I'm just trying to walk myself home.
Cast Iron Skillet Cornbread Here’s some skillet cornbread to go with the soup your serving tonight! This hearty, made from stone ground cornmeal, not jiffy cornbread, is browned to the perfect state of crispy-edge-ness in a cast iron skillet. There is a secret to making this cornbread even tastier than it usually is. It’s not the …
I made this wonderfully hearty soup last week for two different events at our house and though I have no pictures, I am giving you the recipe because I’ve had several requests for it. I was introduced to this soup by my dear friend Karen Smith who I haven’t seen in oh, so long, but …
I am rereading Lying Awake by Mark Salzman for our Boxed Lunch Book Club* at church this week, and I forgot how wonderful it is. I am equally baffled this time as in my last reading at the intimacy with which this author portrays a cloistered group of nuns. First of all he is a …
Roasted Vegetable Soup This roasted vegetable soup is a variation on Late Harvest Soup, a wonderful fall soup full of those delicious orange vegetables that match the leaves this time of year. The small but distinct difference between last fall’s harvest pot and this year’s is the roasting of the vegetables. Roasting brings out …
So, when I got home from Canada this summer, I had all these little scraps of paper in my backpack on which I had written the names of books I had seen in various bookstores and wanted to one day read. This is something I do often, write down a book on a ridiculously small …
Three Cake Recipes for Three Birthday Cakes My husband is feeling mighty loved right about now. Mighty loved and maybe a weensy bit sick. As he eats his sixteenth piece of birthday cake. That’s because I made him not just one but THREE BIRTHDAY CAKES this year. The spread for Taido’s birthday, greatly enhanced by …
Asian Salad Trio + Homemade Ice Cream Sandwiches I feel like I am finally back in my cooking groove and I have sooo been wanting to share with you the delicioso bites coming from the Chino House kitchen. I have special people at my house every night, but on Wednesdays, we have extra special people …
At church this fall, Whitney and I are hosting what we are calling a Boxed Lunch Book Club. I am super excited about it, but I am a little nervous. Because lots of other people are super excited about it too, so I have sold like 20 books. …
Tread Lightly When It Comes To Middle School In general I have not been that mom who couldn’t stand it when her kid moved on from a stage in life. Not that there is anything wrong with that mom. In fact at times I have thought that there must be something wrong with me because …
The Bare Necessities For Traveling All Summer In A Pop Up Camper This morning I started going through some of the writing I did this summer that I never got around to finishing or posting. Because that is WAY more fun than laundry and unpacking. (I shoved all the piles into Simon’s old room and …
Canadian Rockies Tour: Of Glaciers and Grizzlies I am currently in the Canadian Rockies with my four children and my parents. Oh yes, Taido got a relief driver and gave us the slip so he could study without interruption for the final two weeks. So far he has missed a lot of time in the …
One night this summer we were camping at a fairly crowded campground near a beach on the Oregon Coast, and I became keenly aware of something that has been missing from my camping summer. I was walking back from the bathroom with Mary Polly and as we passed the different groups and families camping around …
Berry picking has got to be one of the greatest pastimes ever. Besides being great entertainment, the reward for your work is so great. If you love berries like I do, then you should definitely make plans to visit the Pacific Northwest the last week in July or the first week of August one …
So, Taido’s been reading aloud at night for the last couple weeks instead of me. At first I wasn’t really sure why, but I thought that it might have something to do with the fact that I started a book of King Arthur Stories after the boys began to lose interest in Anne on like book number …
If you are going camping this weekend or sometime soon and you happen to be near a Trader Joe’s, as I happily happen to find myself again, then you might like to discover, as I have, that you can get several days’ worth of relatively easy and healthy camping meals in one quick stop. Cooking …
Things I Love About Canada: Rhubarb Ok, I’m pretty sure Canada didn’t like invent rhubarb. In fact it isn’t even indigenous to North America, strangely enough, but Canada is where I have been lovingly introduced to this enticing vegetable, so I’m counting it as one of the things I love about Canada. Taido and I …
For the last two days, the sun has been shining in Vancouver and we have drunk it in. We have walked and biked in it, basked in it at two different parks and enjoyed its warmth through the windows of our lovely house. I lied on the grass at a park yesterday for two hours …
I finished a book this morning that I have been slowly reading since just before I left home. It’s called Finding Our Way Again. Isn’t that a great title? It’s about restoring to our lives some of the ancient traditions of faith that have given both sanity and sacredness to so many who have gone …
Souvenirs from Glacier National Park If I could magically give you a gift today via the internet it would be this, To sit you down on a bench in the Trail of the Cedars, And to fill all your senses with Glacier National Park. You would feel the mountain sun touch your face as it …
Recipe for Spring Cobb Salad with Bacon and Turkey This spring cobb salad recipe can serve as a reminder to go to your local farmers’ market tomorrow. I now have markets north and south of the river, which makes for a full and glorious Saturday morning of marketing. I brought home four different kinds of …