TGIF...

Today was my final day of substitute teaching early morning seminary.What a fun experience it has been. Years ago Claude gave me a gift. It was a small picnic basket. It was the kind where you have two handles that come up over the lid. The lid was not wood though. It was a cloth top with a gingerbread recipe on it and it was filled with polyfill and has a lace edging. The basket is just a really cute way to serve cookies and things. Today was scripture mastery day in seminary. The kids teach the class and the teacher just brings the goodies for the end of the week. I baked one of my favorite recipes. It's called "Old Fruit Cake". I got the recipe many years ago when we lived in Denver. It makes enough batter that you can cook it in a dripper pan. It stays moist forever. The purpose of the recipe is to use up those quart bottles of fruit you canned and didn't eat. The fruit is still good but it is getting old enough to start to change to a darker color. You just blend the fruit up and use it as a base for making the cake. Then you don't lose that good fruit you bottled. I didn't have a quart jar of fruit to use but I do have gallon bags of apples I froze for pies that I haven't used. So I thawed one of them out, blended up the apples and it makes a quart of fruit. Then I make the cake using those apples. For today's purposes I made 24 little mini-muffins for the seminary class and 3 little round cakes for giving to others. I took my little picnic basket to put the mini-muffins in to serve to the kids. They were totally enjoying the mini-muffins. One of the young women looked at my basket and said, "That looks like Little Red Riding Hood's basket." Speaking faster that I should I said, "That would make my hubby the Big Bad Wolf!!" We got a good chuckle out of that. Today Papa is at an elementary school in Georgetown with Jake's big sombrero on his head singing 'El Gato' with Debra Kumar. She volunteered to do this for a music appreciation day at the school. Debra will be dressed in full Spanish regalia. She will perform this little number several times throughout the day. She asked Papa because she knows he just loves little kids so much and thought he might enjoy this experience. She and Papa have been practicing him playing the guitar while Debra sings and tells the kids the story about this cat. I would love to be a fly on the wall while this is going on. I'm just so happy that he was included in Debra's little sharing music with the kids. That was so sweet of her to think of him. He has enjoyed the experience of practicing. I can't wait to hear how the actual performance has gone. Last night, Claude, Lisa, Barbara and I all met at the Louisville Temple for a session. It was just so nice to be there and enjoy the peacefulness of the temple. I marveled again as we were driving home that in my 40 years of going to the temple and as many times as I have gone I still learn something new each time. I am grateful for that opportunity to put life on hold and enjoy the sweet peace that you feel in that Holy Place. Now I'm off to get some of my handwork done for Christmas. Tonight Claude and I must catch up on TV. Andie alerted me to 2 shows on Public Television night before last about Alzheimer's and I taped them. Yes, we do not yet have DVR so I put in an old VHS tape and taped those shows. Last night while we were at the temple Claude taped a CSI and The Mentalist. Tonight we should have a Numbers to watch on TV as well. So I'll be doing lots of needlework and TV watching come this evening. For right now, Claude is out cutting the grass one final time for the year (has to get it even he says) and I'm going to work on my 'to do' list for Thanksgiving, Christmas and our trip. Here is the cake recipe in case you might like to try it: OLD FRUIT CAKE:

4 cups sifted flour

2 teas. cinnamon

2 cups sugar

1 teas. nutmeg

1 teas. salt

1/8 teas. cloves

1 quart old fruit. Blend in blender. Add 1 cup Wesson oil and 4 teas. soda. Add dry ingredients and mix well. Add nuts and bake in dripper pan for 1 hour at 375 degrees.