Thursday, September 06, 2007

Approaching Fall

Finally. My favorite season is nearly here and I think I appreciate it now more than ever. I love the weather in Tennessee. Although the winters that are really cold I could live without. Since I'm from Florida I hate wearing lots of clothing. No, really I do. I hate layers and I really hate wearing a coat. Fortunately for me we've had a few mild winters and I've been able to wear sweaters mostly, with a coat occasionally. But according to the Farmers Almanac it's supposed to be really cold this year. The only consolation I have for the bitter cold is snow. Floridians pray for snow every time the temperature dips into the 30's. It seems silly I know but we do. So I always dreamed of living in a place with mountains, where the leaves changed colors, where the houses had more than one story and weren't made of cinder block, and where it snowed. I-have-been-gypped. We haven't had a decent snowfall since that huge storm we had almost 5 years ago. But I digress, this is supposed to be about Fall, right?

Since the heat wave embraced our region this summer I have been in a cooking slump. Really, who has been turning on the oven in the 105 degree heat. It was impossible to keep the house cool as it was without creating internal heat. So we've survived on salad, sandwiches and things I could stick in the crock pot. Which I discovered puts out more heat than I originally thought. I couldn't even light candles without it heating up the place. I guess it's just like that in a small house. So with Fall approaching (although I see that the forecast for the highs are still in the mid-90's) it opens new doors for cooking. My poor neglected family can eat again and I can cook. I'm looking forward to trying new recipes and hopefully working them in on a regular basis. Of course they have to have a reasonable amount of ingredients, which pretty much rules out anything in my Southern Living cook books. Any time I've made a SL recipe it tastes amazing but there are so many ingredients that I don't have on hand I end up spending a ton on stuff I'll use once. I need an herb garden. Maybe I'll get some little potted herbs to keep in the window sill.

When we first moved into this house I got several offers for magazine trials and accepted a few of them. One of them was Simple and Delicious. I opted to not get the subscription, I don't remember why. It seems like it was too casserole heavy but maybe not. At any rate there was a cute idea for the kids. So I give you Jack-O-Lantern pops. Since I really don't like Halloween (no matter how many times Pastor Davis tried to convince me to) I will make them just look like pumpkins. I'm sure the girls will have a blast making them with me and I'm looking forward to trying it.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Fall is my favorite time of the year too. Fresh clean cool air is the best.
I have several Taste of Home cook book I will give you when you come in October. They have a lot of simple recipes without breaking the budget. I loved all the pictures you sent of the girls. They are growing to fast.

Amy Button said...

I didn't realize that fall was your favorite time of the year too- very cool. And the cookbooks sound great- I'm looking forward to getting out of town.

Mary said...

I am with you in that I've never been so happy to see Fall approach than I am this year. I'm looking longingly at my long sleeve shirts and hoping that soon there will be a need to wear cozy clothing. Not layers, I'm with you on lots of layers, yuck. I do hope the winter is cold and totally hope that we get some snow. Cute pumpkin pops...I hope you get some pictures of your own creations.