If you like to grow your own veggies or herbs, this is a wonderful Lifetime resource! There is still time to take advantage of the expert advise given in The Home Grown Summit! One of my favorites, Dr. Josh Axe is on the Home Grown Summit sharing about his new book Eat Dirt! This summit is packed full of good stuff!
Home Grown Food Summit I Wanted to Pass along this Great Resource I know that I am probably a little late in posting this but I hope that you will still be able to take advantage of the wond…
Source: The Home Grown Summit!
Spring is arriving beautifully in the South and I’m itching to get outside! As a kid I remember so well the days warming up after a long cold snowy winter! I am originally from a tiny town…
Source: Spring Time has Arrived!
Mama’s DIY Maple Peach Cobbler
Last week I shared a recipe for Mama’s DIY Maple Cookies! So I wanted to expand upon that recipe a bit!
I love summer for the wonderful variety of fresh berries and other fruits. I live in the great state of Georgia, which of course has some of the most wonderful mouthwatering peaches! So……
Today I am featuring a peach cobbler which is one of my family’s favorites! This recipe can be as sweet as you would like, however the peaches that I use are usually really sweet, so I do not add any white sugar, instead I use maple syrup or stevia leaf sweeteners, or local honey.
With the ingredients below, I can make cookies that are gluten free and “sweetened” with 100% real maple syrup which I have found when used in moderation actually has some pretty amazing health benefits! However, by tweaking the recipe just a tad, I can use the cookie dough as a wonderful crust for my fruit cobblers!
When maple syrup is used in appropriate amounts it has nutrition benefits such as important antioxidants and minerals like zinc and manganese. Its benefits can also include the ability to lower inflammation and better manage blood sugar.
Mama’s DIY Maple Peach Cobbler
Ingredients :
3 cups fresh peaches peeled and cut into quarters.
½ cup water
2 cups gluten free all-purpose baking flour
1 tsp Rumford baking powder
1 tbsp. Cinnamon
2 tsp vanilla extract
¼ cup coconut oil ( Traditionally this is butter! )
¼ cup real maple syrup
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees
Sift together All purpose flour and baking soda.
Melt Coconut oil and add to the dry ingredients along with the vanilla extract and the real maple syrup. Mix well, dough will be pretty thick.
Drop dough on a well-floured surface. Either by using a rolling pin, or even your hands, roll out dough to fit a 13 x 9” cake pan.
Place peaches in bottom of pan. Pour the water over the top of peaches and sprinkle 1/2 of the cinnamon onto the peaches. Place the crust over the top of the peaches. Take a fork and score the crust randomly through the cobbler. Sprinkle the rest of the cinnamon over the top of crust. Place in oven and bake until crust has browned and the peaches bubble through the holes or around the sides. Usually around 45 to 45 minutes depending on how fast your oven bakes.
Variations: This cookie crust is much like a basic sugar cookie, you can add a variety of different fruits to make many different cobblers.
One of my favorite variations: Instead of making a whole pan cobbler make individual servings by placing ½ of a peach in a cup cake pan with the cupcake papers. Use about 2 tbsps of water to cover peach and follow through with cinnamon. Crumble the cookie crust mixture on top of the fruit instead of rolling it if you prefer. When the cobbler is bubbling and the topping is brown Viola you have individual cobblers!
I hope that you will enjoy this recipe and that you concoct some of your favorite kinds of cookies or cobblers by simply throwing in what you like or what your family likes! I would love to hear from you! Until next time have fun concocting!
source: http://draxe.com/maple-syrup-nutrition/
Part 10 If Oak Trees Could Talk!
“Inspiring one Dreamer at a time!”
Welcome back to my Video Blog If Oak Trees Could Talk. I am so pleased that you chose to join me this week!
As always, I want you to feel at home, so I hope you have gotten you a tall cold glass of sweet tea or your favorite drink and have gotten yourself all comfy as we continue reading today in Chapter 5 Gleaning Wisdom!
Chapter 5
Gleaning Wisdom
As Amelia and her parents sat outside on the warm terrace, Amelia became silent herself. She again thought of how her parents loved one another. She also thought of how much she loved her own husband, but wondered if what she had with Robert could possibly compare to the kind of love and passion that her parents shared over the years. One thing she did know for sure was that her life wasn’t full of adventure the way that her parent’s lives were. As Amelia continued to think upon her life and compare it to her parent’s she suddenly realized that she must glean from them. As the sun continued to shine on their whitening heads, Amelia felt urgency in her heart that she had to learn how they kept the passion and adventure in their marriage? She needed to know now! Just as she turned to ask her Mom a question, a nurse interrupted her.
