happily snowed in

Well, sort of.  :)

My Farmer read me some dramatic headlines about tens of millions bracing for a storm in the northeast, so we planned to revel in some of our favorite indoor activities today - reading, reading, and more reading.  Preferably by the fire, and preferably uninterrupted by small fry begging for stories and games.  One can dream.

But the snow didn't come.

I had gone for groceries the night before, so the larder was stocked.  In the words of one of our children's favorite poets, Clyde Watson:

Let the fall leaves fall

And the cold snow snow

And the rain rain rain till April:

Our coats are warm

And the pantry's full

And there's cake upon the table.

But, no snow.

I took advantage of the still-clear roads and made a run to the health food store and the library, Lil' Snip happily in tow.  We made it back with our giant bags of rolled oats and stacks of books to a house smelling deliciously of granola.  Sugar, Spice, and Nice had been busy while we were gone.

Still no snow.  How were my Farmer and the children ever going to finish the igloo they'd started with last week's snow?!

We lunched on hot dogs and sauerkraut and Reese's peanut butter cup cookies (a library bake-sale find), and I finished baking the last of this year's newest addition to the cookie list:  pfeffernusse.  [baker beware:  these may not look like much, but they are dangerously delicious!!]

And still the blizzard hadn't arrived.  Oh well, we settled in and read anyway.

Finally, midday, the snow started to come.

We started a meal of comfort food - baked ham and mashed potatoes - and my Farmer lost himself by the fire, reading my library book.

The small fry mostly entertained themselves, dressing up stuffed bears, chasing each other in circles around the downstairs (which is most conveniently arranged to accommodate this impulse), coloring, and building with sofa cushions and stools.

By nightfall the snow was coming down steadily.  Sugar was devouring a book on orchestral music and its accompanying CD.  Spice was hunkered down with Louisa May Alcott's Eight Cousins.  Nice and Lil' Snip were alternately sharing the music player that Cousin R just passed on to us and getting their baths.

The candles burned, and the snow fell.

And now, supper is put away - the ham cubed for tomorrow's soup, sliced for sandwiches later this week, and some frozen for another day - the driveway is shoveled (thanks to my Farmer), the children are all tucked in bed, and the fire burns, and we are happily snowed in.

goings-on

If you were to peek into our lives over the last few weeks, 

here is what you might have seen ....

Grandma not only gave Mommy the day off, she set the girls to making applesauce while she was there!  They made and canned 13 quarts, all finished before Mommy came home.

We spent a day baking and decorating cookies for Sugar and Spice to sell 

at church to raise money for Bibles for India.

For five lovely days we played at a cabin in the mountains, 

part of the time with extended family.  

Teepees that grow more elaborate with each year that we go.  

This year they made "natural museums" complete with little mossy displays.

Lil' Snip loves his corners!

My Farmer was thrilled to find over a dozen different (and new to him) forms of fungus.

And everyday adventures.....

Dressing Lil' Snip up in a Honduran vest that Daddy wore when he was little:

Bounty of colorful carrots from my Farmer's fields:

Tasting agar (!?) from an extra petri dish my Farmer filled for propagating mushrooms:

Tea party surprise one day after Quiet Time:

Sunshine transforming the ordinary:

Our "Farmers' Breakfast":  kale and onions, toast, egg on ham with broiled cheese & tomatoes, coffee, and two squares of dark chocolate to finish it off.

my very own chocolate chip cookie recipe

These are so good that it's just kindness to share the recipe.  I experimented a loooong time to get these cookies to turn out just the way I wanted them to.  [and continue to tinker with the recipe!  Just updated 10-4-2014]  I hope you like them as much as we do.

