Bread, Bread, Bread, Bread, etc...

Saturday was the day I baked my newest round of Friendship Bread. I originally started with two starters from my good friend Leslie. Each starter will make two loaves of bread and four starters for your friends. Out of the two starters I started with it turned into eight starters. I gave two away and kept six.



Not sure what I was thinking at that time when I didn't give all my starters away?? With six starters and each starter making four new starters, I have created 24 starters!! I gave two away Saturday, but still have 22 of them! Needless to say, my freezer is filling up! I did keep one on my counter, so in just 10 more days I'll be baking again.

I decided to do all of my six starters at one time on Saturday. At the same time I was making breakfast, biscuits and gravy, and tacos in a bag for lunch, for the 100+ kids, parents, grandparents, and fans at Enter His Courts. I was one busy cook all day Saturday! (with help from Conner, Mark, Conner, and Parker, no Patrick since he was working at his job!)

My supplies:



My first round of bread was the original recipe.



The smell of the baking bread Saturday morning sure attracted a crowd of hungry guests. Almost everyone coming in the building made their way to the kitchen wondering what I was doing!

My next double batch (I used two bags of starter at one time and just doubled the ingredients) produced Cherry Amish Bread. Besides the original recipe, this one I believe is my favorite:



They don't look too differently sitting on the counter, but once you slice the bread and taste it, you notice the difference! My last batch was Chocolate Banana. After eight hours I was done with all the bread making for the day.



I'm really glad I only have one lonely batch of the starter on my counter!

Strike! Spare! Gutter Ball!

About a month ago our son Patrick attended a birthday party of one of his friends. They traveled to Louisville Kentucky to go bowling at a sports establishment. (I have forgotten the name of the place) Well, to our surprise, Patrick won a free party for 12 of his friends by bowling three strikes in a row!

A couple weeks ago we traveled back to Louisville with a bunch of our friends to redeem the coupon. I can't remember the last time I went bowling, but I do know I have only been three times in my lifetime, and two of those times were during my junior and senior after-prom! I think once, while Ric and I were dating, we had a bowling date, so this outing was my fourth time!

We absolutely had a blast. The food wasn't all that great, but all the laughter we shared made up for it and we had a great time!

Little did I know Ric was getting addicted to bowling. The following Wednesday he thought it would be a great idea to go again!

So now I can say I have been bowling seven times! Three of those have been in the last three weeks!!! Yup, it's pretty much a given the family will be bowling once a week from now on, or at least till the addiction wears off!

Next time I promise I'll take the camera to capture some of the fun times so I can share that too!

Good Ole' (OLD) Bread

Whew! It's been awhile since I've posted. Sorry! January is always a busy month for me in several ways. One of my friends calls it "Hell Month" and I think I can agree with her! I have numerous year-end reports that have to be created and mailed. No one wants to stop their lives and let me concentrate on what I'm doing, so I have to carry on business as usual while still creating and doing the 'Hell Month' reports. But, FINALLY, they are all done and I don't have to think about that for at least another 11 months, so I'm not going to think about it! Yippie!

I did have time yesterday to create my Friendship Bread my good friend Leslie (NO, she's not Amish) gave me a start of 10 days ago. I actually got two bags of the starter, so I ended up with a total of 8 bags now. I made 4 loaves of the bread and gave 2 of the starters away, along with a tasty sample of the melt-in-your-mouth bread.

My good friend Shelley has already posted on her blog about it:

http://whatifitdid.com/?p=2434

I'm not going to include pictures with my post this time, but I will try to next time I make the bread, which will be next Saturday!

Now, supposedly, this 'starter' you have can only be made by the Amish and there is only one type of bread you make with the recipe and that's it. Well...I've done a little research.

It seems most all the recipes I came across are exactly the same. I sort of find that strange as most of the time the same recipe will vary a bit and maybe have 1 cup of something, where another recipe might have 2/3 cup of the same thing! Not with this Amish Friendship Bread. ALL the recipes I looked up were identical!

I did find some variations on the types of bread you could make. There are recipes for Banana Nut, Chocolate, Apple cinnamon, Butterscotch, Mounds Bar, Chocolate Mint, Lemon, Cranberry-Orange, Banana-Chocolate Chip, Cherry, Caramel Apple, Pumpkin Spice, Strawberry, Chocolate Cherry, and Carrot Cake. WoW! There are several.

