Sweet Potato Haul

“Hey, you have to come outside and see this!” my husband burst through the phone from 30 yards away. Last spring, he happened to see sweet potato slips at a feed store. He planted 20 of them (roots with a little bit of leaf), right next to the tiny, spring version of the annual fall tomato jungle. Sixteen of the 20 plants came up. We ignored them until after the first... Read More

A Visit to a Local Farm

We spent a day at a local organic farm recently. There were games on the lawn… a hay rack ride… (Click here to read more or leave a comment on A Visit to a...)  Read More

Angel Food Cake with Strawberry Rhubarb Jam

It’s always a treat when Annie comes to our house! Man, can my sister ever cook! Usually, Annie likes to make things up as she goes, but when it comes to baking… well, sometimes she still makes things up as she goes. For this angel food cake recipe, though, she followed every step exactly. And it turned out… heavenly. The recipe is from Glenda, a woman in Annie’s... Read More

Green Juice Fast

My husband is on a 15-day juice fast. Last week we watched the first half of “Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead.” It’s a documentary about a man who juice-fasted his way across the U.S.A. to save his own life, interviewing people about their diets as he went. It affected my husband so much that he is feeding green juice to our kids (who are very excited about this) and... Read More

Whole Wheat Bread Recipe

The smell of whole wheat bread, just out of the oven, is one of my favorite childhood memories. Our family never bought bread from the store. Mom always baked it. I was embarrassed to take the odd, thick slices to school as a sack lunch sandwich, but I was plenty happy to eat it straight out of the oven at home! Warm and smothered with butter and honey, it is a glorious piece of... Read More

Self Control

I started my New Year’s diet by finishing off a jumbo pack of peanut M&Ms. I needed to have them out of the house, so I ate them! Sigh. I’m taping this to the back of my hand: For God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control. 2 Timothy 1:7 Today is a new day and a fresh start. Happy Sunday!  Read More

"Favorite Things" Salad

Today marks Day One of a race with family to see who can lose ten pounds first! I’ve been pulling salad ideas out of the recipe box. For Christmas Eve dinner on my side of the family (where we made bets on who could lose the weight first) we ate a salad that was full of my favorite things. I went home and created my own version: (Click here to read more or leave a comment... Read More

Grown-Up Chocolate-Dipped Sugar Cookie Variations

Annie came over a few weeks, ago, and we had fun experimenting with sugar cookie flavor variations. She started by making a basic sugar cookie recipe. (Click here for a recipe from Martha Stewart. Don’t forget to leave time to chill the dough.) Then we divided the dough and mixed and matched flavors. (Click here to read more or leave a comment on Grown-Up Chocolate-Dipped... Read More

Another Man's Treasure

This past Friday, my in-laws arrived from Colorado. They planned to close on their new house in Kansas at noon. Unfortunately, the bank didn’t have all the paperwork processed, and the closing was delayed until Monday… and then until Tuesday. I started to head to town for food for our weekend guests, when my husband went to the freezer and pulled out that vat of chili... Read More

Pumpkin Muffins and the Power of Listening

This has been a busy week – no time for cooking adventures. I did make some pumpkin chocolate chip muffins, though. A new friend made these when I went to her house to meet her for the first time recently. We sat on her comfortable sofas and had a refreshing polysyllabic conversation that did not involve her asking me to fill a sippy cup with milk. Not even once. (Click... Read More