I LIVED THROUGH IT!

I was interviewed on the radio today

and I survived to tell about it.

The lady that runs the library asked me to

come onto her library show and talk about

some of the books that interest me and I

agreed (reluctantly) because 1)I don't think

I have a very nice speaking voice and 2)When

she said 1/2 hour of time I couldn't imagine

what we would talk about for that long, but

it went really fast.

My favorite kinds of books (other than

cookbooks) have to do with survival stories,

people beating the odds, what happens after

the end of the world, etc. I didn't know until

I looked it up, but that genre of stories

is called Apocalyptic Fiction.

So I went on the 1/2 hour show today to

talk about Apocalyptic Fiction and we

discussed some of my favorite books:

Excellent! This book will

really make you think...and

will make you want to learn

how to do a lot more things

for yourself...

I stopped reading Stephen King

quite awhile ago because he has

gotten too weird and dark for my

tastes. But this story remains

a classic. It is well written with a

lot of thought put into each of the

characters. It is the classic

Good versus Evil story that

ends well.

This is one of my favorite books.

Written from the perspective of

a man whose brother is high up

in the military and is privy to

classified info about the nuclear

bombs that the USA is being

threatened with. Alas Babylon

is the code name they use to say

that the bomb is coming...excellent

info. in this book and a very well

written story to boot.

This is a very thick book about

a young girl (Swan) that has an

amazing gift for growing things

and how she plays a large part

in the survival of all living things

on the earth after a catastrophe

of world wide proportions.

Warning--there are some graphic

portions of this book that I wish

I could have just skipped over.

Overall I would read it again

because it is well written and

is an excellent adventure story.

The show will air this Saturday

at 6:30 pm our time if any of

you here in town want to hear

me stumble over my words and

you can even hear me drop the

whole pile of books I was holding

onto the floor at one point.

Gah. What an amateur.

:-)

JUST 2 HANDS AND A GUITAR

Wow--I love acoustic guitar and this guy is amazing.

JUST CAKES

It's been a busy couple of weeks as far as

cakes and with the Farmer's Markets

thrown in there too let's just say I have

been buying a lot of eggs!

Here are some of the cakes that have

gone out the door lately. I still forget

to take pictures sometimes, but I am

getting better at that.

I am thinking that at this weekend's

Farmer's Market I may bring cupcake

cups. I sold those at the big Artisan

Market in December and they were

a big hit. So big in fact that I ran out

immediately. And I had people

coming back looking for more.

What I do is make several flavors of

cupcakes and buttercream. I cut each

cupcake in half, put the bottom of a

cupcake in a clear cup, a layer of

buttercream, the top of the cupcake,

a layer of buttercream and then

repeat. Each cup gets a lid on top

to keep it fresh and I attach a spoon

to the side of the cup. It makes a

great portable treat that you can

eat as you are walking around or

you can buy several and give to

friends or take home for desert

that night.

The most popular flavor was the

dark chocolate cake with fluffy

white icing in the middle and the

whole thing topped with chocolate

buttercream.

For this weekend I am thinking

about these combos:

Dark Chocolate/Peanut Butter

White Cake/Raspberry & White

White Cake/Coconut Buttercream

White Cake/Lemon & White

Chocolate/Chocolate

These cups are $4.00 each,

which I think is a pretty decent

deal for 2 freshly baked cupcakes

in a to-go container nowadays.

Sounds good? Which one would

you buy?

Let's Get Out on the Water!

More beautiful weather has come our way so we

decided to get the work done and head out on

the boat!

This time we went out to one of the bays that

were a little bit farther away and we brought

the kayaks along.

My daughter getting the feel for her paddle:

My sister getting into her kayak:

It's not that easy from the boat. You need someone

to steady the kayak and you need to be coordinated

enough to stick both feet in at the same time and

then sit down quickly before it tips.

Whew--nobody got wet.

The view as I am heading out to explore the bay:

There is my daughter waaaaay over there by herself.

I didn't worry too much since she was wearing a life

jacket and the worst that could happen was she would

end up wet and someone would go over and help her

get back onto the boat.

The water is so clear you can see all the way down to

the bottom. There were thousands of clam and mussel

shells on the bottom and when we got closer to shore

we could see the bottom literally moving with hermit

crabs and small regular crabs.

Looking up at the beautiful forest surrounding the bay.

Once you stop paddling there is total silence. The

air smells so clean and fresh.

