Life, with a click!

Sunset is my favorite time of day, often on crazy hectic days it’s the only time I remember to stop, breath, and appreciate my life.

What does faith have to do with bread?  Why when I had all of the prep for Thanksgiving did I spend today making sourdough?  See what the boules up above turned into?  They smell better than they look. (both are out of the oven now)

Last week I promised my primary kids bread like pioneers made so I woke Sheldon (my sourdough start) up and spent today in a kitchen covered with flour and watching for flour, water, and salt to work it’s magic.  A few years ago for girls camp I starting thinking about the analogy of sour dough bread being like faith.  There are several ways to get your start, sometimes they are borrowed from other people, started on the kitchen window sill with flour and water and careful feeding, ordered off of the internet, “cheater” starter with potato water and yeast.  None of them are wrong, but just like faith it starts in many different ways.  Soul searching alone, born in traditions our parents teach, etc. but eventually faith and sour dough have to grow on their own and not rely on others.  The analogy goes on, but I have a disaster of a kitchen to clean up and it’s getting late.

Is anyone interested in me sharing my sour dough technique once Thanksgiving has passed?  Either traditional sour dough boules or bread without any of the sour dough tang that simply uses sour dough starts to leaven the bread.

I love books, book stores, and libraries.  The feel of turning pages and the smell of an old book is comforting to me like a warm blanket.  I can’t think of anything that you can’t learn from books, whether it’s Facebook for Dummies (not kidding, we saw it) or being transported to a magical world full of muggles, flying cars, and good friends it’s possible with books.  Go pick up an old favorite of whatever genre you like best and escape the chaos for a while.

I know there aren’t many flowers there right now, but doing 30 days in November makes it hard to get pretty flower pictures in my yard.  I prefer my flowers growing in the ground instead of a vase, at least most of the time.  This fall weather has been amazing and I spent today out in the flower beds while Neil raked the lawn.  I had salvia, lavendar, beard tongue, and flax that did well this year that I am hoping will be back next year.  My corn flower did okay, so she might be back too but it’s her first year and this fall it was a struggle.

When I’m in the garden with dirt in my fingernails my mind wanders letting me sort though problems and stresses.  The benefit of my garden therapy time is beautiful flowers that thrive in the sunshine.  It will be a long winter before I see the benefit of today’s work but I know it’s coming.  Along the back I have irises planted from Harmony, mini daffodils in a few clumps, a row of crocus along the front (2 different bags and I didn’t mix them up so I probably won’t love them), chionodoxa in 2 clumps in the front bed and 2 more along the fence line, regular daffodils at the end of the fence, and some hyacinth.  I will have to come up with summer/fall plants but for now I should be good through spring to early summer.