Irritate the crap out of you...

Why is it when someone… be it a friend or a family member… does things that is different than the way you do things.. it irritate the crap out of you? It isn’t because they did it “wrong” as there is no right or wrong of it..it is just different from what you would do. But it bug you.. irritates you…bordering on almost ticking you off… you can feel the irritation/ slight anger building up.. you walk away and by that time you are upset with yourself, as it wasn’t a big deal. Can
be the way your husband puts his dishes in the sink, instead of the dishwasher that is a foot and half away, to the way your friend picks thru the food, and then only eats a few things, or the way they fold clothes, when they are helping you. You know.. dinky things..

If by some reason you mention (which is rare) it to a friend (known as #2 now) You realize how dumb it was.. even border line petty… and Friend #2 will ask you if you said something to Friend #1  or family member… you say, no. And they ask, why?  You mumble something about it not being a big deal. Which Friend #2 will say.. “well, if it bugged/irritated you that much, you should have said something.. I would want to know.”

Now you really know how petty it was, and wish you never opened your mouth.

But how do you get around the “irritating the crap out of you?” feeling or is that just life?

 

 

14 years in the waiting..

 

I would have said 14 years in the making…but so far it isn’t in

the making….but as you can see at least we have progress.
Some day.. and this year is the year… we will have a 1947 Ford pickup together…

See the King bought it around 1995 give a year or two.. it was whole. It was pale yellow..  and it was that way until 2002…it was going to be his remodel project.  He had drove it home when he bought it.. he drove it to the garage in 1998 that he stored it in, and then here to our garage in 2002. That was it.

Then he took it apart, it took 5 years before he sanded the cab down, painted and wrapped it. And it sat on the left side of the garage. The bed is leaning up against the wall. The fenders are upstairs in the loft. And I couldn’t tell you were the rest is.

So I told him this is the year… he said yea.. but then our sons told him he better have it together.. before father’s day.. as they are coming just before that to paint it for him… one of them is a professional vehicle painter and the other two have done their own for years.
He found a 91 Ford Ranger, that he found out that it could be used and put the 47 frame on it.  He started to take things off.. like fenders, box and a few others.. and then it sat..  So I told him that the first Saturday of the year, he and I were going to clean out one stall in the garage.. so he could get busy on it. While I am disappointed he didn’t keep it original, I am to the point.. to just get it back together..  

Well, this past weekend.. he got it all unhooked, the cab went in the air.. and out on a trailer, and now, today .. the frame is back in the garage.  He has about a week of wire brushing to do on the frame and paint it.. and then.. and then…

I am hoping for a Christmas miracle… the 47 cab will be lowered on to the frame.

And then each part will be put together.. Maybe we can get him in the 4^th of July parade… and if it is done even earlier.. the Lost in the 50’s parade.

 

Migration of the younger generation

As more and more teens who have graduated from high school, more and more of them are returning to mom and dad’s. Some make it thru college, some don’t even leave after high school. Some say it is the economy. Some of the adult children are there until their high 20’s and low 30’s.

Those of us over 60 remember that there were a lot of kids who didn’t leave home until they married.  Of course, in those days, there weren’t as many houses for rent.. and the apartments were taken up by young couples. Sometimes even the young couples lived with one set of parents or the other..  And in some homes there were 3 generations

living together. Or even 4 generations, if there were children with the couples.

But somewhere around the 60’s and 70’s more and more teens left home. Some even before they graduated. Some sleeping on their friend’s couch,especially the males.  Some group of males would share a house. I think with the Vietnam War and how people felt about it.. it was a separation of

the generations and what they thought of the war. Of course you had the Hippie life as well.  Free love…sleep in tents, huts, beaches and etc.

Now adult children are gravitating back home to the folks.. Some parents welcome it.. some thought they were finally having an empty nest and loving it, so are less than thrilled.  In a way it is kind of funny, as the generation that started the taking off.. leaving Mom and Dad with no problem.. are the ones who are having adults children coming back to the nest. Some in hopes that hey will get a job, save money and get their own place… Hopefully.

