muffins, muffins everywhere

So today was a muffiny kind of day, and this is the most perfect, most easiest, most all day yummiest muffin recipe ever!

Morning Muffins

Ingredients

• 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/3 cup white sugar
• 2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup milk
• 1 egg
• 1/3 cup butter, melted
• 1 cup fresh blueberries

Directions

1. In a large bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Add milk, egg, and butter; mix until ingredients are moistened, do not over beat. Stir in fresh fruit. Spoon batter into twelve greased muffin cups.
2. Bake at 400 degrees F (205 degrees C) for about 20 to 25 minutes, or until tops spring back when lightly touched. Serve warm.               

These muffins are so good, and such fast cooking you can make them on even a hot morning and the oven will be off before the sun really hits! And best of all any kind of berry works, we use blueberries (which theses are) raspberries, and blackberries, though I'm sure there are more that would be just fine, marionberries for example would be awesome...

This year's summer in the northwest seemed to take forever to come, it rained April, May, and July with single shiny days scattered about, but August has been our month to shine, it has been sunny and warm for weeks on end and I am actually happy to say today it's raining. Our yard needed a good natural bath and the birds that inhabit our big front yard tree seem to be having lots of fun. 

Finnley's shiner! Guess how she got that??? Iain and a baseball! I love it, how "Leave it to Beaver" is a baseball to the eye!

The lazy days of summer are so drifty, playtime starts early and ends late, and the times to eat all seem to run together. There is no mistaking the tan lines and extreme tiredness on the faces of my kids, and my extreme desire for them to sleep in every morning. My last 2 weeks with my husband home have been very speedy, racing by and making school loom large and near. This year is my 1st year with both children in school, Iain will be in pre-school 3 mornings a week, and Finn a full time 1st grader, all I keep thinking is "all this time what am I going to do???" Then I remember, oh, right the things i put off this summer, like painting the bathrooms, and my bedroom, oh, and those curtains I wanted to make. Oh, right and Finn wants to re-do her room too, the sewing the crocheting, the re-organizing, yep, my list is getting quite long. Hmm but summer is still here for 2 more weeks, I suppose the list can wait...

Friday

Summer Stars by Carl Sandburg

Bend low again, night of summer stars.
So near you are, sky of summer stars,
So near, a long arm man can pick off stars,
Pick off what he wants in the sky bowl,
So near you are, summer stars,
So near, strumming, strumming,
So lazy and hum-strumming.

A great artist is always before his time or behind it.

George Edward Moore

Let me take you down, 'cause I'm going to Strawberry Fields.
Nothing is real and nothing to get hung about.
Strawberry Fields forever.
-The Beatles

Simplicity is the nature of great souls

-unknown

Blueberry Banana Bread

ingredients
1 c. all purpose flour
1/2 c. whole wheat pastry flour (though you can use just all purpose)
1/2 c. cornmeal
1/3 c. sugar
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking powder
3 tbsp canola oil
2 large eggs, beaten
1 c. blueberries
3 mashed, very ripe bananas

directions
Mix dry ingredients in a large bowl. Mix second list of ingredients in a separate bowl. Add wet to dry, stirring just until moist. Using a 8x4in loaf pan (coated with cooking spray), cook for one hour at 350 degrees, or until pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool bread in pan for 10 minutes, then remove and cool completely on wire rack. Eat up.

this bread was a great use of all the blueberries I managed to hold on to lol, the only way to keep them is to hide them up high where Iain can't reach them.

I just had to add this picture, it just looks so good. This was our Full Circle Farm veg share this week, sooo good. The peaches lasted less than 24 hours!

So i have finally come to terms with my fresh egg obsession, I went to Terrie's Berries for raspberries this week and left with raspberries, blueberries, and a very full egg basket. I had been refilling my own cardboard cartons at home, but inspired by an episode of I Love Lucy I felt the need to have an egg bowl. So on the way home I stopped in a little antique store in Sumner. I had received a call from them about the red pyrex bowl I have been searching for but the one they had in wasn't the right one (the search continues). I was there anyways so a quick look around was definitely in order, as I made my rounds I came across this pyrex bowl, brown on the outside and a mauvey pink on the inside.  I knew immediately it was the perfect egg bowl, it's even egg coloured! I couldn't wait to get it home wash it up and fill it with my beautiful farm fresh eggs! So there it is, every time I open the fridge I'm greeted by a pretty bowl brimming with eggs and I get to smile.

