2 lessons I learned while driving around in the rain | Part 1

taken in Kona in 2009 

This morning two very important lessons were reaffirmed in my life through normal every day occurrences.  Today I will share one, and Friday I will share the other.  

It was sprinkling this morning when it was time for my Wednesday morning walk with my buddy Mike.  My initial thought was we should just brave it and walk, it wasn’t raining all that hard.  And then I remembered, the path that we take is about 2 miles out and back.  A light sprinkle adds up over time.  We would probably be drenched when we finished our walk.  I didn’t want to go to my next appointment soaked, so we just hung out instead.  It made me realize this: 

Little things have a LARGE impact over a long period of time.  

This works both positively and negatively.  Throwing a little bit of extra money into your savings account will add up greatly over time.  Whereas, drinking one more soda a day could surprise you with a few more pounds than you wanted.  

On a personal note:
Here’s to vulnerable blog posting.  I went to the doctor yesterday… there’s some things I need to work on.  I was aware of them, and its obvious what I need to work on if you know me.  I need to lose a lot of weight.  Losing weight will bring my blood pressure and my cholesterol down.  I realized as the doctor was talking to me that this aspect of my health really IS in my control.  If I get down to an average BMI I can reduce the risk of a lot of serious illnesses.  Pray for me:) 

I didn’t get to this weight overnight but I can make little changes that over a long period of time that will lead to a large impact.  


Engage:  What are some of the little changes you have made in your life that have had a big impact over time?  What are some changes you need to make?  Let us know in the comments.  

jim baker 
TestFebruary 29, 2012 - 9:48 am

test

2012 February General Update BIG NEWS

photo taken in kailua kona 2008 during my photography school



We’re going back to HAWAII to staff YWAM’s School of Biblical Studies! 


Getting out of debt 
In December of 2011, Jess and I paid off our last bit of debt.  A big reason we wanted to get out of debt was so that we could serve God more freely without the financial burden of large interest bearing payments.  We paid off over 30k (mostly school loans) in 2.5 years following the Dave Ramsey method and a lot of miraculous provision from God.

Asked to pray
The same week we made our last payment, we were approached by some leaders in YWAM, a volunteer missions organization that we have served with before.  We were asked to pray about the possibility of coming on staff with their school of biblical studies.

Decision
After a lot of thought and prayer, discussion with others and a retreat focused on making this decision we decided that God was indeed calling us to go.

We’re going!
So we leave March 10th (Jess’ birthday!) for Hawaii to staff the school of biblical studies and will return to the mainland in 2013!

More info
Here’s more info on the school –> School of Biblical Studies  I will post again on Thursday giving a lot more detail on what this all entails, but I wanted to let you all in on the BIG NEWS!

Donate
YWAM is a volunteer missions organization and all staff members raise support to do what they do.  If you’re interested in partnering with us financially, you can give using the paypal button below.  You will be giving to our ministry the BAKERS ministry which is a 501c3 to help us with our living expenses while in Hawaii.  (All donations ARE tax deductible)   If you are interested in partnering with us on a monthly basis please contact us jimjessbaker (at) gmail (dot) com and we can set you up using ACH.



If you have questions or comments let us know! Have you been to Hawaii?  Tell us about it in the comments!

jim baker

Corey errettFebruary 28, 2012 - 9:38 am

So pumped for you guys. Love you guys and excited for what Gods gonna do through you both

Anneli JohnsonFebruary 28, 2012 - 1:05 pm

Even though I already was in “the know” I’m do excited for you guys and that you’ve shared public! I think it’s crazy that we are leaving within 3 days of each other. And I arrive in China on my birthday. :)

Blessings,
Anneli

Marc ScottFebruary 29, 2012 - 7:35 am

Again man I’m so proud of you!  And what a nice Birthday gift for Jess to get to Hawaii!

thecompositionofFebruary 29, 2012 - 7:39 am

Yes, I’ve been to Hawaii and it is great!

jimjessbakerFebruary 29, 2012 - 7:43 am

thanks everyone!  

jimjessbakerFebruary 29, 2012 - 7:44 am

you’ll have to let us know of all the best spots to check out!

JeFeFebruary 29, 2012 - 11:03 am

Can i come visit !
( :

jimjessbakerFebruary 29, 2012 - 11:29 am

yes sir, please do!  

3 Reasons why YOU should start blogging!

You, whoever you are, should start a blog and start blogging.  
If you have a blog that is collecting dust, then its time to resurrect that puppy.
I’m calling you out Mark Krebs (blog last updated October 2010)  



This baby gecko agrees, you NEED to start a blogging.

