Pumpkin Waffles

This summer I was inspired by the watermelon waffles I saw over at Sara's Art House, and although I never followed through to finish that good idea, yesterday on a whim the little man and I whipped up some pumpkin waffles for lunch.
To keep things simple on a fairly crazy day at our house (notice, or maybe you should ignore, the clutter in the boy's room and the toys on the counter?!) we simply used Krusteaz waffle mix (made according to the box's directions) with a few drops of yellow and red food coloring splashed in.  But since we've been studying the color orange and color mixing in general, that is okay!  It's more than okay.  It was educational!
In place of syrup (well, that was the plan, anyway, but somehow the syrup bottle still crept onto the table before lunch was over...) we made sweet "stems" by using a saved knob of cream cheese from the fridge (softened in the microwave), a little confectioner's sugar and some green icing coloring that we had on hand. Perfect!  This little guy had a great time cooking up lunch for everyone, and everyone had a great time eating it, too! Win-win-win.


 

image from www.whatsgoodattraderjoes.com

Important note: 
While these aren't the famed Trader Joe's Pumpkin Pancake/Waffle Mix waffles, the mix is currently in-house and they are on the menu for this weekend!!

WFD Featured on Remodelaholic!

Well would you look here?!  We were featured on the Remodelaholic blog! What an  honor!!  If you've never visited Remodelaholic, you simply must stop by at your earlist convenience.  Every single day she shows amazing diy projects that people have successfully finished, sometimes with links to tutorials, even.  It's an incredible place to get ideas!

And I'm still loving these chairs every single day!  That's a beautiful thing to me.  Thanks for visiting today - be sure to have a beautiful day! :)

Want to know something else beautiful, extra, just-for-free? ;)  The plant in this photo is a "baby" of a plant that my husband's grandpa gave to his mom when he was born, and she gave this to me when we were pregnant with our first child.  Such a precious treasure!

Sewing in No Man's Land

image from www.sewinginnomansland.com

How have I never seen this girl's handiwork before?!

image from www.sewinginnomansland.com

She has a stunningly gorgeous blog, with ah-may-zing projects, free tutorials/free patterns and jaw-dropping photos.  It's my new favorite place to drool!

 She also has an etsy shop... (although it's empty now, it can't hurt to keep an eye on it with stuff this cute).

image from www.sewinginnomansland.com

If you like to craft and sew - especially for little people but also for women - no kidding! - visit Sewing in No Man's Land right away.

(No she didn't pay me to say this and no, I don't even know her - I'm just so stunned by the beauty of her site/work I had to share with you!)

Beauty

The days are getting gray again around here, so we're inside more (which = blogging more~~) and enjoying the cozy comforts of fall in Washington. It's really a lovely season, especially when the drizzle clears and the clouds pile up on the foothills. We were on a walk this week when I noticed a bunch of the foggy whiteness scrunched up with the "hill" (we South-easterners still call them mountains...) of evergreens that towers above our town's river.
It took my breath away in its stark beauty!
Thank you, God, for eyes with which we can see your beautiful creation!

Sunday is Special

"The next day he [John] saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, 
who takes away 

the sin of the world!"

John 1:29

Crockpot Applesauce

Do you have any idea how easy this is?!  We have a tart apple tree in our backyard and wait all year to pick them and gobble, gobble, gobble them up.  We don't spray our tree (no icky stuff in our tummies!) so they aren't as pretty as some might like, but they make beautiful cooked apples! So when it's a bumper crop, well.... this is our go-to recipe!

There are many crock pot applesauce versions out there, but this one is my fave and comes from www.allaboutfoodstorage.com:

SLOW COOKER APPLESAUCE

4 lbs. tart apples, cored and thinly sliced (about 12 cups)

1/2 cup sugar (I used about 1/4 c.)

1/2 tsp. cinnamon or apple pie spice

1 cup water

1 Tbsp. lemon juice

Mix apples with cinnamon and sugar and put into Crock Pot.  Pour water and lemon juice over the apple mixture.  Cook on low for 6 hours, or on high for 3 hours.

In my experience, you really don't have to thinly slice your apples. To save time, just do large chunks and it turns out just the same!

If you cook it longer (8-9 hours on low) and stir it a bit,  you'll get apple butter, and if you cook it as described in the recipe above, you'll get chunky applesauce.  With a picky little boy in my house, I cook for 7 hours on low, then mash a bit (with my potato masher!) to get a creamier version. 

In the past I've also used Splenda brown sugar (in place of the granulated sugar) just to mix it up, and once when we bought very sweet apples, I used a scant half-cup of sugar for a huge batch of applesauce.  It tasted great with very little extra sweetener! 

Once I made pear sauce because I had too many pears, and it lost all the grainy pear texture and everyone thought it was dark apple sauce.  This is a truly versatile recipe and freezes/cans well.
Enjoy!

Dinner + Where've I been??

Simmering on my stove right now: traditional Ecuadorian Quinoa Soup w/ Beef, including tomatoes,
cilantro, onions, and carrots freshly brought in from my garden. Mmmmm.
Want to come to dinner?!  There's also fresh guacamole and corn chips...

Image from www.laylita.com

As for the unplanned hiatus, I'm trying to find the balance right now between enjoying the beauty of life in God's creation and blogging about it, plus my camera isn't cooperating so much... but I've got several things I'm dying to share, so I'll be back!