Fall Apples (source)

Andy ate this with his World Famous Homemade Strawberry Ice Cream, which shall be discussed at more length another time. It deserves its own post.

Apple Crisp

4 cups apples, thinly sliced (I use Macintosh apples)

1/2 cup water

1 teaspoon cinnamon

Topping

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1/4 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup oatmeal

1/2 cup all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup butter, cut into small pieces

Thinly slice apples and lay the bottom of a 8×8 baking pan. Mix water and cinnamon, pour evenly over apples. Mix sugars, flour, oatmeal, and salt together. Work butter into sugar/flour mixture until mixture is crumbly. Sprinkle over top of apples. Bake at 450 degrees for 5 minutes; turn heat down to 400 degrees and bake for an additional 25-30 minutes (until crisp is bubbly).

Well, that was a terrible start. I’ll get there.

Pumpkin scones = delicious

Pumpkin Scones

Preheat oven to 425 degrees F. Lightly oil a baking sheet or line with parchment paper.

Combine flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, and spices in a large bowl. Using a pastry knife, fork, or food processor, cut butter into the dry ingredients until mixture is crumbly and no chunks of butter are obvious. Set aside.

In a separate bowl, whisk together pumpkin, half and half, and egg. Fold wet ingredients into dry ingredients. Form the dough into a ball.

Pat out dough onto a lightly floured surface and form it into a 1-inch thick rectangle (about 9 inches long and 3 inches wide). Use a large knife or a pizza cutter to slice the dough twice through the width, making three equal portions. Cut those three slices diagonally so that you have 6 triangular slices of dough. (NB: I made mini scones, which means there were more like 12. I prefer mini.)

Place on prepared baking sheet.Bake for 14-16 minutes (shorter if you’re making the mini – I had them in for about 10-12 min.). Scones should begin to turn light brown. Place on wire rack to cool.

I used a simple glaze, as well. (Confectioners sugar + milk + vanilla extract). Glaze while scones are still warm.

Also, you know how your mom always told you to be careful with can lids because you could cut yourself? That is excellent advice. My forefinger wishes that I had heeded that advice.

“Self,” I thought, “You should not walk to Starbucks and pay them for their milk and espresso and pumpkin spice. It is a rip-off. Do not do it!”

So I argued with myself for a while, because pumpkin spice lattes taste like fall and yesterday was fall, for the first time really (darn you, living in the pseudo-South). Something tasting like fall is almost as good as something smelling like fall, and really, actually pumpkin spice lattes both taste and smell like fall. So it’s a win-win. (-win!)

But, as it turns out, I have pumpkin pie spice. And I have milk. And I have coffee… soo… put those things together and you have a very passable delicious pumpkin-y drink. It’s no latte. But it’s no gas station coffee, either. And it tastes like fall. So there you have it. Elise’s genius idea of the week!

Zucchini should be grated before freezing (don’t freeze a whole zucchini), because the texture changes somewhat. Also, when you freeze zucchini, it seems to be mainly water, so plan on the amount reducing after you thaw it (i.e., I had frozen 3 cups but it actually turned out to be 2 cups once thawed).

So since I’m trying to eat up all my groceries before buying anything new (spending vast amounts of money on peaches wrecks your budget pretty quickly), I decided to make zucchini bread today.

This recipe calls for two loaf pans, but since I only had one, I turned the other half of the batter into Zucchini Muffins… and my friends, they are delicious.

This was approximately 10 seconds before devour-age.

Zucchini Bread

2 eggs

2 cups granulated sugar

3 cup flour

1 cup canola oil

2 cups grated zucchini

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

3 teaspoons vanilla

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

2 teaspoons cinnamon

Mix well, bake at 325 degrees for one hour (in two loaf pans). If making muffins, fill trays about 3/4 full, bake for 25-30 minutes at 325 (makes about 24).

You can’t HANDLE the Pioneer Woman.

Good reminder for Monday Funday.

Operation Flying Donkey in Russia. Yes, this is a true story.

This happens to me on an almost daily basis.

What happens when fatherhood falls apart.

For gallantry.

Oh boy. This is real bad. New life plan: Never get sick, ever.

Summer reading about the Cross of Christ.

Headline of the week, so far.

Me, Sarah, Andrea, and Kandi at Jasmine's house for one of our famous small group cookouts

Me and Andrea while I was home for Memorial Day

Me and Ree! photo by Alex Harrison, since I know she will be upset if I don't credit her

Hiking at Great Falls with Andrea and Sarah!

That’s all for now! I had intended to post more than this, but the internet is behaving badly, and my photos are all on my other laptop.

http://www.politico.com/livestream/

Also, Rep. Green has a fantastic voice.

Rangel background at Politico: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0710/40409.html.

IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.–Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

Read Calvin Coolidge’s speech on the 150th Anniversary of the Declaration.