December 13, 2023 – Traveling with Rich & Julie
I woke up this morning with more energy than normal and decided to do some baking. I haven’t done much in recent months and listening to old-fashioned Christmas songs like “Frosty the Snowman” reminded me of my childhood and put me in the mood. My mom and I always did a lot of baking when I was young and lived at home. Especially during the holidays.
I got out my homemade recipe book filled with family recipes and picked out a few things to bake.
First on the list was one of Rich’s favorites, Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies.
I love having these recipes. This is a photo of the original written in my mom’s handwriting. I never get as many cookies out of a recipe as it says I should. I guess I make them too large.
Next on the list was one of my favorites, the buttery snickerdoodles.
The recipe below is written by me when I was maybe ten years old and took a baking project in 4-H. I had to write out every step. I think I remember getting a blue ribbon for my cookies.
They turned out great. I stuck most of the cookies in the freezer so we don’t eat them all at once. I’m so happy with the new stove and oven we put in the RV. It cooks and bakes perfectly.
Third, I made some chocolate syrup brownies.
These are heavenly delicious. You simply must try them. I would recommend Hershey’s Chocolate Syrup but today I had Clover Valley from Dollar General on hand. They tasted just as good.
While I was baking, Rich walked the laundry down to the free facility provided here at the campground and washed two loads of laundry.
We have never found free laundry anywhere else. This is a wonderful service and we are thankful for having it. There are only two washers and two dryers but it has not been very busy when we wanted to use them.
After all that work it was nap time for Rich and Medium time for me. I still want to make one more kind of cookie, but it can wait until he wakes up.
While Rich was sleeping I went ahead and stirred up a batch of Chocolate Crinkles and a batch of easy peanut butter fudge and put them both in the refrigerator.
The cookie dough needs to be refrigerated for a couple of hours before baking it.
The easy fudge recipe I use is just one 18 oz. jar of creamy peanut butter and one container of Cream Cheese Frosting. Whipped or Regular both work fine. Put them both in a bowl and microwave for 30 seconds. Stir together well. Microwave another 30 seconds. Stir and put in a 9×9 square pan lined with wax paper. Then refrigerate for a couple of hours.
I just can’t get real fudge to set up right when I try to cook it on the stove, but this one is fool proof.
After all that I sat down in the recliner and put my feet up and closed my own eyes for a while.
Overtop of the extremely loud ringing sound that is constantly in my ears, I listened and heard large jets taking off and landing, the small aircraft pilot was giving flying lessons again today but it wasn’t as steady as yesterday was. A few vehicles pulled in and out of the campground and the manager was mowing the grass in several of the empty lots. A bird was chirping incessantly and I wish I knew what it was. I need to download an app that can identify bird sounds. And one of the neighbor’s little dogs was barking at something.
After an early supper, we drove to Gulf Shores Beach and watched the sunset with a great blue heron.
The Great Blue Heron is a large wading bird common near the shores. They are beautiful birds.
He wasn’t bothered a bit by us and allowed us to watch the sunset with him.
It was another great day in paradise. Thanks for coming along with us as we see America and photograph gorgeous sunsets like these.
Thanks for reading. See you tomorrow.