Happy Halloween! Cue the Christmas music. Also, pie.

Happy Halloween! I bet you'll never guess what's in my Halloween mug! Oh, wait, you did?? That's right, it's coffee with pumpkin spice creamer! Not that is was a tough guess, but good for you!

Of course, if you are posh and really have it together, you have a kitty who coordinates with your favorite Halloween mug. Incidentally, I have two beautiful boys who coordinate with my mug. Below is the baby of the two, my lil' guy, and yes, his eyes are that huge. There has not been any doctoring done to the photo. He is as God made him, and he's stunning. Also, he gets held and kissed a lot, and that is because I am as God made me, and He made me nuts for babies.

                                                

Okay! Now, the pies. So, I have a girlfriend who is basically a surrogate auntie for me. My precious aunts on both sides live far away, so we do not get to see one another often. I made a friend years ago who is a kindred spirit in so many ways, I swear, we should have been born related to each other. She is someone I'd take a bullet for in a heartbeat. 

She is also a fabulous baker. Below are two pies that she made that I had the pleasure of enjoying alongside the company of a group of friends. The first pie is butterscotch, the second pie is cherry. Y'all, my friend literally cooked these pies straight from scratch, including the cherry filling. I cannot tell you how good these were, and I could not decide which was my favorite. God bless my sweet friend.

Look at this lil' pumpkin, baby Trudy.This is the "I hear the treat bag" face. Isn't it hilarious? She's a litter mate of the gorgeous lil' guy above in this post. Or maybe it was the spooky episode of Scooby Doo (LOL) that we were watching that made her eyes go big?! Either way, what a doll.

Tomorrow, the Christmas music will be everywhere, if it isn't already! My time has been so occupied with work and other things that I rarely get anywhere these days. It may already be out there, but if it's not, it seems like the end of Halloween tends to trigger Christmas music. Spooky, huh (ha, ha)? 

I've done barely anything for Christmas so far, but yesterday, I did order the gifts for our veterinarian family (yes, they're family to us). We've been going to this particular veterinarian office for two decades. They've helped us with nearly every single one of our rescues. Christmas is my chance to say a little bit bigger thank you. They have hard jobs. I couldn't do their jobs, and I'm so very grateful that they can. We genuinely love them.

I'll miss the anticipation of autumn and Halloween as we delve deeper into the holiday season. I'm a firm believer that the anticipation of some things is just as good as the actual day itself. My buildup to any holiday season is pretty plain, but for me, it's  life-affirming in the best way. It includes some good seasonal coffee and a few treats, decorations that we've used for years that feel like old family friends, and a couple of trips to some quaint places to see the remaining foliage and to look in some small-town shops for a few Christmas presents. It's calm and underwhelming and allows one to be reflective. 

I cannot believe we turn the calendar page yet again tomorrow. It's a gift to be able to do so, but it's also a bit of a shock. Where did 2021 go? I feel like I skipped so many things, and while the new year brings the opportunity to make whatever plans we feel to be necessary, we also know that within the confines of those plans that life happens. We put on our catcher's mitt and deal with whatever comes our way, the best way we know how. If I can stand up every day and in whatever moment I am standing, I am able to say "Come and see what God has done," then my days count. God expects us to put in the time and effort. He's not Harry Potter with a magic wand and spells, there to make life easy or grant our wishes. But He IS there to be our strength and our shield. I have had dark days, as we all have. But God is the Light, and if we can keep hold of that, we can hang on, even in the hardest moments.

Love to you on this fun Halloween Sunday! May your day be full of no tricks and all goodies! Eat something you love, watch something silly and, most of all, be at peace, even in the midst of whatever storm may be swirling around you. Remember, with God on your side, that storm is already defeated.

Doughnuts are forever

From September through the New Year, food has its own place on the living spectrum. It's very nearly front and center and not quite outdone by the early Christmas music that starts on the evening of Thanksgiving Day at  one of our regional radio stations. I can't think of much else that would diminish the time frame kicked off by Pumpkin everything and somewhat wrapped up by champagne and caviar at midnight, followed by millions of New Year's resolutions to "eat better and start exercising."

But doughnuts. Doughnuts are forever. They're for year round, y'all. By now, you know that Peggy Ann Bakery is my local bakery obsession, every single thing there just rocks. I do have other mild obsessions in the doughnut world - Auntie Ruth's Doughnuts being one of them. They have a food truck that has a fairly steady location, and they are also at several regional festivals. I'm that homing pigeon that makes a beeline for that truck every time I see it. These are lovely, large, yeasty, gooey, warm doughnuts dipped in a warm glaze. They. Are. Huge. Every doughnut is a pleasure, a small, kinda naughty meal that when you've finished eating, you know you had something special. See the picture farther down.

Let's bring the weather into this. Yesterday started out rainy and windy and in the 60s. Blech. No matter, I got some things done on a work project rather than power down and lay on the couch and do nothing (really wanted to go that route, but work piles up if it doesn't get tended). But the weather was worth it, because by 2 p.m., the sun had come out and it was crisp and breezy! It was breezy enough to dry the grass and lawn chairs, so we got to take babies out for play. Pictures below, after the doughnut.