I had two boomerangs, to get back their legs… One left quickly as she had trouble with Mom’s house…. Mom’s rules.. Meaning, you had to call if you were not going to be home for dinner.. No excuses, just notifying… No coming in late in the night or early morning… the rest of us have to get up early and need our sleep. And you had to do your fair share of chores.  The other one, found a job and after 2 paychecks found a place and was on her own.

We joked about at the age of 18 we broke their plates.. guess the rest of them believed us.  As they were gone after graduation.  

And all of them are hard working, responsible adults now.

 

Winter scenes of Kootenai

 

Friday, I decided to take my camera long with me on my walk to the post office.. even on a gloomy day, you can find something worth taking pictures of... hope you enjoy, on this lazy grey day goes to show.. it is all a matter of the view you choose..

 

The tracks of an early morning going to work

 

 early morning walk to get the paper...

bear statue peeking out over the snow...

 

a swing set... waiting for the end of winter and spring time children

 Rest are interesting tree forms and etc.

No Flowers?

Next month, millions will receive flowers. It is a billion dollar business.

But there won’t be any on that day for me… Why? Because I insist.

The King knows that come Valentine’s day, he doesn’t have to feed into the guilt of the nation.

How did such a nice thing as professing one’s love with words. A card.

A homemade card, turn into such a commercialism of flowers, or candy or some kind of gift….or all of them? What shows love is not some fancy gift. It is how you are treated each day…

And of course, the prices go sky high. A dozen roses today cost $10 but come Valentine’s day, the stores up it to about $20 and some places as much as much as $60 a dozen… Why? Roses are roses, are roses.

Why does it not upset me, when 80% of the women in United States get roses?   Because of days like to day…. For no reason.. no argument, nothing he did or I did… just because he wanted to… I got these…

One dozen yellow roses… 

Which means more to me…than anything the King could get me on February 14^th.  Because he makes every day Valentines Day for me.  

 

And that is why I love this guy…  

Garage Art....

As one gets older, we seem to venture out to something new..

My father, it was wood carvings.. He made wooden spoons, bowls,and even some people.. I have a piece of wood… when you look at one side it looks like a piece of firewood… yet, when you turn it around it is a fisherman with a fish. …

 

This December my daughter asked what could she get me for Christmas, and I told her I would like to give art a try. A winter hobby. I had a couple in mind… one for my brother-in-law for his birthday… (it says…“My man cave…Others call it outdoors”.. and it has a valley scene). And one for one of my

son’s who lives near the lake.. I just finished that one.. and now working on one for myself.. it is an abstract. 

You have to understand… I can’t draw a straight line…. Never mind anything else. Even when bored and I doodle, I draw the same thing.. a tree.. and if I have a lot of time on my hands.. then a lake in the background with a sailboat.  Sounds great but I am sure that a first grader could do a lot better.  And Grandma Moses, sure the heck did a lot better.. My mother was quite an artist…she did a whole hunt scene around our basement wall, with lodge, dogs, hunters and their horses and the fox at the end.. My kids all are artist of one kind or another.. very talented. I got lost in the gene factory.

But I am having fun doing it.. I call it Garage Art… because that is where I want people to put them. 

The King is getting a kick out of this.. as he knows how craft disable I am. I am not ready for the unveiling yet…maybe when I get a few .. and hopefully I get better.

So you see, no matter how old you get.. you still can try anything.. just ask Marianne Love, of Slight Detour, she is learning how to play the banjo, this year.  

 

 

This Dad's art at the age of 77... I have one of his spoons somewhere.. it is a mixing spoon and that is one strong spoon.

Another 4 years ....

All the pomp and stance of yesterday, even with disillusions, still was a wonderful day… It makes you feel proud to be an American. 

I know there are millions out there who didn’t watch, or watch cussing. Which is sad as it is our process.  The people voted… Obama won by electoral as well as by the majority.  It is the process we have had for over 200 years.  And be it your party wins or the other.. it is still America.  Millions who showed up to watch, of all nationalities.. and those who watched it by the way of the media. Be it television, computers and etc.   They said it was the most electronic recorded Inaugural in history, with the millions there with phone cameras, pad/tablet  camera and etc.  Putting pictures in real time on Facebooks and blogs and sites.  

