For today...

Faith for an uneasy soul.

Hope for a reeling mind.

Love for a tender heart.

And Grace, amazing Grace, to bind it all together. Grace to wash over it all. Grace to fill in the cracks. Grace to salve the wounds. Grace to light up the dark.

Grace. 

To make you whole.

...

Amen. 

I'm ready for my close up.

This is really strange, but, just one month from today, a filmmaker is going to step off a plane in Costa Rica with his fancy cameras and lights and sound junk, which he will then use to follow us around, ask us probing questions, and (I presume) get close ups of all of the dirt, cobwebs, and shower scum in my house.

I am not making this up.

Scott Brignac is a U.S. based film-maker, and he's making a film about...us!

Weird, huh.

When Scott first approached us with the idea for a short documentary, I warned him that we are positively the most boring people on the face of the planet and that our lives, while occasionally whacky, might seem interesting because we live in a foreign country and hang out with foreign people, but they are, in fact, not the least bit entertaining. Like, at all. In any way imaginable.

But, still, he thinks he sees a story in us.

So, in a month, we're giving him a bed to sleep in and the creative freedom to coax (what we hope will be) a worthy story out of us.

I'm kind of embarrassed to admit that the impending arrival of cameras has put me in a bit of a tailspin.

I guess you could say I'm not ready for my close up.

It's true that I haven't had a haircut in over a year, and I have flapping old-lady flesh draping the backs of my arms, and my face is aged and wrinkly and icky. Honestly? Getting caught on film will dispel any myth of attractiveness which I may have been able to fake with the help of digital filters and a carefully closed mouth. If Scott Brignac makes this film, you'll soon know that I'm only “Instagram pretty” and that I have teeth like Kirstin Dunst. It's tragic.

But that's not what's freaking me out.

I guess I wonder what you'll see, from the outside looking in. It worries me that you'll see what I already know, which is that things are not as they should be.

I am not the Mom I should be.

I'm not the housekeeper I should be.

I'm not the Christian I should be.

My marriage is not what it should be.

And maybe I'm afraid that you'll see, frame by flicking frame, that the brokenness I've talked about in these pages isn't just some clever imagery, some silly metaphor, but the stuff of real life.

Maybe I'm afraid that you'll see that sometimes we look pretty Godless, El Chupacabra and I. And it's not because we're some hipster Christians who act that way on purpose to be “relevant” or something. It's because we're just not letting God in, to be part of what we're doing here on His Earth. We don't always seek Him, or listen to Him, or obey Him – even when we know we should. We look Godless sometimes because... well, we are Godless sometimes. And it's ugly. And sad.

And maybe I'm afraid that you'll see how this life has taken its toll on El Chupacabra and me, and how we've run short of Love and Grace and Mercy for one another. Having been married since we were children, we carry with us the tenderness of life long friends, but also the familiarity of inbred cousins. When we argue, which is often, we lose our minds – saying the same things again and again, and ending with a venomous chorus of “Screw you!”, “No, screw YOU!”, “NO, SCREW YOU!!” - until we're both just too tired to keep shouting about who ought to be screwed.

Not that we would do that if there were a camera in the room.

No, of course we wouldn't. Because sometimes we're full of shit. Sometimes we play nice when we don't feel like it because we know someone is watching. For the most part, our lies are innocuous and silly things to make us look smarter or harder working or better disciplined than we really are. But sometimes they're just straight bullshit; dangerous, hurtful, self-preserving lies, to cover our sin, to hide our failure, to shadow our most indecent shortcomings.

Maybe I'm afraid that the camera will ferret out our most horrible selves and those who watch this film will be left scratching their heads, thinking, “Wow. She really is the very worst missionary.”

And maybe I should be okay with that.

Maybe split ends and flabby arms and messy houses and the hard stuff of real life are the things that make a great story.

Maybe we can find God there.

I don't know. 

Maybe this broken bullshit world needs more close ups...

....         .....        ....

What would a documentary of your life look like? 

This is NOT a food blog! But...

...I made a Picaken. 

A "picaken" is a whole entire pie baked into a whole entire cake. And you can't just go and make a Picaken and then not talk about it on your blog. A Picaken is more than food... it's an adventure.

It all started when I was poking around on Pinterest one night and I stumbled upon a Picaken. I thought it was ridiculous and honestly kinda gross looking, so I showed my husband, fully expecting him to agree that, yes, it was absurd and "why would anyone ever do that?!". 

He took one look at it and said, "THAT is what I want, no, demand for my birthday cake!"

And since I'm not the type to let a demand for dessert go unanswered, Picaken happened.

We agreed that a lemon cake with a blackberry pie sounded pretty darn delicious. So using every bit of culinary prowess I could muster, I set about my work, determined to complete the monstrous task of impregnating a cake with a pie.

This is a step-by step guide to the weirdest dessert I have ever made:

Step 1. Bake a pie. Mine was too fat. I should have used less berries.  If you use a fruit pie, you need to really thicken up your filling. If it's too juicy, your Picaken will... um... leak. A leaking cake is not appetizing. But whatever - just bake a pie. 

Step 2. Whip up a cake. Any cake recipe will do. Just whip it up and pour the batter about 1/4 inch thick to cover the bottom of your prepared pan (you need a BIG pan. I used a spring-form).

Step 3. I have no pictures of this because I was FREAKING OUT when I did it. But this is the part where you take that gorgeous pie, the one you just made, and you dump it into the cake batter. And then you pour more batter on top. Bye bye, perfect pie. 

Also? I'm totally not gonna tell you about how, while it was baking, the cake overflowed like lemon flavored lava covering every inch of the inside of my oven and then nearly killed my whole family by smoke inhalation and then took me 2 hours to clean up. It's just too discouraging. 

Step 4. Cool the 9 pound monstrosity on the window sill. (I always cool cakes and pies on the window sill because no matter how big the disaster is inside your house, the people outside will see and smell your creation and think, "That chick has got her crap together.")

Step 5. Release the PICAKEN! Turn that mother out onto a plate. If it starts to leak, you can just swipe the goopy stuff off with your finger and eat it until you have a stomach ache. 

Step 6. While you're waiting for your picaken to quit leaking, make icing. 

Step 7.  Ice that bad boy.

Violá! You've got yourself a PICAKEN!!

Here's a recap - You bake a pie, then you put it in a cake, then you decorate it as if you haven't just done something really bizarre. 

Of course, even sitting there covered in a half inch of buttercream, I had no idea what to expect when we opened it up. To be honest, I really thought that as soon as I cut into the cake it was gonna, like, barf out the pie... 

But it didn't.

It all stayed put...

...and it tasted really, really, really exceptionally good.

Now everyone in the family wants a Picaken for their birthday. *sigh* Great.

*I will say this; You can easily buy a frozen pie and a box of cake mix and throw this sucker together in 15 minutes flat. But where's the adventure in that? That's like riding Disney's Jungle Cruise and saying you've crossed the Amazon. ....But who's judging?! Not me! Even a half-assed adventure is better than no adventure at all!*

....         .....        .....

Now, I have to come up with new flavor combos for my February birthday boys. I'm look for suggestions.  What pie/cake combo would you want in your Picaken?!