Happy Thanksgiving!

Our computer is on the fritz. Apparently, the fan needs to be replaced. It was making a terrible clicky clunky sound. I took off the covering, vacuumed the fan, put the covering back on. The clicky clunky sound was gone, but now it was loudly whirring. Whirr. WHIrr. WHIRR!!!!

So it's been shipped off for repair. Best Buy can't replace fans. They don't even sell them, they informed us and then asked if we backed up everything (we did, of course, being so wise). Bon Voyage little one.

We miss you.

Honestly, trying to respond to e-mails, track on Weight Watchers and respond on Facebook is challenging on my wee little smart phone. Fortunately, I can access Weight Watchers from work. Nothing else, though. Boo.

Any who... we're preparing for the annual Thanksgiving gorging, in which we are grateful for... Tums. I'm making cloverleaf rolls , apple pie and garlic mashed potatoes. Tim will be roasting the turkey, making the stuffing from scratch and gravy. We'll be traveling to his brother's house to celebrate with his middle brother and my sister.

I love this time of year. Perhaps because it was my mother's favorite holiday and she always seemed so happy (she would have been 56 years old today). Today I am grateful for the ten short years I had her in my life and for the memories I have of her untainted by my teenage angst years. Every time I bake an apple pie I think of her. Tonight I'll be making my pie crust and peeling and slicing apples. Tomorrow I will assemble the pie and bake it. I love the aroma of a pie baking in the oven. It always transports me to our first house and my mother in the kitchen around Thanksgiving. She did not bake often, but she did bake one pie for Thanksgiving and to this day, apple pie is my favorite. Thanks Mom!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Recipe #48 - Chunky chocolate chip Reese's Pieces peanut butter cookies!

 My husband loves cookies. I love him. So when he asks me to bake cookies at 8:00 at night, I can't help myself.

Recipes # 47 - feta, roasted red pepper and basil muffins

 This recipe is from The Art and Soul of Baking, which I've mentioned a bunch of times this year. This book, has without fail, the best recipes and instructions in it. I've never had a recipe go awry. Everything has been delicious and come out beautifully. My husband has great taste in cookbooks!

Recipe #46 - Persimmon cookies

A friend of mine and I decided that we would try out a food co-op called Bountiful Baskets and split the basket because so much produce comes in one basket. The first week we tried it we received persimmons. I'd never heard of them and had no idea what to do with one. After a bit of searching I found a cookie recipe.

Seven more recipes to go...

Yep, seven recipes and I will have completed my New Year's resolution.

I've been thinking about what to do with this blog after that. I have seven "followers" but no comments. I know I started this blog for my self, to track my progress with baking, but a blog really isn't a blog without readers, is it? As such, I'm considering scrapping it.

I look at all the baking blogs that I read and some of them are so engaging. When reading, I almost want to be friends with the author. I admire their style and ability to make their entries both education and entertaining. I don't know that I have the writing skills to achieve that. I wonder what their first year of blogging was like. Does it take time to build a base of readers? Perhaps I should find a blogging for dummies type book.

It's also a bit of an internal struggle... I'm very private, yet want to share. I want readers, but I worry about those overly critical mean comments that I see on some blogs.

Any how, I've made some persimmon cookies that I write about later this week.