Now today we are back to whatever amounts to normal for our country. And we wonder what the next 4 years will bring. Let us pray that Congress and the President will find a common ground for the citizens of America, instead of sticking in the rut of party loyalty.

 We use to think that we hoped that our future was judged and shaped by Congress and the President, but it is also shaped by other countries.. more so now than before.. being we have spread ourselves thru other countries, with helping them and accepting financial help from them… once we entangled our finances thru theirs we have put ourselves at risk.

May we get stronger to bring back our factories, companies that have fled, to make it so we stand strong on our own.. To be able to pay back from those we borrowed.

I can wish can’t I?

Rudeness

Can anyone explain to me why people are rude? To service people mostly. People who work as cashiers, workers in a store.. waitresses, or waiters.. and etc.

What possibility can you gain, by yelling at them, down grading them and saying unspeakable things to and about them?  Does that make you a better or more powerful person? I just don’t understand the concept.

There is a young lady who works on the floor of one of our new box stores. She is 18, still in high school, who works hard and tries to please the customers. Yet she gets yelled at….at least 3 times a shift.  These people don’t even know her, but will put her down. She is a A student… she is also a niece of a person I was talking to in a store that is closing locally.  I was told about this because I was telling the clerk at the store that is going out of business, how much I was going to miss the store. It wasn’t just the buying of cards, but the conversations of the workers, the talking of local things… just the friendliness of the staff.  She said that she was going to miss quite a few customers, but frankly there are some who come fairly often, that she would not miss at all.  They were rude and act like just because she is behind the counter, it was ok to belittle her. Like she was “just” a worker. I told her that was sad.. and then she told me about the young lady.

What message does that send to the young lady? Surely she won’t want to be in sales.

It happens in many occupations. Like I said in the beginning … waiter, waitress and etc. I just don’t get it.. Even if you are not satisfied with the service there is a way to get across that you are dissatisfied without yelling or putting down the worker.  You can tell them that you are upset about how you were treated, or that the product was not what you thought it was, or you thought the person didn’t give you the right information. Without raising your voice.

We have become a crass society.

Government 101

I am always spouting off about Government 101… about how Congress has more power than the President..   About how Congress can come up with a bill and pass it, send it to the President… even if he veto’s it.. they come back with 2/3^rd of a vote and they can make it a law… And if the President wants to pass a bill, Congress can table it, put it in committee  or just flat out throw it away.   Those who read my blog often, have heard me say this more than once.

Well, folks, I stand corrected.. I guess I forgot to read the fine print.. and why someone didn’t correct me, I don’t know. Or at least heavily remind me

What I forgot was the less known, hardly even talked about until Obama came to President.  I am talking about Executive Order.  Yes, many of the different Presidents have used it. The two that come to mind is Bush’s two…(I am sure he had more) about Homeland Security and giving the right to the President to declare war.  The last one, made me angry. No so much that Bush could.. which didn’t make me happy… but for whoever becomes President in the future.. Why anyone let that one pass beats me.

What I wonder now… got to research it… is there anyway that Congress can over ride the President’s Executive Order?  Other wise… what is the sense of sending anyone to Congress? I thought the government order was check and balances thru the different sections.

Also I like to see Executive Order either limit to 2 a term or gotten rid of all together.

But I live in the never-neverland, I guess.

I found this... by the way, Executive Order goes back to the days of Washington.

 

Executive order

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

legal conflicts

To date, U.S. courts have overturned only two executive orders: the aforementioned Truman order, and a 1995 order issued by President Clinton that attempted to prevent the federal government from contracting with organizations that had strike-breakers on the payroll.^[9] Congress was able to overturn an executive order by passing legislation in conflict with it during the period of 1939 to 1983 until the Supreme Court ruled in Immigration and Naturalization Service v. Chadha that the "legislative veto" represented "the exercise of legislative power" without "bicameral passage followed by presentment to the President."^[10] The loss of the legislative veto has caused Congress to look for alternative measures to override executive orders such as refusing to approve funding necessary to carry out certain policy measures contained with the order or to legitimize policy mechanisms. In the former, the president retains the power to veto such a decision; however, the Congress may override a veto with a two-thirds majority to end an executive order. It has been argued that a Congressional override of an executive order is a nearly impossible event due to the supermajority vote required and the fact that such a vote leaves individual lawmakers very vulnerable to political critic.

