Project for 2010

I drove home today through downtown San Jose- now let me tell you, this is no big deal as downtown is only about 1 mile long! San Jose is built around neighborhoods, most people have to go no more than 2 miles in any direction for anything they need - movies, cleaners, grocery stores, shopping malls, etc. So downtown San Jose has almost no retail business, other than a lot of great restaurants- however, there is a lot of old and new architecture here- the main library is downtown and the convention center and the center for performing arts are all there as well - and I realized, that although I have lived here the major portion of my life, I really don't have any photos of the area. Since I plan to retire in the next 2-2 1/2 years, I've decided that this year I will work on taking photos of the places I go, places with interesting architecture, etc., until I have a good photo representation of San Jose. I doubt I'll get it scrapped this year, but I will have the photos, so they can be scrapped any time!

This will allow me to play with my photo skills a bit, and see what kind of interesting photos I can take. Should prove interesting!

Waiting for 2010

Christmas is over, the decorations have been taken down, the house is back to clean and simple. I love my Christmas decorations and have a lot of fun getting them displayed every year, but by the day after Christmas, I'm ready to put them away, and I usually do! This is something that I've just started in oh say, the last 7-8 years. I used to always leave the tree and all the decorations up until New Year's Day, that's the way we always did it when I was growing up, so I just continued that tradition. But now, it's all cleaned up shortly after Christmas, not only at my house, but in all my family's too. We've all changed that tradition.

Just catching up on odds and ends this week - we have the week off work, and I always look forward to this week- I have to go in for a couple of hours tomorrow to make sure all the loose ends are tied up for year end - but it's quite there, no one else is in, there's no traffic, and I can go in whatever time I want!

That's all the news for today!

Merry Christmas!

Christmas Eve was so much fun! Great dinner with family- the 3 year old was so excited she can't stand it- the 2 week old- he's just slept! Another couple of years before he really gets into Christmas.

Merry Christmas Eve!

It's here! Christmas Eve. Long awaited, and soon over so fast!

Hope Everyone is exactly where they want to be!

It's almost Christmas!

The bags are packed just waiting to be loaded into the car- the house is - uh - straightened up - the cats are fed and have food and water for the next few days.
I'll work about 1/2 a day tomorrow then head off to the family and celebrate Christmas.

I'm ready!

Recipe Wednesday!

Since it's so close to Christmas, this definitely needs to be a Christmas recipe ...hmmmm- which one - there are so many favorites at Christmas... Got it - this is a great Christmas morning breakfast!

Eggnog Pancakes

• 1 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• Pinch nutmeg
• 1 1/2 cups eggnog (can use light)
• 2 tablespoons oil
• 1 large egg, beaten


1.In a medium mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Whisk to blend ingredients.

2.Preheat griddle to medium-high (I set my electric skillet to 300 degrees F).

3.In a separate bowl, stir together eggnog, oil, and egg. Pour into dry ingredients and whisk just until dry ingredients are moistened. Batter will be fairly thick.

4.Drop batter by quarter-cupfuls onto oiled skillet. Cook pancakes until bottoms are golden brown and bubbles appear on the surface. (Because the batter is so thick, check the bottoms before bubbles break at the surface so they don't burn.) Turn and cook other side. Keep warm in oven until all the batter is cooked.

5.Serve pancakes warm with butter and syrup or honey. Enjoy!

Serves 4 to 6.

Swedish Saffron Bread

During the 1990-1991 school year, I had an exchange student from Umea, Sweden. It was a great year and we exchanged a lot of ideas, traditions, etc.

Just before Christmas she made Saffron bread, or as I reacently found out, it's also called lussekatter.

2 years later I flew to Sweden to spend Christmas with her and her family. I got to have this wonderful Saffron Bread again - and that's the last time!

Something came over me today and I decided I wanted to make the Saffron bread, there were many recipes on the internet, but I couldn't decide which one to try, so what else to do but email my student's mother and ask her for the recipe. She sent it right back. It was in Swedish, but I knew it would be. I found a great Swedish to English translater at Google, and after copying the recipe to a word document, I was able to upload that document and it came back instantly, translated into English. The ingredient measurements were still in the metric system, so I found a metric kitchen converter, said a litle prayer, and started in. This came together so easily, and when the first batch came out, I wanted to scream with delight, they looked perfect, but I knew the true test was in the taste..I cold barely wait for them to start to cool down before I had to try one - Yes! That was exactly the taste I remembered! What fun!

Here's a picture of the finished product:



I think I just started a new tradition!

Number of 2009 posts vs 2008 posts

I just looked at the number of posts I had in 2008 - the real first year of my blog - and I had 120- then I looked at this year, and oops, it's only at 99 - and even if I post every day for the rest of the month (doubt that will happen) I'd only be at about 115/116 - so don't think I'll get as many blog posts this year as I did last.
Somthing to work on for next year!

Cards are in the mail, packages have yet to be wrapped - and I'm still up in the air about doing any more baking - many of the family members can't or don't want to eat sweets, so we've cut way back - and I can't see making stuff just to be making it, though sometimes I do miss the special "christmas" stuff we used to make - but oh those calories! yeesh! We'll see what the weekend brings.

Happy Holidays!

Just a Thursday!

I got a new camera recently, after seeing the pictures a friend took with hers. I've been working with it, and this is the first picture I printed -I love it. I want to think it's the camera that made it come out so well! This plant was a present from another friend for my birthday-and the cats aren't eating it.

Off to new things!

Weekend

I had a pretty productive weekend! After realizing I was only home 1 weekend out of 4 in November, I decided it was definitely time to stay home this weekend, and stay home I did, not even venturing out in the car one time. I did walk around the park by my house yesterday, but that was more to try out my new camera than anything else.

I managed to get all my Christmas cards finished - not mailed yet because the post office hasn't delivered the stamps I ordered, but hopefully today. (You see, one of the 3 things I dislike doing more than anything else, is going to the post office)

I also managed to get all the laundry caught up- so now I won't have to do it until after Christmas, I got the craft room straightened up, but it never stays that way long, I finished 2 Christmas presents, and this week I plan to finish the rest.

Christmas shopping was pretty easy this year, most everyone on my list wanted cash or gift cards - so that was easy enough to do - some I even did on line! Now I just have to be creative with the wrapping so they don't guess them quite right off the bat!

This morning we got a great early Christmas present, little Colton Hud arrive at 5:552 am this morning, mother and son are doing well, and Dad is glad this part's over!