Dairy, Playground, and Train Day

First thing in the morning we went to see the dairy cattle.  Grant is a lover of animals.  He simply wants to be close to all animals.  If we would have let him down in the barns he would have been sitting on a cow.

After visiting the dairy cattle we dropped daddy back off at the Dairy Foods Event and we went to the playground.  They do have a very nice, new playground.  And the boys played,

and played, 

and played.

Grant LOVED to swing!

Check out this drinking fountain - how awesome is that!

We also went on a walk around the little lake that was at the playground park.

This is what happens when Clark gets to use the camera (actually not a bad shot).

On our way home we stopped in Independence, IA.  They have remodeled the old rail depot as a tourist/visitor information center.  It was really beautiful.  Plus, the boys were able to see the train up close.

Good Times!

Family Outing to West Union

I'm going to break this blog into 3 parts - otherwise it will just be too long (and I am going to back date so they are in order).

On Friday afternoon we packed the boys up and headed to West Union, Iowa (way up in NE Iowa).  Alan had to work/oversee the Iowa FFA Dairy Foods/Dairy Cattle Career Development Event's that are held there.  Since they start early in the morning and it is a long drive he goes up the night before.  Last year we started traveling with him.

All morning Clark kept asking me when we were leaving to go to the hotel.  Clark loves to travel and stay at hotels.  I guess he comes by that honestly since he has been traveling across the country with us since he was quite young.  To keep the boys occupied while I packed; coloring seemed a good option!

Once daddy was home, all was packed, and we were loaded we headed out.  Our first stop was one of necessity as we heard Clark holler from the back, "I have to go potty, mommy!"  We were on highway 20 headed towards Cedar Falls/Waterloo but a long way from anywhere.  Alan pulled off at the first exit we came too hoping to find a deserted gravel road.  We actually saw signs for a county lookout point so decided to try that out.  Low and behold they had an outhouse:

Hooray!

And a gorgeous view!

Back on the road again.  Every town we passed Clark asked if we were going to the hotel.  Finally:

hotel check in and swim time.  The boys all had a lot of fun!

However, sleep is always an issue - not a lot of that Friday night.

Test Kitchen Thursday

Last week I found a recipe on an on-line blog for Pumpkin Bread.  Sounded like a good time of year to practice and find the right pumpkin bread recipe for the 2011 ISF.  After thinking about it I decided I would make Thursdays my recipe posting day.  My goal is to bake earlier in the week and have the post ready first thing Thursday morning.  This fell through this week though.  Yesterday when I tried the recipe it was horrible!  There were a couple red flags but I said to myself, "no, I will follow the recipe exactly as written."  Big mistake.  I think the person posting the recipe just made a couple typo errors in the ingredient measurements.  If you ever see something in one of my recipes that looks horribly wrong - please let me know!   So, I couldn't give you that recipe.  I'm really not kidding we fed the loaf to the chickens.

Back to the drawing board I put together my own recipe today.  I'm not claiming it's an original if you find one just like it out there, I am saying I put it together without referencing a recipe book or on-line source.  This one was so much better.  I may tweak it to get a little more pumpkin taste but it was really good.

Here is my Pumpkin Bread Recipe -- make and enjoy!  If you have any suggestions for improvement send them my way.

Andrea's Pumpkin Bread

Ingredients:

2 C        King Arthur Whole Wheat Flour
1 t          baking soda
1/2 t       baking powder
3/4 t       salt
1 t          cinnamon (I usually make it a heaping teaspoon of Vietnamese cinnamon- I like cinnamon.)
1 t          nutmeg
1/2 t       cloves
1/4 t       ginger (omit if you're not a ginger fan).

1 t          vanilla (I use Madagascar Bourbon Vanilla from the King Arthur catalog)
4            eggs (from my little laying hens)
1 C        granulated sugar
1/2 C     brown sugar

1/2 C     sour cream (I actually used light sour cream - worked well; do NOT use fat free)
1 C        pumpkin (I used the pumpkin we froze last year - you can use canned pumpkin)
3/4 C     canola oil

1 C     roasted sunflower kernels

Prepare 2 - 8 x 4" loaf pans.  When preparing pans for quick breads be sure you only grease and flour the bottom portion - up about 1 inch.  Luckily my pans are so old and worn there is actually a discolored line right at this mark.  According to ISF judges this year I learned they prefer the grease with shortening and flour method rather than using baking spray or other methods.  Butter scorches so stay away from greasing with butter.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

Mix/whisk the dry ingredients together.  Set aside.  Beat together the vanilla, eggs, and sugars.  Mix the pumpkin, sour cream and oil into the egg/sugar mixture.  Pour the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients.  Mix well (but do not over beat).  For quick breads I have gone away from using my stand mixer.  I mix everything by hand which for me has resulted in better breads.  My theory is I was over beating in the mixer.  Nothing against my stand mixer - I adore her but she is a very powerful machine.  Allow to set 8 - 10 minutes before putting in oven. Note: this suggestion is for quick breads made with whole wheat flour (don't do this with all-purpose flour breads).  This sit time allows the moisture to work with the whole wheat.