So…2/3rds of Congress can override it…. But getting THIS Congress to agree on anything?  Good luck with that. ^]

The many theories of Sandy Hoop

One thing the Sandy Hoop murders have done is bring back some
of the memory of JFK shooting..

This should be a cut and dry situation.  Adam got up, took his mother’s gun, shot his mother, headed to a local school, argued with the Principal, shot her and proceed to the hall way, shot many children.. and then shot him self.  Cut and dry… maybe finding out what set off the young man off, if we are lucky.

But we aren’t lucky. Why? Because the media had a field day with the so called facts.  Reporting at the speed of lightening, without any back up of proof…. Guess they figured that could come later.. and then they can come up with some excuse, as usual, for how they got it wrong.

As much as I hate blocking and squashing the written word, I think it is getting close to time where something should be done about the press… not only for the ones who follow the stars so close that they endanger everyone around… but for the printed and video press that is high on reporting everything NOW!! Be truth or not.  They should be held accountable.

 The good thing about the old days, is that the people got the story a week later, and by that time most of the facts were there.  AND the journalist had pride in their work and it being the truth…  Seems like truth and common sense have gone to the wayside.

The story, has so many side stories… you got to wonder what is what. I know when I first saw it (about half hour after it happen or was on television)it was reported, they had caught a young man in the field next to the school. A young man that was reported as saying “it wasn’t me, I didn’t do the shooting.”  No this was reported, not show on the television… we were told he was the killer’s brother.  My thoughts was why was he there.  But later it was reported they found him at his job. And the killer had his id.

What is the truth?  It was reported that his mother was at the school.. she was a teacher there.  That turn out to be not true.  They found her at home dead, and she never taught at that school.  I also thought it was odd that there was so many cars blocking the road, at the school, how would the ambulances get in? Maybe a back door.

But now there is so many stories out there.. there is blogs about their theories. There is even YouTube that has so many stories patched together suggesting that the kids are not even dead, that it is a big scam by the government to be able to horrify the citizen so bad, that gun control laws will go in to effect. Suggesting that the people in the town all belong to an acting group, and it was all an act to work out this plan to get more gun control..  (No one suggested the young man isn’t dead).  The video spins a story so fast your head would spin to watch it.  Maybe it was produced by a want-to-be director.

Now we have gun stores selling ammo, guns and ammo loading products so fast that the stores can’t keep up with it, so have set limits.  Kind of reminds me of the sale of generators, dry food and water that was sold in large quantities  just before 2000.

Well, it should be helping the economy, and will they be a yard sales come the summer or after Obama leaves off in 4 years. Maybe it is an investment.. after all you can only shot so many guns at a time.. and so much ammo.   

It amazes me that people believe all of this… but I guess it is better to believe that the government took 26 families and put them on a witness protection type program than the first story I heard…   That being the government sent it up for Adam to go in there and kill the children.. that it was a government program to kill the children and staff.

Guess they gave up that one, because it was to far left for the people to believe … so came up with the people are all in hiding.

As much as I prefer not to have a gun or use one.. I understand others do. And I have no problem with that.  I do have a problem with mentally troubled people getting guns and killing people.  I do believe that if you are a gun owner, you should be a responsible person … meaning if you have more than one..you should have a gun safe. And if you have even more…to have a very large safe.  This protects the gun owner as well as others. If there is a gun safe, then they aren’t stolen.  Will this take care of everything?

Sorry to say no.. but it was take care of half or more.. and that is something.

And mental health has to be addressed. It can’t be push to the side.. the programs can’t be first cut on the governments agenda..  It angers me so, when they are talking about the killer and they tell of how this person was a dangerous person before.  The Arizona killer, the West Virginia killer, and others.. people knew they were problems… not just small time.. but big time.. why weren’t they taken care of them then?

So do I know what happen? Nope, not a clue... 

Changing of taste of television

In the old days.. ha ha… well, maybe I should say a year or two ago. I use to watch CSI, New York.. Miami  and LA Law.. Boston Legal, were some of our favorites.

