Shhhh.....Listen........

Shhhh.....Listen......the sound of silence!  :)     Today, all day, it is just The Honey & I home!  The older 2 grands are in school all day, 3rd grade and kindergarten.  Grand #3 is at the sitters for the day. 
As I have mentioned, my daughter and her three boys are living with us at the moment.  Her fiancé decided that his friends and the bottle is what he wanted and has left (that is called a scumbag).  So to have 4 extra people in a one bedroom apartment has been fun.....yeah.....  Luckily we do have an extra room that has become a bedroom/closet for the boys.  The baby is in a playpen that gets moved around and my daughter is either on the couch or asleep in the recliner. 
It does get very noisy here sometimes (you think!!!)  I have not had a chance to get online much.   I have been working in the kitchen, but not baking like I would like too.  I'm in the dinner mode.  I forgot what it was like...... Lol!

Yesterday, we did go for a nice bike ride.  We went to Bath, NH (tiny ass little town) that boasts the oldest continuous running general store in the US.  I laugh, you look around the town (turn in a circle, you basically see the whole town) you have all these old homes, barns and then you have the double wide.....lol..  After Bath, we went east to the other side of the state towards North Conway.  Out through the woods on RT 302 is a nice quiet ride.  I told The Honey that I was going to ride bitch.  My back and hip where not feeling good, and I knew that I did not want to ride my bike.  So I was able to sit back (not really relax) and take some pictures of our lovey state!  Below are a few of the 89 that I ended up taking. 

Since it is quiet, I have already got the third load of laundry (kids, my god) in the dryer, only 1 more to go.  The dishes are done.  And I'm going to now make some lunch for The Honey before any one of our coffee regulars decides it's time to show up. 

Enjoy the day all, I just wanted to say I have had the blog in the back of my mind, but absolutely no time to even think of typing more than one sentence. 
:)

Hello there!  Nice cool evening tonight, will be crisp already for sleeping.  I can handle that.  Love to have the a/c off and the windows open, nice fresh air to sleep in!  The last couple of days we have gone to several different areas with the canoe and done some blueberry picking!  We ended up with about 20 cups!
It took me about 3 hours to pick through them all ( I don't like to have stems or dried up little ones) last night.  Today I cooked and canned up some preserves.  They tasted real good even though they were warm.  Now I want to get some more to freeze up to have some this winter. 
The Honey really likes to go out through the woods to travel.  We were on some pretty rough dirt roads (my poor car!) to get to a couple of ponds.  We got to see some wild life along the way.  You know, a turkey is a pretty ugly bird! 

 

So we finally get to the pond and I was in heaven!  There were a lot of berries to be picked!  Out and around the edges of the islands, one of them we got onto land and continued picking.  My poor arms and legs were so scratched up! 

After getting every thing all picked clean last night, my back & shoulders were killing me.  Today I made the preserves and a coffee cake.  Both came out well I think.  I will get those 2 recipes on here real quick.  Here are a couple of shots to see what a beautiful day it was for picking and being out on a pond with The Honey. 

 

Nothing like fresh picked berries!  So much better than buying them at the grocery store.  It is a lot of work associated with the picking, cleaning, cooking and canning.  But they are so worth it!  I do want to get some more berries and also want to get some black berries.  That will be the next adventure, to go & find them.  Time for bed, I just wanted to drop in and say hi all.  Have a good evening!

Biking & Baking

Good evening all!  In the last couple of days, I was able to get in both biking & baking!  Yeah!  As I had mentioned, my daughter and the three Grands moved in with us for a bit.  I'm still amazed how much stuff for 3 boys!  Haha! 

Biking :)
Yesterday, we had a beautiful summer day here in New Hampshire.  High 70's, no humidity and just perfect.  About 9:30am I'm telling The Honey that there is sunshine and it was time to hit the fair (Yes, can you believe that the fairs have started already!).  We had to have our coffee regulars that come over first, you know, grand fucking central station!!!!  3pm we finally left to go to Swanzey to go to the Cheshire fair (only about 2hrs away).   That was the first time we had been to that fair (we have now hit all the ones in NH).   We are not ones that will go on the highway very often at all.  We like to hit the back roads, less traffic, scenic, able to just cruise.  Coming back, The Honey decided he wanted to take a left, so we went left.  Ended up on this back road and then had to take a detour!  There was absolutely no other people on this road.  Was awesome!  Along a river (I couldn't catch a name sign anywhere) and peaceful.  Trying to get home we ended up about 50 miles west of where we wanted to be. Lol!  Not the first time that we decided to take an adventure.  !!!!

 

 

 

Baking -

 

So today, Grand #3 (6 months old) is not feeling well, pool little bugger.  Teething and I believe his ear may be bothering him.  He was trying to nap, and I was trying to keep Grand #2 (5 yrs) quiet.  So he was Meme's baking helper.  He tried to say that he couldn't be a baker because he had a tattoo on his arm (Smokey the Bear tattoo from the Forestry booth at the fair).  I was really trying hard not too laugh at that one.  I had to remind him that I do ALOT of baking, and I have several tattoos. So this picture is to show that you can be a baker with tattoos.  Love it!!!

 

Today, I had an abundance of lemons that had to get used up and found one of my recipes for lemon brownies that is real simple and delicious.  Just the right hint of lemon, not too tart.  Had the stamp of approval from S & B (which are another one of the coffee regulars that come over).  If I am baking anything, The Honey will take a picture with his phone and send it to S.  He will call right back and ask what time!!!  Lol.

Here is the lemon brownies

1 1/2 cups flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 tsp salt
1 cup butter (2 sticks) room temperature
4 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 lemon zested & juiced

Glaze
1 cup powder sugar
2 - 4 Tbls lemon juice & some zest (I make it runny to just glaze the top)

:Preheat oven to 350 - line a 9 x 13 pan with parchment paper

  Stir the dry ingredients together.  Cut in the butter with a pastry blender ( or 2 knives) until course crumbs.  In a small bowl, combine the eggs, vanilla, lemon juice & zest.  Add to the dry mixture and mix to combine well.  Pour into pan and bake 25 - 30 minutes until set.  Let cool completely and then add the glaze too the top.  Enjoy!!!

Very good, not to tart, not too sweet.  Just yummy.  Sorry I didn't get any pictures of the baking or finished product. 

Well that's it for tonight, I hope all get to enjoy the evening and the goodies!  xoxo