Its kind of the pot calling the kettle black here, since this blog has had a couple of starts and stops. In 2011 I only posted twice.  But Aaron Reinard has taken the hint, and we’re dusting off our blogs and giving it a go.

Im learning that if you set a goal, even if you start and stop, you will have accomplished more than if you would have if you never set out on that goal.  And who knows, maybe this time will be the time it sticks.

3 reasons you should start blogging.

1. It’s an easy to read, fun way to remember life and share with others
I really got blessed the other night by simply reading through some of my previous posts.  I was able to look back through this past few years, and see what was going in in my life.  It caused me to be thankful for the things that have happened.

2.  It will help you communicate more clearly 
The very practice of writing regularly will help you to communicate more clearly.  I’m sure that if you get in the habit of writing more often, that you will naturally be able to say what you want to say more clearly and concisely.

3.  Your life and your experiences matter.  Share them!   
Michael Hyatt says not to blog about yourself unless you are a celebrity.  While I totally understand what he is saying, his audience is professional bloggers.  I’m encouraging hobby blogging.  The very reason I started this blog was so that people could get to know us digitally.

Check out Life In A Day to see a 90 minute documentary of how captivating everyones normal every day life is!

Have you ever thought about starting a blog?  What is your biggest hesitation?  Why has your blog started collecting dust?  Let us know in the comments!

jim baker

Easy changes to upgrade your blog! | NEW BLOG LAYOUT!

We were in Ohio last weekend and on the drive back I listened to Michael Hyatt’s podcast entitled “10 Ways to Generate More Blog Traffic.”  And it INSPIRED ME!


Following some of his tips from his podcast I’ve redone the layout of the blog.  

RIGHT COLUMN
I’ve added a right column to the layout which I did not have before.  
In the right column I have added…
– a search bar
– two ways to subscribe
– I moved our twitter updates to the right column from the bottom 
– And added popular posts (does anyone know how i can make those thumbnails not distorted?) 

COMMENTS 
I’ve switched the comments to using DISQUS.  Which Michael Hyatt recommended.  
Commenting using bloggers native commenting was a pain in the butt.  I like DISQUS better already, and it easily imported all of my old comments from blogger.  

I added LINK WITHIN at the bottom of every post.  This along with the POPULAR POSTS widget on the right column should keep people exploring the blog more than usual.  

I added an ADD THIS widget which will allow people to share each post easier.  

I made the blog home page display 5 posts instead of just 1 like before.  And I added a new header image and made the background match the header image.  

I’m sure there will be some more changes coming as well.  But thats enough for today.  

Leave a COMMENT for me to test out DISQUS and let me know what you think of the changes!  Are you happy with your current blog layout?  What changes would you like to make to yours?  What blogs have you seen that have the best navigable layout?  

jim baker

jimjessbakerFebruary 28, 2012 - 2:38 pm

thanks Nina!  your blog looks good too, i just commented on your blog with a link to a friends blog that you might like checking out!  let me know if you implement any of the above tips! – jim baker 

Nina Michelle CraigFebruary 28, 2012 - 2:38 pm

Jim! Your blog looks snazzy!  Good job.  I’m always looking for ways to spice up my blog. I decided to have a pregnancy journal, but after Little Guy was born, I decided to keep it.  Check it out sometime. Thanks for the tips!

Blessings!!
http://ninathemom.blogspot.com/ 

2011.10.16 – cream of crab soup


6 months since the last blog post…


So I have this new love for cream of crab soup. Last week after bible study we went to the Phoenix Emporium in Old Ellicott City. Jess got the soup sampler which was a cup of both of their soups, cream of crab and crab vegetable. A cup of one of their soups was like $4.95 and the soup sampler which was both cups for $5.95. Can’t beat that. I ended up eating pretty much all of her cream of crab and have been thinking about it non stop.

We also split a bacon cheeseburger which was pretty epic because they get their beef from right down the street at J.W Treuth & Sons so you know the beef is FRESH and coming from 1 cow instead of 100. I ordered the burger medium and it actually came out medium.

Jess and I are going to be doing “No restaurant November” which I thought we made up but after a google search someone beat us to the punch. We’re desperately trying to KILL OUR DEBT and enter 2012 debt free. So making the soup at home was a step in the right direction. EXCEPT this soup was freaking EXPENSIVE to make… all of the groceries to make it was a little over $40. The only thing we have left over is a cup of heavy whipping cream and a big thing of old bay:)The expensive part was obviously a pound of backfin crab for $17.99

I got the recipe from http://www.allrecipies.com

Here’s a link to the actual recipe. Karyn’s Cream of Crab Soup

Here are the ingredients and directions.

