So sweet. I’ve been rooting for this team for 37 years. This season made it all worth it. Congratulations Seattle!!!!!
Category: inspiration
Getting ready for Mercury.
According to Sky and Telescope, Mercury is at its highest tonight, and reportedly the best view of it, all year. So, after sunset, I toodled over to my favorite nearby west-facing vantage point and caught this shot of it to the top left of the crescent moon.
For those of you that are inclined to look towards the stars for influence on our day-to-day lives, be warned that Mercury will enter retrograde from Feb 6 to Feb 28. Get ready for some weird happenings and funky vibes. More background here. And you may want to bookmark this link for future reference.
And, let me wish everyone a happy Chinese new year. 2014 is supposed to be the year of the horse. But let me just add….. GO HAWKS!!!!!
Applebuttery goodness.
I have had a hankering for apple butter lately. My HEB has a poor selection. The only one they stock was full of multi-syllable chemical ingredients, and high fructose corn syrup. I couldn’t bring myself to put it in my cart. When I was a kid, apple butter was one of the many delicious things my mom would make and I would help her with the cooking and canning. So, i decided to make my own apple butter.
There were many different recipes online. I wasn’t looking to go the whole canning route, as I just wanted to make a small batch. Some recipes started with apple sauce. But I wanted to go as close to the good old fashioned way as possible. I found a recipe that sounded minimalistic and simple. I halved the original recipe, and it yielded 2 pint jars (i recycled some Bonne Maman 13 oz jam jars) of applebutter, which have a fridge life of about 2 weeks. Or could be frozen up to a month.
I’ll start with a picture of the result, to get your mouth watering, and follow with the recipe:
You’ll need a crock-pot and an immersion blender. Here’s the before:
You may want to use a variety of apples. I used mostly gala, which are on the sweet side, and mixed in a few red delicious which are less sweet. I also have one of these awesome contraptions, which makes peeling/coring/slicing the apples a breeze:
Crock-pot Applebutter (yields 2 pints)
3 1/4 lbs apples, peeled, cored & sliced
1/2 c sugar
1/2 c brown sugar
1/2 T ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1/4 tsp ground cloves
1/8 tsp salt
1/2 T vanilla extract
Place apple slices in crock pot. In medium bowl, mix sugars, and spices. Sprinkle dry mix over the apples and stir gently to coat apples and combine.
Cook on low, covered, for 12 hours.
Stir in vanilla extract and puree with immersion blender until smooth. For thicker applebutter, can cook on low another hour with lid ajar.
Cool and place in jars. Store in refrigerator for up to 2 weeks, or freeze for up to 2 months.
Sunday sky.
I cannot resist taking another sunset photo from a very nice Sunday.
Here we go again!
I wish you a most happy, loving, and exciting 2014! I’m counting my blessings while reeling through memories from the year we just wrapped up. Here’s to the next lap ’round the sun. Cheers!
Last workday of the year!
….well, sort of…. I will be on call for work client emergencies during Christmas. Come to think of it, i got stuck with oncall last christmas as well. Crikey. Oh well. Nothing could go wrong, right?!
Anyhow, that will not dim my unbridled anticipation of turning on my out-of-office email message in a few short hours.
That makes today a VERY special TGIF for me.
I hope you have a great Friday, too.
Reflection.
And the winner is…
Joe! First christmas card of the season received. I wonder if I’ll get my cards out this year? 50:50 odds at this point, I fear.
Decked.
It’s the most wonderful time of the year….. Tree up, stockings hung, halls decked, cold outside, rum in the nog, Christmas tunes on pandora….
Twinkly.
Tree in the house!
Bowl me over.
Today Laura and I went to the Austin Empty Bowl Project event. It is a fundraiser for organizations that feed hungry children in the area. Potters donate bowls, food vendors donate soup, musicians take turns entertaining the crowd, and tons of Austinites show up to make it all work. $20 gets you a bowl of your choice and a delicious hot bowl of soup. It was great! This is the one I brought home.
I’m on vacation, …
I’m off work until the monday after thanksgiving ! Can you feel the joy?!
Monte baked a lovely birthday cake today. Do the maracas, cactus and sombrero look a bit familiar? We have recycled them for a few occasions, lately.
Fire time.
Day 2 of cold front in town. We finally lit the fireplace this morning to warm things up. Julie came over last night for dinner and some family time and stayed the night. Mom was admitted to the hospital again yesterday so we’re keeping in close touch. She’s quite the trooper. We’re keeping the home fire burning.
Four month high.
We rafted up last night with Lori, Dave & Jake on Camelot, and Rory & Greg on Sapphire. It was a fun night in the cove, as usual. It’s a treasure, to me… time spent with friends, just sitting outside, on a boat, on a pleasant evening, playing music, dancing a little, and chatting and making one another laugh.
After the rain of the last month the lake is actually up about 7 feet. The bulk of the deluges that hit Austin missed the basin that feeds the lake, so we are up only 7 feet instead of 20 or 30 feet. At 625.5′, Lake Travis is back up to what it was 4 months ago. My blog post on July 6th included a shot of the cove at the same level as it is today. On that day, 625.5′ was a 50 year low, and dropping. Today it’s a 4 month high. I’ll take it, though. Keep praying for rain.
This is a shot I took of Nirvana at anchor, as I was paddling around the cove this morning.
Sheila365 