Easy Hospitality Supper, Key Lime Pie Cheesecake Recipe & A Prayer Request

I'm just wrapping up "peak week" of May in our household.  This month is extremely busy, and this week saw the perfect storm of nearly everything: from the normal (piano, violin, co-op, art, ballet, Bible study) to the less common (haircut, ballet rehearsal, attending a play, houseguests).  

Annie's ballet recital is this afternoon and her costume is enchanting: ice blue over a pinkish-beige, with a pinkish-beige flower in her hair, and blue fairy wings.  She is nervous and excited.  Three-fourths of the grandparents will be in attendance, and I'm about to go pick flowers for her bouquet.  I could have ordered roses from the ballet school, but the coral bells and peonies and lilacs are peppering my flower beds right now! And they're free! 

Tonight we're hosting grandparents after the show, so here's my Easy Hospitality Menu:

*bacon-wrapped chicken

*roasted Yukon gold potatoes

*steamed broccoli

*key lime pie cheesecake 

It's simple, healthy (I mean, minus the pie), and easy. This morning I'm prepping the chicken and bacon, cutting the broccoli, and making the pie.  So this evening all I'll need to do is cut and roast the potatoes (easy), steam the broccoli, and cook the chicken!

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The key lime pie cheesecake recipe is a standby here and one of my signature desserts, so I'd love to share it:

*Two-Layer Key Lime Pie Cheesecake*

Acquire or make a graham cracker crust. 

Set out an 8-oz package of cream cheese to soften. 

For the baked layer: Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Whisk together a can of sweetened condensed milk, 1/2 cup key lime juice (I sometimes just use regular lime juice) and 3 large egg yolks. Pour into the crust and bake until set--about 8-9 minutes in my oven. Let cool.

Once the baked layer is cool, use an electric mixer to beat the cream cheese with 1/2 cup sweetened condensed milk  (yes, more of that!), 1/4 cup of lime juice, and a little dash of vanilla. Beat until smooth, then pour over cooled baked layer, and smooth the top.  

Cover and chill until firm--at least four hours or so. If you want, pipe whipped cream around the edges before serving, but I never do it!

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And finally, if you feel led, please join me in praying for my husband.  His routine 3-month checkup with the surgeon on Wednesday revealed some anomaly that may be scar tissue from his surgery in January or it may be a recurrence of cancer. He will go in next Friday the 18th for a PET scan.  We always want to pray that God's will be done, but I'm also praying that God's will is that this is merely scar tissue.  I spent a little while in agony over the "what ifs", which are scary to consider, given this particular type of cancer, and now we're just waiting.  God very clearly gave me this Bible verse on Thursday morning: 

I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.

Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and He shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the Lord. 

-Psalm 27:13-14

And so we do.