  • 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
  • 1 (1.25 ounce) envelope hollandaise sauce mix
  • 4 cups half-and-half, divided
  • 1/4 cup butter
  • 3 tablespoons Old Bay Seasoning TM
  • 1/2 teaspoon dry mustard
  • 1/4 teaspoon celery seed
  • 1 cup whipping cream
  • 1 tablespoon cooking sherry
  • 1 pound fresh crabmeat

  1. In a medium bowl, blend flour and hollandaise sauce mix with 2 cups half-and-half.
  2. Melt butter in a medium, heavy saucepan over medium heat. Slowly add hollandaise mixture, stirring constantly until thickened. Add remaining half-and-half, Old Bay, dry mustard, celery seed, and whipping cream. Bring to a simmer and reduce heat to low. Add crabmeat and sherry, stirring gently until warmed through. Serve immediately.


A lot of the reviews said that 3 tablespoons of old bay was to much, so I did a little under 2… 3 would have been fine. I put old bay on top when I served it. I also used a 1/4 teaspoon of celery salt instead of celery seed and didn’t use any cooking sherry.


The soup was great, not as thick as the Phoenix, but served fresh it was actually HOT and not luke warm, and it had a lot more crab per bite for sure. I just heated some up in the microwave for lunch and it was good too.

Would I make it again? Sure, for a special occasion, but $40 for 6 servings of soup is way to expensive to be making any time soon.

I’ve never really liked soups but have been really enjoying them lately. Next I’d like to make french onion.

What is your favorite soup? Leave your answer in the comments!
jim baker

The Moldy CannoliOctober 17, 2011 - 8:03 am

I want to try making French Onion too, it is usually hit or miss when you get it at a restaurant so I want to perfect it. I would say it is my favorite soup. I also like homemade tomato soup, which is way better than canned and really easy to make.

jim bakerOctober 17, 2011 - 8:04 am

what makes a good french onion soup for you? when you make it you will have to let me know how it turns out. also what is your recipe for a good home made tomato? – jim baker

DanielOctober 19, 2011 - 1:00 pm

A good French onion soup must be made with beef broth (I know i’m a vegetarian but meat broth doesn’t bother me, i tried making once with some other kind of broth and it was really sickening) be salty, but not too salty have a lot of caramelized onions (nothing crunchy) have a generous hunk of bread on top and topped with melted, gooey provolone cheese. This being said, I do really like Panera’s French onion soup even though, they top theirs with croutons and shredded parmesan. I still like it. :)

jim bakerOctober 20, 2011 - 2:28 am

thanks daniel… soon and very soon i will be making some french onion :) i actually saw some people eating french onion and panera yesterday… we’ll see how the home made compares

The Moldy CannoliOctober 20, 2011 - 5:02 am

Oops, I was signed in as Dan, that comment was from me.

jim bakerOctober 20, 2011 - 5:08 am

haha, i was trying really hard to figure out what daniel that was… i did not have any clue that it would be your dan :) – jim baker

2011.04.02 – A NEW BLOG POST?!!!! Making deviled eggs with my neice

Hey everyone…

I haven’t blogged in 6 months and it’s been a nice time unplugging. I sent out an update for the month telling what was up with us. If you want an e-mail update, leave a comment with your e-mail address and I’ll get you one.

Today is my nieces birthday. HAPPY BIRTHDAY LINDSEY! Thursday night I drove up to their house in PA because I had to drive my sister to knee surgery the next day. Jeannie (my sister) is doing fine.

Anyway, this past Thanksgiving I was thinking of all the delicious foods I love and thinking how we should have all of these things at Thanksgiving. One of them was deviled eggs, and Lindsey piped in saying she liked them too. So I told her that from now on for every family holiday she was in charge of making deviled eggs. And at Christmas time when we visited, guess what she made. Deviled eggs!

I got the idea since Lindsey likes to cook that we should make up a bunch of eggs and try out some different types of deviled eggs. She liked the idea so here’s the result.

Every good evening should start out with some little caesars pizza, this one didn’t have the deep dish pizza though…. I haven’t had little caesars since I lived in NY. Remember when I almost burned my house down with their dipping sauce?

Lindsey made some cupcakes for her birthday to take to school. I got to eat one before the pizza. They were AWESOME. Cupcakes are all the rage. For Jess’ birthday her friend Colleen make some amazing cupcakes too. Check out Colleen’s recent NYC cupcake adventure here.