At the end of the original recipe, it reminds you to keep a starter for yourself and you will be baking every 10 days. Only the Amish know how to create the starter, so if you give them all away, you'll have to wait till someone gives you one back. Well, I also found a way to make the starter. This way you don't have to wait for an Amish person to give it to you or a friend to give to you, you can just create it yourself!

In 10 days I will be baking 12 loaves. I'll make sure to take some pictures to share and also let you know what flavors I create and how good it is! Let me know if you'd like a start of the 'goo', I'll have plenty to share next Saturday!

Blue Moon

Handbook 2010

Today I received this email from a very dear family member and wanted to share it with all of my readers. Please take the time to read each one of these and do your best to apply it to your life and yourself this year. I'm going to do my best too!


Health:

1. Drink plenty of water.
2. Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and dinner like a beggar.
3. Eat more foods that grow on trees and plants and eat less food that is manufactured in plants..
4. Live with the 3 E's -- Energy, Enthusiasm and Empathy
5. Make time to pray.
6. Play more games
7. Read more books than you did in 2009 .
8. Sit in silence for at least 10 minutes each day
9. Sleep for 7 hours.
10. Take a 10-30 minute walk daily. And while you walk, smile.

Personality:

11. Don't compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.
12. Don't have negative thoughts or things you cannot control. Instead invest your energy in the positive present moment.
13. Don't over do. Keep your limits.
14. Don't take yourself so seriously. No one else does.
15. Don't waste your precious energy on gossip.
16. Dream more while you are awake
17. Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need..
18. Forget issues of the past. Don't remind your partner with His/her mistakes of the past. That will ruin your present happiness.
19. Life is too short to waste time hating anyone. Don't hate others.
20. Make peace with your past so it won't spoil the present.
21. No one is in charge of your happiness except you.
22. Realize that life is a school and you are here to learn. Problems are simply part of the curriculum that appear and fade away like algebra class but the lessons you learn will last a lifetime.
23. Smile and laugh more.
24. You don't have to win every argument. Agree to disagree...

Society:

25. Call your family often.
26. Each day give something good to others.
27. Forgive everyone for everything.
28. Spend time with people over the age of 70 and under the age of 6.
29. Try to make at least three people smile each day.
30. What other people think of you is none of your business.
31. Your job won't take care of you when you are sick. Your friends will. Stay in touch.

Life:

32. Do the right thing!
33. Get rid of anything that isn't useful, beautiful or joyful.
34. GOD heals everything.
35. However good or bad a situation is, it will change...
36. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.
37. The best is yet to come..
38. When you awake alive in the morning, thank GOD for it.
39. Your Inner most is always happy. So, be happy.
40. ENJOY life!

Do You Remember?

I'm not sure if it's just me, or my age, or I'm just forgetful. It seems recently my family and I have been strolling down memory lane. I can't count the times Ric or Patrick has said, "Remember when we did...." or "Wasn't it fun when we went to..."

For the life of me, I don't remember the things they are talking about. I guess at the time it wasn't as much fun for me as it was for them, or I just have simply forgotten. Before I go to sleep each night I am usually thinking about something from the past that has happened, either good or bad, but something I have remembered.

Last night was no different. Before I drifted off to never never land, I remembered the time our bestest neighbors across the street invited us over for a game of cards. It was the card game Skip-Bo.



I am not going to waste time explaining how the game is played, that's not what's funny. It is a partner game and me and the female neighbor always took on the men. Of course, we never won because the men always cheated. Always!

This particular night we had had enough of losing at every card game we attempted to play with them. As we set at the table and the men were lining up their cards 1 through 13, we shouted at the men they were cheating. Of course, they denied it. I made the male neighbor repeat 10 times he was not a cheater before I would believe him.

Now, in order for this to be funny, you have to close your eyes, pretend you are in the most southernness state there is, have your southern drawl, and very slowly repeat 10 times in a row,

I did not do that, I did not do that, I did not do that, I did not do that, I did not do that,I did not do that, I did not do that, I did not do that, I did not do that, I did not do that.

By the time he was done repeating it 10 times we were laughing so hard, we didn't care if they were cheating or not! I'm sure we lost the game, I don't remember.

