Happy Birthday!

Sunday was Rick's birthday. He spent a relaxing day at home doing his favorite things - some light yard work, watching news about the current presidential election and watching professional golf on television.

Rick's and the kids' favorite part of his birthday is the ice cream cake. Tatum and Rikard picked out the cake with "groovy" rainbow colored frosting and words. Keeli liked the skinny candles. Rick even got a visit from his mom for his birthday!

Baking bread

One of Rick's all-time favorite foods is home baked bread. That just PROVES he married the wrong woman :). Typically his grandmother and my mother indulge him, mostly on holidays or when he helps them around the house. Then, today, I decided to bake a loaf of yeast bread. I found the recipe while grocery shopping on the side of a box of hot cereal. It was a very healthy whole wheat loaf sweetened with a touch of honey.
Activating the yeast and assembling the dough was quite simple. It took a bit of time and upper body strength to knead the dough for 20 minutes (nevermind the mixer in the corner of the kitchen that I completely forgot about), but this nice dough ball made it all worth it. I really like the flecked appearance.

The dough ball fit nicely into my one and only bread pan. This pan probably didn't know what was happening. It is usually filled with sweet banana or zucchini bread. Can you see Keeli's handprints in the top of the dough near the edge of the pan? She is such a big helper.

After 35 minutes a nicely browned loaf of bread emerged from the oven. We can't decide if we like this side:
Or this side:
Or the inside!

I may make a few more loaves of bread or maybe some dinner rolls in the near future.

Sunday Sunset

Spring is nearly upon us. I captured the colors of the setting sun Sunday through the birch tree in the front yard. This is just as the sun was touching the horizon. The yellow is still kind of shallow in tone, but you can see the red/orange hues just beginning at the horizon.

The deeper, richer red and orange tones came out after the sun was below the horizon and nearly gone. The colors were amazing and hopefully the warm tones mean warmer weather is on its way.

Reader Rikard

This is the typical nightly scene in Rikard's room shortly before bedtime.He has recorded nearly 200 books on his reading list for school. His favorites right now are some Avatar books bought from Scholastic and Belly Button Boy. His favorite literary character is currently Little Critter, who has many exciting adventures and experiences. He is starting to enjoy longer books with a more developed story line. Luckily, he has piles of books and his own library card.

No more snow

Sadly, our snow is quickly disappearing.

Easy come, easy go.

That means spring is on the way!

Snow

My opionion isn't among the majority, I really like the snow! It is beautiful. The way the light sparkles off it in the morning. The way it crunches under our feet. The way it hides the ugly, nasty brown desert we call home.
However, the fresh, white winter snow is preparing to leave us as quickly as it came. Our temperatures have risen from near 0F to above freezing. We can feel the warmth of the sun during the middle of the day. Puddles are forming in the roadways.

I found the snow starting to melt from a nearby rooftop, slowly sliding to the ground. It is turning to ice underneath, bug curved icicles.