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Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Recipe Review: Super Moist Chocolate Bundt Cake

This past week I went to the beach with my parents and godparents. Unfortunately we didn't get to go to Bald Head. Fortunately we were near Bald Head and within 30 minutes of the greatest kitchen store of all time: Cat on a Whisk. We went there. Twice. It was glorious, per usual. Among the myriad of goodies I got is a Nordic bundt pan. Needless to say, as soon as we got home, I searched for a cake recipe to break in my new pan - and I hit the jackpot with this one. Not only was the cake ridiculously easy to make, it was amazing. I made it on Saturday and my family is still eating on it today. In fact, it might be better today than it was on Saturday - it keeps getting more moist. I did modify the recipe slightly, adding about a cup of heath pieces, which might have something to do with the deliciousness.

Here's the recipe: (adapted from Tasty Kitchen)
     1 box Chocolate Cake Mix
     1 box Chocolate Pudding Mix
     1 cup Sour Cream
     ¾ cups Oil
     ¾ cups Water
     ½ cups Sugar
     4 whole Eggs
     1 teaspoon Vanilla
     1 cup heath pieces (or other goodies like chocolate chips, peanut butter chips, etc.) 

-Mix all ingredients (except the heath) together on high speed for 3 minutes 
-Stir in heath pieces 
-Pour batter into liberally greased bundt pan
-Bake for about 45 minutes on 350

Saturday, August 13, 2011

Ending a Chapter, Beginning a Book

The City Project is officially over. We had our commissioning ceremony almost two weeks ago, which was the last part of CP. It would literally be impossible for me to talk about everything that God did this summer (partially because I'm still basking in the goodness of what He did), so I decided a picture-ish post would be the best way for me to share an overview of TCP. 
In New York City, where the magic started! We got to know each other and got to learn how evangelism truly works. Our aim going in was to minister to the very large Muslim population in NYC, but we ended up meeting people of all different religions and cultures. The NYC portion of TCP definitely grew my heart for the nations! It was so crazy to see New York outside of Times Square and see how God is bringing the nations to us in a very real way. 
Another highlight of the NYC trip was being with two amazing people, Jenny & Perry. We were a "triad" and got to evangelize as a team. Being with them from the beginning was such a blessing. Not only did I get to see them grow throughout the summer, but I got to see us grow together into a mini body of Christ. 
 Approximately a million things happened during our 5 weeks in Durham. In addition to the classes we took, each person had an internship with the Summit and with a community ministry. I got to intern with Route 56, a student ministry for 5th and 6th graders at the Summit, and am super excited to get to serve there this upcoming school year! It was in Durham where we really got to live life together and have fun social events and random Cook Out runs.
Another great thing we got to participate in was ServeRDU, a week where the Summit comes together to serve the Raleigh-Durham area (hence the name). It was so fun to get to spend the whole week together as a team doing manual labor!
After ServeRDU, our team split up, with one-third going to Malaysia and the others going to Kenya for two weeks. My time in Kenya was incredible! Most of our time there was spent with people in an IDP (internally displaced persons) camp called Jikaze. We got to live life with them and learned so much from the people there, including how to carry things on our heads, which was legit. One of the best parts of the trip for me was seeing how God reveals himself through nature. Definitely more to come on my time in Africa.

I'm so thankful for everyone who supported me, both prayerfully and financially! This summer was life changing in so many ways. The City Project showed me what it looks like to live out the Gospel in everyday life and gave me a very real picture of what the body of Christ looks like. In a lot of ways, TCP was just a chapter in my life, the beginning of what God will intricately write as I leverage my life for the Gospel.