Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris

I just finished reading the 1st book in the Sookie Stackhouse series, the same series that the HBO show True Blood is based on.  There are many, many more books in this series, and before I read the first one I was excited about the prospect of having another long series to read.  UNFORTUNATELY, I will not be reading anymore of these books.  I've heard this series compared to the Twilight Saga, and even some have accused Stephanie Meyer of copying Harris.  While there are similar themes in both books, i.e, vampires, mind reading abilities, warewolves, human falls in love with vampire, etc, they are also very different and I much prefer Twilight any day (even though I get mad at it every time I read it, but that's a story for another day).  Dead Until Dark just didn't live up to my expectations, and I would probably only give it 2 stars out of 5.  The biggest warning I would give someone before reading this is that it is rated PG-13 at best, and probably more like R; there's a reason True Blood airs on HBO, and it's in the book too, so watch out if you don't like that kind of thing.  But even more disappointing to me was the lack of character development and predictable plot.  It was kind of like a vampire-slash-murder mystery novel, and I'm really not that into either. Plus the mystery part wasn't very compelling and pretty easy to figure out (I knew after the second murder who the killer was).   The biggest theme in the book seemed to be sex, sex, and more sex.  Bottom line, the characters weren't interesting or even likeable, and the plot was LAME.  I think the overall idea (vampires openly living among humans) was complelling, but too bad Harris did a lousy job of telling the story.  Sigh...I guess I'll have to find another long series to read. 

My next read is the seond book in the Looking Glass Wars series, Seeing Redd by Frank Beddor (I loved the first one, so I'm looking forward to this one).  

The best whole wheat bread recipe!!

Lately I've been experimenting with baking whole wheat bread with food storage wheat.  I figure if I'm gonna have a year's supply, I better know how to use it right?  So I've found a couple good recipes, but I just tried a new one yesterday and the bread turned out sooo good.  So I thought I'd post the recipe for anyone else who may be interested.  I found this recipe at One Happy Homemaker Blog and on www.foodstoragemadeeasy.net.  Enjoy!

3 c. very warm water
1 T instant or quick rise yeast (I've discovered that bread machine yeast is the same)
1/3 c. vegetable or canola oil
1/3 c honey
1 T salt
6 cups whole wheat flour (hard white wheat is best)
1/2 c. whole oats
1/4 c. gluten w/vitamin C (I didn't have gluten w/ vitamin C, so I added 1/2 t. of ascorbic acid)

Combine the 1st 5 ingredients and mix.  Add 5 cups flour, oats, and gluten flour.  Mix well. Continue to add the other 1 c. flour slowly until the dough forms a ball and scrapes the excess dough off the sides of the bowl.  Let mix for 5-10 min.  While mixing, preheat your oven to 100-125 degrees.

Oil the counter surface and your hands (Use oil, NOT flour). Put your dough on the oiled surface & slice with a knife into 2 large or 3 small even loaves.  Pat down and roll into loaf shape, then put into greased bread pan.

Turn OFF your oven, cover loaves LOOSELY with saran wrap, and put in warmed oven to rise till double (about 45-60 min). Remove loaves from oven and preheat to 350 degrees.  Bake loaves for 24-30 min.  Remove from pans immediately and place on a wire cooking rack. 

I also made this recipe in my bread maker.  I simply cut the recipe in half and added all the liquid ingredients first.  Then I added the rest of the ingredients ending with the yeast on top.  I set my bread maker to the whole wheat setting and let it go.  It worked great! 

P.S. If you have trouble getting your loaves to rise, it may be that the whole wheat flour isn't ground fine enough. If you are grinding it yourself, you may need to set your grinder for a finer setting.  If you can't grind it finer (like on the one that I used), then just substitute half the whole wheat flour for all-purpose flour.  It may not be entirely whole wheat, but it will rise much better and still taste great!!  I mentioned this, because it took me FOREVER to figure out why my loaves wouldn't rise higher. Although I will add, that even with my loaves not rising as high as I would like, the bread still tasted sooo yummy and moist!

Food Storage Quest!

I'm on a quest to obtain a one year supply of food storage for our entire family!  For me this quest presents many challenges, but offers me lots of fun opportunities to learn.  Lately I have been learning to can all kinds of foods, including meat.  I have also been attempting to bake bread made with 100% whole wheat.  I have only had one semi-successful loaf so far, but I will not surrender!! 

I'd like to keep this page updated with my most recent food storage adventures.  I'll include some helpful tips I learn along the way and some links to my favorite food storage web pages.  So keeping checking back to see what fun things are going on! 


Here is my first link!  This is one of my favorite web pages for food storage!
http://www.foodstoragemadeeasy.net/

The Book Nook

Most of you probably  know that I love, love, love to read.  I read for fun, I read to learn, I read to read! 

