friday, goodbye January

listen to ‘friday, goodbye January’ on Audioboo

Friday, Jan 24... it's cold

listen to ‘Friday, Jan 24... it's cold’ on Audioboo

21 swings (video)

Yes, this is good reinforcement of community and collaboration!




Hat tip to Upworthy for sharing this!
http://www.upworthy.com/your-favorite-childhood-pastime-has-been-upgraded-for-maximum-awesomeness-2?c=ufb1

Bread pudding recipe

I decided to make some bread pudding to use up the first batch of sourdough bread that did't come out too well. It is handy to have such a use for good bread (avoids waste). When I found my copy of the recipe I decided I needed to make a better copy....

the recipe has seen better days

Bread Pudding

Ingredients
Bread cubes - 2 cups
Milk - 2 cups
Butter - 3 tablespoons
Sugar - ¼ cup
Eggs  - 2
Salt - dash
Vanilla - ½ teaspoon


Process
Cut ‘old’ bread into cubes
Place in 1Qt baking dish
Scald milk with butter and sugar mixed in
Beat eggs slightly, add the salt, then stir into the warm milk mixture
Add the vanilla
Pour liquid over the bread as is

Set the baking dish in a pan containing water up to the level of the pudding
Bake in moderate oven 350 degrees about 1 hour or until knife in center comes out clean


Variations
Substitute ½ cup of honey for the sugar
Or ½ cup brown sugar to melt with the milk
Or 1 square unsweetened chocolate to melt in milk
Or add about ½ cup of chocolate chips to the bread cubes

the finished product - bread pudding

Lessons from making bread

When you get the ingredients together and start mixing them to form the dough, it can get really messy and really difficult. How will this all come together? Will this ever form a ball to knead?

mixing together

Stick with it, take a little at a time.Don't be afraid to add more flour.The mix will come together, the ball will form and be knead worthy!

kneaded and formed into a ball

One good thing with bread making is that you get to do some work like kneading and then let the dough rest. Split the dough into loaves and let the dough rest. Bake it, take out to cool (rest).

Kind of like the good practice for running workouts, hard and easy. Work and rest.

two fresh loaves

Best part, after all the work (and rest) you get to eat some of the bread... a nice reward!

Falling gracefully

listen to ‘Falling gracefully’ on Audioboo

The spot of the fall

I took the picture as I came back reversing my original direction of travel. The squiggle line on the top angling down to the right is the slip. The large spot is my butt then back hitting to slide gracefully (I hope)

Three word goals for 2014

Late to this but better late than not at all.

• In 2009, it was Basic, Leverage, and Return
• In 2010, it was Conversation, Content, and Community
• In 2011, it was Analogy, Bold, and Conduct 
• In 2012 it was Learn, Share, and Laugh

For 2013 it was Mentor, Leverage and Exercise


And while I may have broken a rule last year in reusing one word from a prior year, I am going further this year and keeping all three.

Yes: Mentor, Leverage and Exercise will be the new three word goals for 2014 as well.

Mahoning Creek over Meadowbrook Road, Danville, PA

Mentor - one of the key ways for me to help those around me is via mentoring. I did some. I can do more.

Leverage - time is short, I need to be able to leverage and re-use smartly wherever possible. I need to be able to draw upon the network to help advance both Franklin Matters and the Franklin Food Pantry on the home front. I will need to also expand and leverage the network within Citizens Bank.

Exercise - as a life long runner, it has been an issue for me not to have run since mid-July 2013. I developed "Morton's neuroma" and will be continuing treatment for it. In the meantime walking (as much as possible) and other exercises will have to suffice until I can run again.


Do you have a goal setting process? 

What is your goal for 2014?

Happy new year

listen to ‘Happy new year’ on Audioboo