Tasty Tuesday - Herbed Butter Crackers

"Crackers? Who makes homemade crackers?"

That's what a friend said, when I brought these (minus the herbs) to a potluck on a platter beside venison sausage and cheese.

( I love the herbed ones by themselves, but was unsure how the flavors would mingle with sausage.)

One note on the recipe: I put the powdered milk in with the warm water so it dissolves properly.  

Or if you want, this is my new version, kinda like wheat thins:

1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup warm water
1/4 cup nonfat dry milk
1 cup white flour
1cup wheat flour
1/4 cup wheat bran
 3 teaspoons sugar
1 teaspoon salt
sea salt for sprinkling

Mix well, knead a bit, and let sit, covered, for 1 hour.

I split the dough in two balls, roll each out on a jelly roll pan with my Baker's Roller, cut with a pizza cutter and poke with a fork.

Bake 400* for 11-13 minutes. They need to be lightly browned to be crisp.

They are nice and thin, crispy, melt in your mouth yummy.

Now you can join the likes of those who make their own crackers!

Tasty Thursday (beacuse I'm delinquent and forgot on Tues: Ginger Cran- Apple Granola

The Flat Belly Diet comes through once again, with a superb recipe. I've experimented with granola recipes in the past and this has great flavor, good crunchy chunks and best of all, makes use of the dried apples from our trees!

Here's what you'll need:

2 c oatmeal

1 and 1/4 c walnuts, chopped 

1/2 c unprocessed bran

1/3 c ground flaxseed

1/3 c apple juice or applesauce

1/2 c maple syrup (I use the real thing.)

1 tsp minced crystallized ginger

1 c dried apples, chopped

1/3 c dried sweetened cranberries

For my daughter I leave out the ginger and cranberries and add a teaspoon of cinnamon. That was a big hit!
For cooking and baking directions, and a parfait recipe, follow this link.

Garden Planning, also, I'm not really a girly girl

This is the pretty part of gardening.
The lists and pretty packages and lovely doodles and neat handwriting.
The flowers plucked from a bed of disarray, brought in, tamed, displayed in glass on doily.

The is the truth of gardening and me:

I'm really not such a girly girl.
I have garden gloves, but rarely wear them.
I wear open toed sandals in the dirt and let my feet feel the earth squish up and around my soles.

It's hard work, of course.

But oh, it feels good.

My list of good things:

 Her and her.

safety in storms
breezy picnics
garage sale with friends
free stuff
deals
finding just what I needed
and a few things I didn't
bikes all the right size
motors that start after sitting idle for a season
asparagus that planted itself, put proper in its row
things reorganized
study guide I don't have to write

Other thoughts of mine on gardening:
Meeting in the Garden
A Warm Healing

sharing this list with others who count....

Rhubarb (Nut) Muffins

I cut the oil in half in this traditional church cookbook recipe and substituted vanilla yogurt. Also, I swapped one cup of whole wheat flour for white to add a bit of fiber.

I left the sugar as it was. There is such a thing as too great a sacrifice. :) The result is fluffy and moist without being too chewy.

I left the nuts out in mine, but shouldn't have, as Megan loudly protested that she would prefer zucchini muffins and I will probably end up eating the majority of these myself. I'm not complaining. Not at all.

Rhubarb (Nut) Muffins

1 1/2 cups brown sugar
1 cup milk soured with 1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 egg
1/3 cup oil
1/3 cup vanilla yogurt
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 teaspoon soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups finely chopped rhubarb
1/2 cups nuts (optional)

Mix wet ingredients together. Add flours, soda, salt and mix. Stir in rhubarb and nuts.

Spoon into greased muffin pan.

Sprinkle tops with cinnamon and sugar.

Bake 15-20 minutes at 325* F.

Good and Perfect

 Just popping in to say, yes, I am counting. 

Amidst last week's raindrops 

and this week's sunny glimmers, 

my list grows, 

seven a day, 

sometimes more.

boy - belting it out

red hair

budget costumes

remade hats

all things vintage

boys in suits

slicked back hair

quiet ticking clock

warm sun spots

guacamole

cotton balls and Vaseline (Minute to Win It church game I played)

a tile, rub-ons and a dry erase marker

weeds that pull easy

first dandelions

freshly tilled garden

new leaves

late sun glimmer on the underside

first sunburn of spring

the good tired and sore of hard work

clip art

neices chubby arms

shunshine

warm toes

lunch at Mom's 

donuts and coffee with Robb

baby kisses

four signed up and at least four more, to read One Thousand Gifts with me. 

things waiting to be counted, unopened gifts for tomorrow

Every Good and perfect gift 

is from above 

coming down from the Father 

of heavenly lights 

who does not change 

like shifting shadows.

 James 1:17

Sharing my list with the Counters of Gifts at Ann's.

Dandelions While We Wait

The sun came out from hiding yesterday, and so did I.

Rows of dead, crisp things lingered in my garden from the early arrival of winter so many months ago, still stubbornly clinging to the soil. I slipped into sandals, stripped off my top layers down to cami, entered my patch of scratched dirt and let the sun kiss my shoulders.

Then, for Mother's Day, I asked Robb to help till my garden.

Some manure may also be in my future.

It strikes me ironic that even poop can be re-purposed. What one could not gain any nutrients from, another can use.

Lord, work the hard places in my heart, 

the settled-down-in-my-own-ways places. 

Use the excrement of my life,

the thing I thought I couldn't use, 

didn't understand. 

Furrow it in, 

till it deep. 

Make me fertile ground 

for your Word to take root, 

grow fruit.