“Ms. Amelia, it’s time for your Mother’s therapy now.”
Amelia disappointed, turned to her mother and kissed her.
“I’ll talk with you later okay Momma?”
“Yes dear, we’ll talk later. You had better take your father inside, the sun is becoming very warm and your Daddy’s fair skin will burn.” Helen suggested as she always had her husband’s wellbeing on her mind.
Amelia took her mother’s suggestion and before she barely had gotten Henry back inside, he made a suggestion of his own.
“Let’s go see your mother!” Henry said with a devilish grin.
“We will, Daddy, she should be out of physical therapy pretty soon!”
Amelia pushed her Daddy down the hallway and made several loops down and back as she stalled for time until she thought her mother would be back into her room.
“You know she spent the night with me, don’t you?” Henry said with a smile that told more than Amelia wanted to know.
“Daddy, you and Momma are going to get in trouble!”
“Ah, What can they do to us, kick us out? We only wish to be in such trouble as to receive that kind of punishment.” Henry stated with a defiant little chuckle.
“Daddy, I know you and Momma want to be home. It will happen, Daddy. It really will. I promise you Dad, I’m working on trying to get both of you back home.”
“I know dear, this has been as rough on you as it has been on us!”
“I’m fine Daddy, I’m just happy for our conversation today! I truly believe that you and Momma will be home again soon!”
With those words said, Amelia knocked on her mother’s door. She pushed her Dad inside and the room seemingly lit up as Helen smiled widely and so did Henry.
“You two act like teenagers!” Amelia said with a giggle.
“Nope, not really, your mother didn’t care that much for me when we were teenagers!”
“Now Henry, that’s not true! I just wanted to make for sure of my feelings before I agreed to go steady. My goodness, you kept me scared to death as all you talked about since we were kids was marriage!”
“I had to wear her down, Amelia!” Henry said with a giggle.
“Well, I’m glad she gave in!” Amelia replied as she shook her head and giggled as well.
“Tell me, how do I keep passion in my marriage the way that you two have?” Amelia asked.
“Why honey, that’s easy, we’ve always just put each other first. In doing that, we’ve never wanted for anything outside of what we have together!”
“Surely Mom, it’s not that simple!”
“Yes dear, it’s that simple. It’s not always easy, but it’s that simple.”
“See your Daddy, wouldn’t even let me be sick first that he didn’t follow me right into this place!” Helen stated with a chuckle of her own.
A knock on the door interrupted the laughter and the best conversation that the Tyler family had had in a long while.
“Hello Tyler family, I’m sorry to interrupt the party, but Mrs. Tyler has more therapy and Mr. Tyler is due for his meds!” Nurse Wanda stated as she looked at Amelia.
“Okay, Momma, I love you, I will see you later. I’m going to keep things simple,” Amelia said as she blew a kiss to her mother.
“Come on Daddy! Let me get you back to your room for your medicines. I hope that you will have a whole book of memories written down for me the next time I see you.”
Thank you so much for “tuning in” or reading along with me today to If Oak Trees Could Talk! It is my pleasure to spend this time with you each week. Again I would love to hear from you. All of my videos are archived both on my Youtube channel if you would like to Subscribe, or on my Blogs! Feel free to comment on either site. Thanks again, “Tune in” next week!
Mama’s DIY Maple Sweetened Cookies!.
This recipe would be wonderful for Christmas Cookies!
Part 6 If Oak Trees Could Talk
Welcome back to my Video Blog! I have been so thrilled with the response that I am receiving as I am attempting to do something new or at least new for me! My hope is to truly Inspire One Dreamer at a time! I hope that you are that dreamer! This past week was Father’s Day! Even though my characters are fictional in my books I always model them after people that have impacted my life!
In the main character is Henry William Tyler, I wrote this character based on my Precious Dad! My Dad was a loving, passionate, larger than life man that I loved with all of my heart! As I wrote the characters of Henry and Helen, it was my hope and desire to honor my wonderful parents! So again I thank you for taking the time to “Tune in” or to read along as I continue to read today If Oak Trees Could Talk beginning in Chapter Three entitled Henry’s Homework!
Chapter 3
Henry’s Homework
The morning light came in unusually bright and Henry found himself awakened early and alone. His precious Helen had awakened even earlier and went back to her room before the nurses came to their rooms. Henry squinted for a moment until his eyes adjusted themselves to the light. As he sat on his bed, he remembered some of what the Oak tree helped him to remember, but he really did not know if he had actually remembered it or if he had only dreamed about it. Regardless, Henry decided to take action and regain some of his life. He rang the on-call button frantically and impatiently for a nurse to come to him.