Then the news programs … meaning 20/20 or 60 Minutes and Dateline, and if the subject matter is good, I still do watch them…

I loved PBS Waiting for God and Travels with Rick Steeves.. but PBS has been moving them around so much, it is hard to remember it is 5:30 pm on Saturday.  Also love Antique Road Show.. and they have moved that several times..

In our household the one who has the remote is the King.. and he loves…Duck Dynasty, Swamp something or other, Axe men, Gold something or other.. and two I do like.. Pawn Shop and Pickers. The others I take with a grain of salt..  But we seem to jump between A&E and History channel. I am more partial to History channel. Especially when they have shows like Hatfield and McCoy or Men who created History.. and such. And we hit on

Discovery channel, and National Geographic channel from time to time. Cajun Pawn is pretty good to.. funny at least. And Restoration is great to see how Rick can take something rusty and broke and make it like it came off the factory floor.

I guess we are tired of the same old, same old…too many CSI’s and stars leaving L.A. LAW.. and realty shows was a short attention for us.. one year of each singing one was enough for us.. AND WHO CAME UP WITH BABY BOO BOO? Please.. talk about lower the bar.

 Television isn’t like it used to be.. where you wanted to tape shows so you didn’t miss an episode.  Nothing seems to have replace the likes of Seinfeld, Carol Burnett, and some of the mysteries. Or maybe we just changed.

So it is no wonder I don’t recognize any of the new stars.

   

 

To Lock or not to Lock

In an neighboring town there has been a rash of robberies.
At least 7 in the past 5 weeks.. Houses and garages.

Guns, check books, engine hoist, engine stands, tool, television

jewelry… the usual stuff we hear about..

But so many of them, we don’t normally hear about. But with a

new Facebook site there is one called North Idaho Community Awareness. And on there is about these robberies.  The last one being Friday.

We had some in our neighborhood last summer. But it was kind of small stuff and they did find the people involved.  So far no one has in Sagle.

In our town of Kootenai, it was a computer, gas from trucks, and some vandalism and other small stuff.. That lead us to think about our own things.. As one of the robberies (computer in a trailer) was next door to us.. and one other was two doors down and sometime last early spring someone stole my bike. I couldn’t put in a complain about the bike, because it was a non-descript bike…. Black 3 speed.. older than the hills. No clue what brand. But someone wanted it worse than I did.. I guess. It was between two buildings so wasn’t in the opening.  We started locking our sheds, put up fences with locks on them.. stop foot traffic thru.

 The cars was a quandary as I jumped back and forth between do I lock it or not?  See there is nothing of value in there.  Dog bed with blanket, a map book in the back seat with a sweater and a couple bottles of water.  So I figure that if I leave it unlocked the thief can open the door and see there is nothing worth stealing…. Rather than locking it.. and have the thief break the window to see if there is something worth locking the car over…..and then I have a $500 deductible to pay to get the window fixed.  It is a toss up.

Well, now I will lock it because the car I have now has a car alarm on it. So does the truck..

 

Now what about the house.. well if they want my tv that bad, they can have it, but they better bring 3 men and a boy to carry it out, as it is heavy.. and it is OLD.  So figure they will leave that. My jewelry is yard sale and Avon type.. Sure isn’t of gold or silver…  Anything even remotely worthy is on my fingers. And if they are that close they will be dying of lead poison.. as I believe that

shot gun is a good gun of choice.. you don’t have to aim it much and it covers a lot of ground.  

 

 If they come when the house is empty.. then they won’t be impressed.  So now we are looking in to more motion lights.. we already have them in the yard and around the garages… but how much more should we go? Cameras? Safes? Alarms? I don’t know.. but it is getting scary… when those who don’t want to work for things, want what you have worked hard for.. and the trouble is.. 99% of our stuff is only worth something to us.. because of who gave it to us. Or where we got it. But hock shops would laugh at the thief for bring it in..

Sad, because I am from the generation that left their house and car unlocked.. and now I lock the front door when I am in the yard.     

 

 

 

You know you are old when.....

You know you are old or out of touch when….