Add the sunflower kernels to the top of each loaf just before placing in oven.  Bake for 50 - 60 minutes or until toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.  Always check at least 10 minutes earlier than recipe suggests since all ovens cook differently.

After removing from oven allow to cool on wire rack for 10 minutes before removing from pan.

Since I wasn't sure how much it would make I started with a 9x5 pan.  Only fill pans 3/4 full.  Once I reached the 3/4 mark I had just a little left over.  It fit perfectly in a mini loaf pan.  The mini loaf was so cute (and yummy).  The next time I make this bread I will use a full can of pumpkin (or equivalent amount of our frozen pumpkin) so there wouldn't be waste if someone uses canned pumpkin.  Not sure what to do with the flour/dry ingredient amount though.

Garden grown pumpkin

My little helper.

Ready to bake! (after putting on the sunflower kernels)

Baby loaf.

Enjoy!

What to Do, What to Do

Today I was sorting through some of my fabric stash to find this:

to send to my "Brown Bag Quilt" partner.  Pretty sure she doesn't read my blog so I shouldn't be ruining her surprise by showing it to you now.  She was amazingly fast and had my package shipped 3 hours after we received the e-mail that we were partners.  Can't wait to see the quilt she makes with the fabric I'm sending her.  The gist is each person sends the other some fabric they want to utilize to reduce their fabric stash.  Then make a quilt using this fabric and any other  fabric out of your own fabric stash.  You are only allowed to purchase 1 other piece of fabric.  Once quilt is done you post the quilt to a photo site set up by the host.  All have to be done by March 1st.  This is also known as an Ugly Quilt - but the host for this one thought that seemed a rather mean name.

As I sorted through my stash I found this piece:

It even glows in the dark!  Clark thought that was pretty cool.  He loved it so much he wanted us to leave it in his room tonight.  I'm just not sure what to do with it.  I thought wall-hanging but it's too big (at least for any of our walls).  I could find some fun Halloween fabric to make a couple borders and make it into a quilt (from his reaction I think Clark would sleep with it every night).  If anyone has any other really good ideas let me know!

We had a picnic outside for lunch.  As I was taking some pictures the boys got a little silly posing.  And - Grant said "Cheese!"  He's vocalizing words at an amazing rate now.

Clark and Grant are still making sure the kittens are tamed.  We go out at least once every two hours to check.  Grant gets very upset if Clark goes out without him.

I've started exercising on Wii Fit again.  The deal is once my 1/2 hour is in Clark can play while I make supper.  He really likes wrecking balls and soccer (or panda heads as he calls it).

Thanks for following along!  Hope everyone has a great day!

Apple Orchard Time!

Today we started visiting apple orchards.  By the end of October we'll probably have been to at least 5 different orchards in at least 2 states (and some more than once I'm sure).  Why?  We love apples!  And the orchards themselves are so much fun to explore.

Today Clark's Preschool Class visited the orchard near Cambridge - Center Grove Orchard.  If you live in Central Iowa and have never visited this orchard (especially if you have young children) you really should!  Everyone seemed to have a great time!  Grant and I went along too.  I learned a lot myself.  I learned that my oldest son is very independent.  Once the orchard's group leader took over Clark just followed her.  Really, he didn't even look around to make sure I was still there for a large portion of the morning.  He loved the hay ride and sat in front (to better see the tractor of course).  He enjoyed the big bouncy pillow tremendously.  He knew how to get in line with the other children.  He even held hands with a little girl.  Whose son is this???  Although in classic Clark style he never really smiled much - very serious; but I knew he was enjoying himself and he babbled about the fun he had to me in the car and to dad when we dropped by for lunch.

Milking the cow

Playing in the Nursery Rhyme area

Visiting the one-room school house

The big bouncy pillow

Holding hands

Grant liked the animals - especially the goats!

He liked the turkeys too!

I had to get this picture with Grant and the turkey.  We bought him a new book when we were in Minneapolis about lots of farm animals.  The first animal sound he has done is - turkey.  It is so funny when he makes the turkey noise.  I'll have to get video.  

Clark on daddy lookout!

Since we were so close to Ankeny we drove down to eat a picnic lunch with daddy.  Clark had just spotted Alan's car turning into the parking lot when I snapped this photo.

One item in each hand = balance, right?