“Well, aren’t you up early and raring to go this find and glorious morning? What’s your big emergency that you hit that button a dozen times or more?”
At first Henry did not recognize Nurse Wanda, but then he answered her.
“Pencil and paper, I want pencil and paper please.”
“Now why do you want a pencil and paper Mr. Tyler? Are you fixing to write yourself a letter?”
“Yes, a letter sounds good.” Henry answered with an urgent plea in his voice.
“Okay, Mr. Tyler, if you want a pencil and paper, then a pencil and paper you’re going to get!” Nurse Wanda said as she was glad that Henry seemed to want to do something besides sit and stare.
It wasn’t long until Nurse Wanda returned to Henry’s room with his medicine, breakfast tray, and of course, a pencil and paper.
“What’s this for?” Henry asked. “You want me to do homework or something?”
“It’s for your letter that you were going to write. Do you not remember asking me for a pencil and paper so that you could write a letter?” Nurse Wanda probed.
“Yes, Mrs. Stone, I’ll take them home so that Mom can help me with my homework.”
“Yes Sir, Mr. Tyler, you just let your Momma help you okay?”
As Nurse Wanda left Henry alone once again, he stared at the blank piece of paper. He thought as he looked upon it, that this is how his life had been, just a blank space that he couldn’t remember. What kind of homework was he supposed to do? Henry wondered. Before long, he found himself with pencil in hand. He put the pencil on the paper and even to his amazement he began drawing a picture of his dearest friend. As he drew, he drew branches extended wide and a huge trunk to an old tree. He thought of how his friend towered above the others and so he drew it the entire length of the sheet of notebook paper. As quick as a bolt of lightning, the memories from the night before came flooding back to him. Henry began writing what he had remembered. As he penned the events of the night before, more and more thoughts kept coming into his mind. He wrote as fast as his stiff hands and fingers would allow him. He wanted to capture every memory before they vanished away, possibly for forever.
At first the memories came just as a flash of something that seemed to be real. However, then another image would come and still yet another one until finally Henry once again had enough of the pieces to realize that he had real memories of a whole event. Every one of them always involved his old friend. He frantically wrote down what he could see in his mind’s eyes. He tried to pen down all the emotions as he experienced the events again, so that when Helen and dear Amelia read his letters, they would know why what they were reading was important to Henry. Henry felt hope for the first time in months. He felt as though he was reclaiming some resemblance of his life. He knew that in his memory bank was a treasure chest of precious hidden treasures. For whatever reason, the old Oak tree was serving as a key to help him open his treasures to share with others.
Thank you once again for either Listening or Reading along with my Video Blogs on Youtube! I hope that you will subscribe to my Video channel so as not to miss any!
Sometimes I feel like a nut or maybe I should say Coconut or “Coconut Oil” to be exact! Oh my goodness, what to say about Coconut Oil? I am going to sound like Bubba Gump from the movie Forest Gump because just like Bubba came up with many ways to use shrimp, I can say that much about the many uses of Coconut! I honestly am not an expert that can prove Coconut or Coconut oil to be a super food, but this Mama says, “Coconut Oil is Super!” Although there are hundreds of uses for Coconut Oil, I wanted to share my top 10 uses. I’ve also included another one of Mama’s Concoction Recipes using Coconut Oil! I hope that you will enjoy it!
My top 10 Uses for Coconut Oil!
1. Coconut Oil is great for healthy cooking! Fry or bake, as replacement for all vegetable oil and margarines.
Mama’s Mandarin Orange Scrub
Mama’s DIY Recipes
http://www.covenantessentials.com
Ingredients:
1 cup Organic Virgin Coconut Oil
1 cup Sugar
2 to 3 tsps Orange Juice
5 drops Wild Orange Essential Oil (Doterra Essential Oil)
1 Glass Container ( I use pt Canning Jar w/lid)
Directions:
In a glass bowl combine Virgin Coconut Oil with sugar and mix well with a spatula.
Cut Mandarin Orange in half and squeeze juice ( usually yields about 2 to 3 teaspoons) directly into the bowl
Pour in the 5 drops of Doterra Wild Orange Essential Oil and continue to mix.
When all ingredients are mixed well pour into glass container or jar and enjoy!
I love to double the recipe and give keep one and give the other as a gift!
Simply tie a Ribbon around the jar and Voila! ( I love the little Embellished Jute Ribbon)
As you can see Coconut Oil is so very versatile. I love the fact that I get the wonderful benefit of replacing it to replace a lot of the unhealthy chemicals that are in the products that my family uses every day! If you have enjoyed my blog post and Mama’s DIY Recipes I would love to hear from you! Until next time, I hope that you to will feel like a “Nut, or at least a Coconut!”
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