Site moving

This little blog is moving.

I tried to send the new location to everyone that I think might be visiting, if I've missed you and you are interested, please email me at bikingala@comcast.net and I'll send you to the new address.

The housebuilding is finally underway this week :-)

He's a Bold One

He doesn't even try to hide and do it anymore. When I pick, he picks.

A Chapter Ends, a Chapter Begins

It's a big day in the Smith household.

Over a year ago we finally found and purchased our property in the country after 3 or 4 years of searching. We planned for several months to build a log home, but in December made a big decision to switch gears and build a farmhouse instead. In February we hired a firm to create our blueprints, and thought that since we had the plans drawn except for fine details, that we would have finished plans in a month or so. We finally got the completed plans at the end of May. On June 4 we applied for the construction loan, after being pre-qualified. Again, thinking a few weeks and we'd be closing. If you read the previous post, you saw that we encountered problems with the property department at the mortgage company. FINALLY, yesterday, after our lender threatened her own institution that if they didn't close this loan, she'd take it elsewhere and get it closed, they set a closing for 3:00 this afternoon. It actually happened. We're still feeling a little disbelief. Disbelief that it actually happened finally.

So tonight we met with Daniel the Builder. He has been working deligently behind the scenes to get everything ready to go, even though he didn't have a signed contract. He's been awesome, hanging in there with us through all of the cancelled closings, all he frustration, just having faith. So tonight we met and signed the contract and started making immediate plans. One of the things he's done is get estimates for the excavation and concreting for the basement, and he told us tonight he already has a crew ready to start excavating ... this coming MONDAY!! We are going to actually see digging on our property on MONDAY!! Needless to say, we're on a bit of a cloud right now. I'm not sure how my boss is going to take it when I tell him I have to be out for a bit on Monday to go take pictures when they start to dig :-).

So, now the fun begins. I get to start shopping. I'm not usually much of a shopper, but I think this may be a bit different. I could actually get excited about it I think.

First order of business, find the perfect pot filler!

A Few of My Favorite Things

We have enjoyed the peppers, tomatoes and zucchini from our little backyard garden so much this year. We are really looking forward to having a huge garden next year at our new house and growing all of our vegetables that we can.

Every day lately is harvest day.

I love cooking with fresh herbs, so I usually plant plenty. I've always wanted to dry them, but haven't had the time. That's one of the things I want to start doing next year. But for this year, I did try something I've not done before - I put quarts of basil and rosemary in the freezer, following freezing instructions I found on the Internet. Supposedly they freeze well, we'll see.

We will hopefully have some good news on the house-building front tomorrow. We are supposed to close on the construction loan tomorrow afternoon, after many, many trials. There has been concern by the property department at our mortgage company, who looked at the property pictures the appraisers provided them and deduced that we are building in the middle of nowhere. And a house in the middle of nowhere doesn't appraise for a lot, so they couldn't agree with the appraisers on the appraised value, evidently. It took our loan officer driving out to our property and taking pictures of surrounding properties, measuring distances to Huntsville and to schools and other houses, etc. You get it. A lot of work. And a lot of postponed closing dates. FINALLY today all the new evidence was accepted and everything closed out. Our very patient builder has everything in order, ready to break ground as soon as we give him the go-ahead. Hopefully that will be tomorrow.

We did get a nice surprise last weekend when we made our usual trek to look at the property (yes, we look at it a lot. Just look at it.) When we turned off the main road we saw a beautiful site over the rise...utility power poles! Two of them, down the property line, ready for power to be turned on when we take the building permit to the utility company. They will later run underground cables from the property line to the house.

It doesn't take much to get us excited these days :-)

Summer Temptations

It really doesn't matter how well you try to control the diet during the summer, there's always something yummy lurking around the farmer's market, or growing on a tree in the yard, like at my lucky friend Dawn's. Things that really should turn into pies, muffins, jams...

We couldn't resist the temptation to buy lots of blackberries so that we could freeze them and have them all year. These didn't make it to the freezer.

They turned into this ... a delicious cobbler.


Yum. I love summer.

Correction on the Last Post

OOOPS...error on the zucchini bread recipe on the last post.

The oil ingredients should be 1 c. (or 1/2 c. applesauce and 1/2 c. oil).

I'm sorry, hope no one made this yet, without realizing 1 c. of each would be A LOT!

Happy Baking

Zucchini and More Zucchini

I mentioned in previous posts that we have zucchini the size of footballs growing in our little garden. I threw a couple of huge ones away, thinking they wouldn't be good. Then yesterday we were at the Madison County Farmer's Market, and I saw...yep...HUGE zucchinis for sale. I asked the farmer if they were good when they were that large (like I thought he would say no?), and he assured me they are. So, I decided I'd try using the huge ones to make bread.
It wasn't hard to find a huge one out there.

This is the ingredient list I used:

INGREDIENTS
• 3 cups all-purpose flour (or 1 c. whole wheat, 2 c. white)
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 3 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 3 eggs
• 1 cup vegetable oil (or 1 c. applesauce, 1 c. oil)
• 2 cups white sugar (or 1 c. white, 1 c. brown)
• 3 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 3 cups grated zucchini
• 1 cup chopped walnuts (optional)

DIRECTIONS
Grease and flour two 8 x 4 inch pans. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C).
Sift flour, salt, baking powder, soda, and cinnamon together in a bowl.


Beat eggs, oil, vanilla, and sugar together in a large bowl. I used my pure vanilla that I got in Mexico last week. You can't beat pure vanilla.


Add sifted ingredients to the creamed mixture, and beat well.


Stir in zucchini and nuts until well combined.


Pour batter into prepared pans and bake for 40 to 60 minutes, or until tester inserted in the center comes out clean. I suggest leaving it in as close to the max as possible without it burning, at least 50 - 55 minutes if possible. It's very, very moist, and might be a bit too moist at 40 minutes. In my oven 50 min was good.


Cool in pan on rack for 20 minutes. Remove bread from pan, and completely cool.




The one zucchini made these 2 loaves, and I had about 1/4 of it leftover. About 40 more loaves, and maybe I can use up the large ones I have left.