When you open up a People’s magazine in the doctor’s

office and see a bunch of pictures of what they call hunks..
or Most Sexy man… and out of 8 of them, you only have
heard of 2.

You know you are old when ….. you watch People’s Choice

and you ask your husband who is that? Or who are these people?
and he says darn if I know…

And you know you are old when.. you turn on the radio and you

don’t have a clue who is singing…never mind the song.  Unless
you are listening to the oldies but goodies station.  Which that is
laughable too, as a lot of THEIR songs are the same songs you
heard when your kids were young and you were yelling TURN DOWN THE SPEAKERS!!

 

 

Taxes and bummed out...

I got my form letter from my tax person.. Which is the one I used
last year but not the 20 years before.. So I read the form and the list
that came with it.. The list is what I should be bring with me when
I get to do my taxes.  So I read thru it.. and there was a lot there.
But a good share did not pertain to me. But there was one that almost knocked me off of my chair.

 “Did you make purchases on the internet?”

I have never been asked that question before.  Not last year, nor any

year before that..  What an unusual question I thought.  The more I
thought about it, the more it bothered me.  So I googled it.
 
What a can of worms that opens… It seems it is on the state taxes for most states.. (line 28 for Idaho) and also the site explained that if the company you buy from doesn’t collect the taxes, then it is up to the buyer to pay the taxes.  WHAT THE !!!!  So does that mean I am or was suppose to figure out what the taxes are on the package I received and then write a check to the state for that amount… each time?  Because I sure didn’t keep track of what I bought on line.

I thought if you bought some on line.. you were exempted.  I mean after all. I live in Idaho.. and I have gone many times to the state of Washington. Yes, I was charged THEIR sales tax… but I sure didn’t come home and pay Idaho a state sales tax on what I purchased in Washington. So why would I do it if I ordered it on line and had it shipped to me?

Oh, yea.. if you buy on line… and they don’t charge you a sales tax… then you are responsible for it.. but it becomes USER TAX..

THIS IS GOING TO BE AN INTERESTING TAX MEETING…
I didn’t keep track of what I bought…. Do you?? Do you have a receipt for every purchase you made by the way of Internet?  I sure don’t.

 

Friendship ? Bread

I put a question mark there for a reason…

A friend sent me a recipe for a no kneading bread.

That even a 4 year old could make it..
Which reminded me, back in the 1980’s there
was a recipe that went around called Friendship Bread.
I guess it is taken from the Amish Friendship Bread recipe.
You would take and give what was called the STARTER and
a loaf of bread to a friend  and the recipe.

 

You take the STARTER and followed the recipe… then on

Day 10… you divide it up in 4’s… One cup you put away for
yourself…

Then take two, one cup…. And make two loaves of the

bread from the bread recipe. 
Then take one loaf and the left over cup of STARTER, and
Head over to your friend’s house. Give her the STARTER,
And the instructions.. with the loaf of bread, so she will know
what it taste like.. You could make it sweet with fruit and etc.
And it actually did taste good..

Only trouble is, it doesn’t take long before you run out of friends

to give it to… besides your friends who you already gave it to
have given it to your mutual friends..  And some friends start
to side step you in the grocery store, in case you have one on
you. 

Then you are getting tired of making up the stuff too… so you end up

making 4 breads to get rid of the starter..  We can laugh about
this now, but back then it was hard to see your friend run
past you as you came over to their house, or hide behind the door.

But for those who have never tried it… or for those with fond
memories… here is the starter recipe and the bread recipe.
Good luck… oh, and no I don’t want any… thank you..

 

Friendship Bread starter

 I got this from this site.. incase you would like to try it...

http://www.friendshipbreadkitchen.com/pantry/recipe-amish-friendship-bread

Need a Starter?

If you ask around, chances are you’ll find somebody you know with an Amish Friendship Bread starter to share (exercise good judgment if accepting a starter from someone you do not know). If not, here is the recipe for making your own (you can also go to our Recipe Box for a printable version of the recipe by clicking here):

Ingredients

1 (0.25 ounce) package active dry yeast
1/4 cup warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup white sugar
1 cup milk

Directions

1. In a small bowl, dissolve yeast in water. Let stand 10 minutes.
2. In a 2 quart glass, plastic or ceramic container, combine 1 cup flour and 1 cup sugar. Mix thoroughly or flour will lump when milk is added.
3. Slowly stir in 1 cup milk and dissolved yeast mixture.
4. Cover loosely and let stand at room temperature until bubbly. Consider this day 1 of the 10 day cycle. For the next 10 days handle starter according to the instructions for Amish Friendship Bread.