Funfetti cupcakes, white frosting topped with a chocolate covered strawberry. DELICIOUS!

My sister Jeannie did all the hard work of boiling and peeling the eggs. Thanks Jeannie:)

Ingredients: hardboiled eggs

red onion

bacon?!

Here are some of the other staples. White vinegar, relish (which we didn’t end up using) mayo, and miracle whip.

Lindsey starts the process, cutting the egg in half long ways.

Recently a photography teacher that taught in my photo school responded to our e-mail update and reminded me to make sure that I am not always behind the camera during family events. So I handed my camera over to my sister and let her snap a few.

Jeannie did pretty good behind the camera, she took this one of Lindsey.

Lindsey gets a little help from her mom.

Lindsey got super fancy and piped in her yolk mixture in with a bag. Not only was it a ton faster than me trying to hold onto a slippery egg white and neatly scoop the yolk into the egg, it looked a lot better.

Look how good those look! Presentation, presentation, presentation.

Lindsey and “Uncle Jimmy”

Lindsey’s usual recipe for deviled eggs is her dad’s recipe. This is how he makes them.

Lindsey’s next recipe was only a bit different. This one added in some white vinegar, and didn’t have celery salt.

This was based around a recipe I found on allrecipes.com You can see the actual recipe here. I didn’t follow it, I just threw in some of the ingredients that it listed.

And this was my second recipe. I based this one off of how I grew up eating them. We always used miracle whip in our egg salad, potato salad, macaroni salad, and deviled eggs.

Jeannie, Lindsey and me!

Mike (Lindsey’s dad, and Jeannie’s husband, my brother in law) came home after work and taste tested them all without looking at the ingredients and could tell what was in each one. He liked the white vinegar and egg salad ones the best. Jeannie, Lindsey and I liked the bacon one the best. Cause bacon makes everything better:)

Since I was spending the night to get up and take my sister to the dr the next morning I had to sleep in Lindsey’s room. I didn’t wake up with Bieber fever, just a stomach ache from all of the pizza and eggs:)

Thanks to everyone who still checks in here from time to time, I was pretty surprised to look at the analytics to see that people are still checking in.

What’s your go to deviled egg recipe? Leave me a comment and let me know.

Should I get back into blogging? If you think so leave me some comment love and maybe I will…

JIM baker
Jon BarnesApril 2, 2011 - 2:03 pm

I don’t care who you are, BACON makes anything better. I literally drooled on my keyboard when I saw those deviled eggs with bacon. congratulations.

joanApril 2, 2011 - 2:07 pm

Hey Jim,
Welcome back to blogging. You know I love hearing what you have to say and, also, love seeing some new photos. It’s great and hope you continue.

Looks like a fun time for all.

Love, Grandma and Grandpa

jim bakerApril 2, 2011 - 2:14 pm

@ jon – yeah dude… we should have a bacon party. i’m serious. lets do it. how many different ways can we use bacon?

@ grandma – thanks! not sure if I’m going to keep up with it or what… I’m really out of blogging shape it took me over an hour to post that one.

//meganApril 2, 2011 - 4:00 pm

My Cru group at AU totally had a Bacon Potluck and it was the best thing ever :)

It sprang out of a conversation about if there was any food at all which didn’t go well with either chocolate or bacon … the answer of course being pretty much nope, because chocolate or bacon make everything better.

jim bakerApril 2, 2011 - 5:24 pm

@ megan – please tell me there was some chocolate covered bacon at that pot luck.

wendybird03April 4, 2011 - 6:05 am
jim bakerApril 6, 2011 - 1:32 pm

@ wendy – have you tried it?

The Moldy CannoliJune 1, 2011 - 5:16 am

Since I hate both mayonnaise and miracle whip (I can’t tell the difference between the two) with a passion, I make my deviled eggs with plain yogurt and dijon mustard and I sprinkle the top with cayenne pepper. I think they’re pretty delish. Adding white vinegar sounds interesting though, I think I will need to try that. Deviled eggs and hot chocolate used to be my favorite breakfast. :) Yummy!

jim bakerJune 2, 2011 - 2:07 am

@ moldy – probably a lot healthier with yogurt, i should give that a try sometime, why do you hate mayo and miracle whip so much? deviled eggs and hot chocolate? that seems like a strange combination but maybe with the yogurt its alright

11.09.10 – sorry for the neglect

It stinks when this happens to blogs… they go for a while… and have a good go, and then they slowly start to fade and before to long you notice that your last post was weeks, months or even years ago…

I got a nice wake up call from a friend that sent me a message on facebook asking why haven’t I updated the blog lately? Well… theres no real good excuse…

This blog sort of turned into a photography blog of sorts… it didn’t start out that way but it kind of morphed into that. Now that I’m doing photography full time, I don’t care to be blogging about photography on my personal blog.

