Homemade Goodness

I have an awesome Hubby. It's been awhile since I told you that, so I think it's about time.

Wanna know what inspired this particular gush of Hubby-gloat? If you are still reading, you must. Since a picture is worth a thousand words, I'll show you...

I jumped to this photo on purpose. I think it's a cool shot AND I wanted to keep the suspense going, at least for some of you. Others, I know, probably know where this post is heading. (Like Shannon, who I should just apologize to now, because there's a pretty good chance this post might make her a teeny bit homesick. Or hungry. Or both.)

Let me back up a bit...

Does this shot help? I doubt it. I mean, I took the picture. I know what this is, but you can't really tell just by looking at this shot, which I think sort of resembles a mud pit.

How about now? Is this better?

That amazing Hubby of mine made CINNAMON ROLLS yesterday. From scratch.

His cinnamon rolls are quite tasty. Very. Heck, they're downright delectable.

As I was taking these pictures, I was thinking to myself, "My blog is going to end up looking all Pioneer Woman-ish." Which is cool, 'cause I love the Pioneer Woman. That wasn't my goal, though. I just love the way food pictures turn out when shot with my 50mm prime lens (if you are at all into photography, there's a good discussion on the lens thing here).

Hubby didn't even complain that I was all in his way as he carefully rolled the buttery-cinnamon-sugar-laden dough. He's nice like that. Or he knows that after almost 17 years of marriage it's best to just shut up sometimes (i.e., often) and humor your wife. Maybe it's a little of both.

Look at that focus!

Yes, this image is a repeat. But I like it. Not only do I think it is sort of artsy, it's a great example of where the "roll" in cinnamon rolls comes from. If you've never seen them made, you may not have known that.

Let's say you knew that the dough is rolled as part of the cinnamon-roll-making process. Did you know how the soft, squishy dough is cut without being all smushed? A knife would totally smush the things so you'd end up with oddly misshapen ovals instead of circles.

The cutting tool of choice for this particular baker (aka Hubby) is dental floss. Not the minty kind either. Just plain, ole dental floss.

See how neatly it slices the dough?

Here's another artsy shot. Click on the image so you can see the big version if you really want to appreciate the artiness of the shot.

See how nice and round they are?

The next step is baking. You may need to let the rolls sit for a while first. I'm not sure. The baker is not downstairs yet, so I can't ask. But it doesn't really matter because this isn't a how-to post, it's one of my I-bet-I-can-make-you-hungry posts.

Because I had to leave, I was not able to get a shot of the steamy, fresh-from-the-oven rolls. I missed the whole making of the cream cheese icing, too. In all honesty, I even forgot to take a picture of the finished product until after I'd consumed one (okay, two) and was going through these pictures.

However, knowing at least some of my faithful fans would want to see the end product, I did what any good blogger would do and made sure I got at least one good shot so I could include a shot of the ready-to-eat cinnamon rolls in today's post...

Now, if you will excuse me, I need to go grab myself a cinnamon roll. Or two.

The Real ToadMama

A post written by one of my favorite bloggers recently got me thinking. I'll tell you the name of this blogger, which is important because names are the issue here, but I must warn you that she exercises her right to free speech a bit more than I do. By that I mean she cusses. A lot.

That's fine with me. I mean, it's a free country, right? I choose to keep my blog relatively clean. Mainly because my Moms read it. So it's a respect thing. Even if I am almost 43 years old (gasp!). I guess even the ToadMama can be old-fashioned...

Anyhoo... Booshy did a post recently that was basically about there actually being other people in the world known as Booshy. Which is pretty odd, considering Booshy is sort of a unique moniker.

But then, so is ToadMama, right? Right? That's what I was wondering when I turned to Google and learned that, much to my dismay, there are other ToadMamas out there!

Of course, I had to be all nosy and check these impostors out. Since they're totally stealing my name. So here's the skinny, in order of their appearance on Google. By the way, I'm the first hit on Google, which is proof that I am the REAL ToadMama. Agreed?

IMPOSTOR(s) #1: The ToadMamas

The ToadMamas are a band, based in Charlottesville, VA, who describe their style as "hopping Celtic, New England, French-Canadian and American roots music."

Um, what?

It's a good thing their site has some sample Toad Tunes.

There's a schedule of appearances, too. Oddly enough, the closest one to me seems to be in Shepherdstown, West Virginia on February 6, which just so happens to be the REAL ToadMama's birthday.

IMPOSTOR #2: Doris "ToadMama" Pearson

This nice lady appears to be an upstanding citizen from Minnesota. She's a bit older than me, but seems relatively normal. Our pets would not get along, that's for sure. My three dogs would probably eat her five cats and four guinea pigs. But, get this, hazelnut coffee and creamer is her favorite. So, we could hang out. She'd just have to leave her pets at home. I think this is her, too. AND she's on Facebook.

IMPOSTOR #3: Tobey aka "ToadMama"

This particular impostor appears to be inactive. But I thought it worth mentioning that she's married to a guy named Mike and, in 2007, they were planning a move to Downeast Maine. I'll have to see if I can dig up more pond scum on this particular individual. 'Cause I love Downeast Maine. And, if she's cool, I might just have to go and meet her. Huh, guess what? Upon further examination, I have determined that she's still active on the 'net and looking for friends. Should I send her an e-mail?

IMPOSTOR #4: Unidentified ToadMama

Not much info here, but there's definite coolness potential. Although, she could be like 12.

NOT REALLY IMPOSTORS, BUT RELATED

Someone that goes by "laughingtodeath" at the Photobucket site created this particular toadmama, which is cute and definitely worth sharing.

LURVELY: Oddly, I found this Web page , which somehow or other gathered all of my favorite Flickr pix for public presentation. Weird.

