winter wellness, making elderberry syrup

   I was going to write this post last night but guess what? My teeny sniffly cold turned into a full on achy, fever and chills illness. Oh boy. It's been a while since I've felt this down and out... I feel spacey and goofy in the head. Example, just five minutes ago I meant to "publish" 5 listings on etsy but accidentally hit the "delete" button. gonnnnne! Damn! So no more working today and let's get on with a wellness recipe (or two!).

 When I'm ailing I drink a little lemon, honey, ginger, cayenne hot water steamer delight all day long! It's super soothing and easy!

 While the water is boiling, squeeze a quarter of a lemon in the cup, then add a few slices of fresh ginger (I usually make a few slits in each piece of ginger), a couple shakes of cayenne pepper (wow typing is really hard when I'm sick, I keep having to go back and correct my many mistakes!!).

 Elderberry Syrup:

*1 cup fresh or 1/2 cup dried elderberries
*3 cups water
*1 cup honey

  Combine Elderberries and water in a heavy saucepan and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and simmer until elderberry/water mixture is reduced by about half (this takes about 2 hours). Remove from heat, cool a bit, strain and press juice from berries. Compost the berries. Add honey to the elderberry liquid and heat gently just to combine. Carefully pour into bottles, label and refrigerate.

  I usually double the recipe and keep a bottle in the fridge and freeze the rest to be thawed as needed.

  Elderberry syrup is really wonderful taken daily (1 tablespoon every morning) as a preventative. When you are actively sick, take 1-2 teaspoons every hour until you start to improve.

I always want to make a batch with other herbs steeped into the mix but my kiddos aren't into the idea. Elderberry syrup is really sweet and delicious so children don't need much encouragement to take it.

 I'm on my second steamer and I'm feeling all lonesome, super cranky and chilly. Whenever I get sick I feel like Samantha in this episode of sex and the city. I was laying in bed having weird fever dreams/hallucinations (my being sick also coincides with the full moon and my own moon cycle craziness) last night. Creepiness. I'm gonna watch the Gilmore Girls and attempt to wash it all away.

   I need to get my head together before the little lady gets home. There are many more holiday crafts to be made and packaged up asap...

  Now I'm off to boil another kettle of water. Another cup of hot tea... xo m

skorpor (& sunrise)

   Last week an obsession with Biscotti (and a facebook post) led me to Skorpor (which is pretty much the Swedish version). And oh my...! lemme just thank my sweet Scandinavian friend Jan Norberg (click on his name and listen to his music, cuz you will love it, he's waaaay magical!) for cluing me in to skorpor and the recipe.  And I learned of another dry biscuity bread category (baking nerd zone...), the Rusk.  yum, I LOVE Rusks!
  I am deep into cardamom and couldn't wait to make these. Of course I made a few tweaks to the recipe...

 Skorpor

• 2 cups sugar
• 4 ounces butter
• 1 cup sour cream
• 1 egg
• 4 cups flour
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 3/4 teaspoon ground cardamom
• 1 tsp vanilla (or almond) extract 
• 1 cup finely chopped almonds  

1. preheat oven to 350°F.
2. Cream the sugar and butter.
3. Add the sour cream and the egg. Mix well.
4. Add all other ingredients. Batter will be sticky (no joke, really sticky!)
5. Grease a 10x15 jelly roll pan (basically a cookie sheet with edges) and spread batter evenly on pan with a greased spatula (I found it easier to grease my hands and press it into place)
6. Bake 30 minutes. Let cool completely.
7. Cut into 1/2" x 3" pieces and arrange on cookie sheet. Bake at 250F until light golden (mine didn't really appear to change color but I just touched them and took them out when they seemed biscotti dry/hard in texture. It took about 25 mins.
   
   
   Makes a lot! Perfect for working into holiday cookie gift boxes. So super good dipped in creamy coffee! Keeps well since you don't have to worry about them getting stale.

  The skorpor smelled insanely good, like heaven. when baking. The house still has a faint cinnamon/cardamom perfume vibe. I wish I could make a perfume that smelled like it, so beautiful!

 Those jars are only about half of the skorpor I made. I'm going to make attempt a gluten free version next week. I usually make non-gluten free treats for gifting (it's just too expensive to make gluten free for everyone) but that also means that from thanksgiving through new years I eat some gluten...

 And then this morning there was a really wonderful pink/orange/purple/blue fantasy going on in the sky. The light filtering through it was as if we were literally seeing the world through rose tinted glasses. Pictures couldn't quite capture it but oh it was stunning and my kids (even the teenager) were awestruck.

 oooh... hello there pretty sunrise!

  The intense cold snap (It was in the mid 20s during the day and dropping into the teens at night-pretty odd for the pnw-all week!) seems to have subsided. Today it got up to 43 and it felt almost warm. I feel pretty grateful for the moderate winters we get here. As much as I romanticize the winters of Connecticut (the ice storm!!) or dream of a snowy farm in Vermont or Maine, I'm not sure I'd be the happiest or most productive version of myself if I was battling consistently frozen fingers and toes. I'm still a California girl at heart.

approaching 2013!

   It's been cup after cup after cup of hot tea all day long. I rarely get the "queen cup". The little lady usually calls dibs on it. Our old house is so drafty that if I don't have hot tea (and LL Bean slipper sock on-yep, it's true!) I am freezing.

