Living within our means.

The blog itself starts further down. I'll however explain what is shown: 1. Sugar cookies. 2. Semi-american pancakes. 3. "Finska klumpar" 4. Scone-batter on the plate just seconds from entering the burning inferno within. 5. The ready supposed-to-be scones.

Now, on with the text itself.

One principle that is taught in within our church is to live within our means, or in other words: Do not spend money that you don't have, save up some extra money for unexpected situations. And more specifically, we're thought to not get in debt unless we really have to (e.g. take a loan on a house might be acceptable, but getting a huge loan to build a swimming pool and to go on a great long trip might be less wise).

I was fortunate to get a summer job for the summer, many weren't. But rather than getting a well payed job at a factory, I was selling paint. Great job, but it's not by far as well paid. As a result, I now have less money than I usually have, and I decided it's time to spend less and save up (so that I still have money to special things).

Part of this has been to spend less on food. I have been eating macaronis more and try to eat at school every day; Good diverse food that contains all I need for the day to a cheap price, and then live cheaper off at home. It just so happened to be that I have a lot of macaronis at home :)

One part of this has been to bake my own things when I feel I want a little extra something, and I wish to expand upon this subject. First I went to an excellent web page filled with recipes for cookies and biscuits [www.bakakaka.se] I looked for anything that could be made with the available ingredients, I found out that most things wanted either baking powder or eggs, I had no baking powder and my eggs where 4 months old, so the only thing that I would do with them was to throw them out. I however found one recipe for something called "Finska pinnar", I would need eggs and big-grained sugar for decoration, but if that simple unculinary step was disregarded, it was just butter, sugar and flour and into the oven. The name "Finska pinnar" means "Finnish sticks", I however didn't feel like making sticks, I just made small slightly flattened balls out of the batter, and I've decided to call them "Finska klumpar" i.e. "Finnish lumps".

When talking to my mother on the phone, she convinced me that buying baking powder and eggs would be a good idea. And so I did. Next up, I made raisin cookies, they contain butter, flour, sugar and ... baking powder, along with raisins for added feature. I made them, and while they were a little to long in the oven, they probably are the best thing I have made in weeks (unless we count pancakes and crepes).
Since I lack a deciliter-measuring cup, I use my "well trained engineers eye", to approximate the amounts needed, I ended up with extra "flour-sugar-baking powder mix" and I decided to make pancakes out of that, since there was baking powder and sugar in it, it was on the road to american pancakes, I added eggs as a moderator and the result was semi-american pancakes instead.

And lastly and most freshly, I caught a recipe for classical scones from [www.scones.se], I decided to make half a batter rather than full, since it's my and only me on this, it was a good idea :D With no deciliter cup and my t-spoon in a box under my bed, I put to much baking powder compared to everything else. So I could tase that when eating the finished product. Also, my butter is running low. And that's an expensive investment... we'll see what I do next. But so far, I have been happy about my baking-creations. The scones where a happy product, the baking powder taste didn't ruin them, but I know what to be more carefull with next time.

Ok, I'm going to leave travelling to the side, I'll get back to it if I ever find the inspiration. But now, my live goes on. And next up: I am going to keep a presentation about my 2 years in Greece to a school audience, the purpose is to inspire other students to go on exchange studies.

The difference however is that I didn't go on exchange studies to Greece, I went there as a missionary. And I am a bit worried about the whole deal, how will they all react when I expose to them that I have been proselyting my religion for 2 years. Due to the religious taboo we have, I have been reluctant about telling them, a few have been told and another few know parts of the story. I have prepared a nice presentation, it does not focus on missionary work as much as it does on all around it and how I got to get used to greece, the language and culture etc. And I mark some emphasis on the charity actions we did.
Bottom line, I am a bit worried, probbly not as bad as I fear. But I did ask God for strenght about this thing.