The yucky front blew in some glorious weather for the week, with temps in the 60s and sun and breeze all week long! Nearly perfect for Autumn. Lunch outside today will be a treat, 54 degrees by 1 p.m. with 8 mph winds. Let's come full circle with the doughnuts- I bought extra, so dessert today will be huge donuts slightly warmed, topped by cherry pie filling and cool whip. Notice, please, that I'm several paragraphs into this post, and I'm still yammering about the doughnuts. Okay, enough. I'll get a picture of that dessert. In the meantime, the picture below is one of the doughnuts in its natural habitat, wrapped in thin parchment paper and carried in a crinkly, brown paper sack. It's a lovely thing. Respect.

Yesterday, we spent about an hour at an annual festival that they have outdoors each year (well, Covid messed that up last year, but it's back!). There are over 120 vendors, and the festival is located just two streets away from us. Each year, we get up and go before the crowd hits, it's ridiculously convenient because it's nearby. It has rained every year for the last four years, but no problem, rain boots and umbrellas fix that and we just mucked through to look for Christmas gifts and birthday gifts, etc. We had a nice time, found some gifts, and headed home to get warm and to dig into one of those doughnuts.

I'm not missing summer yet. I'm enjoying this cool down too much, but I know the day will come when I just want to be warm again. In the meantime, there is lots to look forward to - a few more festivals, holiday foods, being outside without mosquitoes, getting chilled then walking into a toasty house, holiday flavored coffees, Peanuts holiday specials - you get the picture. As you can see in the pictures of the kittens below, our trees have not changed just yet. We are still pretty green, but that's okay, the landscape won't become so drab so quickly if the leaves linger a bit longer. I hope you have a blessed Sunday and that you are loving the season wherever you are.

That FB glitch and "what we call a house"

Starting the post with a picture of Baby Oscar, because why wouldn't I? What a doll. He is three years, seven months old, hard to believe. He and his littermate, Oliver, are my very special boys. I never tire of looking at them, they're beautiful.

Speaking of beautiful, look at mama and her little boy. Aren't they the cutest? I love to pick up these two, they're super "fluffy" (okay, chunky), and when you hold them, you know you've gotten hold of a plush kitty. Pure goosh.

Today's post is super random, covering topics that rolled around in my head recently, and I thought might be of note to re-read later on when I'm going back and trolling my life in past years (mainly to keep up with what worked in the gardens from year to year).

I came off Facebook permanently a while back. Apparently, FB had an outage for several hours recently. That outage received more coverage than anything remotely newsworthy, yet I don’t think that anyone died from the outage. 

I enjoyed some things about FB, and I think there are people who do truly good things via FB. Truth be told, I miss it at times. But I also felt like FB manipulated a lot of information and tried to squelch freedom of speech. I’m hoping that some people found relief in the lack of access to FB, perhaps found themselves with some time on their hands to live beyond social media.

I watch one particular person on YouTube regarding the frugal lifestyle and have learned some very good things from her. She and her husband live in France now, but they are from the UK. My introduction to the phrase "aggregation of marginal gains" came from her, and I read the story behind it. It was truly good and helpful. Look it up if you have time, it's really common sense laid out.

Most recently, she talked about some of the things that she and her husband did as they worked toward a debt-free life. Part of that included downsizing their home. I laughed pretty hard when she said that the first home they moved to after downsizing was what Americans call a "tiny house," but what they refer to in England as "a house." She's not wrong! Houses in the US are way too big. They suck up resources unnecessarily and, while I'm glad for anyone's success and for them having a beautiful home, I think excess in lifestyle is basically another type of gluttony.

Our home is very modest and was already 50 years old when we bought it. We had to put some money into it to make it livable, but I don't really spend money re-doing it or getting it refreshed and more 'up to date' aesthetically. There's not really any style or flow to it, but it's home and it feels like home. I do need to re-paint a couple of rooms and replace some tired, old, yucky rugs, but outside of that, it is what it is. If any remaining renovations don't get done before I die, then they didn't matter!

The next installment of the movie franchise "Halloween" comes out this weekend! We can stream it through one of our streaming services, so that is the plan for Saturday, when the cooldown blows in with rain in the forecast. Hazelnut coffee with pumpkin ice cream will do nicely for the viewing event. It's only Wednesday, and I'm beyond ready for the weekend! I've got to start thinking about Christmas presents, I've made zero progress in that area, literally. 

Happy hump day to you, I'm headed to the kitchen for a refill of pumpkin spice coffee with butter cookie creamer and some cheese toast. May 5 p.m. roll around quickly so that we can get back to life after work!

Puppers, holiday food, corn puddin' and the earth

Look at puppers. It's Sunday morning, and she's trying to sleep in. She's not in the least bit interested in me at the moment. Breakfast isn't for a bit yet, so she's going back to sleep. We love our girl. Lacey is an excellent dog. She is extremely loyal to me, and it's obvious that if you're around her for more than two minutes, you easily see that I'm her person. I'm honored and humbled by that. She's just beautiful.

