Fall is Here! Muffins

I let Shelly lick the mixer beaters. She said the batter tasted like Fall.

Archer walked into the room and said, "It smells like Fall in here." And thus was born my new favorite muffin. Not overly sweet. A little spicy. Enough said, let's get baking!

Fall is Here! Muffins
Original recipe from the Kitchn.

Ingredients
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 stick butter, softened
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract

2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp salt

1/2 cup milk

2 to 2 1/2 cups diced pears - 2 pears (or mix of pears and apples, 1 each)
1/4 cup candied ginger, diced small, but not TOO small, you want to taste those little chunks of ginger like treasures in every other bite...

mixture of cinnamon and sugar for topping

Instructions
1. Heat oven to 425. Place paper muffin cups in muffin pan.
2. In large bowl, cream sugars and eggs until well blended. Add eggs one at a time and ensure all well mixed. Add vanilla extract.
3. In separate bowl, mix flour and all dry ingredients.
4. While mixing egg/sugar mixture, add about 1/3 of flour mixture to egg/sugar mixture. Once incorporated, add 1/3 of milk. Continue alternating adding flour and milk until everything is blended. Don't over-mix!
5. Add pears/apples and ginger, gently fold in with rubber spatula until fruit is evenly distributed within the batter.
6. Scoop batter into muffin cups, this should make about 12 medium sized muffins. Sprinkle cinnamon-sugar mixture onto muffins.
7. Place muffin pan into oven and reduce heat to 400. Bake for 20-25 minutes, rotating after 10 minutes, until browned and toothpick inserted into muffins come out clean.
8. Place muffins on wire rack to cool before enjoying.

Why We Love It
Because they taste good? Because they're not overly sugary so you don't feel like you're eating dessert for breakfast? Just because!

Just 3 stars because 2 of us don't really like the chunks of fruit.

  

Genius, Fails & Rants

I've found a new podcast. I cannot stop listening. Sometimes I listen at work on my earbuds and start laughing. I try to keep it quiet, but someone always catches me giggling to myself and then we have to discuss what was so funny, etc. It's the best. These two Mothers talk about real Raising Kids Stuff and they're funny and serious and so very encouraging. My favorite part comes when the Genius Fail Rant segment comes on. Other parents call in to brag on their latest Genius innovation in Child Raising. And confess their Fails as a Parent. And Rant about whatever injustice just happened in their lives. You can hear the joy and pride in their voices, sometimes you hear these poor moms sobbing as they lay out their Fail and how disappointed they are in what just happened. And at the end of each call, the two Mothers tell the moms what Geniuses they are. And tell the moms what Failures they are, laughing all the way through, but also tell everyone just what a wonderful job they are all doing. They tell even the Fail moms that they're doing their very best, and tell them why they're NOT failures at all. They never go through a show without telling us, "You're doing a GREAT job. You're doing great. Keep up the good work!"

And the reason why I love this thing so much is that almost every single Genius is something I've discovered myself or WISH I had discovered, it would have made things so much better! And those Genius things that I discovered, DID make our lives better for at least five minutes, while they still worked with the kids. And those Fails - most of them I can relate to. I've DONE those things.

Dog got into the diaper pail and shredded everything and spread it evenly over the entire floor of the living room. Someone had a leaky diaper and... Driving down the highway and I looked in the back seat to see Shelly standing up in her car seat so she can see out the window. Forgot to buckle her. Missed the bus in the morning and had to rush everyone out of the house at the last second. Got the pickup time wrong and Shelly was still at the art lesson long after everyone else's moms had picked them up. Forgot to pick up Archer from school when I promised him I'd be there. Winter has arrived and no one has boots or coats that fit them. Summer has arrived and no one has a swimsuit. Failed to wake them up on time for school, failed to have the right flavor of jelly for PB&J sandwiches, failed to have the right kind of berries for snack, failed to get all the laundry done on time for the favorite shirt to be available today and on and on. I've yelled at my kids too often. I can see myself in all those frustrated, exasperated parents that call in to share their stories.

On the flip side, I cannot list all the Genius moments that we've had as a family, there are too many to count. Every time a vacation goes well, or most of us like the meal that I've cooked, or we get back into the School Swing once again, year after year. The kids are awake and dressed on time 364 days out of the year, we have SOME food in the house even if it's not the RIGHT kind of berries, most of the laundry is caught up.  The kids get tons of time with their grandparents and cousins. They're pretty responsible because (I think) David and I have pushed them in that direction every chance we get. I laugh and dance and sing and read with my kids. And every little one of those is a victory, our own Genius moments one by one.

Sometimes it is so easy to get caught up in the list of Fails that stick in our minds. But if we can just stop reading down that list, if we could toss it into the trash and instead start thinking about those Genius moments, wouldn't we all be a bit happier? Or maybe, if we can take that list of Fails and just laugh it off as these Mothers do with every single call? Something didn't go quite right, maybe we learned a lesson from it, and can we laugh at it as a past hiccup? Anyway. What's so great about this podcast is that it leaves me feeling Not Alone, we're all travelling through this Parenting thing one step at a time and just trying to make it through the best that we can. And that's the end of my Rant for today. Feel free to add your own. We're in this together, right?

Scout Weekend at Devil's Lake State Park

For the second year in a row, I've taken the kids to join Archer's Boy Scout Troop camping at Devil's Lake. Those kids always amaze me. The Scouts are wonderful hosts (thanks Archer!). The rest of us are just along for the adventure. Incredibly, Eli hiked the entire trail both morning and afternoon with no complaints, no major injuries, etc. etc. There really isn't much more to say than that. We all had such a great time that I'm pretty much speechless.

Thanks Kids!


Abridged Summary of Events...

- Practically a dance party in the van on the way up to camp, great music, only a few wrong turns along the way
- No Rain
- No Rain Fly (left at home! oops!)
- No UPD (Universal Pounding Device, Scout speak for mallet/hammer/beat up old bowling pin) for pounding stakes into the ground
- Used IPD instead (Improvised Pounding Device, Mom speak for a ROCK)
- Amy, Mary, and kids arrived at camp well before the Boys, set up camp and then waited for many many hours for the Boys to catch up
- Picked a site across the street from the pit toilets, good I guess?
- 3 air mattress completely covered with mold, luckily the kids are small enough to share the remaining 3 good mattresses
- So many stars. Visible thanks to the lack of rain fly over the tent
- So much good food. Thanks to the Boys for all their planning and cooking
- Fun at the dance and around the campfire and on the ferry on the way home, new stuff (boys at the dance and who's dancing and who's not), repeat stuff (boys at the dance? a story for another time), great memories for all
- So many wonderful miles hiking around the lake, enjoying the company and laughter of friends and family. Let's do this again sometime!