Happy Halloween

This morning when I was getting dressed for work and since it was Halloween, I thought, why not!

Pumpkin Greek Yogurt Banana Bread

I had 3½ cups of fresh pumpkin in the freezer from last year and I have 2 new pie pumpkins sitting on my dining room table now so I better use up the frozen stuff. Thought I'd make a pumpkin bread and pie but needed 4 cups of pumpkin so I looked for a recipe using pumpkin and bananas and found this one from Closet Cooking

Pumpkin Greek Yogurt Banana Bread

A moist, light and fluffy pumpkin banana bread with Greek yogurt that is perfect for cool fall days and pretty healthy as well.
Servings: makes 1 loaf  (my note:  very moist -YUM!)

Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 60 minutes
Total Time: 1 hours 10 minutes

Printable Recipe
Ingredients
1 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 cup whole wheat flour (or all-purpose flour)
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ginger
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon cloves
3/4 cup brown sugar
1 cup pumpkin puree (homemade or store bought)
2 large over-ripe bananas
2 eggs
1/2 cup Greek yogurt
1 cup pecans, toasted and coarsely chopped (optional)

Directions
Mix the flours, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg and cloves in a large bowl.
Mix brown sugar, pumpkin puree, bananas, eggs and yogurt in another large bowl.
Mix the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients followed by the pecans.
Pour the mixture into a greased 9x5 inch loaf pan.
Bake in a preheated 350F oven until golden brown and a toothpick poked into the center comes out clean, about 60 minutes.

Hilton Head - September 2014

I am so far behind in posting that I must get this one uploaded and then try to stay current because I won't know what I did with my life.

We went to Hilton Head with Audrey and Steve and before that spent a few days at St James Plantation in Southport, NC.
= = = = = = =

I must have written the above a month ago.  Well, it looks like I took the easy way out.  Instead of posting all the pics I made a photobook and it's available for viewing here.

Now back to my t-shirt quilt.  I'm almost ready to sew it together.  I have watched Seasons 1-6 of Mad Men and all of Breaking Bad during the past month while I work on this quilt.  What else have I been doing,  ? ? ? ?

Click here to view this photo book larger

Create your own custom photo books at Shutterfly.com.

Sydney - Gone but Never Forgotten

After two stressful and exhausting weeks it came time for Laura to say goodbye to Sydney.

Sydney

1998 - September 26, 2014

 Sydney was so little and light in this picture from Christmas 1998 she was able to sit in the tree.

A picture of Laura and Sydney from back then and Calie (same age as Sydney) thinking what's up?

Moon Eclipse

We went outside at 6:30 AM to see the eclipse.  This was the best picture that I got.  We should have gone out by the lake because there were too many trees in the way to get a better view but it was 6:30 and I was in my pajamas.

Fajitas

Fajita Seasoning

1-1/2 teaspoons seasoned salt

1-1/2 teaspoons dried oregano

1-1/2 teaspoons ground cumin

1 teaspoon garlic powder

1/2 teaspoon chili powder

1/2 teaspoon paprika

1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes, optional

I used this recipe to make fajitas for Girls Night on October 10th when Larry went to visit Michael.
We had an entire Mexican meal.
To Start:
Tostitos
Black Bean Hummus
Guacamole
Nacho Cheese
Salsa
Margaritas

Main Course:
Chicken Fajitas with sauteed Peppers and Onions
Black Beans and Rice
Refried Beans
Grated Cheese
Corn Tortillas
Sour Cream (it was on my list but I didn't realize till the next day that I forgot to serve it)

Mary came over the next day and we had leftovers and when Larry came home on Monday we had more leftovers but we used the sour cream that night.

Easy Black Beans and Rice
1 cup uncooked rice (I used brown)
1 can Rotel tomatoes
1 can black beans
1 can corn

Cook rice as per package directions
Add other ingredients and blend together
Reheat for serving as necessary

Chicken for fajitas
Marinate chicken in 2-3 Tbsp seasoning with 2 Tbsp olive oil and water for more moisture as necessary for 4 hours
Bake on rack on baking sheet in 450° oven for 15-20 minutes
When ready to serve slice in strips

Catching Up

Well, I still haven't posted our beginning of September posts from our trip to Hilton Head and here it is the middle of October.  But tonight, just around midnight I finally got my T-shirt quilt laid out, at least it is with graph paper.  I still have a long way to go because I have to do final cutting on a lot of the pieces and still have 4 or 5 t-shirts that I haven't cut at all but the hard part is done.  I am so excited.  I've been working on this since August.  I had to take some breaks because all that bending over the island doing the cutting and the ironing board putting on the interfacing killed my neck and back for a week.  Good thing we went away for two weeks so it made me take a rest from it.  Since we've been back I worked on it in between other things but now I've been more focused since I've been binge watching some shows which probably drags out the actual time I spend working on the quilt because I have to focus a lot on my shows.

So far since the middle of September I watched the first six seasons of Mad Men and now I'm into Breaking Bad.  Just finished the first half of Season 4 and I have Season 5 ready to go after that.

This was the first layout

and then I moved a couple of pieces around to make it more interesting.  Tomorrow I'll play with these pieces some more to reorganize where I want the colors and to move some of the pieces that form straight lines  that are too long .

My brother - an author

Thanks to Phil's post on LinkedIn I discovered this on amazon --> click here:

Congratulations to all the authors!!!

and then went to Gerry's author page