Cinnamon Pull Apart Bread and Marshmallows

I want to write something deep about some things that have been stirring in my soul for a while. About some things that I have wrestled with and have rocked my world once I started taking hold of them. That kind of writing is going to require me to sit and sit and think and tap out and backspace and walk away and come back and down a cup of coffee. Sort of like the scene in You've Got Mail when Tom Hanks is working on the perfect reply to Meg Ryan as to why he stood her up the night before. Except I'm hoping my would be deeper than that.

That kind of writing, however, is not going to happen tonight and I'll tell you why.

It is Thursday night. I have had ten minutes to sit at my computer and somehow that is just long enough to convince myself I can tap out a quick blog post. I remember daily I have a blog and also that I haven't written anything, so if you think I've forgotten, I haven't. Today has been my calmest day of the week. I think. I had Bible study this morning. Bible study now involves me picking up Mama B and Baby K and taking them to church so Mama B can work in the nursery for two hours. She calls it one of her jobs. (Including this one, she now has three. All three occur during the day hours although if you ask her about one shift of one day, she calls it the night shift because she works starting past noon.) Chaos surrounds her. She gets in the car and dumps. I don't know why. Is it because I'm the first outside person she can talk to? Is it because that's what a person so lost in themselves does, not once thinking of me and wondering how I'm doing? I don't know. It's not my decision to make. But I do secretly cry out about the chaos that surrounds her. It makes me laugh out loud sometimes at how ridiculous it all is and yet she can't/won't or is somehow unable to escape it, save for Christ. So I share with her the gospel over and over. She needs Jesus. From where I sit, He is what she needs. So I pray even more and I beg you to continue to pray.

Later on I mop the floor. This is nothing compared to someone knowing Jesus and the God math should always win out but for some unknown reason, I was granted an entire afternoon home, alone, with me and my mop. If I die tomorrow, please know I went out with a semi-clean floor. It's how happy I feel about being able to mop my floor. 

On Wednesday I let Ben sleep in because he had an orthodontist appointment in the middle of the morning. In fact, he skipped school altogether because it was an early out. He was very happy about that. We instead filled our time after the appointment with a little bit of clothes shopping (in a sports store, so he mostly didn't die), grabbing a cup of coffee for me and a big cookie for him and then buying him a hermit crab. It's his third one. After doing a little bit of reading, Ben thinks the first two croaked because we didn't give them enough space to be a hermit crab. I have no idea but now I need to find a 10 gallon tank because that's apparently enough room for one. On the ortho note, Ben will eventually have to have braces as he has an overbite that keeps getting worse instead of better. The good thing is that Bill is very involved in Ben's orthodontics. He gets up from his chair and asks all the questions. Ben is second generation braces on Bill's side.

I don't remember much of Tuesday. I think I did stuff during the day. Like maybe start laundry, which was finally all folded and put away today (so again, if I go, know that Bill has enough undershorts to get him through a week but then someone help out and do a load or two please). Oh, yes, Tuesday. I asked Bill out for a lunch date. We ate at House of Chen. I ordered the Chicken Pad Thai and the Hot and Sour Soup. He got the Honey Shrimp and the Egg Drop Soup. 

It's my week to drive the youngest kids in our little carpool to their school. The drive takes about ten minutes. Four boys: 1 early kindergartener, 1 kindergartener, 2 second graders. The drive is somethin' else, I tell ya. Here's the conversation I overheard Tuesday morning. 

LW: "My mom made cinnamon pull apart bread yesterday."LH: "Actually, all bread can be pulled apart."DH: "Yeah, that's right!"CH: "I have marshamallows in my lunch." 

That right there, my friends, is good logic. 

In a very longish way, that's how I'm getting to my what 2 eat. I made cinnamon pull apart bread Monday afternoon because somewhere between helping a friend move stuff into her new art studio and all the rest of life, I thought it a good idea. I originally pinned Joy the Baker's recipe but ended up using Pioneer Woman's recipe, which is her cinnamon roll recipe, which by the way baffles me. I have no idea how only stirring milk, yeast, sugar and flour and then letting it sit an hour only to add baking powder and baking soda in at the end is able to produce a dough that is immediately usable as bread dough. It goes against all my years of bread making. But if you are new to bread making or now have your interest piqued by my description of her method, then you should give Ree's recipe a try. And if you aren't up for it now, go for the marshmallows.