Battle of the Mind today: See who won

Photo Credit and AWESOME post!!

A stream of thoughts that went through my head on my run this morning at any given time between 5:15 and 5:50 am:

Oh my gosh I've never been this tired.

Yes you have, that's stupid.

Man, I really am tired though.

Just get through this - then go to bed early for once tonight.

Gosh I'm slow.  I'm barely jogging, really.

But you're moving.

Might as well be walking.

Just keep it above a walk.  You can do this.

Seriously though, I might as well be walking.

Don't you dare.

Holy cow I've only done two laps?  I feel like I should be done by now!

Don't look at your phone.  Don't look at your phone. Just run. Don't worry about time today.

Wish I didn't have to carry it.....wait, what is this?.......there's a pocket in these pants for my phone?  GET. OUT!  My pants just got a whole lot cooler.  I have cool pants.

My race is going to kill me on Saturday, I can't believe it's been so long since I've been out here.

Your race will only make you stronger, and prove that you haven't lost as much traction as you thought.

Yeah, but I'm going to DIE.

That's dumb, you will not.

Seriously though, there's hills.  My last races didn't have hills.  I'm doomed.

Worst that will happen is you have to walk some of it.

I don't want to walk some of it.  I want to run the whole thing.

Yeah, but if you *have* to walk..

I'm not walking.

I can do this.  I know I can do this.  I KNOW I can do this!  I'm DOING this!!

The battle of the mind is REAL!  I may have thrown some funny stuff in there because, well, that really is how my mind goes but in all seriousness, I don't think people give enough credit to the strength and power that their mind holds.

One of my favorite quotes that I think I've posted here before is, 

"Whether you think you can or you think you can't - you are right." -Henry Ford

What we tell ourselves is extremely important.  Make sure it's positive.  Positivity breeds success.  And I think we all would like some of that.  :)

practice makes perfect...or...a lot better, at least

My first ever cake pops.  Almost exactly two years ago.  The shape of the hearts wasn't so bad.  Using a good food pen does wonders, though!  

Here are some my partner and I made the other night.

I honestly can't believe it's taken two years to create basketball pops.  I used to live and breathe basketball. You know, back in the day when my entire responsibility quota consisted of don't fail a class...and...keep my room clean?  We won't talk about my success at these responsibilities.  Back to this post.  My point is, I'm surprised I haven't done basketball cake pops until now.  My partner actually dipped these and then I drew on the lines.  Let me tell you, this was MUCH harder than I thought it would be!  It took probably half a dozen before I didn't have to look at the actual basketball that Anna brought up from her garage for me to look at.  :)  Creating a 3D basketball is a little different than doodling it on notebook paper, which is what the majority of my high school class notes consisted of.  I did finally get to the point where I could just do it without looking at the ball, however, it was still very difficult to make the lines straight.  Anyway, even though my perfectionist personality won't allow me to proclaim how amazing and wonderful and perfect they are (I can point out three things to you in this picture that kill me every time I look at it), I am pretty proud of them.

artistic cake

I'm just a little busy.  I enjoy trying my hand at many, many things!  Even when I was young I was always up for a challenge and for trying something new.  I always enjoyed striving to "top myself", to get better and better at something the more I tried.  As a result of this inclination to try new things and enjoy many things, my hand is in many pots.  I wear lots of hats.  I've talked a little about it before on here, but just wanted to show you one of my hats or pots or whatever.  Meet: SusAnna's Sweets. I am not alone in this endeavor, hence the "Anna" of SusAnna's.  Anna and I have had fun getting this thing slowly off the ground.  We have 5 kids between the two of us, all 3 and under so things tend to get, well, busy.  But we have enjoyed the journey of it so far.  

Our specialty: cake pops!

If you have not had the pleasure of tasting these little treats, you need to go find one (I know of a PLACE that sells them!) and experience the yumminess!  They are great for...

birthdays...

holidays...

weddings...

They can be eaten without the stick, as cake bites.

They can be arranged in a pot as a bouquet...

Mother's Day Bouquet

For any occasion...

And while we pride ourselves on our pops, we also whip up a cupcake or two...

vibrant colors!

scary eyeballs!

valentine's day love!

We can also do cakes:

barnyard animal smash cake

elmo!

wedding/bridal shower

7th birthday!

17th birthday!

rapunzel cake

If you are not local, we can also ship our cake pops!  You'll find all the info on our WEBSITE.  We also have an etsy site and a facebook page.  What are you waiting for?  Check us out!  :D

new hobby

Well, not exactly new. I've always loved to bake. I prefer baking the crazy, calorie-infested desserts to cooking the healthy, good-for-you meals. So recently, like within the past six months or so, I've become slightly more interested in cake decorating. This burger was the first in my branching out from the regular ol' cake in a pan. Unfortunately I cannot claim originality with that.....

.....or this one. I got the ideas from a book called "Birthday Cakes For Kids". It has some really cute cakes in it. I plan on making each one eventually. The frog I made for Josh's nephew Zeke's birthday last April. The burger I just did for fun while Josh and I were living with his parents for a time in March or April.

Ok, don't laugh. This one, like the burger, was also just for fun. I was bored one day. So the cake wasn't as smooth and level after it was iced as it looked before I did all the work. Oh well. It tasted just as good.

Now this is a first for me. I was elected to bake a cake for a small party we threw for our boss yesterday for National Boss Day. I decided, perfect time to try something new I've never done before, right? I must say, it turned out good as far as being smooth and no lumps, however, the design of the top of the cake is a little wanting. I didn't realize before I opened the fondant how quickly it dries out. I was working with four different colors so it became very difficult to keep them from drying out on me. So, I had to slap it on the cake before I really thought out what I was going to do. It says, "WE heart TB". No, not tuberculosis. It's my boss' initials. Anyways, that's my exploration through cake decorating thus far. I plan on taking a class at our Michael's store down the road as soon as they're offering it again.