Today, some 30+ years later, Ric or I can say 'I did not do that' and still laugh about it. The neighbors across the street no longer live there, but I'm still friends with them and once in awhile I'll ask them if they want to play a game of Skip-Bo, to which they will say, 'I did not do that!'

Improving on Perfection

A few posts ago, I told my readers the way to make ding dong cup cakes. Scooping out the middle, adding the filling, warming the icing...well, I've improved what I thought was the perfect way to do it!

Some of my readers have asked me about the way I make my cake mix for the cup cakes. Yes, this is true. All I use is diet cola!

One box of cake mix
12 ounces of diet pop (1 1/2 cups)

That's it!

Mix one box of cake mix with the diet pop. If you are using a white cake mix, use diet 7 Up or diet sprite. For a dark cake mix, use diet coke or Pepsi. I have used root beer because that was all I had at the time and everything turned out fine. The cup cakes tasted great!

What I've made easier is the way you add the filling. I purchased an icing bag with the little attachments to make the decorations on a cake. I use the one with the biggest hole in it, fill my bag with the filling, then stick the tip into the cup cake, squeeze until the cup cake expands and begins to crack, then I stop. The filling is in the cup cake...without the mess! No scooping, no packing the cake back into the hole, and NO MESS!

I still heat my fudge chocolate icing for about 15 seconds to get it a little smoother and easier to spread. Stir the icing and spread onto each cup cake.

Last week for Christmas I made around 80 cup cakes in one evening and was done before I knew it! I gave most of those away to my great friends for their holiday enjoyment!

Tonight I made about 50, to give away again tomorrow. This time I got a little fancy:





Be prepared. I just might be knocking on your door again tomorrow with an awesome treat for you!

Happy New Year to everyone. May you be blessed in the new year with everything you attempt. May your health be perfect and may you be surrounded with love from great friends and family!

Time for Some Rest and Relaxation

The tree is down, in the box, and in storage for another 11 months. The gifts are washed, or put together, or in their proper places until they need to be used again. The carpet is swept, the dishes are done and put away, and the 2009 Christmas season is now a memory...and a good one it is!

I hope everyone had a joyful Christmas with friends and family. Again this year we were blessed by everyone that came to visit with us, telephoned, or sent a card. Friends and family from Florida, Oklahoma, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Minnesota, Kentucky and of course Indiana made this season special.

Today we are preparing to spend a quiet, relaxing, couple days at our favorite Inn, Spring Mill. The heated pool, game room, dining area, or just some quiet time in our room. It all awaits us as we make our way southwest. Yes, it's time for some rest and relaxation!

Favorite Time of the Year!

I love this time of year and I also love shopping on Christmas Eve. Ric and I have always went to the stores on Christmas Eve. We never need anything, yet we still go to enjoy the people.

For the last 15 years we have taken Patrick. Now, like us, he enjoys his shopping experience almost as much as we do!

When we left the home this morning, this is what I saw:



Almost a roll over!

As we continued to Clarksville it kept rolling:



Tada! 100,000 miles!



Whew! What a ride!!



Finally we arrived to our destination to begin our shopping:



Once inside there was several in line to see Santa and give him their last minute requests. Some weren't too happy to tell him what they wanted...



...while others brought along their beloved pets:



I really wish I could have read Santa's mind in the above photo!

Ric was involved in some last minute shopping...



...and it looks like he thinks he's found a bargain:



Patriots vs Colts??? Both of these guys look a little confused with their surroundings:



We took a little breather:



A few of my favorite shots:



This one is for Shelley:



and a much better angle:



He's off shopping again:



...then back for a rest:



Sometimes I would really like to know what he's thinking:



And finally...



...MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Be Thankful

Be thankful that you don't already have everything you desire.
If you did, what would there be to look forward to?

Be thankful when you don't know something,
for it gives you the opportunity to learn.

Be thankful for the difficult times.
During those times you grow.

Be thankful for your limitations,
because they give you opportunities for improvement.

Be thankful for your mistakes.
They will teach you valuable lessons.

Be thankful when you're tired and weary,
because it means you've made a difference.

It's easy to be thankful for the good things.

A life of rich fulfillment comes to those who are also thankful for the setbacks.

Find a way to be thankful for your troubles,
and they can become your blessings.

Be thankful...always!