Treasures of Many Sorts

A smattering of the Bread-making related presents I received for my birthday. Everything in the picture, including the yellow gingham towel everything is set on, was a gift. Bring on the breadmaking!

The book, The Bread Baker's Apprentice, by Peter Reinhart, is the book that DaMomma has gone wild over, and now, so have 2p and I! We're plowing through the book at the pace of a recipe per week (each recipe generally takes 2 days, some more or less) alongside Pinch My Salt. I had been borrowing DaMomma's book, but now I have one of my own! :)

The rising bucket (not sure of the technical name...anybody?...anybody?) is the smallest of many - the largest can hold a brining turkey. They're great because they're marked on the side, so you can see if your dough has doubled in size, etc. I used the small one to make my Lavash yesterday! So many uses - so exciting!

The yellow probe is an instant read thermometer - a Thermapen. I've been pining for one of these for years now. My other thermometers are so slow that by the time I get the reading, the item has already cooled down by 20 degrees! It would literally take 5 minutes or more. Recently, I used a Thermapen and I sat there waiting for it to figure out a temperature. After 30 seconds of waiting, I realized that it had read the temperature in the first two or three seconds and that I wasn't even thinking it would read that fast, so I kept waiting.

Dur-real!

So the new Thermapen is really exciting - I can use it for baking bread - the dough temp and the bread temp, and for all other things - meat, etc. And, hmm, looks like the inside of my house is 82 degrees!

The towels were a set - the blueberry pancakes one has a whole recipe for blueberry pancakes on it. I always have a towel over my shoulder when I cook, so these are great! And cute! And Martha Stewart! {swoon} :)

The Nature Table

I recently set up a nature table for Leify. This is the nature table on its first day.

We put things on there that we collect on our walks, or have collected on trips. Right now it is very sparse, but has a nice range of textures to it: the prickly pinecones, glass-smooth stones (from our Honeymoon - the only thing we brought back from our honeymoon was a bag full of collected rocks!), colorful shells, worn shells that you can see the innards, rough rocks from the road, gum balls (from gum trees), a stick from a palm tree that has tiny jagged teeth along its edges, and my personal favorite, the jar of small feathers.

Leif likes to go to it from time to time and examine the little pieces we've brought In from the Outside. As time goes by, we'll add new and different elements and it will change with the seasons. We may add in some homemade goodness (like wool, seeds from garden, etc.), too.

So, these are our little treasures that we've been excited over lately. Okay, mainly I've been excited over, but Jason is excited about the bread and Leif likes his Nature Table!

Happy Days!