The first Crocktober is officially cooking away on high for the first hour, then on low for the following 2-3 hours. Here it is, corn puddin', in its nekkid state. This is full of the good stuff - cream corn, fresh garden corn from friends of my parents, sour cream, colby cheese, local honey, eggs, milk, butter, Jiffy cornbread mix, all mixed up and poured into a crock-pot liner for easy clean up. I did use oil on the liner as an extra precaution against sticking. Here's hoping it works!

I would think that cutting up some fresh jalapenos and using pepper jack cheese would give this a nice kick, too. I tend to like cheese with a nearly-bitter edge like stiltons and blue cheese and very aged cheddar. A three-year aged cheddar would probably be phenomenal in this, especially served with an autumn side salad that has dried cranberries and a creamy but semi-sweet vinaigrette dressing. The Aldi kale salad kit would be VERY good with this if a strong cheese were used.

This is the time of year when food is on my mind a lot. I've got carrots cooking away in honey water on the stove top. They'll be tossed in real butter and heavily salted and peppered and eaten with the corn casserole. Later today, I'll fix an alfredo pasta dish tossed with barely steamed broccoli, which will be supper for two nights in a row. I was hoping to avoid the grocery store this weekend (my least favorite task), but we'll have to go for a few necessities. I'm thinking Aldi then Publix or Ingles.

Speaking of Ingles, it's a regional chain. Our newest one is beautiful, and during the holiday seasons, they decorate the store front. When you walk in, you see the produce market, floral shop, food court, hot deli bar, salad and wings bar, bakery and coffee shop. This time of year, there are big cinnamon brooms, pumpkin displays, bins full of varieties of apples, caramel apple displays, cider, etc.  It's just gorgeous. They carry the vegan meat that we eat, but this time of year, I like to troll their kiosk and holiday foods, as well. I don't often veer from the grocery list because it really adds up when you begin throwing random non-list items in the cart, but the last quarter of the year, I make that exception. 

This time of year, I love seeing barrels of loose nuts in the shell with those giant, metal scoops. Orange and cherry slices signal the holidays to me, too, far better than gumdrops, although I do like those as long as they aren't spiced. Chocolate and maple creme drops are killer good, especially eating them alongside cinnamon red hots. I'm not a big hot chocolate person, but I do like a mug every now and then topped with marshmallows and cool whip (yep, both of those, please). Warm butterscotch anything is wonderful, too, as is pretty much anything caramel or pumpkin.

I've got to start thinking about the garden for next year, but every time I see a plane overhead, I feel like it cancels out the good that I try to do for our pollinators. It's a tough line to walk, I've flown before and enjoyed the convenience of it, but I have mixed emotions about it. I, personally, gave it up a few years ago. I think plane fuel is very detrimental to the earth. 

The solar energy people are yelling about isn't good for the earth, either. Do you know what it takes to create those millions of solar panels? Coal. Tons of coal. Those panels are imported, usually, and the nations that make them use coal to fuel the electricity needed to make crank them out to these countries who think these panels create a lower impact on the earth. They don't, and it's heartbreaking. (BTW, I am not anti-coal. I believe that coal is useful for electricity, and if the consumption of electricity were curbed by man-kind in general, the coal resource would be far more beneficial overall and far less threatening than other types of sources.)

An all-cotton, reusable bag takes gallons of water to make, and a "paperless" society means that landfills will be full of metal and plastic and fiber optic cords - millions of miles of them - as technology continues to grow and change at rapid speed. Was paper really so bad? We can plant trees. We can replenish that supply indefinitely. But we cannot undo the plastic and the metal. 

I don't like asphalt/concrete, either. People comment about how much cooler it always feels at our house. It is because we did not pave our driveway, no do we plan to. We have not quite two acres and we have grass and trees and a rock driveway. Gravel breathes much better than asphalt, no matter how modern the design of the mix for the asphalt. Nobody talks about asphalt, but it is a significant source of pollution and affects crowded, urban areas terribly, not to mention what it puts out into our atmosphere.

There is no easy answer. I'm not a tree hugger, but I'm also not an idiot. I do believe in global warming, but my perspective is different than most people who "worry" about it. We bought an older home and fixed it up. We drive old cars so that, perhaps, at least for us, we are putting less scrap and junk metal into a landfill over the course of our lifetime. We do use reusable bags, but they're polyester so that they can be washed and hung on the line to dry and used for years. They won't rot through like all cotton does eventually, and it did not take gallons of water to create them. 

I hated the day that I got a smart phone. Flip phones were fine, society did not need to be plugged in 24/7. I wonder how many discarded phones there are now. Remember landlines? You kept the same phone pretty much an entire a lifetime. I love a lot of our modern day conveniences, but many of them also make me cringe. 

I'm trying to live more thoughtfully these days, more aware of what impacts are made and how they are made. I avoid jumping on bandwagons until I TRULY think about what some of these groups are saying about the earth. If someone is preaching about global warming then hopping on a plane, beware of the "truth" they speak. If they have an enormous home - solar power or otherwise - and they're preaching about global warming, beware of their words. Seek for yourself those truths and draw your own conclusions. 

I'm off to check my corn pudding! Fingers crossed it turns out like I'm hoping. October is officially in full swing!