My Wishes Are For…

A Gingerbread Castle…

I got this wonderful recipe for gingerbread pound cake from Pamela at From the House of Edward.  It was Pamela who suggested baking the cake in a castle cake pan, one of which I have owned for a few years but have only used once a year to make  sandcastle cakes for a summer birthday.  Now I have another reason to take my pan out…and the cake is delicious.  I changed the original recipe by adding a  big handful of crystallized ginger.  I love biting into a chunk of that candied ginger…one of my favorite tastes.  Also, I ran short of the key ingredient molasses.  Mr O suggested using maple syrup rather than running back to the store…and I loved it.  The best part about baking this…is the spicy smell permeating the entire house… I’m pretty sure this cake would be delicious made in any cake pan!

 

Gingerbread Pound Cake

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1 cup butter at room temperature
1 cup sugar
5 eggs
2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground cloves
Pinch of nutmeg
1 cup of molasses – I didn’t have a whole cup of molasses so I used 3/4 cup molasses and 1/4 cup pure maple syrup
1/2 cup sour cream
I added 1/2 cup chopped crystallized ginger – it’s optional 
powdered sugar
whipped cream

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Directions

1.  Cream butter and sugar with an electric mixer, beating well on medium speed.
2. Add eggs, one at a time, scraping down the bowl after each.
3. Combine flour, soda, and spices. Set aside.
4. Combine molasses and sour cream.  Lightly whisk together.
5. Add flour mixture to creamed mixture alternately with molasses mixture, beginning and ending with the flour mixture.
6. Mix until just blended after each addition.
7. Fold in chopped candied ginger.
8. Pour batter into a greased and floured pan.
9.Bake at 325F for 1 hour or until a wooden pick inserted in the cake’s center comes out clean.
10. Cool in the pan for at least 15 minutes, then remove and let cool on a wire rack.
11.  Sprinkle with the powdered sugar “snow”.
12.  Pamela serves this with Lemon Sauce but I prefer barely sweetened, freshly whipped cream.

A Bench….

One day, during my sister’s illness, she asked me to go with her for a walk along the river at a nearby park.   There she mentioned that rather than having a headstone in a cemetery she would like to have a memorial where people could bring a dog, rest, picnic, enjoy beauty, contemplate life, and remember her.  Today marks one year since her death.  The river flows on just in front of her bench…

LX and II…

Sunday,  I celebrated my 60th birthday with my family and many friends…This involved a not so very secret party held at our favorite Mexican restaurant, three hours of dancing with abandon to my son-in-law’s band, and an overnight at a beautiful old inn.  I made a decision not to bring my camera and I would never have had time to take photos…but I wish I had. Photos help me remember things and I want to always remember this birthday.  

Sunday also marked the second anniversary of this blog.  I may not be sure of the future of this blog but I have certainly enjoyed the past two years.

A new view…

The next prompt for Picture the Holidays was “The View From Here”…and it just happened to occur on the day after I received a new 50mm 1.4 lens as an early birthday gift…so my view was through my new lens…and it has been ever since.

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…it is so nice for shooting Christmas lights!

The Key…

“What helps you to slow down, take a deep breath and enjoy the moment…”  These are the words from the prompt on day 4 of Picture the Holidays that jumped out at me.  They could be interpreted in many ways but what was the first thing I thought of?  Why a glass of wine of course…

If truth were to be told, I don’t really need help or reminding to slow down…I am the Queen of slow and enjoying the moment.  I can escape into another world at the drop of a crown.  What I need is a technique for speeding up a bit…getting a few things done at this time of year.

All you need…

On the  second day I already had difficulty finding the time and creativity to come up with something for the Picture the Holidays prompt.  Today was different…I still watch my grandchildren on Fridays and it remains one of my favorite days…full of love and joy.  I didn’t have much trouble coming up with a photo for the prompt “All you need is love”.  I did have trouble getting any photos in focus…they still move too fast for me and my camera.

I rather like the slightly out of focus look here though.  Mr J tried very hard to display that sandwich at just the right angle…he was much more patient than I thought he would be. 

Picturing the Holidays…

I have found that a daily prompt can inspire me to get 0ut the camera and take some pictures that I normally wouldn’t take the time to do.   I think this shows my lack of creativity as much as my lack of motivation...so I signed up to participate in Picture the Holidays during the busiest time of the year.  By the end of the month I might have some photos with a bit of variety and improved quality and I will have documented my holiday season better than ever.   The first prompt has to do with gratitude and it had me not only standing on a stool to get a shot with better light and perspective but it also had me dusting the living room. Now that is inspiration!

I photographed family portraits to illustrate gratitude for my family and realized as I was editing the photo that it also illustrates my gratitude for the ability of photographs to save memories.  Memories of my children as babies, of my sister dancing, of my parents in good health…