Dad diaries...yesterday was beach day!

but more important Iain received his 1st real big boy bike-o happy day!

Busy Busy Busy

This day has sure been busy, which is very good, I feel like I've done a lot. The best part of the day was when I figured out why I have been so motivated of late, and strangely enough its all due to tv. I know everyone who reads this is going to go "tv???", but it's very true. I recently started watching reruns of The Andy Griffith Show on netflix (the best use of my husbands xbox-lol) and the women on the show are always so busy. They are cooking, cleaning, sewing, baking, all the time and if that's happening and I'm sitting and not even crocheting I feel sooo lazy! Watching this show really has made me feel like I could do so much more, starting with bread, I used to make all of our bread by hand in Idaho and then just gave it up, not quite sure why. So I figured if the women in the 50's could work making bread into their schedule then so can I, and on more than special occasions and specialty breads too! So this morning when I got up I decided today was bread making day and I needed to make at least 2 loaves to make it through at least 5 days.

They just look so warm and cozy and comforting on the counter. They make me think how wonderful they will look on the counter when the weather turns cold and the frost hugs the grass, I can't wait!

Easy plain bread recipe
Ingredients

• 2 cups warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
• 2/3 cup white sugar
• 1 1/2 tablespoons active dry yeast
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil
• 6 cups bread flour

Directions

1. In a large bowl, dissolve the sugar in warm water, and then stir in yeast. Allow to proof until yeast resembles a creamy foam.
2. Mix salt and oil into the yeast. Mix in flour one cup at a time. Knead dough on a lightly floured surface until smooth. Place in a well oiled bowl, and turn dough to coat. Cover with a damp cloth. Allow to rise until doubled in bulk, about 1 hour.
3. Punch dough down. Knead for a few minutes, and divide in half. Shape into loaves, and place into two well oiled 9x5 inch loaf pans. Allow to rise for 30 minutes, or until dough has risen 1 inch above pans.
4. Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 30 minutes.

The next step in my productive day is to bring out the newly relocated sewing machine and work on something, even if I have to leave it unfinished. Well, I finished it! I took sewing lessons from a woman who lived in Bayshore (the development I grew up in) when I was about 9, I remember riding my bike to her house and then home again afterwards with whatever I had made in my backpack. I have always felt comfortable with a sewing machine because of those lessons, but hadn't picked up a pattern since those days. Until today. I had just started looking at school clothes for Finnley a few weeks ago and just can't stand so many of them! She's only six for gosh sakes! I want her to look like a 6 year old girl, she can dress and look 13 when she is! So, I went to the sewing department and picked up 2 patterns marked easy, picked out some basic material in colours and prints I thought my little girl would like and brought them home. That was Thursday last week, and it took the weekend to build up the confidence to actually open the pattern.

So this morning with two loaves of bread happily rising on the stove-top I opened the forbidding pattern, and immediately wished I hadn't-lol. I had forgotten all the instructions, and how large pattern sheet are! It took a bit of time, a little bit of internet searching, and some remembering my sewing lessons but I managed to do it. I took my time and went slow which is hard for me with sewing, pinned everything as I was supposed to though that's hard for me too, and voila! I had made Finn a cute little sun dress, it only took 6 hours (minus finishing bread, making lunch, and wrangling kids).
It fits, Its well made, she looks like a 6 year old should, and there is something deeply satisfying about seeing my daughter running around in something I've made for her with my own hands. And better still she likes it.

playing waitress yesterday

I probably would have been able to make 2 blueberry cakes, if it weren't for the little thieves I live with.

Blueberry cake for breakfast! It sure didn't last long!



