Reasons My Hometown is the Best # 17, 66, and 90

My trip home has reaffirmed that my hometown is really the best, beyond the reasons I have already written about here and here. I am so pleased that most of my favorite people are moving back in the area, and that just means that our welcome home party someday will just be that much bigger.

Reason #17 - Locally Owned Stores

Most stores and restaurants in my home town are small Mom and Pop joints. More importantly, people make a conscious choice to go to these businesses over the chains. One of my absolute favorite places is Lafeens, a local donut joint. When I was real young, we would walk over to Lafeens after church (or even during Confirmation when the teachers were trying to bribe us teenagers). When I was in high school, in our rebel ways we would gather there at 11pm on the weekends when the donuts came out of the oven all nice and gooey.

Home this year, my sister and I went there immediately after running three miles. Perfect post-workout treat.

Reason # 66 - Big Trees

The trees are big and green and real old. There is something great about hiking around trees that are a hundred years old and massive. They are gnarled, mossy, and must have a lot of wisdom to share. If only I spoke Cedar. Here in this picture my bro-in-law stands in front of a root ball (can you see Marty creepin on him?)

Reason #90 - Long Summer Nights

The summer brings long nights, perfect for strolling, ice cream, bonfires, and being out on the water way too late. The day cools off, unlike here in the south, for a pleasant night hanging out til the wee hours. 

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Most of these things I took for granted growing up. What do you love most about your hometown?

Peach Custard Pie!

I'm enjoying my family. You should enjoy this recipe!
(As seen in my post on K and K!)

PEACH CUSTARD PIE

Ingredients

1 unbaked pie shell
4-5 peaches peeled and sliced
3 Tbsp butter (or so)
1/2 Tbsp cinnamon (or so)
4 eggs
1 cup sugar

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

Peel the peaches. One way to do this is to place peaches one by one in boiling water for about 30 seconds. Remove them and immediately place them into cold water. After about 10 seconds, they will be super easy to peel. Go ahead and peel them and slice them up.

Put sliced peaches into unbaked pie shell. 

Dot with butter and cinnamon. I eyeball this for the most part, but it is about 3 Tbsp butter and 1/2 Tbsp cinnamon.

Beat 4 eggs and 1 cup sugar together. Pour over the peaches. 

Bake at 400 degrees for 10 minutes. Reduce the temp to 350 and cook for 60-65 minutes more. You will know when its done when you stick a knife in it and it comes out mostly clean. The custard will set even more as it cools.

Unsolicited Advice

Yesterday was our third year anniversary. I wrote a long rambling post about a few things I have learned about being married but it was just that - long and rambling. This is what I did instead. When you get married, you are gaurenteed to receive one thing -- a whole ton of unsolicited advice.

Right back at you, blogosphere!

This is what I know about marriage so far.

1. It is a lot more fun then they make it out be. I think as a reaction to so many failing marriages, people like to scare young people and let them know it is hard work. It is hard work. But it is fun, too.

2. I am annoying, you are annoying, we are all annoying. Let's laugh about it. We made our lists of what we thought were the most annoying things about ourselves and ended up just laughing about dirty kleenexs in the bed (me) and a tablespoon of milk left in the jug (not me).

3. The worse piece of advice I got: On your wedding day, what you see is what you get. Don't expect your partner to change. Should have known this was a crock at the time. As someone who has been with my person since we were 17, partners change all. the. time. You just don't get to take credit for it (if its for the good) and you must be supportive (if it's otherwise).

4. Marriage works best when you are best friends. This is something I learned from both my parents and my in-laws. They love each other, but I think that they really like each other too.

5. Best advice I got: Part of forgiving is forgetting. I'll just leave it at that.

6. Go to bed mad. No, really, just do it. Sometimes nothing positive is going to happen when its late, you're both tired, and you have gone round and round for too long.

7. Laugh at your self. Admit when you are being silly. But don't ever tell you partner they are being silly. They might be quite serious.

8. Your husband IS NOT your girlfriend. Keep your girlfriends close.

9. Look at each other in the eyeballs when you are arguing. It makes it that much harder to be mad.

10. Brag on your boo. That one is easy for me. Because my husband is a ninja. (see below)

A Baseball Team!

 This is me.

(Finally) resolved to take in the Southern summer. It only took me four summers.

