Friday, October 17, 2014

Last Bouquet, Cheesecake, Chalkboard, and Camera Cuts




                     Pumpkin Cheesecake

I followed the recipe for the cheesecake part itself and it was not right. It ended up being glorified pumpkin pie...kinda.  Next time I will use half the sugar and eggs. And not beat it too much. The recipe I used didn't call for any spices, so I added them anyway.  That, I will do again.
And the crust was my GF creation of blended oats, brown sugar, butter, sorghum flour, and pecans. This part was right, too.
     That was my 101 on cheesecake. Next time will be even better.
     
 







We repurposed an old wall hanging for our chalkboard. It was a rather nice framed painting back in the day, but there appeared a large water stain exactly in the middle where the trees hung over the peaceful water. A coat of black paint and a couple quick coats of flat white paint for the frame and we were right in style. Love this. Amy has an easel that holds it perfectly.
   The flowers came from the garden which still has not been completely frosted yet. The poppies are budding. If we do not have frost soon there will be a whole new crop of beauties out there.

  

 Whom have I in heaven but You?
And there is none upon earth that I desire besides You.
My flesh and my heart fail;
But God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
                                                                       Psalm 73:25,26


Wednesday, October 15, 2014

Harvesttime

 
      Abbey and I took Brad and Amy out to Nebraska and it was a good trip. (They plan to stay for a couple of weeks to visit and help out with harvest and other projects.) We headed down there on Friday.  For my little brain of fluff the roads were crazy. My car did well working the traffic, so I should not complain. But I had to concentrate a lot. No lolly-gagging along looking at the prairies, windmills, and corn crops.  Eyes on the road, speeding along at a ridiculous rate. Still makes my toes curl to think about it. What if we had actually changed lanes smack into that big white SUV? We would have all gone straight to heaven pronto. Somehow we like to die nicer than that, I guess.
     It is autumn everywhere. In Iowa and Nebraska this means that huge, wide machines swipe up and down the endless acres eating and spewing into trucks or gravity wagons the golden crops of beans and corn.  Everything is big out there: the roads, the sky, the fields, the machinery, and the horizon. Even the sunset sprawls out in brilliant blazes from a much larger ball of fire than we ever see in cozy, tree covered Wisconsin.
     We had good visits and coffee times with our family there.  They were gathering up the last of garden crops: a few ripe tomatoes, the last bouquet of zinnia, over looked squashes and peppers. Afterward, Gabe took a bush hog and mowed the whole tangle of vines and weeds down to little more than a soft covering of "green manure" to be tilled under to maintain the black loam. Jenny rejoiced in the completion of freshly turned soil.
        

        

Tuesday, October 7, 2014

Discovered Settings

 We found lake Camp 4 on a Sunday afternoon drive. (I posted a picture of that a couple of posts back.) So for my birthday we had a picnic there.  It was getting dark much sooner than we expected for some reason and so it was all very short and sweet. Soup packed from home, gifts from the family, and a canoe row around the lake ending at dusk. Perfection.
That was discovery, the first, on my list.

 I love corn candy. Because it is pretty and "musty" (must have another one). I know, it is pretty much all the bad sugars packed into one lethal piece of nonsense. Oh well, we only indulge once a year, that is, for a few days in the fall.
We had a fire going, chairs set up, a table of food at our elbows in about five minutes that evening. It is a lot less work for me than it used to be to do an evening outing. Now everyone makes a couple of hauls apiece and presto we're all set up or all put away depending on which side of the picnic we're on.


 And here is Discovery, the second. I needed a desk area: a place to scribble, and to keep the laptop from getting sat upon when not in use.
   This has been a work in process. The book shelves used to be one piece built for Mom Graber's use. She bequeathed them to me once upon a time. I had no wall large enough to accommodate

 them. So I cut them apart and added the board needed.  Looks like I did it, too. I filled them with books and you are none the wiser, albeit my terrible carpentry.  We used them that way for many years. We had seven other book cases, too, at some point in our school years. By and by, we shifted down to only five or six, and these two started to just be in the way. Until I thought of hanging them after dreaming over New Decorating Book by Better Homes and Gardens.
 Then we painted them right into the wall, so to speak. We have enjoyed this so much. It changes the room entirely to exactly the right cottage feeling we love.
   So. The desk and book cases and window out of which I can see our lovely maples and lawn makes me happy. It doesn't take much, yes?
   Discovery, the third, is realizing that I can actually understand and adjust the settings on this camera I have been fussing about for the last year. It's Lance's camera, a cast off of Clark's, and Lance reminds me betimes of those facts.

 Anyway, I FINALLY changed the settings to get rid of that nasty over-exposure and the blue-ish tinge on every vista out our windows when I take indoor pictures Wow!
   Conclusion for this bit of scribbling is this: We are never too old or stupid to learn and make changes with the things we already have. We should study our current stuff/assets/tools. Perhaps we can do better with what we have, instead of coveting.
 




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