So… where does that leave us?

I’m not quite sure.

I was looking at my old myspace blog the other day while searching for something to send to someone and didn’t know if my life was just more interesting then or if it was more interesting because I took the time to actually write about my daily experiences.

So I think I’m going to lay this blog to rest. I appreciate everyone who has followed, and commented.

I do however think there may be a new blog in the future, maybe starting up in 2011…

Bless you guys
Jim (and Jess too) Baker

The Moldy CannoliNovember 10, 2010 - 9:49 am

Oh, how sad. :(

10.26.10 – the winner is…

C is the winner! Jess took C.

Seth took A.

And Jim took B.
Sorry this is late, I was on the road this weekend. Our print giveaway winner is Jeremy Wat, Jeremy you have 48 hours to email us at jim@carpediemphotovideo.com with your address so we can mail out your photo to you.

We are moving the WHOLE thing to FACEBOOK because we’ve heard from a lot of people that they are still having trouble voting. And also you are WELCOME to tell us WHY now but its not required.

We’ve gotten a couple of entries for the critique contest this week with YOUR fall pics. Keep sending them in! Details here.

JIM baker

10.22.10 – CRITIQUE NEXT WEEK with YOU!

Hey everyone, we’ve been asked by a couple of people to open up the critique so we ARE.

The topic is FALL.

You need to send us a HIGHEST RESOLUTION jpeg you can, (so set your camera setting to the highest resolution you can) and make sure that the photo is cropped in a 4×6 crop, so we can blow it up to an 8×12″ print.

It HAS to be a photo that you took after reading this post. So no awesome pics that you took from last year. It has to have been a shot intentionally taken for this competition.

Submit your photo to jim@carpediemphotovideo.com on Tuesday October 26th by 11:59pm.

The carpe diem team will pick the top 4 and then we will post them just like we always do on thursdays and open it up to everyone else. If you win we will send you an 8×12 of the print and also a winner that voted for your pic!

We’re SO LOOKING FORWARD to seeing your work!

JIM baker

10.21.10 – kitchen utensil

A

B

C

Only 3 submissions this week.

Vote by telling us which pic you like the best by LETTER and tell us WHY in the comment section.

Only votes on the blog comment section are official and you can only vote for 1 pic. Voting will end at 10am on Saturday Oct 23rd.

All of the votes for the winning picture will be automatically entered in a random drawing and the winner picked will get an 8×12″ print of the winning picture!

The winning pic and print give away winner will be announced Saturday the 23rd on the blog.


Click on the word “comments” on the bottom of this post, and then click on name/url if you don’t have a google account, and type in your FIRST and LAST name for us so we know who you are.

ANONYMOUS POSTS WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED and only comments on the blog count!

go vote and tell your friends to vote too!!!
JIM baker

Timothy S. MilliganOctober 21, 2010 - 4:17 am

C

I expected a knife, and instead was surprised to discover this is a family portrait, a short essay on procreation. The other two struck me as a little cliche? Not much, but this seemed a little more original.

My name is Tim Milligan

colleenOctober 21, 2010 - 5:43 am

Outstanding week. Incredibly hard choice, but I melted with A. Love (LOVE) them all! B is very cool and C was very funny!

Jeremy WOctober 21, 2010 - 10:57 am

A is ridiculously cute. B has some great lines and sweet colour choice. C is just plain funny. I vote for C. Great photos all around.

Claire FrameOctober 21, 2010 - 12:00 pm

A!

I love the lighting. I also love B and thought it was super creative.I think C was pretty funny, as well.

Ashley AdelgrenOctober 21, 2010 - 2:34 pm

My vote is for B. Photo A is SUPER cute, but I love the color and the modern-art look that B has to it. I would totally hang it on the wall in my kitchen. 😉

KatyOctober 21, 2010 - 5:52 pm

C for sure. i love the spork and the conposition of it. I agree with the guy who said it looked like a family portrait…that’s exactly what came to my mind

The Moldy CannoliOctober 22, 2010 - 3:08 am

I like C. It is cute how instead of a fork, their is a spork. Sporks remind me of Taco Bell and I sure did a lot of Taco Bell eating as a child. yum, yum!

AaronOctober 22, 2010 - 11:05 am

C

It took me a second. At first I was like….wait that’s not right….then I realized how right it really was! it’s funny but it’s also shot really well.