… and I think you can tell. I was a little overly excited about the new technique that saved the day on the Yoder HVAC cookies. But in this case, the swords would have been better piped free-hand. Also, there just wasn’t room for all the words on these small cookies. I should have spoken up with the donor or selected a much larger cookie. AND the cookies were too brown around the edges. Anyhow, I happened to be at this party (why am I *never* at the parties for the sets that I’m really proud of?) and was completely tickled to hear a grown man rejoicing over receiving cookies with “pirate swords” on them. Never mind that they were supposed to be medieval swords

But guess what? Perfection or not, this order earned another five nets for the vulnerable in Africa. And that’s something to rejoice over!

Did you know that I’m gaining another incredible sister-in-law? I am! While Susie is a gifted photographer with an established photography business, she also runs her family’s HVAC company (or will be until she moves up here in September). When my brother-in-law went to visit her family in May, he thought they’d [...]]]>

Did you know that I’m gaining another incredible sister-in-law? I am! While Susie is a gifted photographer with an established photography business, she also runs her family’s HVAC company (or will be until she moves up here in September). When my brother-in-law went to visit her family in May, he thought they’d enjoy some cookies depicting the Yoder HVAC logo.

This was the first cookie that I didn’t freehand. I didn’t think I could do those fans and a few failed attempts confirmed my fears. So I tried a technique that I learned from my cookie hero, Bridget at Bake at 350. You just print out a life-sized depiction of the detail you want, then put it under parchment paper and pipe (or pipe and flood in the case of the fans) on top of the image. The piping goes incredibly quickly this way!! Believe it or not, once the icing dries completely (“completely” being the operative word!), the details simply detach themselves from the parchment paper.

Then you just drop them into wet icing and Voila! – details that I could never have achieved freehand!!

Thanks, Bridget, for the techinique! And thanks to Akie for another six nets and for picking a really awesome sister-in-law that I can’t wait to share family life with in the coming years!!!

This set was ordered for a young lady graduating from nursing school. I say that the world is a better place for another good nurse!! Our nurses at Howard County General Hospital administered and monitored painful medications in a compassionate manner and cheerfully went about physically difficult and unpleasant tasks. They sat [...]]]>

This set was ordered for a young lady graduating from nursing school. I say that the world is a better place for another good nurse!! Our nurses at Howard County General Hospital administered and monitored painful medications in a compassionate manner and cheerfully went about physically difficult and unpleasant tasks. They sat up with me during restless, fearful nights. It was their careful observations that enabled our doctors to make good decisions and they educated me on how to care for my preemies. I have the very highest respect for the profession of nursing and it was my absolute privilege to contribute to the celebration of this new nurse!

In addition, it was a privilege to partner with this donor to earn two more nets for those in Africa who don’t have access to adequate nursing care if they are infected with malaria. Thanks for the order, Joyce, and congratulations to your daughter!

These were thank you gifts from a little guy who loves super heroes to his Special Ed preschool teachers.

Even though the Superman symbol is just red and yellow, the colors weren’t working for me until we got some blue and black in the set. To a five year old [...]]]> SUPER CARTER!!!

These were thank you gifts from a little guy who loves super heroes to his Special Ed preschool teachers.

Even though the Superman symbol is just red and yellow, the colors weren’t working for me until we got some blue and black in the set. To a five year old girl, there was nothing more crush-worthy than Christopher Reeves’ blue eyes and jet black hair!

There are a lot of heroes in any special needs story and most of them are unsung. To me, the greatest hero is the donor herself. She has borne the brunt of Carter’s SIX heart surgeries and ensuing complications. Having experienced the difficulties of mothering a cardiac patient, Erika has still committed to adopting a little girl named Therese from Burkina Faso who needs similar surgery and will require so much care. This will be Erika’s fourth child and her second adopted daughter. Things are moving very, very slowly in their process. Will you please pray with me now that there will be a breakthrough in this adoption so Therese can come here for the surgery and the family that she so desperately needs??

Two nets were donated from this order – one more notch on Erika’s superhero belt!

So here’s the scenario… You ask your baby girl what kind of party she wants for her third birthday. Every time, she simply responds, “Purple!!” What do you do? If you’re a good mom, like my friend Karen, you roll with it. If you’re a mom like me, you never asked [...]]]>

So here’s the scenario… You ask your baby girl what kind of party she wants for her third birthday. Every time, she simply responds, “Purple!!” What do you do? If you’re a good mom, like my friend Karen, you roll with it. If you’re a mom like me, you never asked the question in the first place because themed birthday parties are far too stressful!

I wasn’t sure how I was going to do these “fancy threes” (the party was a tea party brunch), so I just sat down and started experimenting. My Cookie ADD kicked in and after about four designs, I decided it would be far more fun to make a dozen unique cookies than to reproduce the same idea over and over again.

Upon observation, you may note that only nine cookies are in this collage. That, too, is due to my Cookie ADD!  It completely inhibits my ability to take the same picture twelve times.  Somehow I didn’t manage to grab them all (and I confess that I purposely omitted my least favorite.)

And… my favorite deserved its own picture I iced some very simple “K for Kendall” balloons because I felt that the 3’s were a little small.

Two more nets from this order!!! You people are awesome… thank you!!!

Quick related story… when my friend came to pick up the order, the house was a MESS. For instance, he and I stood talking over an arrangement of dead and rotting flowers (I had fresh ones in the kitchen but had yet to replace them – I blame the Cookie ADD). I was a little embarassed, but felt that he must understand, as I was clearly surrounded by dozens of cookies representing several different orders. As I walked him to the door, I passed a basket of laundry that was folded but not yet put away (again, Cookie ADD). Laying NEXT to the basket of laundry, in plain view of the world, and most certainly my friend, were two pairs of old, faded, grannie panties. Ay yi yi… please tell me its happened to you?!