2.27.2010

Love is in the simple things...

Today was a wonderful Saturday. There's nothing like sleeping in late (8:30am is late for us actually), bumming around, and hanging out with your best friend.

We sometimes get so busy during the week that we don't make time to just sit and talk with each other. So we went to Panera Bread for some top notch bagels and drinks and sat for awhile. It was so nice and refreshing from the long week. We found some cool new things for our apartment, and my sister and her husband came to visit us for the weekend!! I'm leaving with Hannah tomorrow for a road trip to the East coast! So excited.

Some days, it's just nice to relax and not do a whole lot. Simple living is the best kind.

Here are some images from our easy Saturday.

Cheers,

Leah














2.25.2010

Homemade Goodness

There are a few things that can really brighten my day when I'm feeling low, and one is a freshly baked loaf of homemade bread! I am a lover of bread.

My family started making our own bread each week when I was a young girl. Now we started from scratch...we ground our own wheat into fresh flour right before we used it in the recipe. We had a Bosch grinder and mixer which are so wonderful, and maybe someday I'll have my own to use. Since we used to live in Kansas, we had farmer friends who sold wheat and we were able to have buckets and buckets of red and white wheat to use. I am so thankful that my siblings and I could take part in helping. I feel so confidant in the kitchen now, and nutrition has become so important to me and Landon.

The problem with bread in stores now is that there is a loss of nutritional value. The thing I look for when buying bread is 100% whole wheat or whole grain. And I also look for a very small ingredient list. The less I see long words I can't pronounce, the better. Now I'm not putting down store-bought bread. Sometimes you can find some great bread, but you usually have to pay a lot more. I love making our own bread because it's so incredibly cheap and easy and healthy! Since I don't have my own wheat and grinder, I like to buy 100% whole wheat flour. If I have to buy white flour, I look for unbleached flour that hasn't been enriched. Bob's Red Mill is a great brand for high quality flour. Plus, they also offer a variety of flours like rice and soy and even gluten-free flour. You can usually find Bob's Red Mill products in most large grocery stores and health food stores.

Whole wheat is my favorite bread to make, but I also love to try specialty breads. I love making French bread, pizza dough, cinnamon rolls, herb bread, soft pretzels, and so many more. Some breads I'm going to try now that we're settling into our new place are: focaccia, bruschetta, asiago bagels, panettone, and some german black bread.

Now I will share with you the recipe that Landon and I use for bread. We use a mix of white and whole wheat flour so it's a bit lighter. We also use honey in this recipe because it's a natural sweetener and we can buy it in bulk.

Honey Whole Wheat Bread

Prep Time: 25 minutes
Cook Time: 35 minutes

Ingredients:

3-1/2 to 4 cups unbleached white flour
2-1/2 cups whole wheat flour
2 pkg. active dry yeast
2 tsp. salt
1 cup milk
1 cup water
1/2 cup honey
3 Tbsp. oil
1 egg

Preparation:

In large bowl, combine 2 cups unbleached white flour, 1 cup whole wheat flour, the yeast, and salt and mix well.

In saucepan, heat milk, water, honey, and oil until a thermometer reads 120-130 degrees F (warm). Add liquid mixture to flour mixture along with the egg and stir to combine. Beat this batter for 3 minutes. Then, gradually stir in rest of whole wheat flour and enough remaining white flour to form a firm dough.
Sprinkle work surface with flour and knead dough, adding more flour if necessary, for 5-8 minutes until smooth and satiny. Place dough in a greased bowl, turning the dough in the bowl to grease the top. Cover and let rise in a warm place about 1 hour, until double in bulk.
Punch down dough and divide into 2 pieces. On lightly floured surface, roll or press each piece of dough to a 14x7" rectangle. Starting with shorter side, roll up tightly, pressing down, into greased 9x5" bread pans, making sure short ends of bread are snugly fitted against the sides of the pans. Cover and let rise in warm place until the dough fills the corners of the pans and is double in bulk, 30-40 minutes. Bake in preheated 375 degree oven for 35-40 minutes, until the bread is golden brown. Remove from pans and cool on wire racks.