Of course we had to have apples from the orchard for lunch.  I also bought some popcorn balls last night while grocery shopping since Clark just loved them last year.  They are a hit for the fall season at our house once again.  The minute Clark saw the packaging when he woke up this morning he had to make sure I packed them in our lunch bag.  Grant has decided apples are awesome and loved snacking on them today!  I miss my apple tree and fall trips to the tree right after nap for a healthy snack :(

Today I allowed Grant to meet the new baby kitties.  He went nuts.  Couldn't pull the child away.  Grant is a huge animal lover.  I let both boys pet a kitten.  They both did well at being gentle.  Depending on where momma cat decides to move the kitties they should be tame little kitties in no time.

That's it for today.  I think I am going to work on some cross stitch yet tonight - I found some really cute Halloween charts in my stash of charts.  Since beginning my weight loss challenge again this week I need something to do with my hands late at night (to avoid late night snacking).  Plus, I think a couple of the designs may work for some Iowa State Fair entries next year.  You just can't keep me away!  Maybe my new goal should be to enter Fabrics and Threads until I earn a ribbon.  I realize this may keep me stitching and entering well into my 90's.  Last night I also signed on to Becky Bee's Stitching Hive "Great Pumpkin Challenge 2010."  I know I can get at least 1 pumpkin (even if just a little pin) done in that amount of time! 

Mums the Word

Aren't they pretty?  They are now in the front of our house!  They are the nice big mums that are hardy to -(negative) 30 below.  Since it sounds like rain will be with us the next few days I decided I better get the new planting in the ground.  We bought a few beautiful perennials at Country Landscapes in Ames on Sunday - they were 1/2 off!  Sad- we looked at some of the chain stores that had not so nice looking plants for more money - glad we didn't buy there.  Sometimes it pans out to go straight to the experts.

Here is what the area looked like prior to planting (and weeding).

Yes, I know my curtain is hanging oddly - two little boys enjoy playing in the curtains and bending my curtain rods!  Anyway - nasty landscape.  I have so much gardening to do I decided to pick one small spot and focus on that little area.  If I have time later on I will focus on a different area.

All dug up and ready to plant.  Clark was having a great time playing with worms (and centipedes).  Just playing in the soil in general kept him busy.  Boys and cats - natural attraction to freshly dug soil.  At least the one doesn't immediately fertilize it.

Clark helped me haul over the plants in the wagon and we laid them all out to see how they would look.

All planted!  I use many of the same plants over and over again in my beds.  Now is a good time to divide iris and day-lilies so I dug some out and divided them (OK, 1 plant of each) to add to this bed.  I still have lots of iris left over.  Anyone looking for some yellow iris?  Other plants I like include coreopsis, phlox, hostas (where I have the shade), and then something fun like the mums.  I also plant in some bulbs such as tulips, daffodils or crocus.  Luckily, I still had some left from my Spring haul from my brother's house so I put those in too.  

I always make sure I have something for bees and butterflies - which Mr. Bee did not like my moving the mum to plant it.  And I usually try to put some type of bird feeder in.  You can't see it in this picture but we put up the shepherd hook and a finch feeder.  Clark insisted the birds needed to be fed!  I also like to add in large rocks or a vintage find that can be utilized or re-purposed for the garden.  

Purple (the cat) approved.  It's not what we would ultimately like to have in the front of the house but such a large improvement for under $50.00.  Someday if we ever have the money to really fix up the front of the house all of these perennials can be dug and moved and divided (to make even more landscape plants).

I had to show off my favorite variety of phlox - "Candy Stripe."  I think it is so pretty when it blooms.  Of course my beautiful mounds of phlox are currently buried under the collapsed well house (dang summer storms) along with my daisy's and black-eyed susan's and a few other pretty perennials.

One helpful tip I discovered while snapping this photo - I now have a photo of the variety with a picture of the plant!  Where does this become helpful.  Well, with so many little helping hands and such strong Iowa winds I lose all of my tags eventually.  If I save the tags I eventually forget where I put them or where I put the plants.  But today I snapped a photo of all the tags with their own pictures of the plant and the variety name.  I put these photos in a folder labeled South House Landscaping and now if I need or want to figure out what is planted there or go back to buy more of the same variety I have an easy way to look it up!

In other news:

Seriously - I thought all the cats were male around here.  Obviously I missed this little lady.  She is the proud mother of 4 kittens!  Clark and I actually witnessed the birth of the 4th kitten and the devouring of the afterbirth.  Yes - this is why I enjoy country living - nothing like these little life lessons.  We talked about how the babies find food and how the mama makes milk for them (because he was ready to throw them a handful of adult cat food).  Mama cat is pretty exhausted in this photo and I don't blame her.  Clark kept going back to check on them.  I was so proud of him because he was always quiet, careful and gentle.