Let Me Sing-Along....

Okay -it's been one holy zoo here this past week!

Between trying to finish up getting orders for the Avon campaign I was working, trying to collect money for other orders,  plus a kazillion other things I had to do -baking bread, making bark candies and some sweet rolls as well as a pan of bar cookie/candy stuff, run to Milroy to pick up the grandkids and bring them up here, get my fat fanny off to church this morning for the Fall Bazaar and a bunch of not so great other things that cropped here and there in between, trust me when I tell you I am mighty glad to be done with this week  in November of 2013!

All was actually moving along fairly well though until Thursday when I started the bread baking routine.

I was about half-way through mixing up the first batch of Swedish Rye bread, when trouble struck here!

Normally, when I mix the bread dough, I have a fairly liquid-bit of batter and to that, I add the yeast (proofed) and about half of the flour the recipe calls for and I mix that in with the regular beaters on my mixer. Then, when I have about 3, maybe almost 4 cups of flour left to add, I switch the beaters out and replace them with the dough hooks that my mixer uses.

Well, on Thursday, when I got to that stage -and I could see the yeast was already beginning to work in the dough mixture, I went to put the dough hooks in as the dough gets too difficult to deal with at that stage with the regular mixer beaters -and had a rude -very rude -awakening.

The darned dough hooks were somehow or other "locked" together and I couldn't get them to come loose!

Talk about a panic stricken person holding that mixer in one hand and with my other hand, I had a firm grip on the mixing bowl and yes, the old yeast was steadily working away on me already then!

It took a good bit of work -plus my trying to reach my three neighbors that are on my fast phone list when I need help with anything kitchen related -all while then mixing the rest of the flour in using the method my Grandma always was relegated to using -manual labor! LOL Actually, that LOL is being used very sarcastically there as mixing that much flour into bread dough is not any laughing matter.

No sirree Bob! Not in the least happy was I to have to use that method and my arm was about ready to play out on me -out of energy quickly using that method -or maybe it's just that I'm too darned old to be doing stuff that requires that much extra effort!

At one point, I had finally gotten in touch with my neighbor across the street and her husband was checking to see if they had an extra set or two of dough hooks and if so, he was going to come down here with them to see if they would fit and work with my mixer when Katie -my step-granddaughter -popped up in front of my face holding my dough hooks but she had one in each hand!!!

I was ecstatic to see she had gotten them separated and asked her how in blazes she got them apart.

Her answer? "I have absolutely no idea what I did but all of a sudden, they just came apart!"

Now, as much as she enjoys listening to all kinds of music and stuff like that and has always made comments about wishing she could have this or that kind of stuff to use to listen to her kinds of music, it made me really wish that I had enough coins to get her something good for her listening pleasure but sadly, I know I didn't hit it big on this week's powerball lottery, so that the needle then that pricked that little bubble thought in her mind!

Sorry about your luck, Katie but it looks like you'll have to keep joining me, week after week, and share the disappointment then that you can't get what you'd like to have and I still can't go out and buy that darned Winnebago Wagon RV I've been asking for well, seems like it must be forever now that I've been wanting to buy one of those things with my powerball lottery winnings!

Definitely have to try again next Wednesday. That would really give me one huge thing for which to be thankful then on Thanksgiving Day though -and Katie too!