Frosting

Lydia’s birthday cake

I’ve been involved in many projects.  One of the more recent projects is when I made frosting for my sister’s birthday cake.

On November 16th I was making maple frosting for a cake that my family had made for my sister’s birthday. I gathered the recipe, the ingredients, and the hand mixer. After carefully measuring the ingredients and dumping them into a small silver bowl, I grabbed the hand blender and mixed the ingredients together. Tasting the sugary mixture was delicious! My mom walked in, stirred the frosting and proposed that more powdered sugar should be added because it was too drippy. I took her advice and poured more into the mixing bowl. As it was being poured, sugar spilled from the bag onto the counter. It was extremely messy! I whipped the frosting with the extra powdery sweetness and tasted it again. It had the perfect fluffy texture! I slid the frosting bowl into the fridge until the cake was able to be frosted. The fun was over and then it was cleaning time. I wiped down the counter top, swept the floor, and rinsed the dishes.

When the cake had finished cooling, I removed the frosting from the fridge and grabbed a rubber scraper from the silverware drawer so that my sister could frost the cake. Lydia had the privilege because it was her birthday.  The frosting was a success.  At first it was a fail, because it was too drippy, but I was able to fix it, and it turned out to be fluffy and delicious.

The Appalachian Trail

The Appalachian Trail is the most popular hiking trail in the United States. It stretches roughly 2,220 miles from Georgia to Maine.

The name ‘Appalachian Trail’ is a shortened version of the original name, ‘The Appalachian National Scenic Trail’.

There are many dangerous animals in the Appalachian Trail. A few are Black bears, which weigh about several hundred pounds, snakes, such as the Copperhead and the Timber Rattlesnake, and ticks, which carry Lyme disease.

The Shenandoah Valley is a large area in the Appalachian Trail covered with trees. It’s a huge forest!

The Appalachian Trail has steep hills, rocky paths, and beautiful scenery. It it a very famous trail.

The Lincoln Highway

Built in 1913, the Lincoln Highway starts in New York City, New York and ends in San Francisco, California, passing through several major cities such as Chicago, Illinois, Denver, Colorado, and Salt Lake City, Utah.

The Lincoln Highway passes through my state, Indiana. The original route begins in Fort Wayne, winding north-west to South Bend, then moves south-west to the north-west corner near Merrillville. But the third generation travels straight from Fort Wayne to Merrillville.

For more information click here.

Otto the First

Otto the First became Duke of Saxony and King of Germany in 936. Once king, he united the other Dukes and made them into his vassals. Vassals are nobles.

In 551, Otto found a way to expand his kingdom. He rescued the widowed queen of Italy from her oppressors, married her, then crowned himself king of Italy.

In 955 his kingdom was invaded by the Magyars, who where a Hungarian tribe. They intended to take over Otto’s kingdom and use the land for themselves. Fortunately, Otto was able to drive the Magyars back but not without some damage. Otto’s oldest son, the heir to the throne, was killed. So Otto named his two year old son as the knew heir.

Pope John XII was having some trouble controlling his Papal States, so he asked the strongest ruler in Europe to help him. Otto, being the strongest ruler in Europe, agreed to to help only if the Pope would crown him as the Holy Roman Emperor. The Pope agreed. So Otto stopped the rebellion of the Papal States. In 962, Pope John XII crowned Otto as the Holy Roman Emperor and Queen Adelaide as his Emperoress.

In 989, the Catholic Church attempted to limit bloodshed and violence. This attempt was called the Pax Dei, or the Peace of God.

Otto the First was a very successful ruler. He united Germany, helped establish a centralized government, and was also very affective in spreading Christianity.

Early Roadway Development

Roads where not easily built. All the stumps, bolders, and bruch needed to be cleared away. This task was usually was done by hand, but sometimes horses would help out with the job. It was a very difficult activity and took a great amount of time.

The next thing that was done was leveling. Leveling the trail was done with hand-held rakes and horse-drawn scrapers.

Lastly, the gravel was applied. Large pieces of rock were smashed with sledge hammers until they were made into small chunks.

Then the road is ready to be used.