Blueberries in bloom

Blueberry Cake: Ingredients

• 1/2 cup butter
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 egg yolks
• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/3 cup milk
• 2 egg whites
• 1/4 cup white sugar
• 1 1/2 cups fresh blueberries
• 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
• 1 tablespoon white sugar

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour an 8 inch square pan.
2. Cream butter or margarine and 1/2 cup sugar until fluffy. Add salt and vanilla. Separate eggs and reserve the whites. Add egg yolks to the sugar mixture; beat until creamy.
3. Combine 1 1/2 cups flour and baking powder; add alternately with milk to egg yolk mixture. Coat berries with 1 tablespoon flour and add to batter.
4. In a separate bowl, beat whites until soft peaks form. Add 1/4 cup of sugar, 1 tablespoon at a time, and beat until stiff peaks form. Fold egg whites into batter. Pour into prepared pan. Sprinkle top with remaining 1 tablespoon sugar.
5. Bake for 50 minutes, or until cake tests done.

We have been having family dinner at our house on Sunday evenings for about 6 weeks or so now, and really enjoying it as a mini-tradition. Right now it just involves my parents coming and the kids and me making something sweet. Tonight we will be having pot roast from our organic butcher (Meat Shop of Tacoma), accompanied by organic carrots, potatoes , and onion from Terry's Berries and this delicious blueberry cake, which is a much loved spin off of a blueberry muffin and is soooo good with real whipped cream (thanks mom for that kitchen aid stand mixer all those years ago).

Finn's church day hair. Doing Finnley's rapidly growing hair is another Sunday mini-tradition. We get on-line and look for something we both like and then give it a try, most work out but sometimes she picks something that doesn't work on her length of hair. Those we file away in the Rapunzel hair file for Sundays and school days in the future.

There was snow on the mountain tops outside Palmer Alaska this morning. There is nothing like the 1st bit of termination dust to hit the mountains back home. It bring Christmas to the forefront of your mind faster than you can imagine, and throws me into a crochet frenzy. We all need hats, gloves, sweaters and blankets of course. Though I'm hoping to begin working on a quilt soon, my newest challenge, well that and some school jumpers and skirts for Finn. I find a lot of store bought school clothes just too "grown-up" for my little girl. Sometimes I just want to stand there in the middle of the store, throw my hands up in the air and shout "SHE'S ONLY 6"!

Started a new project in crochet! So many projects going I have to keep a notebook by my bed to jot down ideas as they come to me, there have been so many lately. I wish I knew why or how this motivation happened so I could keep it going, it's fun!

Who Bread

So I have no idea why it's called WHO bread other than I know it's a reference to owls, though my kids connect it to whos as in Dr. Suess and the Whos in Whoville...so here it is...

WHO Bread
1 1/4 cup water
2 tablespoons honey
2 tablespoons butter @ room temperature
1 tsp salt
3 cups of flour (we do 2 cups unbleached white, 1 cup whole wheat pastry)
1/2 cup rolled oats
1 tablespoons brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
2 1/4 tsp active dry yeast (or, one package)
Pour 1 1/4c. warm water (about 110 degrees F), honey, sugar, and yeast into a bowl. Whisk until well combined and mixture is frothy. Set aside to proof while you mix together the other ingredients.

In a separate large bowl stir together, flour, butter, salt, rolled oats, and cinnamon.

Pour yeast mixture into flour mixture, and mix until thoroughly combined. (I like to do this with my hands.)

Place dough into a lightly oiled bread pan. Cover with a damp towel and leave in a warm spot to rise for about an hour (45 min. if you’re impatient!). Punch down dough and let rise a second time for 45 minutes, covered with a damp towel.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Remove towel from top of dough and place pan in the center of your oven. Bake for 20-25 minutes. Done!

It is a wonderfully simple recipe, my kids adore it as toast topped with some butter and raspberry jam :)

Yesterday we made the trip to Terry's Berries for, well, berries and other veggies, and eggs, eggs, eggs, I was sooo very out of eggs. My kids especially love the trip because they get to feed the chickens. They very much love the idea of feeding the chickens that will lay the eggs that mommy will make for breakfast or bake something yummy with :)

so of course after the much loved feeding the rest of the day revolved around chickens and how many questions they could ask in order to get the most information about chickens possible. Which was quickly followed up by chicken portraiture...

I had bought a new camera last summer it is an SLR Nikon D3000, I had used it a few times with fabulous results and then just somehow got too busy to be bothered. Well I have fallen in love with it all over again as is probably evident to everyone else and just can't seem to stop taking pictures and seeing photo opportunities at every turn. Someday I know my kids will be grateful to have all these pictures of their childhood, I hope :)

They seem so very innocent and sweet, and really they are of course...

