Happy Baking to You!

In case you are in the mood for some last-minute holiday baking, I must share with you this most wonderful of breads. My favorite!

Orange-Cranberry Bread

From The Great Holiday Baking Book
by Beatrice Ojakangas
(a wonderful treasure!)

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup sugar
1 ½ teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
¼ cup (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, melted
1 large egg, beaten
1 teaspoon grated orange zest
¾ cup orange juice
1 cup halved fresh cranberries or ½ cup dried cranberries
1 cup chopped walnuts

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Butter and flour one 8 ½ x 4 ½-inch or three 5 ¾ x 3 ½-inch loaf pans.

Mix the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together in a large mixing bowl. Stir in the butter, egg, and orange zest and juice all at once, stirring just until the mixture is evenly moist. Fold in the cranberries and nuts. Spoon the batter into the prepared pan or pans.

Bake for 1 hour 10 minutes for the large loaf, or 50 to 55 minutes for the smaller loaves, or until a wooden skewer inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool for 5 minutes in the pan and then turn out onto a wire rack to cool

Makes 1 large or 3 small loaves

* * * * *

a salt & pepper concoction

It was the first time she'd had two french braids. :) So kissable!

From our trip to WY~

:: holiday baking ::

With the very best little cooking buddy ever!

My helper

Rosie loves to wash dishes :)

little girl evening

a good afternoon nap

warmed-up chicken and dumpling soup

long sudsy bath with eucalyptus

coconuties and footie-jammies

warm chamomile tea with honey and milk

stories read with Mama, next to Dad

Buddies

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Greta and Pa

Walk

pleasant Octoberings

(a few colorful bits of our days)

growing girl :: a yummy autumnal meal :: wood-hauling weekend with much help (my man's family is the best!) :: much canning (also with helpers) :: indoor coziness :: snow! :: my great new purse from Ana (!!)


Among things not shown: painting our basement, cleaning out corners before winter, family shopping trips, going to favorite restaurants with even favoriter people, a faraway friend, Miss A., come to visit, laundry folding, winterizing our yard, lots of rain, the first frost, picking apples, my shiny new pressure canner, new winter coats, new purple little-girl snowboots and pink snow mittens...

fire

::
Send Me - live at MHC
::
(Lecrae)

a new place for the stuff on the table:

(for Mama to see ...like most of my posts!) Which, as you can see, is by no means out of Greta's reach. :)
***
This is she while creating the lovely piece of chalkboard art:

apple green

Apparently it's not safe to take me to the hardware store anymore. :) This time I found a paint called "Granny Smith", and it was perfect for the back stairs. Monday morning, on it went. I love it. (Thanks, Man.)

Sunset on the Lake

{pictures by Caleb}

Van Vac Part V

evening hide-and-seek

Such giggles and squeals of laughter!

September garden

garden bounty

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.

Greta and I picked these yesterday morning in the garden, and Auntie Livi helped peel them all in the afternoon. Today is tomato soup and salsa bubbling day. :)
* * * * *

my new paint ~'::

I found this wonderful paint color on Saturday when we were at our local hardware store. It was a lovely gray, with a blue/green color-of-the-sea edge to it. "Ancient gray" they called it. It was just the color I wanted to paint my bedroom. I showed the color to Caleb and said please, and he decided that we could paint our bedroom this weekend since we had Monday at our disposal.



.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
We picked up the paint that afternoon when we went to the next town to get groceries, and Monday morning, as soon as Greta had us mostly awake, we took things off of the walls and moved furniture out from the walls. Leah and Ethan came over to help and in no time at all my bedroom was transformed. By dinnertime we were done painting, and by suppertime could put everything back.

It is so lovely. The room feels much bigger and airier and cleaner. And I just love the color. (I don't mind the carpet anymore either. :))
* * *

* * * * *
Caleb is wondering why it is taking me so long to post this.
He had told me I could have the computer to post my pictures.
I told him, "Well, it takes a long time for me to do this. I wanted to write a little bit."
(Envision: a tired Greta crawling all over me, ready for bed.)
He wants to know why that takes long. He says to just say, "This is gray paint."
Indeed.
* * * * *

Marriage milestone marker:
When Caleb was setting up to paint he asked me if we had an old sheet to put over furniture, and we had one! We're officially an old married couple now. ;)

part the fourth

Anyone who doesn't like lots of pictures in one post has permission to skip these... Our week was so full of happy things that going back and looking at pictures helps to soak up the beauties of individual moments and people. ~'::
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
my man and my girl, the dock next to the swimming area (...where Dad and Uncle Phil sat with their flashlights to help us see as we tore down the hill from the sauna to jump into the lake!)
.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

our cabin...seen from the path, love-birds :)

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

my petunia, three friends...who accidentally came to supper matching in our jeans and blue plaid flannel :)

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

upstairs sunpatch, handwashing clothes in a bucket mid-week

Cloth diapers are a lovely thing...until you have to wash midweek while on vacation and you'd rather not spend most of one day in town sitting in a laundromat putting lots of money in the machines. :) So the alternative is... spending a good deal of one of your days boiling water and soaking and swishing. Mimi did most of the one-by-one scrubbing out at the end. On the line they went at dusk and were crispy clean and dry next afternoon. At least I got to be outside most of the day next to the beautiful lake!

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

Greta on my back (good buddy), meal prep

.

.

.

.
.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

* * *

We got to have a

Bluegrass Concert

midweek by our dear friends with us,

The Bankester Family.

It was so good!

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

getting ready for the concert, Mimi and Greta

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.
.
.
.

.
.
.
.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

These guys sounded so good. Will, Olivia and Ben even got in on some of the fun!

(You can check out the trailer for the Bankester Family's new music video on their website.)
* * *
.

.
.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

storytime with Melissa, aforementioned helpful Mimi-scrubbing

.

.

.

.
.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

suppertime!

(Van Van '09, part IV)

{we three}

We love to take early morning walks, we three. Today was the perfect morning; it was cool enough for a sweatshirt at the beginning. We stopped at the auto parts store, of course, and stopped by to say good morning to Grandma and Grandpa before we went home.

nummie-num!

A sweet little person came with me to pick some tomatoes for supper last night. They looked so yummy that she just had to pick one out of the basket and eat it. :)