 Doing good on cutting waaaay back in the caffeine dept. And no more coffee, for reals! It KILLS me. Striving to achieve balance in all areas of consumption has been a real goal. A true transformation. It feels good to have a severely restricted diet. I feel so much better. And my continued abstinence from alcohol etc (70 days so far) has been such a lovely clearing of my mind and emotions. I feel like my true self and every little weird interaction or moment in time doesn't shake me into an agoraphobic mess that has to run and hide... I'm happy that I feel my feelings and I want to feel them.

 Extremely grateful that we got all the garlic planted and tucked away for the winter. It's so rewarding to pull it up in the summer and see all the multiplication those little cloves did!

 Into hot baths, hot tea and a super hot book (by the hottest guy alive)... Kind of... So far, it sorta reads like the memoirs of a sleaze ball bad dad... but darn it, I'm gonna finish it!!

 Pancakes on many days. Easy to make and warm and gluten free. Yep, cheating from a mix, but it's just easier than gathering 5 different gluten free flours.

 There are 14 candles on that cake! FOURTEEN!! This month my guy turned 14.  I have a teenager that is 14! It's crazy. He's awesome and chill but... I pretty much feel like I'm still 15 (16 max) inside so um, when did all this time go by??

 Rainbow bat goth extravaganza cookie extraordinaire!! My little one needs no guiding into the melancholia that inhabits our genes. She loves this stuff. Ghosts, bats, haunted houses, cemeteries, night time, vampires. "I love all spooky stuff!" she says. Yeah , me too!

My little loves and cousins just a couple years ago. Wow, everyone is just so darn BIG now! And now into the new year. I remember when 2013 seemed this crazy far away dimension of mega future-dom! I honestly thought things would be all Blade Runner/hover-car like by now. I'm going to spend some time tomorrow writing out my dreams for 2013 (and referencing my dreams for 2012). xo m

december...

  It seemed just yesterday was Hallows eve and here we are... already into the end of December (and soon it will be 2013!). Time slips past too quickly. I'm trying to work on being in the moment, here.  now. It's hard! So damn hard. I'll keep on it though. There have been:

 -cafe dates, and dinners out (only rarely-the dinners).  My kids often talk about how much they love spring and summer when we're in the winter. Our northwestern winters are so wet and rainy!

 -satsumas and tea all the time. The tea kettle is always full/boiling/ready... I've been so in love with Juniper Ridge white sage and wild mint tea. It's delightful.

 -The winter spiral. Celebrating winter with songs & the lighting of candles...

 -working on the VAMP BOOK and wrote an erotic vampire short story (which turned out to just be a prequel chapter to the vamp book) for a publication that is no longer happening. I'm happy I wrote it. I like guidelines/deadlines. It makes me finish. I've been working on my book for over 2 years and not even close to finishing. 2013, the year of finishing the book!

-rain and wind and rain rain rain! darkness all day and getting seriously dark around 3pm. It's true, Edward would love it here! Now I'm off to bed. Tomorrow will bring more treat baking. xo m

snowed in...

   Yes, the snow is here. Seattle is a ghost town, everyone at home on lock down. The lights keep flickering. I actually had to drive out to childrens hospital in the blizzard yesterday morning (an ear infection on top of a nasty cold had my girl coughing like crazy with a high fever) and at first I was scared but it was actually pretty chill and really beautiful and no one was out on the roads. It felt good to try something hard/frightening and push through it to get something done, coming out on the other side just fine!

 It was just too cold to stay outside for more than 15 mins or so. I was desperately bribing with cocoa to come back in.

 I broke down and had a little coffee (75% decaf) yesterday. so so good!

 and this morning, more snow. covering up all the footsteps and trails. It's still snowing hard now and the sky is the darkest grey. It's obviously pretty but I love to get outside and go do things. As much as I'm a homebody, the day is usually punctuated with numerous trips outside of the home.

  This picture was taken from inside the chicken run. They are NOT happy about the snow, or the fact that I had to grease down their combs and wattles (we had a few spots of frostbite last year and Sadie lost most of her comb) with vaseline... The hens won't even step into the snow. It's sooo deep!
  I guess today is a chane to really clean out the kitchen drawers etc... happy snow! xo m   

before the snow...

   There are rumors and whispering that a HUGE snowstorm is headed this way. Weather reports are often wrong, so far we've had tiny dustings of snow. Today it's supposed to get crazy... We'll see. When there's even a bit of snow on the ground, this city pretty much shuts down, at least transportation wise, and the people who are out there driving, really should not be cuz they have no clue what they're doing... 

   On Friday I was tidying up my sewing area (/playroom/hallway/family room-our house is small and each room is multi-purpose) when the house became awash in the lovliest light! It was as if someone clicked on these perfect pinky-orange floodlights outside and it just came pouring in all the windows. I went to take a closer look of the setting sun out back...

wow!! Happy Sunday relaxing... xo m

the winter solstice...

Happy Winter Solstice friends! Hope you enjoy the darkest day and fest and celebrate the return of the light. It is coming!!

xo m

fall feast...

  Here our some snaps of our fall feast. It was so delicious and we had all the treats you'd need except, I forgot to take the cranberries out of the fridge! oops..

  Staying around home this weekend except we are sneaking away to the tree fields to cut down our own little holiday tree.. Today will be hot cocoa and tea and decorating all day. Happy weekend! xo m