Happy Thanksgiving!

We are thankful for:

  Our Faith, Family, and Friends,

And All the Good Things the Heavenly Father Sends,

Like :

My washer and dryer

And coffee by the fire;

Cheese, tapioca, pumpkin pie

Living in a house, not a pig stye;

Bimpslins, and crimpstlins, and painted toes,

Some nice webbed feet and a stuck up nose;

I am thankful for Michelle she is my freind,

together our freindship will never end;

Grass and early morning dew

And a great big sky, clear and blue

Pies, even though there should be more --

And Cathy for doing our  menial chores;

Mops and also soap and bubbles

for cleaning up all Anna's puddles;

For kitty cats and puppy dogs

And brothers who sit on the couch like bumps on logs;

Thankful for acorns and leaves that fall

and the care and love that comes from all;

For, Nina who is the best aunt ever,

the hugs and kisses she gives us -- I will love her forever:

Potato peelers that actually peel

and the awesome amazing Thanksgiving meal!

Children who pitch in and help with the cookin --

All of 'em smart and sweet and good lookin;

(And goofy and silly and weird and random --

You have to be mighty open-minded to stand 'em...)

Thankful for all this, true

But also mindful Who we're thankful To!

From the Davises and Extended Family and Friends!

(Mashed Potatos and stuffing

Blueberry and pumpkin pie;

I'm so full and suff'ring

If I eat anymore I'll die!)

(Written by folks here present who happened past the computer and kindly added: Dan and me, Kevvy, Omar, Michelle, Theresa, Cathy, and Anna)

The List + Butter Making 101

* turkey: check
 (Two fourteen pounders instead of one 20-odd pounder, because the price worked out better, and because, even though we have a light crew this year, we LOVE us some leftover turkey!)

* potatoes:  check
 (Russet, ten pound bag.)

* green beans:  check

 (To be made Grandmom style, with a little butter and a dab of beef bouillon added.)

* creamed corn:  check
(Canned, because it's not wildly popular enough to take the time and trouble of "scratch.")

* bread and vegges for stuffing: not quite
(Got bread and onions, but I need to get some more celery.)

* plenty of flour and yeast for rolls: check

* home-churned butter:  check
(The kiddos are really excited about this one; it's a special treat for Thanksgiving this year. See below!)

* Cranberry sauce: check
(Jellied and out of the can because every year I make it from scratch, nobody eats it but me.)

* Sweet potatoes and marshmallows for Fluff: check
(Because some people think Thanksgiving is all about the sweet potato fluff.)

* Spiced apple rings and cream cheese for apple ring treats: not yet
(Can't find the jarred apple rings here on the western slope, so we're making our own today.)

* Pie crusts: check
(Because when you make more than two or three, it's just way too time consuming to roll them all out.)

* Filling ingredients for French silk, pumpkin, apple, butterfinger, and blueberry pies: check

(No more than six this year for goodness sake! We don't have that many people -- and Jon, the pie making machine isn't here... Though he is apparently being utilized by the seminary to supply a Thanksgiving bake sale.)

* All the towels and wascloths washed:  almost
(One more load -- Important because we go through them unbelievably quickly with even only a couple extra teenagers home.)


* Beds and bedding ready for extra bodies:  almost
(Still have to get up in the attic and unpack a couple extra pillows and maybe one blanket)

* Kevin, Michelle, Omar, and Aunt Nina:  On their way!
(Should be here in time for 7:00 Adult Doctrine Class with Fr. Bernard tonight and to help with pies tomorrow!)

Churning Butter 101:



First, add room temperature cream to your butter churn  -- double cream is best .  This is a half gallon, a good amount to start with. We are fortunate to get our cream from the organic dairy up the hill, but grocery store cream will work just fine.  We found the '30s era Dazey butter churn at an antique store some time back, but the same effect can be had using a large jar with a tight lid.  Instead of turning the handle, the cream can be shaken in the jar -- or rolled back and forth by careful hands across a carpeted floor. Or, you can use the blender, but it's not nearly as rewarding as the "hands on" experience!




Now, here comes the fun part!  Start the cranking or shaking or blending at a slow pace until the cream starts to thicken, then pick up the pace.  It took us a about an hour of constant (or well, semi-constant churning) to seperate most of the butter milk from the solid form of the butter.  It takes longer if the milk isn't room temp, or if the "agitation" isn't constant.





If you have a kitty, she will know without being told that something very interesting is going on...





And it won't take long before she is really making life difficult trying to get into the churn.



Once the butter has separated -- and you'll know when it does! -- scoop out as much of it as you can with a ladle.

