Some Visual Updates and the BEST Blondie Brownie Recipe EVER!

FIRST ANNUAL GOBBLER 5K (MALCARNE FAMILY PLUS SMITHS)

Post Gobbler Football game (Thanksgiving 2013) with nephews

Piper and Great-Grandmother Rasmussen

The Thanksgiving Crew--My parents, John's parents and grandmother, my brother John and Family, My sisters Anne and Doreen and their Families and my niece and her husband, Kyra and Patrick, and her brother Zach. I think it was 27 total. Total blast!

The Feast

Henry and cousin Shaun

Finn and both is Grandpas making the Thanksgiving puzzle (they worked on this for four hours!).

Black Friday (or rather Gray Thursday) shopping with cousins--10pm Thanksgiving night

Annual Tree Decorating Party . . .

Celia Getting ready for school . . . whose under that table?

Christmas 2013

Henry (with pig tails) and Phoebe skating . . .

Newest Addition to our family--the Eternal Flame outdoor gas fireplace

Santa Came!

The utter exhaustion of opening presents!

Holiday Ice Skating (yep, that's Henry in that mask)

Happy New Years 2014!!

Selfies with the littles

Cross Country Skiing with Cousins in Herriman State Park in Idaho

Most beautiful talented ladies in my life--YW Board for the Highland 34th ward

Beautiful Sisters--our 15th Annual Malcarne Sister's Reunion in Stuart Florida

Me and my Mama

Hanging out for five hours with my sister Anne in the Atlanta Airport in the Storm of 2014 waiting to go to Florida . . . best five hours ever!

That's just a few . . .

Now . . .

Blondies

I go this recipe from the BEST DESSERT recipe book ever (from Anthropology--yeah, who knew a clothes shop would have a great recipe book . . . well, it IS Anthro . . . ). It's worth buying just for the pictures and the whole idea of beautiful, simple desserts that MELT you. It's called The Beekman 1802 Heirloom Dessert Cookbook

These are to die for . . . so I'd double it :)

Blondies with White Chocolate and Macadamias (though I omit the nuts thanks to my allergic kids)

Ingredients:

Melted butter and flour for the pan

8 tbsp (1 stick) unsalted butter at room temperature

3/4 c packed dark brown sugar

1 large egg

1 tsp Vanilla

1 c flour (all purpose)

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 c. macadamia nuts

1/2 c. coarsely chopped white chocolate (or white chocolate chips)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350.

Butter 8 by 8 inch pan.

Line bottom of pan with parchment paper (you don't have to do this, but it makes clean up and serving so much easier) leaving 2 inches around the edges. Butter and flour the parchment paper.

In a small skillet, melt the butter over medium heat. Cook for 2 minutes, or until the butter is golden with little bits of brown spots.

Immediately remove from heat and transfer to a bowl.

Wisk in the brown sugar.

Wisk in the egg and vanilla

Stir in flour, baking soda, and salt. Fold in nuts and white chocolate chips.

Pour into pan.

Bake for 18-25 minutes--or until a tooth pick inserted in the middle, comes out with little crumbs clinging to it.

Let cool for about 10 minutes and then pull out with the parchment and cut and serve . . . I promise, if you bring this anywhere, they'll be gone in minutes. Heaven!

Forced Frugality

We are going on ten months of looking for a job. Last September, after a rather horrid ten months, John got the boot. It was oddly and rather unfairly done, but a great relief to all of us. Working at that company had become a puzzle that grew harder and harder each day until it was in fact, impossible. The stress of it took a wild toll on John's mental and physical health. By the end, he was neither eating nor sleeping. He had strange episodes of racing heart and an inability to tell what was real and what was imagined. I sat him down and told him I would use up every penny of our retirement and sell the house if it meant he could stop working in that environment. And it may take all that. And I still won't regret it. When I feel rather sorry for myself, I remember what life was like for him a year ago and then I don't feel sad that I am once again digging through my closet to find a new way to wear old things. In fact, there is part of me (small though it

The Best Kind of Tired

My often daily life . . . (John is two feet away—I can’t do all of them by myself) Last week, every single time I sat down, I almost instantly fell asleep. I kept telling John, I have the sleeping disease. What is going on? Am I getting old? Is it the covid after effects? What on earth? He didn’t have any answers for me because he was doing the same thing. We didn’t really do anything for seven days straights. And our kids joined us in the sleepy, do nothing, lazy slug bug state. It wasn’t until this morning as I was looking over the pictures of the summer that I realized why. . . We literally haven’t stopped ALL summer long—one awesome amazing trip/visit/fun after the other. It’s like we are making up for last years “staycations.” Holy hannah have we ever made up for it. Just about did ourselves in playing and hugging and kissing and caring for babies. Highlights of the summer (in no particular order): Cousin sleepovers have resumed (most missed activity since the pandem

Midlife-Cri-sis

It's been a year. I'll sum it up by saying that food no longer tastes good to me. The last time that happened, I had lost three pregnancies in a row and John had lost and found a job and we had moved three times. The feeling is very similar. There have a been a lot of losses or near losses. Enough that when the phone pings with a text or vibrates with a call (I long ago turned off the ringer), I take a deep breath and think, you can do this . More times than not, I need that deep breath. I am probably in the second half of my life and I feel it. 47. My children are nearly grown. My house is established. Our bank accounts don't fluctuate like they used to. I don't go to the store and dream of being able to buy things. I walk into my closet and wonder what I can do without. I feel the finality of my existence and I wonder . . . what do I really want out of all this? For book club, we read A Million Miles in a Thousand Years . It's about re-writing o

The Phoenix: Epicuriousmothering Rising

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