I figured it out...

After all my searching, I remembered that the recipe wasn't a recipe. It was a suggestion for how to revamp the recipe on the back of the syrup bottle. LOL.

So, grabbing my Karo syrup bottle (I know, I know--HFCS...), I made two lovely pecan pies...with dark Karo syrup, brown sugar instead of white, and maple flavoring instead of the vanilla called for. Definitely a great tasting pie. I'd post a picture except for the fact that they are both GONE. ALL gone.

We had company this weekend--friends from west of OKC, and from OKC itself. We were due to have some friends in from TX, but a health related issue kept them home (please, if you would, pray for a speedy recovery for G, and patience for M as he heals, lol). Hopefully, though, they will be able to come up soon. Some friends brought smoked pork butts, and we had garlic parsley potatoes, and broiled green beans with brown butter sauce...another meal was homemade potato soup..nummmmmmmm. We had more pork today (home raised and butchered pork loin, our last from the pigs we raised/butchered last fall), with mashed potatoes, and onion gravy, and homemade bread...oh me oh my....

And this next week, we are going to be starting to work on baking some really serious bread. El Husbando, who probably should have been either an old-school miller, or baker, has been growing some serious home sourdough starter...not just any sourdough starter though. A real old-school Desem starter, with fresh ground whole wheat flour. Yes, I finallllllly pulled out the $200+ Nutrimill grinder I bought probably 5 years ago, and used it. By the way, wheat, whole wheat, *will* keep for a very long time. At the same time as purchasing the mill, I also bought myself some wheat. Hard red, soft white, and also got a bucket of oats. Used some of the red, but not much, and so we've carted it from GA (where I bought it), to NC, and now, to OK...where I am finally getting around to using it. Hopefully, we will have a good supply of wheat, soon, as T & S will be bringing some of their home-grown wheat to share with us. We sent them home with some starter and fresh ground wheat flour to feed it with, until she is ready to make bread. A good trade off, I think.

We are hoping to build ourselves a wood-fired brick oven at some point in the next year, year and a half. It is not a terribly cheap endeavor, so we will be purchasing the supplies as finances allow...But once it is done, it will be the focal point of an outdoor kitchen...which will be wonderful for summertime canning (no heating up the house!), pizza parties, and BBQs. Eventually we want to put in a churrasco style spit/bbq, so that will be niiiiiiccccceeeee....a nice, shaded by a pergola patio of concrete with salvaged brick scattered around and set into it...some crape myrtles (I love crape myrtles, and they should grow well here)...yep. I'd be one happpppy momma/wifely-type. :-)

We were blessed to receive probably another 3-4 inches of rain overnight. This is a wonderful thing, in part. However, we really do need to be able to get into the garden patches and get those tilled up...which means the ground has to be dry. It was just beginning to dry out after the ice and snows we have been having since late December...and thunderclouds rolled in...lol. We ended last year at least a foot over the average. And so this year is following right along with the program...I only hope the rains spread out just a bit more than they did last year--as it made cultivating and weeding, harvesting, and doing "pest patrols" a bit more than impossible...

Of course, now it makes getting any of our preliminary work done in the garden areas, and makes doing any basic yardwork a challenge. We still have branches and limbs and such from the ice and snow storms last month to clean up. El Husbando thankfully was able to get out there and move things and cut them into chunks, but the children and I have had a harder time getting out there and removing the debris, and stacking the larger bits for seasoning this year...

Hopefully, you are having a blessed start to the Lenten season...

I will post more this week, hopefully, as we 'recover' from having company in, and get back into the swing of things around here...