Being Thankful

This morning I woke up grumpy. I don't like waking up grumpy or being out of sorts. Then I went outside.
Though it was still dark, but the sun was turning the sky pink and the light was shining over the mountains. A mockingbird was singing his happy song, because as I imagine, his wife is on the nest and there are eggs in that nest. The air smelled fresh and clean and the dew was heavy on the grass. The trees are all covered in new leaves of different shades of green.

 

Now this is a funny thing to be thankful for but  I just had to tell you. Every time I walk by this, ( On the way to my chicken coop.) I pass the swimming pool. I will stand and stare at it. Because it is so blue. So blue. After last summer and my eyes would tell me it was green as grass. I still keep asking Ron when we walk by, why is it so blue. It is like my mind can't take it in yet.  I do have to tell you my one job that is on my summer list. Which I don't mind in the least. I have to scrub all of that tile. With a pumice stone. We have really hard water here so I will be scrubbing the line. I like doing that because I have to go swimming.

I finished up on little thing for my "Dreaming in the Attic" box this week. I am having so much fun making things for it. This design is from Pineberry Lane.

 

I need to make a couple more things for it. I really have a hankering to go visit some antique stores. I have a favorite one I like to go visit. It is in the old Woolworth's building down town. I love that place. There is one called the Old Curiosity Shop I have been meaning to visit and haven't had a chance.  

 

I have been walking out dreaming of this a lot this week. It has been so warm I am sure that every thing would come up so fast.

I don't do recipes very much, only ones that I think are the best I have found. When I had my son William, it was June and the sweet ladies in our church who brought us dinner, all made us apricot cobblers. It must have been a good year for apricots. So we tasted lots of different recipes. The last person to bring us dinner was my grandparents. In the summer they only ate out of the garden. So they brought us fried squash, black-eyed peas, okra and sliced tomatoes. We sat down and we ate and ate and to this day it stands out as the best meal I have ever eaten. My grand parents cooked with bacon grease so the fried squash and okra were just the best.
My Mama  and Papa brought apricot cobbler. Which also was the best I we ever ate even after six previous ones. I asked her and asked her for her recipe. She was real dogy about it and wouldn't tell me. Then she got sick and I never got it. For 30 years now I have been on a quest.

I get a letter from Charles Stanley once a month and this month they had a recipe in it.  It said,
Dr. Stanley's Mother's Blackberry Cobbler. I decide to make it as I read through it and I think this is the one I have search for so long. Dr. Stanley's Mother and my Mama would have been close to the same age.

So here it is with out further ado.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees
Melt 1 stick of butter in a baking dish.

Make batter as follows:
1 cup self-rising flour
1 cup sugar
1 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla

Pour batter into melted butter~ do not stir.
Add 1 pint of blackberries. Cut in small pieces and sweeten with a little sugar.
Pour blackberries over batter~ do not stir. Bake 45 minutes until nice and brown.

 

 This was the last piece I was able to take a picture of before it was all gone.  I can't wait to make it again and I think I will try different berries and peaches and of course apricots when they get ripe.

Oh, I doubled the recipe and used a 9x13 pan. I also added 2 eggs to the batter. I can never leave a recipe alone.
Self-Rising flour can be made by using 1 cup sifted flour with 1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder and 1/2 teaspoon of salt.

It is quick and easy and is a keeper kind of recipe. I think after a day of working in the garden and having a dinner eating only from the garden and having a glass of iced tea in a quart jar with cobbler for dessert is my favorite part about summer. Sitting on the porch. That is when I sit and think to myself of  my blessings and count them one by one.

Have a wonderful day. Thanks for reading my ramblings. There are so many things to be thankful for today.

~Kim~

For Rose who wanted to see Zinnias.

" For there is hope of a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, and that the tender branch thereof will not cease, Though the root thereof wax old in the earth, and the stock thereof die in the ground; yet though the scent of water it will bud, and bring forth boughs like a plant."
---The book of Job---
Taken from the Scent of Water, by Elisabeth Goudge.