When you reach the point that the butter looks like this, you will also have a good amount (a couple pints or so) of buttermilk.  After you've ladled as much as you can, carefully pour the last remaining drops of buttermilk carefully into your pitcher and save it all to use later.  Or to drink!

Then, add about a half cup of cold water to the churn/blender/jar and give it some more agitation.  Pour off after a bit and discard.  Repeat this step until the water runs clear.



Here you see the butter and the buttermilk.



The next job is to remove as much of the remaining buttermilk as is humanly possible.  This helps keep your butter from going rancid.  The best way we found to do this is to place the blob of butter on a large, sterilized cutting board.  Using a rubber spatula, pat, turn, and fold the butter.  You'll see "beads" and streams of buttermilk rising up and pooling underneath.  Place a rag at one end of your cutting board and tip the board on the opposite end, to allow the buttermilk to roll down into the rag.  Do this often.  It takes a good half hour usually to pat out all the buttermilk.

 When you've gotten out as much as you can, you can add salt if desired, folding and mixing it in thoroughly with your rubber spatula.  We used three teaspoons for this amount of butter.  But it's up to you how salted you like your butter.



After you've got out as much of the liquid as you possibly can, place the butter into molds -- or little tupperware containters with good lids.  To unmold, you may just need to gently squeeze the sides of your container and pop the butter out onto a plate.  If it sticks, wrap a hot rag around the bottom of the container for just a couple seconds, which should loosen it up enough to upturn onto your butter dish for a pretty presentation.  (You can smooth the final product with the back of a spoon if it's a little "messy.")



This is how much we made from a half gallon of cream.

This is how the finished product looks.  And when you taste it, you'll be amazed at how much better  it is than store-boughten!  SO creamy and light!  Worth every crank!

Thankful Thursday

Thank-you, dear Lord, for my son, Jon. 

I miss him so much now that he is gone.

But, You were so good to have given him

A sweet understanding of his mother's whims,

And a heart so kind, so generous, so big

That he conspired to buy me this flying pig:

Did you notice the pig, Lord?

A silly thing, for sure --

But, it's the giver not the gift I'm thanking You for.

See Your good work,  Lord?

My son, Jonathan Charles, a prince among men --

He's handsome, he's charming -- he even calls home now and then!

But the thing I love about Jon the most

Is that I'm sure he won't mind

(Or at least he'd be resigned)

 That we decided to name the pig

                                                    Juan Carlos.

After him.

                          On a whim.

Not  bcause he reminds us of Jon.

But as a whimsical thing to remember him by --

Because pigs can't fly

But Jon's such a nice guy.

Who loves his Mom.

Even though her poem stinks.

And who understands his Mom

When she misses the boat on things

Because she's waiting at the airport for the pigs with wings.

Jonathan Charles, son number three

Dearest Lord, thank-you for this young man,

Who also waits for them to land.

Juan Carlos, the yard-art flying pig

Because we never get tired of dreaming the impossible dream.

Another tramp through the woods...

The Road Not Taken

.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

.

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same, 

.

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back. 
.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

.

~ Robert Frost

Michelle and I went for a hike in the mountains and woods west of Sedalia, Colorado, on Sunday afternoon.  It's a long story, but the plan was to find a fire watch tower we'd read about.  We started out on the wrong path to begin with, though, and then we came to a fork in the trail. We took the one less traveled, and this is what we found:

Rocks, rocks everywhere.  Boulders, big and small -- of all shapes and sizes and man-size boulders, like this one, balancing on the edge of mountain-size boulders.

Lots of funny mushroom shaped rocks like this one (above).

Can you see the face in this one? 

( There were definitely trolls in these woods.)

 

Lots of fun, relatively safe boulders to climb.

These boulders arranged like Stonehenge reminded us of what happened to Bilbo's Trolls in The Hobbit.

After a bit, we hiked our way around a large stone outcropping...

....

.... and found the coolest cave!

Then we climbed onto some boulders near the cave and looked out across the ravine to the craggy mountainside -- the path more traveled where we were originally going to go.

And we looked down around our feet and found some first signs of fall.

On turning back, we saw the back of the large rock formation, over the cave.

Do you see what we saw?

We thought he looked like an Easter Island fellow (the guy from Night at the Museum, Dumdum, who likes gumgum), a Henson Muppet, or just another rock troll that lives in these enchanted woods.

The views, grand and tiny, were spectacular.  We had a wonderful time, and were grateful we'd taken the trail less traveled.  It was a glorious, slow, meandering day.  I'm thankful for all the chances God provides for me to slow down, and to enjoy His beautiful  creations -- particularly the wonderful gift of my first-born daughter.