I am listing the brands that I use because it's so disappointing when I try someone else's recipe and it turns out all different.  I can only assume that if I followed the directions they gave me, then it must be a difference in ingredient brands, and I want to save you that frustration.  So - if you follow the recipe exactly and don't love the cookies, at least you won't have to wonder what you did wrong - you'll just know that you and I have a different taste in chocolate chip cookies.  Alright.  Here goes:

My Very Own Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe

1 cup natural peanut butter

1/2 cup salted butter, softened

1/2 cup peanut oil (or coconut, if it's liquid)

1 1/2 cup raw (demerara) sugar

1/2 cup raw honey

3 small eggs (or two large ones)

2 tsp. real vanilla

Mix all the above well with an electric mixer.  If you didn't let the butter soften enough (as happens sometimes in households where the cook is both spontaneous and impatient), try to smash the resulting lumps with a spoon to somewhat integrate them.  Now, stir in:

2 cups King Arthur's ("white") whole wheat flour

1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour

1 tsp. Arm & Hammer baking soda

1 tsp. salt (I use the pink Himalayan now, but I'm not sure it makes any difference)

12 oz. bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips (Shurfine works, but Hershey's Special Dark is better, and Ghiradelli is best)

I usually chill the dough till I'm ready to dive in to the business of cookie-baking, but that's only because I tend to do jobs in small increments.  You can bake these right away.

Whenever you're ready, turn the oven on to 350 F.  I use AirBake pans (because that's what I was given waaaaay back at my bridal shower) and the cookies take 12-15 minutes to cook, switching pans halfway through, so if you use thin aluminum you may need to watch them for burning bottoms.  Also, if you put fewer cookies on the tray, they'll bake faster.

For the peanutiest flavor, let them cool to room temp.

Enjoy!

a "wasted" day

Today is Saturday.  

Usually, by Friday afternoon, at least, we (I) plan our Saturdays to maximize our time together (i.e. "our joint ability to get a lot of chores done").

This week I am too pooped to muster thoughts of efficiency.  This week, we watched a movie on tv Friday night.  It had absolutely no literary merit and was not otherwise lofty in any way.  (If you must know, it starred Steve Martin and John Candy).  We stayed up late and laughed ourselves silly.

And then ....

....we slept in.  Until the sun and the children woke us up.  It was lovely.  And even more lovely was having absolutely no plans for the day.  It felt deliciously decadent to know that we could watch tv all day if we wanted to (that would be a shocking first for us, but it felt like a real possibility).

Mid-morning, I found myself posting on facebook that I was "doing nothing", and realized that I had in fact already fed the baby breakfast, started a load of laundry, cleaned the bathroom, bathed one daughter and showered myself.

Huh.  But it did feel like "nothing", somehow.

Later, after watching a Chinese language dvd with the girls and helping Sugar and Spice make lunch (which they usually do by themselves while Nice sets the table), I folded laundry, took a quick nap, read an extra chapter to Sugar and Spice from The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (while advising Nice to keep Lil' Snips away from various enticing household dangers), and then decided to bake cookies.

And it still felt like "nothing."

I spooned lumps of cookie dough onto the trays, mulling over this anomaly:  I was doing as much as, or more than, I would have on a day powered by a to-do list, and yet .... I felt relaxed, carefree.  Was it the extra sleep?  Having "backup" (as husbands who work away are gratefully but inadequately called when they are home)?

Both sleep and the presence of my stalwart husband help, of course.  But I feel as if I have discovered something alluringly simple.  Today I was focused on enjoying the day, relaxing, just being with my family.  My intention was to deliberately "waste" my day.

Instead, serendipity happened:  I was productive with my time.  And, miracle of miracles, I enjoyed it along the way.

I wasn't hurrying.  I didn't push children out of my way (*blush* as is my custom at times).  I didn't say "not now" when Nice longingly admired the pictures in one of Lil' Snip's books.  Instead, I stopped what I was doing and read her the story - right then!  (that only deserves an exclamation point, I'm embarrassed to tell you, because it is so highly unusual for me).  I didn't fret about time & schedules - in fact, we ate lunch early because .... we were hungry early.

I would like to say that this has been an epiphany and hereafter I will run my household with a lighter touch, but I don't suppose there will actually be an overnight transformation.  It does give me a faint sort of hope, though, for a different reality.  Could life be like that - always?

Or is that what heaven is for?

I will be grateful for the gift of a happily "wasted" day.  Now if you will excuse me, I need to go eat a cookie with my daughters....