Good Morning Saturday-Amazing Pre-Sunrise

 Happy weekend friends,

    The weatherman has lowered our temperatures for the weekend and next week, but still hoping to get some things accomplished outdoors. and Saturday around 4 pm we are hosting a small fishing-birthday party for Larry. His birthday is on the 16th which is a Sunday. We have looked around and purchased some hand crafted brats, some mild some very hot. Larry didn't want potato salad just munchies and dips. I am thinking of baking upside down pineapple cupcakes too. Should be fun. Originally we were to be in the mid 70's all weekend which has changed to the mid 60's instead.

   We are also on a red flag alert-conditions ideal for wildfires-so I won't be firing up the grill this weekend.

   We woke up to an amazing looking sky this morning-early. When the sun rose it was soooo bright I couldn't look at it, so didn't get a photo of that.  We also viewed lots of little ducks in small groups-some flying over and some swimming in the lake.

  These photos are shown in order while we watched  We both have always been early risers-never people to just stay in bed late-if we did we would have missed all this beauty

The reds now gone-sun beginning to peak through

The little ducks that we watched on the lake

  In the first photo can you see them??

This one was taken indoors-sorry through dirty windows

This week I made us bean soup with a little bit of ham and cornbread

and my recipe-the best ever in my opinion I have shared this in the past-this one is gluten free and I love the method of mixing this up

Sharing the cornbread recipe I use. I found this online in 2004 on King Arthur Flour's site. It is no longer there.

I always really liked this one because it uses only cornmeal no added wheat flour so this is gluten free too. This is also not sweet which I prefer

This recipe is made for a cast iron pan-could be made in a different pan but won't be the same for the crunchy bottoms and sides.

I use my 9 3/4" inch square cast iron pan. The recipe calls for an 8" cast iron pan. I double this recipe which will fill my pan nicely as it bakes. This is awesome baked outdoors over and under coals in cast iron too

Not-Northern Cornbread by King-Arthur Flour

4 teaspoons bacon drippings or I use 4 teaspoons olive oil

1 cup cornmeal-divided ( if you can find it popcorn meal is really good too added with the cornmeal)

2 teaspoons sugar (I use splenda)

1/2 teaspoon salt (I omit)

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/3 cup boiling water

3/4 cup buttermilk (I make my own-add 3/4 tablespoon lemon juice to milk or half and half)

1 large egg lightly beaten

Warm up your oven to 450 degrees F when oven to temperature add in your cast iron pan with fat to heat up

In a medium sized mixing bowl, whisk together 2/3 cup of the cornmeal, sugar, salt, baking powder, and baking soda.

In a small bowl combine the remaining 1/3 cup cornmeal with the boiling water-stir to blend. Add the buttermilk whisking til most of the lumps are gone. Stir in the beaten egg.

Stir together the wet and dry ingredients, mixing til just combined. Remove the hot skillet from the oven and pour fat into the cornbread batter. Spoon the batter into the hot skillet, spreading it evenly over the bottom. Return the skillet to the oven and bake the cornbread for 20 minutes or til it's starting to brown around the edges, and the center springs back when lightly pressed with your fingertips. Remove the skillet from the oven and transfer the cornbread to a cooling rack. It should slide out of the pan easily

Happy Friday and weekend

Just a Few Photos

  This week I have been helping out in Hub's shop, so not as much time in my craft room.

  I did start on one of the February pages worked on it late last night-it's addictive haha

  I remembered a technique I learned about when I was learning about crazy quilting-use a rubber stamp to imprint an image on to velvet with a hot iron.   It worked out well and I sewed a blanket stitch around the two velvet hearts. I then stamped two images with the same stamp. I am using linen fabric as the base-re purposed clothing from the thrift shops

Last night I decided to hand stitch all over around the hearts like random quilting 

I should be able to finish this part tonight while watching the Olympics

  I always look forward to the Olympics especially the winter ones. Do you love to watch too?

  I cut up a honeydew melon late this afternoon and put the rines out by the stump  The deer love them

super nice weather break today and tomorrow-mid 50's Loving it, but over the weekend winter returns, nice thing about this area as we always get breaks in the cold temps-makes winter more tolerable.

Happy Thursday everyone

Update on Muscovy Ducks

  The photos I just shared in the previous post were taken yesterday-our Sunday.  The Muscovy pair of ducks usually arrive around 7 am each morning.
   I kept watching for them, and then around 9 am I see just the hen Muscovy. I am feeling sad as she must have lost her mate. We do have eagles and hawks here and other wild critters so anything could have happened.
   I am feeling very sad for her this morning. These are not wild ducks but rather domestic ducks so don't know what will happen to her now.
   The pair usually slept up by the house-just outside the big bay window where my computer is. The hen is resting there at the stump.  I wish I could reach out and give her a hug.

Update: the male has arrived but he is away from the hen I feel so much better now still a mystery though that didn't come in together and later
    It is very cold here right now

and this is cute a squirrel eating corn from deep in the cracks of this old stump-was here when we bought our property in '98

Good Morning Monday-Photos

  We have wintry weather with very cold temperatures and strong winds again. I guess Tuesday is suppose to bring us some ice and snow.
    I took a couple wintry photos yesterday just enough snow to make things pretty with strong winds.

  The deer are keeping an eye on the ducks they are not sure yet what to make of them haha