Note: When you make a starter from scratch, you can sometimes end up with a much greater yield than 4 cups depending on the temperature of your kitchen and eagerness of your starter! If this happens, reserve one cup for baking and divide the remaining batter into Ziploc baggies of 1 cup each to freeze or share with friends.

You can find several sites that give you bread recipes to use this with...

If you run out of friends you can freeze the extra and make bread with it..
There are so many recipes out there.. fruit, sweet, sour dough and etc.
This is commonly called Amish Friendship Bread. Which kind of made me
wonder... because even if only one woman started it.. I would think that with
everyone else making it too.. they would run out of members of the community who would want it.. but then again.. they could sell it in their stores they have.. they have excellent breads...

 

The Recipe

Following are the recipe and instructions for Amish Friendship Bread as it was given to me. You can also go to our Recipe Box for an easily printable version of the recipe by clicking here.

NOTE: Do not refrigerate starter. It is normal for the batter to rise and ferment. If air gets in the bag, let it out.

Day 1: Do nothing.
Day 2: Mash the bag.
Day 3: Mash the bag.
Day 4: Mash the bag.
Day 5: Mash the bag.
Day 6: Add to the bag: 1 cup flour, 1 cup sugar, 1 cup milk. Mash the bag.
Day 7: Mash the bag.
Day 8: Mash the bag.
Day 9: Mash the bag.
Day 10: Follow the directions below:

1. Pour the entire bag into a nonmetal bowl.
2. Add 1 1/2 cup flour, 1 1/2 cup sugar, 1 1/2 cup milk.
3. Measure out 4 separate batters of 1 cup each into 4 1-gallon Ziploc bags.
4. Keep one of the bags for yourself, and give the other bags to 3 friends along with the recipe.

REMEMBER: If you keep a starter for yourself, you will be baking in 10 days. The bread is very good and makes a great gift. Only the Amish know how to make a starter, so if you give all the bags away, you will have to wait for someone to give you a starter back.

Should this recipe not be passed onto a friend on the first day, make sure to tell them which day it is when you present it to them

Friendship Bread Kitchen

“We love all the wonderful variations but the classic Amish Friendship Bread recipe is by far the simplest and the best!”

Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 1 hour
Servings: 16
Yield: 2 loaves

Ingredients

1 cup Amish Friendship Bread Starter
3 eggs
1 cup oil
1/2 cup milk
1 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups flour
1-2 small boxes instant pudding (any flavor)
1 cup nuts, chopped (optional)
1 cup raisins (optional)

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 325° F (165° C).
2. In a large mixing bowl, add ingredients as listed.
3. Grease two large loaf pans.
4. Dust the greased pans with a mixture of 1/2 cup sugar and 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon.
5. Pour the batter evenly into loaf or cake pans and sprinkle the remaining sugar-cinnamon mixture on the top.
6. Bake for one hour or until the bread loosens evenly from the sides and a toothpick inserted in the center of the bread comes out clean.
7. ENJOY!

Kitchen Notes

If you’re watching your cholesterol, this recipe can be a little tricky. Fortunately there are plenty of oil and egg substitutes available; our favorite is flaxseed meal. If you like raisins, combine different variations (golden, Thompson, and red flame) to keep it flavorful and interesting! We also like to use candied pecans or walnuts (leftover from the holidays and kept frozen in our freezer) to add an extra sweet crunch.

 

Nutritional Information

Approximate nutritional information, per slice (based on 10 slices per loaf and not including optional nuts and raisins): 300 calories, 13 g fat, 1.5 g saturated fat, 35 mg cholesterol, 300 mg sodium, 41 g carbohydrate, 1 g fiber, 29 g sugar, 3 g protein
Nutritional analyses by Joannie Dobbs, Ph.D., C.N.S.