Everything Will Turn Out Fine...

I can't believe how long it's actually been since I've sat down at the machine and stitched anything! (Discounting the two microfiber towels that I dissected and hemmed for our son for his camper. That's vastly different than working on a quilt block! And, if the truth were known, that chore nearly sent me around the bend when I discovered that my 30-year-old serger was on the fritz! Grrrr.....) I'm seriously suffering from piecing withdrawal. Between the ongoing kitchen project, traveling and keeping up with life in general there has been little time. Sigh. Without a stove top or oven I'm proud to say that I've become adept at meal prep using only an electric skillet, crock pot, microwave and/or the outside grill! I was craving some homemade bread the other day, I dusted off our trusty bread machine, pulled out my favorite dough recipe and baked a couple of loaves. The recipe is below. When this recipe's author says you can skip things and it will still turn out fine she means it! In my haste I didn't properly count the cups of flour that I was measuring and, probably ten minutes into the process, looked inside at the resulting goo, grabbed the flour canister and added another cup (all the while hoping for the best!). The results are shown above. If you're craving something home baked and comforting like I was you can't go wrong with this recipe. I'll get back to sewing eventually. We'll get our sink, stove, oven and countertops installed before too long. Everything will turn out fine! And, in the meantime, I've got some pretty yummy bread to snack on! 

Bread Machine Dough Recipe *

Ingredients

Bread Machine Bread Dough Ingredients

• 1 Cup Water Warmed (110 - 115 degrees)
• 1 Tbsp Milk
• 2 Tbsp Oil
• 2 Tbsp Honey If you don't have any, you can skip this, and it will still turn out fine!
• 2 Tbsp Brown Sugar
• 1 tsp Salt
• 3 Cups All Purpose Flour You can also substitute with half whole wheat flour
• 2 tsp Instant Active Dry Yeast

Instructions

How to Make Homemade Bread in a Bread Machine

• Heat 1 cup of water to 110 degrees.  (If you don't have a thermometer, just use slightly hot tap water and it will be just fine. (really!) I never use a thermometer and never have any problems with my bread machine dough rising.)
• Put all ingredients in the order above into bread machine (you don’t need to stir it , just dump it in!)  Water, milk, oil, honey, brown sugar, salt, flour, then finally - yeast.
• Set bread machine on dough setting, and let it make the dough for you over the next couple hours.
• Once dough is made (it takes my machine about 1 1/2 hours to make just the dough), remove dough and place in loaf pan.
• Let bread machine dough rise for about 30 minutes to an hour, until it's around double the size.   When I don't have time to let it rise, I just go ahead and bake it a little sooner and it works out fine. This recipe is extremely forgiving!  Towards the end of this time, preheat oven to 350.
• Bake bread dough in 350 degree oven for 30 minutes, and enjoy!

Life is Good!

* credit for the above recipe: https://passionatepennypincher.com/

It's difficult to answer a question when the commenter is a "no reply"; so I'll do that here:

Terry: my bread machine is made by Oster. It, too, bakes a non-traditional shaped loaf if it runs through all the cycles. For this bread, though, I make the dough only in the machine and then transfer it to a regular loaf pan after the first rising. Then, I let it rise again in the loaf pan and baked it in my small convection oven for thirty five minutes. It's a GREAT! 

Tagless Technology

This is one of the best additions to clothing that I can remember... what's been taken out! Tags! I've been noticing it more and more and it's completely wonderful... no itchy neck tags, or waistband tags or wherever tags. Just pure cotton comfort. T-shirts, underwear and exercise clothing. I love these! I understand that it's a newly refined process of heat-set ink that allows the tags to be dispensed with and prevents the care instructions and other information from bleeding through to the right side of the garment. Fantastic!
I'm embracing this technology! I read recently that Gap is producing knit clothing without seams. The knitting machine for T's and the like are able to produce a one piece article of clothing without side or back seams at all. At this rate the clothing will be so totally comfy there's no need to change into pajamas at the end of the day... we can go straight to bed; or we could get up in the morning and go to work, or to the grocery store, in the same clothes we slept in all night! Oh, wait... we're already there. I did happen to see a woman out shopping in her pajamas last week!

~But that's another subject for another post on another day!~

Life is Good!
...and even better without pesky tags...