It was the best of projects, it was the worst of projects. Traditionally, bad news is told before good news, so let's first look at this cooking project my children recently worked on.
They decided to make lava cakes from scratch, which involves a long-ish process of mixing both the outer cake dough and the inner "lava." The first stages proceeded with no hint of the disaster to come.
Assembling the final ingredients is tricky. Dough needs to be put in the cupcake pan, lining the sides. Then a scoop of the cream that becomes the lava goes in. A final layer of dough goes across the top as the foundation of the "volcano." The goal is not to have the dough puff up over the top of the cupcake pan. Once baking is complete, the chef needs to invert the pan and drop out the cakes, leaving a mound of delicious double-flavor delight.
We had a few problems with the final product. First, the cakes did grow above the pan.
Being the adult in charge, I had the job of inverting the pans. Sadly, this also did not work as intended.
The scraps still tasted good. They definitely looked more like earthquake cakes than lava cakes.
Another project was to ride from the main branch of our library system to get a treat at one of Columbia's village centers about two miles away. We took the rural route around two lakes. Lake Kittimaqundi by the library has an exercise path where we stopped to work out our upper bodies.
The second lake we visited, Wilde Lake, had some challenging hills. One end of the lake is dammed, leaving a little path for visitors to go out and look at the pleasant view.
The other end of the lake does allow fishing. Even the fish cooperated by swimming near the shore.
The houses at the other end of the lake were very fancy and looked like fun places to live (in addition to being on the lake).
We finally made it to the village center after an hour and a half of biking (did I say there were a lot of hills? Also, cycling around the lakes added some distance!). In order to see more stuff, we decided to take the more direct route back to the library, following a main road that went straight. The bridge across the road was the most fun hill we had to ascend on the way back.
In fact, that ramp was the only hill we had to deal with. The road was not only straight, it was all downhill. We coasted our way in twenty minutes back to where we had started nearly two hours earlier. I was happy for the fast return.
Our second adventure threatened to be a long slog back to the car but it turned out to be the best of rides.
They decided to make lava cakes from scratch, which involves a long-ish process of mixing both the outer cake dough and the inner "lava." The first stages proceeded with no hint of the disaster to come.
 |
| Beating on the cream cheese |
 |
| Maybe he had a premonition of the disaster to come? |
 |
| Working on the filling |
Assembling the final ingredients is tricky. Dough needs to be put in the cupcake pan, lining the sides. Then a scoop of the cream that becomes the lava goes in. A final layer of dough goes across the top as the foundation of the "volcano." The goal is not to have the dough puff up over the top of the cupcake pan. Once baking is complete, the chef needs to invert the pan and drop out the cakes, leaving a mound of delicious double-flavor delight.
We had a few problems with the final product. First, the cakes did grow above the pan.
 |
| Over the top and cracked too! |
 |
| A little underdone and all over the place |
Being the adult in charge, I had the job of inverting the pans. Sadly, this also did not work as intended.
 |
| Whoops! |
The scraps still tasted good. They definitely looked more like earthquake cakes than lava cakes.
Another project was to ride from the main branch of our library system to get a treat at one of Columbia's village centers about two miles away. We took the rural route around two lakes. Lake Kittimaqundi by the library has an exercise path where we stopped to work out our upper bodies.
 |
| Working a different muscle group |
 |
| The long and unwinding road |
The second lake we visited, Wilde Lake, had some challenging hills. One end of the lake is dammed, leaving a little path for visitors to go out and look at the pleasant view.
 |
| Wilde Lake |
 |
| The dam |
 |
| Bird on the dam |
The other end of the lake does allow fishing. Even the fish cooperated by swimming near the shore.
 |
| Can you spot the fish? |
 |
| A little easier to spot the fish |
The houses at the other end of the lake were very fancy and looked like fun places to live (in addition to being on the lake).
 |
| I would totally live here |
We finally made it to the village center after an hour and a half of biking (did I say there were a lot of hills? Also, cycling around the lakes added some distance!). In order to see more stuff, we decided to take the more direct route back to the library, following a main road that went straight. The bridge across the road was the most fun hill we had to ascend on the way back.
 |
| A bridge across the road |
In fact, that ramp was the only hill we had to deal with. The road was not only straight, it was all downhill. We coasted our way in twenty minutes back to where we had started nearly two hours earlier. I was happy for the fast return.
 |
| The mall on the way to the library |
Our second adventure threatened to be a long slog back to the car but it turned out to be the best of rides.
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