Soon we'll work the hard settled ground, dreaming of days long and baskets full.

But for now, while we wait, we'll rummage around for an appropriate sized vase and notice the beauty of first dandelions on the kitchen table.

Today, I'm sharing When God Seems Late for Elizabeth Ester's Saturday Evening Blog Post. Thank you for your comments, encouragement. God is faithful. And you are faithful friends.

Tasty Tuesday - Hot Fudge Sauce

This recipe has been added to my list of homemade things to keep on hand, because you never know when you're really really really gonna need some good ole hot fudge sauce. I make a double batch and there's always a jar of it in my fridge. YUM!

3/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup butter
1/4 cup sifted cocoa
1/3 cup cream

Put all above ingredients in pan.
Over low heat, melt butter.
Stir continuously.
Turn up heat to medium until boil.
Boil 1 minute.

Add:
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/3 cup white corn syrup

Drizzle over mint chocolate chip, orange sherbet....or whatever your craving demands.

Quirky fact: When my twin sister requests this recipe from my grandma....she asks for it grainy! If you  like your hot fudge grainy too, (why you would, I don't have know..) don't sift the cocoa. Happy drizzling!

Surfing the Waves

I didn't want to brag, so I've not posted or said a thing (here, at least) about our recent vacation. We've been home a month now, spring has yet to come, and I'm tempted to forget how blessed I am.

We went to Mexico for a week. And we didn't have to pay for it. You'd think the gratefulness would carry me through for a while. 

The waves have come, we're storm tossed, sucked under, sand worn, and I've complained about the waves that pull at my anchor.

I've forgotten that waves are meant to be surfed.

Gratefulness can carry me to shore.

Today's List:

Planning a book club on One Thousand Gifts. I can't wait to share it with my real life community!
Relaxed Sunday
Vintage gloves and shoes
Little girls having tea in gloves and dresses and shoes
YouTube (Do I really need my own channel? I say yes. :) )
Dance recital
Formal wear
Growing up girls
Little girls who worship and pray together
An agreeable committee
Walking with friends
New hobby for Mitchell
Unexpected Bible Quizzing awards (Megan's team got 1st and Mitchell placed 15th individually.)
Gifts we don't deserve
Justice
Hope
And love that never fails.

Linking with friends who count here.

When God Seems Late

I'll admit it.

For the first time in my life, I'm mad at God.

It is unusual to me, strange even, that I would be mad at him now. I've faced worse things in the not so distant past, so why now? Why would the current set of circumstances make me angry at the one I claim to trust?

Why not back then, when what I thought we were crumbled and I had to redefine my life by grace. Why not all the other years I've lived with an uncertain future? Why not when Robb resigned and I was embarrassed, feared church gossip, and was confused about what God was doing in our lives. Why not those times?

Why now?

I'm tired of change and stress. Unknowns. Waiting.

Tired...

....and whiny.

I think I do know the why of now. In the past when we made decisions, I voiced my opinion, and then let my husband decide. I left all the responsibility on his handsome broad shoulders. Then when things went south, or at least happened in a way that made me unhappy, I could blame him.

Lovely, huh? Convenient, certainly. Pleasant? Not so much. I disgust myself.

This time around, in the roller coaster of our work/finances we sought after God's leading more than we ever have in the past. We were eye's open wide to closing doors and an open one. We walked through, full of faith and dependence and trust.

And you know what? I wrongly assumed that just because we made a decision to walk this path, to follow this road of His will, somehow He would magically provide and we'd have a Disney ending.

But it just hasn't been that clean cut, that easy.

I've said that God is never late, but rarely early.

 Photo credit: Astronomical Clock (Souvenir) (Anthony Dodd) / CC BY-NC 3.0

It feels like he's late.

You know, there's danger in claiming God's leading. Because when things don't pan out the way we thought  and it doesn't look all nice and tidy, we need to be prepared for God to take the blame, or else we need to admit we were wrong. Neither option is easy, especially when we're just as committed to God's reputation as our own.

I'm just being gut honest here. This is hard. Of course I still trust him. He says he'll provide everything we need. It's just that what I think I need and what he thinks I need may look very different.

Somewhere in the Word,* it says that God is not slow in keeping his promises, as some think. He is patient. He has something in mind. He's not on my timetable.

Lyrics to a song come to mind.
"There's a time to be angry and a time to let it go...He is with you." ~Mandisa's With You

With me. I've been waiting for God to show up big.

But he's already here.

So he's not late after all.

Photo Credit: Astronomical Clock (Anthony Dodd) / CC BY-NC 3.0

Time makes no difference to him because he is the God to whom a thousand years is like a day, who calls what isn't into existence, who knows the beginning from the end, who redeems years. And yet His timing is perfect, precise.

It's time to let it go. It being my plan, my expectations, my right to feel sorry for myself, my silly anger at a God whose plans are always better than mine.  I'd better quit whining, learn to be patient like He is patient, get with His program.

He is with me. And He is all I really need.

*2 Peter 3:9

Tasty Tuesday - Waldorf Salad Pita

Waldorf Salad Pita

Mmmmm. Summer's a-comin' and my taste buds are ready!

This is what you'll need:

Apple
Walnuts
Celery
Lettuce
2 Laughing Cow Cheese wedges in Swiss Light
Whole Wheat pita

Dice a nice amount of apple, walnuts and celery.
I can't be bothered with precise measurements. Your guess is as good as mine. :)
Spread cheese on pita, insert lettuce, stuff with chopped yumminess.

Didn't guess accurately with the quantity of apples, etc? Store in fridge for a craving later.
You'll have one. Believe me!