Rain

It rained overnight.

Sure, it wasn't much by the rest of the country's standards but it will be just enough to boost rice grass production.

Unfortunately, it will also be just enough to boost weed production, too.

I got the newspaper and landscape cloth laid out in the front.  Hubby moved the 1/2 wine barrels over after I emptied them.  I'm going to do flowers in the barrels on drip instead of having sprayers in the front.  I'd like to do a pond out there as well at the end of the boardwalk.  Maybe a seer ball with water trickling over it or a rock with a hole in it and water spewing out the top.  Some gold fish would be nice.

Really warm overnight at 45 degrees.  Cloudy but 60 already today.

I have to go.  The homemade hamburger buns need to go into the oven:)

Sunday

For several years I made the effort to go to church on Sundays.  When that church wasn't making sense, I tried several more churches.  In the end, none of them made any more sense than the others.

I could have switched from Christianity to another religion.  There are plenty available but after giving it some thought, I decided to just stay home on Sundays and enjoy my secular life.  I am no less moral but I am a lot happier.

It is snowing just a bit but it isn't sticking.  We are right at freezing but the temp should go up a bit as the day goes on.

I brought a wheel barrow load of wood in early, on my way back in from feeding the goats and the horse.

I haven't felt really well for several days but I can't really say I am sick either.  I think I am fighting off the flu but, who knows?  Maybe it is just the mid winter blahs:)

I have been using the hedge trimmer to cut down spindle bushes [official name Purple Smoke bushes].  They are nothing like Purple Smoke Trees.  These are odd spindly desert plants that have purple blooms on them in the late spring.

I also like to lop of the dead rice grass so that the new growth in the spring can take off.  Grasses appreciate a hair cut and at least with the bunch grasses you can do that once a year during the winter time.  Not like a lawn where you have to get out the mower every week.

Looks like I need to bake bread today.  I'm going to try a little less salt and see if the bread will rise a bit faster.

Baking Bread and Chocolate Chip Cookies

I'm baking bread today.  I like the classic Betty Crocker White Bread.  I have two loaves in the loaf pans and they are making their final rise.

I have the house at 80 degrees.  That is a little too hot for my taste but the bread is loving it.

We have a wood stove so I'm not wasting a bunch of money heating the house:)

I decided to bake chocolate chip cookies.  The batter didn't seem quite "thick enough".  I decided I must have forgotten the last 1/2 cup of flour in the recipe when I measured so I added the 1/2 C. flour and forged ahead.

They turned out really flat and greasy.  I must have really screwed up on my flour measurements somehow.  Oh well, you win some, you lose some.