This was a neat contrast with the barnacles on top and

the mussels underneath the water:

Oh, and the prize that we came for--beach asparagus!

I learned about this when I saw a lady selling it at the

Farmer's Market. It grows wild (you just have to find

out where, of course) and it is easily picked and tastes

delicious! It is crunchy and a bit salty, perfect for

stir fry and adding to vegetable dishes. Can you just

imagine the nutritional value of this stuff, growing

wild and totally pollution free?

Yum! I took the risk of getting out of the kayak to pick

a whole bag for us to share. I didn't have a gun with me and

the bear factor is pretty high out here where people don't

go much, but hey, I'll risk my life for freshly picked

asparagus--wouldn't you? :-)

Even after picking a huge bag I stood back and looked at

the patch and I couldn't tell where I had picked it from.

Kinda cool looking kelp growing--no we didn't eat it.

We came across this huge slide--see where it starts

at the top? I noticed there are a lot of these all around

these bays. It must happen when we have the winters

with huge amounts of snowfall.

Oh my word--I've spotted Bigfoot!!!!!

See him to the left creeping out of the woods??!!

Oh.

My brother in law stayed on the boat and fly

fished for humpies.

Heading back to the boat...ahhh, back to reality...

MY HOW TIME FLIES!

I was going to say When you're having fun...but that

is not very accurate, at least for my Mom. She had

a setback in the middle of July and was taken back

to the hospital. Her regular doc wasn't there, so

the attending one suggested they take a "wait

and see" attitude as to why all of the sudden

abdominal pain and nausea.

She didn't improve, so when her doc got back they

went ahead and did another surgery. Good thing

they did, because they found a big part of her

intestines had twisted and buckled, which was

causing all of the pain and of course, everything

was backing up in her system.

No reason given, she didn't do anything wrong.

The doc called it a string of bad luck.

They ended up taking out approx. 7 inches of

her intestines and she has been suffering

through the last week or so with pain and

lots of nausea. I talked with her today and

she was just getting ready to receive a blood

transfusion. It should make her feel a whole

lot better, hopefully with a lot more energy

so she can go home soon and heal.

I have been selling at the Farmer's Markets, which

is a lot of work but a lot of fun too. Here are my

daughter and I at our table:

This was most of the way through the day so all I had

left were gluten-free cupcakes and cookies.

See my computer on the right? What an awesome

tool a Mac can be. I have it set to slideshow and I

have pictures of my cakes and cookies scrolling the

whole time I am at my table selling. People just

love this feature and comment to me about it all

the time.

And the fishing! This time of year a lot of

effort is spent harvesting to fill the freezers

for winter. Here is my husband pulling up

the skate line he set earlier the day before.

It takes a bit to learn where the best spots

are to set the skate. And you don't dare ask

anybody, no siree! The most detailed answer

you will ever get is... Out in the water. Or,

my favorite...In my secret spot.

Wow, how very helpful!

So you just get your buns out there and

learn for yourself. Sometimes you get

good eating fish, sometimes you don't:

No, these skates are not for eating. They

sure are cool looking, though aren't they?

We let him go and off he swam, he was

very happy to be released.

The eyes were blue--weird.

Lots of these huge sunstars in the crab pots

my husband set out. They are not like regular

starfish, they have lots of legs and get really big.

Oh, and then my personal favorite, the

Wolf Eels. Yuk. My husband took a friend

out with him and one of the eels had

swallowed the hook so far that they

couldn't save it. So he took the eel home

and cooked it to eat. We talked to him

later and he said it was a white meat and

tasted like a mild fish. BUT, the texture

was mushy, which would have done me in.

eeew.

throw. it. back.

Look how gorgeous! We went up to one of the

bays not far from our house and it was calm

and silent. There were eagles in the trees just

sitting calmly and watching us slowly float,

nobody else was around anywhere.

I asked my husband--Can't we just stay here forever?

Next time we will bring the kayaks and paddle around

the whole bay.

Today was the first day of hunting season for deer. My

husband and older daughter were gone at first light.

They set a skate on the way up to where they were

going (sshhhh...it's a secret place) to hunt and

shot a spike at 9:30am. The spikes are small, but

boy oh boy is the meat good. Every part of a deer

this size is a tenderloin.

On the way back they checked the skate they had

set and there was a real nice halibut on there:

I quite like the idea of a freezer full of

clean, organic meat, how about you?