Collage Day

Yesterday Morning my sisters and I had a paper-scraps-on-the-floor, ripping-out-magazine-pages, sticky-glue-on-your-fingers, kind of collage day! Here is my creation.

Picnic Lunch

In September we took a picnic lunch to eat at a park after church. It was my dad's birthday, so we planned ahead for a more memorable afternoon than our normal Sunday. There are trails to traverse and one hill that overlooks much of Almaden.



Picnickers. Is that how you would spell it?



Homemade bread.



On top of the world.





The great adventurer.



Resting on the solid rock.

It is a beautiful park, a visit will never disappoint.

Three P Soup

I think it is high time to brag on my mother. Three words: She can cook! This afternoon she made the most cozy, tantalizing, autumn soup. Three P's: Pumpkin, Sweet Potatoes, and Peanut Butter. An unlikely combination, but trust me, my tongue was in ecstasies. She cut up green onions for a garnish; it was a perfect contrast.

If

(From the Rudyard Kipling poem, "If")

occasional oblivion

sometimes i notice the little things that matter, but most times i am so wrapped up in myself that i forget to look around. it dawns on you, like when you start talking to that person at the other end of the room, & feel like it what you're saying is so interesting, & five minutes later you realize that they were never there at all & all those words were wasted... it helps to pause every once and a while, & simply observe.

My Lunch

Salad:

my mom's homemade saurkraut
cucumber
celery
carrots
apples
vinaigrette

mm.

I Heart Faces - In the Orchard Photo Challenge

Of all the challenges that I should enter, this is the foremost. I am blessed to live right on the brink of an apple/pear orchard, so I have many photos "in the orchard."

This is my entry:

Definition

I have written myself a definition of gossip for my own personal reference:

Gossip:
Attempting to tickle the ears of ones listener by expounding upon facts (thereby creating fiction) which draws attention to oneself at the expense of another.

What do you think of its accuracy?

Pennants

There has been a decided surge of photos in the blogosphere that feature pennant banners which I think are very adorable and worthy of my time. Late this summer I sat down to create just such a banner. Following is the result of my troubles.



The fabric came from a Laura Ashley sample book which we were given for free when a friend of my moms, who owned a textile shop, went out of business.



I hung it up in my room, and even though I hadn't measured anything beforehand, it fit perfectly wall to wall!



The simplest things do so much do perk up a room!

A Good Morning

A good morning starts with warm.
Warm from a shower,
Or warm from a fuzzy blanket in an armchair,
Or warm from steamy coffee or tea.



On a different note, I had an "iced coffee" from burger king this afternoon with a friend of mine, and I asked for a non flavored coffee; just plain coffee. Well, apparently their version of "non-flavored" is "sugar flavored." I've gotten into the habit of just coffee and milk, (when I do drink it), but even when I do sweeten it I never load it with as much sugar as that! So much for plain iced coffee... I couldn't finish it.

New Kid on the Block

A special announcement! My little sister has joined the blog world, and would love it if you stopped by to comment on her first post! Here is the link: http://bethanykauk.blogspot.com/

Enjoy.

Food for the Fall

I am regularly shocked by the narrowness of my peers diets. I brought cauliflower and butternut squash soup for my lunch at class one day, and its warm, spiced aromas filled the air with comfort. But my fellow students, after asking what it was, could only say, "Oh. I never eat that kind of stuff." Think of the worlds of flavor they miss out on by disdaining "that kind of stuff!" Lucky for me there is a pot of squash on the stove as I type for dinner tonight. Butternut squash, however, is only one example of the many foods for fall.
Another fairly recent personal discovery is the spaghetti squash: this remarkable vegetable, when roasted in the oven, flaunts a stringy interior that can be substituted for noodles! It has a mild, sweet flavor, and thus pairs perfectly with your classic meat marinara.
Finally, I have learned how to cook up a pot of lentils with a slight tang and a touch of thyme.



After soaking 2 cups of lentils overnight, covered with warm water and 2 Tb of whey, rinse them and cover them with new water. Add a few quartered onions, a few cloves of garlic, a few sprigs of thyme (tied into a bundle), and a few grinds of pepper. This mixture cooks for about an hour or until the lentils are cooked through. Before serving add up to 1/2 cup of lemon juice, and salt to taste.

Fall also brings a finale to the garden production. Are you not blown away by this plethora of tomatos? After an incredibly abundant crop of luscious, crimson, beauties, we decided to clear off the rest of the bush. Joshua gathered them this morning. He remembers my dad making a green tomato sauce last year, so perhaps that will be the end of these as well.