ART: I now know where to buy a one-of-a-kind polymer clay horned toad sculpture.

SELLING OUT: There's a Toadmamma on eBay, but she has nothing for sale at the time of this writing.

So... after much time spent wading through and following links on seven Google pages, that's all I've got. There aren't as many ToadMama's as I feared.

And I still say I am the REAL ToadMama.

I'm At a Loss for Words

Most days, if I woke up to this, I'd be all excited.

I mean, it snowed!

I love snow.

But it's been snowing so much lately, it just feels like more of the same.

My first thought, of course, was to turn the dogs loose in the backyard and grab the camera.

But just how many snow pictures can one person take?

How much can one person say about snow?

Sigh...

Our Ski Adventure

As mentioned here on Tuesday, Eric and I went skiing yesterday. The trip was a success, even if things did not go exactly as planned.

Here's what was planned... drive to the WV place on Tuesday night. It's about an hour from Wisp. We would leave there early on Wednesday to ski, spend the night at the WV place on Wednesday, then drive home this morning (Thursday).

Eric got off work late on Tuesday, so we didn't leave my house until 11:00 PM. It's a three-hour drive to the WV place. So we should have arrived at about 2:00 AM. I say should have because we hit a bit of trouble. Nothing horrible, but we were definitely delayed.

Before I tell you what happened, you need a bit of background. The WV place is not far east of Wisp. It's more in the foothills than the mountains, so it's not subject to the extreme mountain weather that hits the mountains not far west of the cabin. We haven't been to the WV place since Thanksgiving. They were hit with the same blizzard as us in December. But that was like three weeks ago, so we figured the snow would be gone.

We were wrong.

Hubby wisely convinced me to take our big, bad four-wheel-drive truck instead of my car (wimpy little sedan).

Unfortunately, not even the big, bad 4wd truck was a match for the foot of compacted icy snow on Turkey Hollow Road.

We got stuck. A mere 100 yards down Turkey Hollow Road. We were only about 1/4 mile from the house at that point, but...

It was 2:00 AM. It was dark. It was COLD.

It didn't take long for us to realize the truck was not moving an inch in either direction, so we grabbed our essentials and walked the rest of the way. Lucky for us there were flashlights in the truck!

I did mention that it was cold, right? About 20 degrees. The heat at the cabin stays set at 50 degrees when we are not there. It felt absolutely balmy at first. Because it would have taken hours for the radiant heat system to kick in, we just slept in the back bedrooms, which each have their own baseboard heating systems. It was 40 degrees back there. By the time we went to bed at about 3:30, it had warmed up to 45 degrees. Eric had an electric blanket and I had lots of layers, so we were okay.

I seriously had no idea there would be that much snow left at the WV place. Here are some pictures I shot on Wednesday morning...

Our (undrivable) driveway.

The house surrounded by snow.

Another shot of the driveway from just outside of the garage.

The big hill on Turkey Hollow Road, heading back toward where the truck was stuck. Notice all the critter tracks? It's a mix of deer, turkey and people tracks (Eric and me).

Looking down Turkey Hollow Road toward our driveway.

Eric with shovel and rake in hand. Those were all the tools we had to work with to free the truck.

More people tracks, me and Eric, going and coming, taken from right in front of the truck looking down Turkey Hollow Road.

That's Romney in the distance.

Just after we crossed the Potomac River back into Maryland, south of La Vale. Notice the pretty blue skies? It did not last long.

Not far west of La Vale on I-68.

The highway exit ramp from I-68 onto US-219 at Keyser's Ridge.

Eric (dude in center) adjusting his boot.

Here I am. I felt like a mummy. I was warm, but being so bundled up made it hard to take pictures, which is why there aren't many action shots. Plus, it snowed all day. They'd gotten 5 to 8 inches of snow the previous day and were predicting another 4 to 8 inches yesterday. The snow was awesome. The wind was bitter.

Skiing in powder was quite a treat, once we got used to it. It's a bit different than skiing on packed snow.

The ride home was quite scenic with all of the snow stuck to the trees. (The farther east we traveled, the less snowy it was.)

All in all, we had a good time. Aside from the 30-40 minutes required to free the truck, that is.

We will definitely try to do it again. Wisp has a special on Wednesdays where you can ski for $21 all day, 9 am to 9 pm. The same lift ticket costs $39 per person any other non-holiday weekday and $59 per person on weekends and holidays. It was quite a deal. And there were NO lift lines. None.

Hopefully it will be a little bit warmer next time.

Readjustment

Now that the holidays are over, it will be interesting to see just how long it takes the girls to readjust to my work schedule.

This scene was repeated over and over yesterday. It's a good thing I wasn't busy...

My girls can be quite demanding at times. After I'd let them out a gazillion times, all K wanted was to sit on my lap. Having her there tends to put a crimp in my typing speed, however.

With my handy new point-and-shoot, which I can keep by my side at all times, I snapped a couple shots of K on my lap. Then, last night, I did some editing with PS Elements and this is what I ended up with...

I applied some different lighting, color and texture effects. Then I framed it. What do you think?

I took Wednesday off to go skiing with my baby boy. I am determined to take advantage of some $21 all-day lift ticket specials this year.

Wish me luck. It's still damn cold. Tomorrow's forecasted high is 20 degrees with snow showers and some wind, so it will feel like 8 degrees. If I dress appropriately, all should be fine. Right?

Snow conditions are great. They've had 63" so far this year and expect some more overnight tonight. We'll be driving out to the WV place this evening if all goes as planned. That's about an hour away from Wisp and just outside the snow belt, so we shouldn't have any problems.

If you want to see how things are going for us on Wednesday, check out the Wisp web cams.