Holiday Baking Plans?? Updated-New Tea Co

  Good Morning and it's Cyber Monday as well-if you shop online (which I do more of since moving more rural to the lake) We do not live close to any large stores except for a smaller Wal Mart-that's it.

 I finished up with the baking of the fruitcakes last week. I use a very old English version recipe which is a dark fruitcake with just enough cake batter to hold it all together. My gluten free version turned out really nice this year-I had also mixed in dried fruits with the glazed fruits. Mine needs to age in the back of the refrigerator, but the wheat flour version is stored in containers in buckets-wrapped with brandy soaked cheesecloth-in a cool place.  I got these cakes baked much later this year.

 I was brought up cooking and baking everything from scratch-and after all these years I still continue to do that. Probably about 10 years ago at least we stopped going out to eat in restaurants. With our health concerns-me gluten free, and Larry heart and diabetic food concerns, we just needed to stop dining out-too expensive for one, and those dining out foods most always are full of too much salt, sugar, and not healthy ingredients. Really don't miss eating out at all.

  Since retirement especially, I have baked up loads of cookies and other holiday treats and gifted most all of it to friends and neighbors.  Gave me an excuse to make candies and lots of Christmas treats, which I have always enjoyed doing.  This year I decided not to do much of that. I will gift our good neighbor- just down from us on the lake-with hand dipped chocolates and chocolate popcorn though. Mary Lovesssss anything chocolate. Mary and her husband are always there for us if we need help with anything.

  I always have enjoyed baking cut out cookies-as I have a huge cookie cutter collection, but I may not do that this year. Thinking of trying out a few new recipes this year for our holiday baking. 

   I ran into a recipe online from Williamsburg for large soft molasses cookies-those sound amazing as we both love gingerbread. recipe here and photo from site   

I also found a group on Facebook that shares mostly older holiday cookie recipes There I ran into someone looking for a 1960's pineapple cookie recipe. Curious I searched and found this one  We love pineapple so I may make those, read the whole article as she makes suggestions like using butter instead of shortening.       Growing up my Mom always baked with margarine-ugh-being raised on a farm I never understood that-she said butter was too expensive. When I was older and left home, I never bought margarine or used it again

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Writing this post, yes I am thinking I will need to bake up a few cut out cookies-those are always fun for me to bake and make this time of year more festive.

  Will you be baking for the holidays? 

 I have always found baking and cooking rewarding and too fun as well.

Update: this time of year lately, I enjoy searching out new teas to try, or if one pops up in my feed somehow I check it out.  Harney & Sons has a lovely list of teas with pretty tins and not overly expensive-usually the tins are too expensive for me. They have a sale right now and free shipping with any size order. free shipping is a must for me.

  This is one I purchased-with white tea

 

For my American Friends-Happy Thanksgiving

 

Asking for Prayers & Positive Thoughts & Reubins

  Good morning, I think today is one of the first of a typical November fall day-cooler with rain. I never did get the energy to burn leaves-so many here too-may just have to wait til next spring.

  After another several weeks our home nurse for Larry, came out to remove the catheter early this morning. Hoping third time is the charm. In the past his bladder was not working, and before the day was out he would be back to significant pain.

  So I am asking for prayers, and those that don't believe in prayer for positive thoughts that Larry will finally pass this hurdle today, and will be able to totally focus on physical rehab. 

  Getting in and out of the wheel chair is a big one. I purchased a hand rail for the bed so he has something to grab on to when getting back into bed-last time with our bed being very high-I needed to call the fire department to help him. Three very tall men came out and just picked him up. Thanks so much for our excellent volunteer fire department.  Our physical rehab person also suggested making a little box that will fit between the wheel chair wheels for another boost into bed. Our good friend that lives "down the lake" a bit from us built one for Larry.

 Over the weekend I brought up a corn beef from the freezer. Saturday I made up our favorite corn beef dinner and then Sunday I made us another favorite corn beef sandwiches with provolone cheese, good quality sauerkraut, and a little mustard-I forgot about picking up the thousand island dressing when I went to the store. I did really like the mustard in the sandwich.

  Here is my gluten free sandwich-I had two of these since the bread was very small

Happy new week, and for those of you in the States Happy Thanksgiving. 

Manhole Covers in Japan

   Good evening, I just started reading the latest Reader's Digest that popped into my mailbox the other day, Larry remembers this magazine being one of his Grandfather's favorites. I grew up with it too, still good reading but the pages are very few compared to those olden days.

   There was a very short article about a book and the story of these lovely manhole covers in Japan. The book was printed awhile ago and is now out of print, and the books I found started at $200.00  If I used a library wondering if they would have a copy or could get one on loan.

   I am wondering if any of you that have visited Japan saw any of these gorgeous manhole covers and looked for them?

  This is a photo of the book

If you are on Facebook I found a group that has great photos and the locations of the manhole covers-the group's name is Japan's Manhole Cover Collections

There are several articles on line with photos Here  and Here  If interested-they are really gorgeous pieces of art-just do a search as I found quite a few posts. Adding this link-history and lots of photos here

Here are few photos copied from online

I think it would be fun if in Japan to look for these lovely pieces of art

Searching online for articles I did find a couple of cities selling their manhole covers that are obsolete   here

  Japan always has such beautiful art-in many forms

Honoring Our Veterans

 Today we honor all of our Veterans-thank you for your service

Good Morning Monday Update & Bamboo Tootbrushes

   Good Morning Friends,

    As dawn approaches this morning we have a beautiful sky-before sunrise. Lots of different reds and oranges. I have not been taking photos do to still not being able to see photos on the computer-need a new monitor we had been thinking, but with Larry's fall in early October just haven't decided if I want to look for a new monitor or wait til I get a new computer as well. The one I have is pretty old.

   Sadly Larry had another setback with his recovery over the weekend. The hospital area he was in for rehab was so poor monitoring his health recovery that we are now thinking he had the start of a urinary infection early on and the pain of course got worse over his stay there and even worse since being home. 

  Over the weekend it was horrible so I had no choice but to call 911.  He did have a serious infection, they added the catheter back in and sent him home. Told him to call our doctor for removal on Monday-which means a 911 ambulance transport to and  from. With all this going on he has had no rehab since being home-which is worrisome as his legs are getting worse since he is still bedridden. 

  Friday I got papers in the mail from the hospital for a review of his month stay there-I need to get my thoughts clear and write about what happened there-so many mistakes-but write it so they will read in and improve-hopefully.

  I am still getting no sleep-if I am lucky 3 to 4 hours in a 24 hour period since Larry has been home-this will be the third week home. He needs a pill every 4 hours, so I ended up ordering an alarm clock that uses a battery with a very loud ringer to wake me up. Just when I think I can get 4 hours sleep Larry calls for help with something. 

  I am going to call the in home healthcare we are using early today and see if they can send his nurse out to take the catheter out-makes more sense to me than using the 911 ambulance for transport.

   On a different topic I have been thinking about changing over to bamboo toothbrushes since they can be recycled in different ways and change from toothpaste to chewable tablets instead.  I took the plunge this morning and ordered both to try. I did find this article on different ways to recycle the toothbrushes-here  I thought most of their ideas were very doable. Have you switched over to a more recyclable way of teeth cleaning?  

  We are supposed to have a few 70 F degree days early this week-I have sooo much to do out there too-perhaps I can burn some tree limbs and leaves if not windy.

  I did look out our windows towards the lake early one morning before sunrise, to see a buck deer walking along the lake front-that was awesome and made my day.

Happy new week everyone