Of Soups, Strudels, Bread and Bears

I have been very bad. It has been over a month since I last posted; but I'm sure you all know how much running around we all do before Christmas.

I will try to give you a quick update on the comings and goings of my household.


P.J. is doing wonderfully on he diet and has noticeably lost several pounds, for the first time since getting her, we actually saw her jump for a toy! All four legs left the ground! Amazing!

I have been trying out a new cookbook: "125 Easy Quick Breads" and made for dessert a cherry-filled coffee cake. It was lovely and crumbly, wonderful to have with tea or coffee.


The only thing about the cookbook I found odd, was that they generally called for a 70-80 minute baking time at 350. That seemed a tad excessive to me, so I would set the time for 45 minutes and check every ten minutes until it was ready.

I also made some homemade Challah, one of my favourite breads. This batch I hand-kneaded for about 15 minutes, I could have used my bread maker, in fact, my mother has an amazing bread machine Challah recipe, but I like kneading, I find it therapeutic.

A couple weeks ago we had a really miserable cold day. Jeremie decided he wanted soup - nice homemade chicken noodle soup. The problem was, we had no cooked chicken.

It turns out my husband is a great improviser, we made a chicken broth and threw in just about every root vegetable we had. Any spice that we thought might taste good, 1/4 cup of pot barley and noodles.

It was delicious! We ate it for two days!

Two weeks ago, we decided to go on a walk at a local park. We bundled up and took off on a Sunday afternoon. We were enjoying ourselves until we came to a big sign at the front of the main trail that read: "Warning, Brown Bears have been seen in this area, proceed with caution." And a big picture of a mean-looking bear underneath it.

I didn't feel like we were in any real danger, and Jeremie felt pretty confident, so we kept walking. Though that didn't mean we didn't jump with every snapped twig!

By the end of our hour walk, we hadn't seen any bears, or really much wildlife at all; but I enjoyed the fresh cool air very much, and the exercise was good for us.

My nature man:

The next few weeks are full of Christmas planning and Volunteer work. My mother every Christmas collects donations for the Salvation Army, she stands normally in a grocery store with her red Salvation Army apron and donation kettle, ringing the little bells happily.

After hearing about how much she loved doing it, I decided to give it a try at my own local grocery store.

I love it! I have a three hour shift and in a small town, you know pretty much everyone, so I get to visit or chit-chat with people coming and going.

Though, unlike my Mum, I decided to dress up like an elf.

I figured, if I was gonna do this, I was gonna do it right!

I decked myself out in red and white, wore little elf boots and a Santa hat and just had myself a party!

I was so blessed by seeing how generous people are, how happily they give and how much they enjoy just a smile and a "good morning!"

More than anything else, doing this has really put me in the Christmas spirit!

Peace (on earth! :D )

- Jenny

Apple Sauce, Herbs and Babies

I love how Apple sauce looks. It's so pink and pretty, not to mention delicious! Mum got a great sale on "deer apples" so Saturday morning the girls made apple sauce while the men chopped wood.
It was a gorgeous day; the wind was cool but the sun kept you nice and warm as long as you were moving around.
Even though we've had nights of hard frost my herb garden somehow survived and I was able to collect a good portion of it. I have been so lax in my herb gathering, I could've gotten tons of cuttings off my plants, but was only able to do it a few times.


My Calendula even blossomed again! I was shocked - I missed the first blooms sadly, but I was given another opportunity! I gathered Lemon Balm, Calendula, Applemint and Peppermint - they're hanging upside-down now in my pantry drying out except for another bunch of Lemon Balm that I put in the dehydrator.
From my garden and dried, I have Chamomile, (more) Lemon Balm, Spearmint, Peppermint, Comfry and some others I can't remember at the moment.
They'll be mostly used in teas and baking.

The ladies were also able to finally sit down and pick out days to finish all our projects. We'll be meeting every Wednesday until Christmas to get the candle making, soap making, preserving and organizing done. I can't wait!

I'm now on a big hunt for recipes to use all my lovely herbs in. I know most of them would be lovely in tea and I have recipes for that - but I'd like to make more goods such as the Lavender Bread I made a couple weeks ago. I find them very original and tasty!
Does anyone know of a good website or cookbook they can recommend?

The same apple sauce making Saturday, we also had a bit of a baby party. A friend of ours came over to dinner with her two adorable twins, Issac and Maggie. Sam and Henry had fun playing with them, but Jack the dog was happy to follow them around and be on crumb-control.

And finally a picture of the hard-working men chopping/sawing wood!

This week is fairly quiet - all I have is work, a hair appt, and French lessons, which it turns out, I'm hosting! It'll give me good incentive to clean and get everything tidy!

Have a good week!

Peace,

- Jenny