Here are two examples of breads I've made: Honey Whole Wheat, and Old World French Bread.





Cheers

Leah

2.24.2010

Moving Around

We have finally moved to Indy and are feeling somewhat settled in now. I spent three straight days unpacking, sorting, organizing, reorganizing, and cleaning before I finally felt at home.

We absolutely love our new place and the area around where we're living. There are so many things to do! Being in the newly-married-no-kids phase of our marriage, I think that this is the perfect area for us. It's hard to wrap my mind around the fact that we can literally drive 2 minutes and get anything we need! We are both country kids, and growing up having to plan trips to town has made this new area seem so amazing and surreal. Even though this is not the area we want to raise a family...with all the commercialized and materialistic things, it's exciting and fun and awesome to explore right now. I can't wait for warmer weather when we can go to the various festivals and activities around the area!

I got things pretty much situated in our apartment to take some pictures. I love all of the handmade and wooden things in our apartment. We've had so much fun refinishing furniture, and making creative accent pieces for our living areas. I love going into stores like The Pottery Barn and Crate & Barrel and looking for cool ideas for decorating and home improvement. It's gives me a sense of accomplishment to find a neat idea, create a DIY version, and know how much money I saved! Plus I love the piece so much more knowing I put some work into making it.

Landon has been enjoying his job so much. He really likes his new office and it's only 10 min. from our apartment...gas savings, woo hoo! There aren't as many people in this office, and Landon really likes the quiet and focused environment to work. I am so proud of him!! He has learned so quickly and is working so hard. For those of you who don't know exactly what he does, he's doing structural engineering on cell phone towers. When he first started back in October, he was working on all different kinds of towers for different companies. Right before we moved, he got word that he was being put on the AT&T team. So now he only works on AT&T towers and is able to have more consistent work. It was like a promotion for him and it was so encouraging to hear!! My husband is amazing and am so proud of him!!

We would love for our friends to visit if you are ever driving through Indy. Goodness knows we could find a place to eat that's close by. :) Or, I could make you some chicken parmesan with bruschetta and some scotcharoos and tea for dessert....hmmm, I'm hungry right now. We're so happy to be here and we are so excited to explore and get to know our new city!

Cheers

Leah













2.11.2010

New Things

Well I have neglected this poor blog for many moons, and now I am finally getting back into things. Since it's a new year and so many new things have happened, I decided to give my blog a new name and look in honor of all these changes. Let me bring you up to date.
My internship in Oregon was amazing, as were my travels and the different people I met. Some of my highlights were going hardcore rafting and bridge jumping with some pals on the White Salmon River, getting to stand only a few feet away from a newborn baby elephant at the Oregon Zoo, exploring the amazing city of Portland with Powell's bookstore and the Greek Cusina restaurant, and getting some amazing time to reflect, read, and just live a little more simply and quietly than I did in college.
But the most amazing highlight was when Landon shocked me completely by flying out to spend a weekend with me. He proposed as we were sitting on a blanket in a field overlooking the airport in the night with the planes flying right above us. I moved home after my internship was over and began wedding planning.
My sister was married in May, 2009 with a beautiful outdoor wedding. She and I had so much fun planning our weddings together and being each other's maid of honor.
Landon and I were married October 3, 2009 in front of his parent's home. It was the most wonderful day of my life. He is my best friend and we are truly in love and having the time of our lives being married.
So fast forward four months. We are now getting ready to move from our dear, yet small studio apartment in Akron, Ohio to the dashing town of Indianapolis. Landon is working as a structural engineer, and he loves so much what he is doing. I am busy with design work, arts and crafts that I've always wanted to try, and gearing up for our move. I have a job interview in Indianapolis, so we are hoping that all things will work out as the Lord wills. God has been so good to us. We have learned to trust Him and are still learning. After some disappointing job letdowns over the summer, I really believe He has us where He wants us right now.
Landon and I are so excited to move and settle into our next location. We hope there will be many more! We have some plans for this summer of travel and working on our art and are so looking forward to what the next few months will hold.
I leave you with some images of our wedding.





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