fans

Have you ever watched a ceiling fan? If you stare at the blades, it looks like a fan, spinning fast or slow... But if the fan is on at a slower speed, and you look at the center- It goes into this strobe light effect, where the blades seem to be flashing.

Anyone?  

Try it, let me know if it's just me.

elf?

Do you know any elves? 

Mine is 6'5". 

Weird, I know. 

Seriously though... Check out these goofy socks!

They were made to treat planar fasciitis, an issue that people have in their feet or something. 

But Ladson doesn't have that issue. 

He has REALLY TIGHT ACHILLES tendons. 

So he's trying to wear these to loosen it up:

So HOTT right now.

 

But I don't think it works for the achilles. 

They need to make one with a firmer foot. 

All this does is make my husband an elf!

Peanut Butter Cup Ice Cream

A few weekends ago, Ladson and I went biking on the W&OD trail.  Famished afterwards, we had to "feed the beast", beast being Ladson's man-stomach, that eats a lot of meat and such, in quantities unfamiliar to semi-vegetarian X. So, we stopped for lunch at Lazy Sundae, a classic little American deli and ice cream shop.  We had some of the BEST chocolate peanut butter cup ice cream EVER there, and we don't even like chocolate ice cream. And since then, I was determined to make some of my own, with my favorite wedding present, the Cuisinart Ice Cream Maker!
I found this recipe on a blog shared with me by Elizabeth. WOW, Homemade Peanut Butter Cups!!!AHHHH!!! it's too good... but for real!
But this is where I come in. For some reason, recipes just never do it for me. I always want to change something, whether for health reasons, or because I don't have a certain ingredient; the issues were two fold:

1. my food consultant/husband and I decided that peanut butter cups are best in vanilla, not chocolate. So, I based the recipe more on the Cuisinart's.

2. The peanut butter cups in the recipe call for graham cracker crumbs. And who has gluten-free graham crackers??? 

Here's what I did. You can do the same, or be inspired and modify it again to fit your desires!

For the peanut butter cups:

I pretty much followed the recipe from Confections of a Foodie Bride, but instead of the 2 cups of graham cracker crumbs, I used about a 1/2 cup ground flax seeds. This gave great consistency and flavor! I still used powdered sugar (which you can make from normal sugar in a vitamix! so cool!), so they weren't uber healthy, but I think you could use honey or agave nectar if you wanted to, without totally damaging the consistency. Following her instructions more carefully would have made very pretty peanut butter cups, but I didn't care too much. With Trader Joe's semi-sweet chocolate morsels and organic peanut butter...

Ladson and I agreed they were way better than Resees! 

  I had to make more because they were running 

out by the time I got to the ice cream part!

For the ice cream:
Cuisinart's recipes always call for too much sugar.  Additionally, the peanut butter cup recipe made way more peanut butter filling than there was chocolate) or maybe that's just because I ate the chocolate as I went... So instead of mixing peanut butter and sugar as Cuisinart suggests, I just whisked the rest of the filling in the milk/cream mixture to add flavor.  This is my modified ingredient list:

a little bit of the peanut butter mixture
1/2 cup raw honey
1-1/4 cups whole (raw) milk
2 cups (really) heavy (raw) cream
a slug of pure vanilla extract
2 handfuls homemade chocolate peanut butter cup cups (save the pretty ones for eating by themselves)

Whisk together milk, honey, and peanut butter mixture.
Add the cream...

Raw cream is so nice and thick!

I think I could eat this plain because I love raw milk so much! 

I turned on the ice cream maker (be sure to have a frozen container!!) and let the magic begin!! While this was happening, the peanut butter cups came out of the freezer and into the food processor. 

But I had to chop them more because they were too frozen hard. I recommend either chopping by hand on a large chopping block, or letting them be a little softer before sticking them in the food processor. Always pulse large things like this!

This stuff was AMAZING!!!!


 I don't really know if I can put into words what a great thing it is to make homemade ice cream. And this one "took the cake". Literally.

What would I do differently?

1. The ice cream got dry and flaky after freezing it.  That didn't stop me from killing the quart in less than a week, but next time I would have used a vanilla ice cream recipe with eggs in it, to keep a better consistency.

2. There were too many peanut butter cups. I know, this seems impossible, but it's true, it was so chunky you could hardly call it ice cream.  I think I would use one cup of chopped peanut butter cups in the future. There is a fine balance there... we will find it someday over the rainbow

canada?

who is reading this in Canada???

awesome.
(the fact that I can know this is why I still like "stats")

an apple [cider vinegar] a day

Yes, it tastes kinda gross plain, but it is oh so good for so many ailments.

My mom had a physical therapist tell her to take a tablespoon a day for muscle soreness. I had a nutritionist tell me to take a tablespoon a day to help my body's pH balance.

My what???

Healthy tissues are alkaline, whereas cancerous tissues are acidic.
Our bodies are alkaline by design and acid by function.
Therefore maintaining alkalinity is essential for vitality and a healthy life.

-stuffinanutshell.com  

 It helps with digestion, joint pain, headaches and numerous other things

sippy cups are for kids

Do you get really thirsty before bed?
I mean like you take a few sips of water before brushing your teeth and then, just as you get under the covers and you realize my mouth is really dry. So you have to get up and go get another glass of water.

Do you ever toss and turn after that because you're so thirsty that you can't sleep?

Or wake up at 4am and chug 12 oz of water?

Is this just my issue?

So I think my bedside table is closer to the bed now than it has been in the past, and I have knocked over my bedside water glass not 2, not 3, but 4 times in the past two months. Yes, I have my Bible and cell phone right there: in prime location for soaking it up.

The solution:

And you thought sippy cups were for kids!

this marriage

sometimes i wonder if i'm old enough to be married








then we go do something fun

like this weekend, our trip to Tarara Winery

We wanted to go for a bike ride out in Leesburg. Maybe along the Potomac? Over White's Ferry??

So we got up bright and early! about 10:30 am, and had some breakfast, and then Ladson had to have an EMERGENCY haircut. And then I had to have an emotional breakdown (see my post on tears), and in that amazingly on schedule manner, we packed up the pathfinder, and headed North with bicycles, helmets, bike shoes, and manchego.

We stopped at a farm stand and picked up squash, and peaches, corn and kettle corn. The produce will be addressed later this week, but the popcorn, that was open when we got in the car.

We all know that only adults go wine tasting.




And we are experts at that (being adults).

Actually, Ladson, since getting married and therefore becoming incredibly grown-up, has found the perfect match: white wine & kettle corn.

this was taken by me, with my point and shoot, very artsy, i know ;)

I think that the couple next to us, who had just celebrated their 30th Wedding anniversary, was very impressed with this pair.

So, I guess my point is, maybe I'm old enough for this marriage.

and we never did go biking. but it was a beautiful afternoon getaway.