Hangin out

I love laundry on the line.  It brings me joy.  Strange?  Perhaps.  It's so colorful and it waves in the breeze like a rainbow sail.  The loud crack the clothes make as they whip in the wind is part of the song of a sunny day.  I love it.  And then... BONUS!  They smell SOOOO good when you bring them in.  Even days and weeks later I'll pull out a shirt I had hanging on the line and it still smells like 'outside' and I smile as I take a deep whiff.

Jim has made me a system of pulleys so I don't even have to leave the little porch off my laundry room to hang them up.    Now... if only I could find someone to put away the clean clothes.

Fried Apple Heaven

Sometimes I come up with an idea and I can't believe that I didn't think of it sooner.  I mean really.  How did I not have this stroke of genius before?  It seems so obvious now.
 I LOVE apple pie.  It's no secret.  I'll tell you to your face.  I LOVE APPLE PIE.  All warm with a little scoop of vanilla ice cream.   mmmmmm I'm getting all Homer Simpson drooly over here.  Anyway, I also LOVE LOVE LOVE fried apples.  Love them!  All warm and sweet and delicious.  Why did I never think to combine the two before?  It's genius.  Really.  Best of both worlds.  Jim thinks that I only like it because it's a way to get more butter into my apple pie.  Is that so wrong?  Anyway, here's what I did:

I peeled and cut up some apples.

I melted butter in my trusty cast iron skillet.

I fried up those bad boys and added brown sugar.  Do you see this?!?  Do you see it being all bubbly and delicious?

I slapped on a simple pie crust.  It's not pretty, but it did the job.

Then I put in in the oven just long enough for the crust to get all golden brown and delicious.

It turned out like this!  Y*U*M

I didn't measure anything so I'm kinda guessing on these measurements.  Tweak it how you like and enjoy.

Fried Apple Pie

4 cups of tart apples peeled and sliced
1/4 c. butter
1/4 c. brown sugar

1/3 c. vegetable shortening
1 c. flour
1/4 c. sugar
1 tsp salt
1-3 tsp water

Mix together shortening, flour sugar and salt until it becomes a crumbly mixture, begin mixing in a teaspoon of water at a time until the flour mixture is moist, then form the pastry into a ball.  Roll out pie crust so it will fit in your skillet.  Set aside.

Melt butter in large cast iron skillet over medium/high heat.  Add apples.  Cook about 3 minutes then add brown sugar.  Cook until brown sugar melts and becomes bubbly.  Remove from heat.  Add pie crust.  Place in 400 degree oven and bake until crust is brown.

First day of school

Tuesday morning I felt like a failure.  It was our first day of school and I had been scheduled to work.  That was not my plan.  It was a long day too.  Wow!  Lots of rooms to be cleaned.  But at the end of the day, I got to pick some windfall apples from the small orchard at work.  On the way home I cooked up a plan.  So our first and second days of school have been about apples.  It's been a great way to ease into school and the kids have enjoyed it, and honestly so have I!  Spelling tests and math facts will come soon enough.

Our bounty

Treasure practicing her Home ec skills.

Joy drew apples and then Asked put dots on them to represent the number of seeds in each apple.

We made a graph to show us which was the most common number of seeds for our apples to have.

We're going to try to grow some apple trees.

Apple art

The blue box

I LOVE mac and cheese from a box.  Why is that?  In theory it is not good to me.  Powdered electric orange cheese and too much fakeness.  Blech.  But then... I mix it up.  And it's electric orange fakeness beckons me.  "Brenda.  Oh Brenda.  Come eat me."  And I do.  From the pot with the big spoon.  That's the best way I think. During more than one of my four pregnancies I could eat the entire box for lunch.  I'm not even picky about my box.  It doesn't have to be the blue box.  I'll take the store brand.  Now I'm hungry.