Fantastic dress! one of my best bargain of the summer finds $1.50...

I just love speckled eggs!

Have a wonderful summer's eve...

a doughnutty day

Baked Doughnuts!

1 1/3 cups warm milk
1 packet active dry yeast (2 1/4 teaspoons)
2 tablespoons butter
2/3 cup sugar
2 eggs
5 cups all-purpose flour
A pinch or two of cinnamon
1 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup butter, melted
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon

Place 1/3 cup of the warm milk in the bowl of an electric mixer. Stir in the yeast and set aside for five minutes or so. Be sure your milk isn't too hot or it will kill the yeast. Stir the butter and sugar into the remaining cup of warm milk and add it to the yeast mixture. With a fork, stir in the eggs, flour, cinnamon, and salt - just until the flour is incorporated. With the dough hook attachment of your mixer beat the dough for a few minutes at medium speed.

 This is where you are going to need to make adjustments - if your dough is overly sticky, add flour a few tablespoons at a time. Too dry? Add more milk a bit at a time. You want the dough to pull away from the sides of the mixing bowl and eventually become supple and smooth. Turn it out onto a floured counter-top, knead a few times (the dough should be barely sticky), and shape into a ball.
Transfer the dough to a buttered (or oiled) bowl, cover, put in a warm place (I turn on the oven at this point and set the bowl on top), and let rise for an hour or until the dough has roughly doubled in size.
Punch down the dough and roll it out 1/2-inch thick on your floured counter top. Cut out doughnuts, cover with a clean cloth and let rise for another 45 minutes.

Bake in a 375 degree oven until the bottoms are just golden, 8 to 10 minutes - start checking around 8. While the doughnuts are baking, place the butter in a medium bowl. Place the sugar and cinnamon in a separate bowl.
Remove the doughnuts from the oven and let cool for just a minute. Dip or brush each one in the melted butter and a quick toss in the sugar bowl. Eat immediately if not sooner.

These were utterly amazing! I can't believe how well they turned out and I can't wait to make them again!

Today has been such a good day, I managed to clean out the kitchen drawers, I now have 2 empty ones!! I also cleaned out the cabinets in out laundry room so I now have a place to keep my sewing materials and my sewing basket :) happy me, and to make it all better my kid's were invited to go play next door! yay!!

These are my favourite mixing bowls! The big yellow one and the little blue one are an inheritance from my amazing and wonderful grandma Marion who passed away in May and the green is from a local antique shop. Come to find out however there is also a red one in this vintage set that I have been scouring antique stores for and have yet to find...hmm.. and now that I know there is a red size between the green and blue size it seems the perfect size bowl for so many things I have made recently. I am optimistic one will present itself to me at the perfect moment.

This set of measuring spoons were also among my inheritance they are so useful and handy because I'm able to grab one (when I actually measure instead of guess) because of the handy dandy hanger! I love useful vintage things! Especially when they are the things I used repeatedly as a child.

Thanks so much for everything grandma, I love you!

August 1st

Today was a lovely day here in the northwest.  Iain woke up with an upset tummy-poor boy, but just like his sister used to do he shakes it off and is good in a few hours (connected to growth spurts?) Finnley and Iain spent all day in backyard, which we are sooo grateful for (so is our mole) is very large and completely fenced. My husband has major plans for it, but I'm just so thankful it's there.

Iain wore pajamas all day because he was a little sicky and they made him feel better

Finnley got a new skirt crafted by me, out of an old t-shirt jersey bed sheet.

today was a good day, took a lot of pictures and the kids painted new refrigerator art-my favourite.

sewed a dress, and skirt, ordered some new books, one about sewing and one about *gasp* quilting.

I have always done everything in the crafts, and arts without hesitation, but quilting intimidates me like crazy. I know why though, it messes with my dyslexia, so many steps (or so it seems) my brain has a hard time deciding where to start. I just couldn't help myself though, I love quilts so much, especially vintage, well worn, very soft, warm, loved quilts, so I will keep everyone posted on how it goes.

new sewing book can't wait for it to get here!

the all intimidating quilt book-still a little excited though :)