Alright humidity, bugs, and electric-frizz-hair. Let's go....

To the lake that you can't swim in or hike around or run around..... but you CAN row a boat on!















To the state farmers market to buy a bushel of peaches, a slice of chocolate pie (how did I not know this existed) and personal sized watermelon!

Drink an iced coffee before 8 am because that's the only time you can go outside!

















To a small town called Saxapahaw (the second 'a' is silent) where there is free music and a farmers market, a lovely river flowing by and three American flags on massive bamboo (?) poles!






And finally, the southern summers just got that much better thanks to a random old guy at the farmers market who took me aside to tell me a great joke...

What has 18 legs and catches flies?

A week with two Fridays!

With the Wednesday holiday, didn't it seem like this week had two fridays??

(It also felt like it had two mondays, but hey, I'm a glass-half-full kinda gal.)

The Fourth of July was the perfect chance for us to take a break, reconnect and take the excuse to do nothing for one.whole.day. So we drank whiskey and lemonade, went outside for as long as we could handle (4.5 minutes), and made hot dogs on the stove. At night we went wandering for a glimpse of what was making those big booming noises, and got lost taking in the Southern summer - humidity, cicadas, and big skies.

Cheers to the weekend!

Bad Mood Dance Party

I woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning. And Saturday is just the worst day to be grumpy.

I forgot that everything wrong in the world was not a personal slight against me. (Commence early morning pre-coffee pity party).

Coincidentally (?) Marty had to go to work for the morning. So it was just me and the weight of the world. Til I remembered...

What makes any day brighter? What is gaurenteed to make you smile?

(other than a cinnamon roll, and I didn't have a car at this point)

A DANCE PARTY!

So I turned on this song.



 And this song.


This one too, for my BFF.


 Ended with this one.
 

 And now I am all geared up for a great weekend!!

My Saturday Breakfast

I am guest posting over at K and K test kitchen this week with my usual saturday breakfast! I thought I would share it with y'all. Check out the website, you can see it over there ----> in my blog stalking list.

Enjoy!

I love making a big breakfast on Saturday mornings. Growing up my Dad always whipped up something great on the weekends, as he was the one up the earliest. Somehow I have come to expect something yummy on Saturdays. At my house, I am in charge of Saturday morning breakfast. My husband makes the bacon and I make the main dish.

This is my go to recipe. I grab a fresh loaf of Challah at the local food co-op on Fridays. This recipe feeds 2 people (with big appetites) using half the loaf. The other half goes into the freezer for next weekend! You can also use french bread or brioche, but I find Challah to be a perfect balance between the plain french bread and the too dense (and too expensive) brioche.

Ingredients

1/2 loaf Challah bread, or 8 - 1 inch slices
3 eggs
1 cup milk
1/2 Tablespoon cinnamon
Butter for the pan

Cut the challah into 8, 1 inch slices. You can make them thicker if you want, but make sure to increase the cooking time.

In a bowl big enough to dip your bread, mix 3 eggs and 1 cup milk. I use skim milk, but you can use pretty much any kind of milk. Whisk eggs and milk together. Add 1/2 Tbsp cinnamon and mix. If that sounds like too much cinnamon put less! I just love cinnamon.

Heat a frying pan on medium to medium high heat and put enough butter on  the pan to grease it up. Make sure that your butter doesn't burn and put a little more on the pan after each round of cooking the french toast.

Dip one piece of Challah bread in the egg mixture at a time, coating each side and making sure that the mixture is soaked through the whole slice of bread. Don't leave the bread in the mixture too long, if it gets too soggy it will fall apart. Once dipped, place on the warm pan. Be sure to whisk the mixture between dipping every two or three slices or the cinnamon will rise to the top and you will get one really cinnamon-y piece.


Cook the first round of slices 3-4 minutes. Flip each piece and cook an additional 2 minutes. Make sure it is cooked all the way through - it should bounce back when you touch it. The french toast may be a bit more brown that you are used to because of the cinnamon. Once cooked, keep each slice in a warmed oven while you are cooking the next round. 

I serve the french toast with vanilla yogurt and fresh berries, and of course real maple syrup. But you can top it with whatever you would like - powdered sugar, butter, maple syrup, jam... 

Yum!