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Here at the Food on Fridays carnival, any post remotely related to food is welcome. Recipes are enjoyed, but you can write about your favorite international food or link to a canning video on YouTube.In other words, the Food on Fridays parameters are not at all narrow. I think of it as a virtual pitch-in where everyone brings something to share; even if the content of one item is unrelated to the rest, we sample it all anyway and have a great time.When your Food on Fridays contribution is ready, just grab the broccoli button (the big one above or the new smaller option at the bottom) to paste at the top of your post and join us through Mr. Linky.Here’s a Mr. Linky tutorial:

Write up a post, publish, then return here and click on Mr. Linky below. A screen will pop up where you can type in your blog name and paste in the url to your own Food on Fridays post (give us the exact link to your Food on Fridays page, not just the link to your blog).You can also visit other people’s posts by clicking on Mr. Linky and then clicking participants’ names–you should be taken straight to their posts.Please note: I return when possible during the day and update this post by hand to include a list of the links provided via Mr. Linky. If I can’t get to the computer to do so, you may access them all by clicking on the Mister Linky logo.

Food on Fridays Participants

1. Premeditated Leftovers (broiled cherry tomatoes)
2. e-Mom (outrageous cupcake art)
3. Frugal Antics of a Harried Homemaker (home canned salsa)
4. At Home ‘N About (ham ‘n cola)
5. Feels Like Home (sandwich ideas)
6. Kitchen Stewardship (packing a reduced waste lunch)
7. Inside the White Picket Fence (fried ice cream)
8. Hoosier Homemade (freezing sweet corn)
9. Hoosier Homemade (blueberry cupcakes)
10. Cook with Sara (hot fudge sauce)
11. Finding Joy in my Kitchen (ratatouille)
12. Simply Sugar and Gluten-Free (simple oven-baked brown rice)
13. Twirl and Taste (Kennedy irish potato cakes)
14. Newlyweds! (sangria)
15. the Finer Things in Life (crescent taco bake)
16. Heart ‘N Soul Cooking (glazed pear shortcake)
17. A Welcoming Heart (Mexican pot roast)
18. Not the Jet Set (peach syrup)
19. Leftovers On Purpose (easy sausage & cheese balls)
20. Unfinished Mom (make your own yogurt)
21. Jean Stockdale (Watergate salad)
22. Frugal Homemaking (chicken chow mein)
23. Katrina’s Home (Anzac biscuits)
24. Gathering Manna (God speaks through fountain drinks)

Food on Fridays with AnnMy little boy is turning eight years old very soon.He’s been planning his birthday for months. His top concern? He wants all of the family members who are coming to have a very good time. He doesn’t want anyone to be left out of anything. He wants everyone to be happy.One of his cousins isn’t crazy about chocolate or cake, so the birthday boy has been trying to come up with a dessert that everyone will enjoy.He loved the coffee cake I made, so he wrote a letter to his eight-and-a-half-year-old cousin (even though he could have phoned or sent an e-mail) asking if that would be a good option. “Do you like coffee cake?” he asked.The cousin wrote back a cute note and added at the very bottom of page two, “p.s.s.s. I like pie.”The birthday boy was ecstatic. “Pie!” he exclaimed, waving the letter. “He said he likes pie!” Now the birthday boy is confident he can serve a dessert that will make his cousin happy. It’s a birthday wish come true—the potential for happiness all around at his party!He is so relieved! Now everyone can have something they enjoy!This means, however, that I have to make three different desserts.But, you know, he asks for so little.His biggest birthday hope is that everyone will be happy. If three different desserts can increase the odds of that happening, I’ll be honored to spend a few hours in the kitchen this weekend preparing some coffee cake and pies.The final dessert menu for his birthday party:

• Coffee cake: half with blueberries; half without (the birthday boy is not fond of blueberries)
• Pumpkin pie (the birthday boy’s favorite pie)
• Berry pie. I might make this blueberry pie, though I have a bag of frozen raspberries and could do a mixture. Thoughts? Advice? Winning recipes? What’s the happiest berry pie you’ve ever made?

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The post Food on Fridays: Happy Birthday Pies appeared first on Ann Kroeker, Writing Coach.

I don’t want to lose that skill, that gift.Or if I have temporarily lost it because I have instead trained my eye on the time or the speedometer or the packed pages of my daily planner, I want to regain it.In spite of having physical eyes that function quite well, I am sometimes guilty of missing a lot—so much that I might as well be blind. I want to see both physical beauty and that which is beyond it; I want a glimpse of deeper realities. Though I’m blessed to have my physical eyesight, I long for more.Wouldn’t it be something to have the privilege given to Elisha’s servant, when Elisha prayed “O LORD, open his eyes so he may see” the reality of hills full of horses and chariots of fire all around to fight on their side? (2 Kings)But even if I never see chariots of fire, I don’t want to squander my everyday sight. I don’t want to blunder through my days like a blind woman.On busy, blurry days, I can feel like the blind man whose story is told in Luke 18. He called out to Jesus, “have mercy on me!”Jesus came near and asked, “What do you want me to do for you?””Lord,” he answered, “I want to see.” Lord, have mercy on me … I want to see. Yes. I, too, want to see! I don’t want to miss the good stuff, the real stuff, the hard stuff, the beauty, the life, the needs, the truth. I want to see all that I need to see.Jesus granted the blind man his sight.I pray He’ll grant sight to these eyes, as well; I turn to Him that I might have eyes that see.And as I start to look around, I’ll start small.Pausing, I’ll give something my full attention.A butterfly.A seed pod.A metaphor.A turn of phrase in the last line of a poem.A friend on the phone.A sculpture.A blob of oil paint on canvas.A daughter walking hand-in-hand with me to the park.A sunflower bobbing over the fence.I don’t mean to simplify something subtle and spiritual by being overly practical, but when I launched a series at NotSoFastBook.com about how to practice “seeing,” I offered art as an entree.It’s a little lesson in seeing.Seeing is much more than learning to appreciate shadow, shape, and color on canvas.But it can slow us down and remind us that there is much more than meets the eye.

Don’t miss a word: It’s easy to subscribe to annkroeker.com updates via email or RSS feed.

Visit NotSoFastBook.com to learn more about Ann’s new book.

The post Learning to See appeared first on Ann Kroeker, Writing Coach.