Did the Garden Forget it Was Autumn?

I think my flowers have forgotten it is autumn. I am amazed what survived the frost a week ago. No complaints here... I will just keep bringing in bouquets!

Williamsburg Orange Cake: A Keeper from the Recipe Box

I have had this Gold Medal Century of Success Cookbook since the early eighties and I had never tried this cake recipe. I love orange and can't believe I always skipped this page. Yesterday I served it for birthday cake at a special Sunday dinner. It is a moist cake filled with golden raisins and walnuts and the frosting adds just enough sweetness to make it irresistible.

Williamsburg Orange Cake
2 1/2 cups flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 1/2 teas. baking soda
3/4 teas. salt
1 1/2 cups buttermilk
1/2 cup butter, softened
1/4 cup shortening
3 eggs
1 1/2 teas. vanilla
1 cup golden raisins, cut up
1/2 cup chopped nuts
1 TB grated orange peel
Heat oven to 350. Grease and flour rectangular 9x13 pan or two 9 inch round pans. Beat all ingredients together in a large mixing bowl on low speed, scraping the bowl constantly 30 seconds. Beat on high speed, scraping the bowl occasionally, 3 minutes. Pour into pan(s).
Bake until wooded pick inserted in the center comes out clean. ( rectangular 45-50 min., layers 30-35 minutes.) Cool layers ten minutes; remove from pans. Cool completely. Frost with Orange Butter Frosting.
Orange Butter Frosting
Mix 1/2 cup softened butter and 3 cups powdered sugar. Beat in 2 teaspoons grated orange peel and about 2 tablespoons orange juice until of spreading consistency.

A Day Filled With Birthday Blessings

"Birthdays are filled with yesterday’s memories, today’s joys, and tomorrow’s dreams." Anon.
Today JEJ and I hosted a gathering to celebrate our friend GH's birthday. A circle of friends came for Sunday dinner and GH's special day was filled with good food, big laughs, great conversation, and a traditional toast for our friend and neighbor.
I only had two birthday candles so GH got to decide if he wanted to be three, seven, thirty-seven, or seventy-three years old today. I didn't have the right candles for his real age. He wanted to be thirty-seven today as we lit the candles and sang "Happy Birthday". He requested an apple pie with sliced sharp cheese on the side as his birthday dessert. I also made a Williamsburg Orange Cake (recipe to follow tomorrow). How can you have a birthday party without a cake ? It was fun to plan a dinner for our dear friend. Friends also contributed amazing food and wine and he loved the whole meal. His wife and our close friend died a few years ago, but fond memories of SH are always cherished at a gathering like this by the people that knew her.

MM,GH, and JEJ stopped to pose before dinner began.

As the celebration came to a close I loaded GH up with a leftover dinner and his collection of wonderful gifts. He confessed as he left that he also loved orange cake, but didn't have room for two desserts! I suggested he take a slice home to enjoy later. He didn't argue for a second.

Sibling Assignment # 78: An Awful Awful and D and D at the Brunswick Cafe

courtesy of Orange TV at Remember the Roxy which you can find here.


Silver Valley Girl gave the sibling assignment this week. "Pick a business in Kellogg where you used to "hang out" in junior high or high school and tell a story about an incident that happened at
this location that was really memorable." Soon you will find Raymond Pert's here and Silver Valley Girl's here.

I am going to break the rules a bit this week and talk about a place we would hang out in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho called The Brunswick Cafe. In high school we had pep club buses that traveled to games to cheer on our Kellogg Wildcats in football and basketball. Often the pep band also traveled on these long bus trips. I think back to those poor bus drivers during those years on those buses. We screamed, sang "Hey Jude", "99 Bottles of "Root" Beer on the Wall", and " I Think We're Alone Now" a hundred times a trip, and always yelled cheers for our hometown team. Probably all those bus drivers that are still with us are deaf!

It seems like we always stopped in Coeur d'Alene for a restaurant stop on every trip. I am sure we didn't do it every time, but we always stopped at the Brunswick Cafe. I don't know why that was the only place we stopped. It sure is a place I always remember. The big deal at the Brunswick was to order an Awful Awful. It was this big messy hamburger that had about everything on it. It was messy to eat and very filling, but we all ordered them with fries and Pepsi. If there are any of you out there that remember Awful Awfuls... it seems like they were more in the shape of a French Dip in a poor boy bun. I may have that part wrong. Let me know.

Many a late Friday or Saturday night during the early seventies this cafe was filled to the max with rooters from Kellogg High School. It actually seems like sometimes the team was there also sometimes. I always remember not spending all my money at the concession stand during the game so I could order that great Awful Awful.

The memorable incident that happened at The Brunswick Cafe was when I first learned about D and D. This stood for Dine and Dash. One late night some of us were getting ready to pay as we were heading out the door to find the bus again. Some girls from the bus just walked out. Once outside they were cracking up hysterically! When I left the cafe I reminded them they didn't pay. More explosive laughter as they screamed, "We just dined and dashed!"
That was my introduction to D and D and that night I was taken aback by my fellow pep club members. Thoughts raced through my head. They broke the law. It was such a risky act while traveling with a school group. It wasn't like them. I don't know how often they dined and dashed after that night, but the rest of the ride home that night I was bothered. I wondered if they would be caught. I thought the police might stop the bus going past the Rose Lake exit and come and arrest them. I don't think they ever gave it another thought except to brag it up on other trips.

To this day I have still never dined and dashed, but I do remember well how tasty those Awful Awfuls were during those stops that broke up our long, late night bus rides.

Photo Hunt: Family

" All things bright and beautiful

All creatures great and small
All things wise and wonderful,
The Lord God made them all."
C. Alexander

Our family of animals gets along most of the time. They watch out for each other, comfort each other, tease each other,
and make room for each other when they sleep on vacation!
For other photo hunters using family go here.

The Journey

Last Saturday evening my friend BW was heading to a concert in a college town in southern Idaho with a friend. They were crossing the street at a crosswalk when a car hit them both, throwing them into the air. My friend BW suffered multiple injuries from the accident. Her friend didn't survive the accident. As BW lays in a hospital bed with a broken hip, leg, and ribs she is trying to manage the pain. She also struggles with the fogginess from the concussion. When she first woke up after the accident she was concerned about her dogs, the lesson plans for school, and her many obligations that are first and foremost in her life. She has had to let go and let her body and mind heal.

In the collection of poems Ten Poems to Change Your Life compiled by Roger Housden , the following poem reminded me of the journey ahead for BW. She is blessed to have a support system of colleagues, church members, and friends around her as she embarks on the journey of recovery.
My prayers are with you BW... keep up the fight!!

The Journey

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice --
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do --
determined to save
the only life you could save.
-Mary Oliver