If you look on the right side of my blog, you'll find my selfari book self.  This self is full of books I've read and plan to read. Take a look to find out what some of my favorites are!

I will be writing reviews on some of my favorite books and comments on my recents reads.  Please feel free to post any of your favorite books and give reviews and comments where desired.

Here's to some good reading!!

In memory of Uncle Dick...

My Uncle passed away on September 12, 2010, and I wanted to honor him with a post full of my favorite memories of him. 

Uncle Dick was my favorite uncle when I was growing up.  I remember lots of fun summer vacations to Zion, Illinois that all included him.   When I was a younger child I used to be very afraid of him, because he liked to tease me and pretend like he was going to eat my belly.  Uncle Dick was a big guy and could be rather intimidating, so I always took his threats seriously.  In fact, I remember hiding under the bed a couple times to avoid getting my belly eaten.  But truth be know, Uncle Dick was really just a big teddy bear, and all his teasing was done in fun.  It's interesting that even though I remember being scared of him, I also remember loving him and wishing to see him at the same time, so I guess I couldn't have been too afraid of him after all. 

When I got a little bit older my fondest memories come from his famous ghost stories.  You see, my grandparents house was pretty small, so whenever we would visit, the older kids would sleep outside in a tent.  After we all got settled into our tent, Uncle Dick would come out, climb into the tent, and tell us a couple of scary ghost stories.  He would get us all worked up and nice and jumpy, then kiss us goodnight and go back inside.  We would sit inside the tent talking about the ghost stories and jumping at every little noise, and without fail about 10 to 20 minutes later Uncle Dick would quietly sneak back outside and scare the pee out of us!  For some reason he was always able to scare us even though we eventually caught on and knew he was going to do it. 

I remember many summer days and nights while visiting my grandparents, where Uncle Dick would sit in the garage smoking, drinking a beer, and teasing us.  He was also something of a magician and would perform all kinds of tricks.  As I got older he even showed me how to do some of these tricks myself!  He loved to pull pranks on people and I especially enjoyed watching him tease and prank my mom!  He was just one of those people that you couldn't be around without laughing and having a good time. 

Another favorite memory of Uncle Dick is the one and only time he came to visit us here in Colorado.  He came out here because Regina was supposed to get married and he promised her he would come.  The wedding ended up getting cancelled, but too late for anyone to cancel their tickets, so instead we had a small family reunion and did all kinds of fun things.  I just really loved having Uncle Dick here in our home town and showing him around our beautiful state.  Uncle really seemed to enjoy visiting and especially seeing all of the grandchildren.  He later told mom that he was really proud of how well we all were doing. 

Uncle Dick was a kind and generous man, the kind of man who does Harley motorcycle drives to collect toys for sick kids, and the kind of man who sends his niece a little bit of money to help out during a particularly difficult time.  Even though I haven't seen Uncle Dick in several years, I will miss him dearly.  I know that one day we will all be reunited with him, and what a joyous day that will be, but in the meantime, this world seems a little bit lonelier without him.  I love you and goodbye for now uncle!!

Let's start blogging!

So I've decided to give this blogging thing a chance, but I can't gaurantee that I'll keep it up to date!  Sooo....

This Charlie Brown family resides in Thornton, Colorado and consists of four little peanuts, two big peanuts, two snoopys (only they're not beagles), and one cat.  Our four little peanuts are Shannan (9), Justin (7), Zach (4), and Caleb (2).  Yes that's right, we have three very active and crazy boys, and one very calm and mostly gentle girl. 

Our snoopy's are Misty, a yellow lab, and Strider, a mutt (and yes he's named after the Lord of the Rings). 

Our cat, Tucker, was adopted several years ago to help control our mouse problem, and he has been extremely successful at earning his keep.  Tucker is more of a neighborhood cat who just lodges at our house on occasion, and I pity any other cat that decides to challenge his territory (he has been in brawls with foxes, so he's fierce).   

The two big peanuts in our family are the one and only Charlie Brown and of course me!  Charlie is an electrician by trade, but will be returning to college for the winter semester to pursue a new career as an Athletic Trainer.  Hurrah for him!!  He is very excited about this new turn in events and we're all sure he will make the best Athletic Trainer ever.  Who wouldn't want to have Charlie Brown as their Athletic Trainer?? 

As for me, I am currently finishing my four year degree in Human Services and expect to graduate in May 2011!   Hurrah for me, I'm almost done!!  It has been four long, hard years so far and I'm very excited to be nearing the finish line. Upon completion I will be a Certified Addiction Counselor I!  This is a field of work that I feel very passionate about and am absolutely thrilled to be a part of!  In fact, I've already applied for a couple of positions, so everyone wish me luck with those please!!

So there is a quick run down on us!  Keep checking back to find out what other fun and exciting things we are up to!