by Sara Barry | Sep 30, 2015 | abundance, baking, fall, kids in the kitchen, what I love
“It’s no fair!”
We get a lot of that around here. This time, my big girl was disgruntled that the cooking class in the school enrichment program was only for bigger kids.
So we had our own cooking “class.” We invited some friends, and although we ended up with a smaller group than we hoped, we had fun with apples.
The kids peeled, cored, sliced, and grated apples. They measured sugar and spices in between playing with Legos. Then while things cooked, they became ninjas and butterflies. I’m pretty sure that didn’t happen in the regular cooking class.
Up next: Pumpkins
Easy Apple Muffins
2 medium apples
1 cup sugar
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. allspice
1 egg
1/2 cup oil
1 1/2 cup flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
- Grate the apples into a mixing bowl. Pour sugar and spices over apples and let sit for 10 minutes.
- Preheat over to 350.
- Mix egg and oil into the apple/sugar/spice mixture.
- Add the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Mix to combine.
- Fill greased muffin pans and bake for 20–25 minutes. (Makes about 18-20 small muffins and 12 medium size ones.) Alternately pour the batter into a greased 8×8 cake pan and bake for 50–55 minutes.)
I love fall foods and getting back into baking after a summer of using the oven less. I love cooking with my kids even when it’s messy or looks a lot more like dress up play. I love that they wanted to share this fun with friends.
What do you love?
Write What You Love is back. I hope you’ll join me.
by Sara Barry | Sep 23, 2015 | fall
Hello, fall.
Hello blue skies and hints of yellow in the trees.
Hello purple asters. Hello hum and shimmy of busy bees.
Hello wardrobe confusion—jeans in the morning, shorts in the afternoon.
Hello red wine, goodbye white.
Hello porter and stout.
Hello applesauce and apple pie and apple crisp.
Hello sunshine and crisp air.
Hello apple pork pie and shepherd’s pie and pea soup.
Hello cool nights and smoky fires.
Hello, fall.
I sat in the sun today drinking coffee, catching up with a friend, watching the bees all over the purple asters. I walked around the block under warm sun and felt the difference in the shade. I made applesauce and baked apple muffins with my girls to welcome this season.
At dinner time, we all put on long sleeves to eat outside, because we still hang on to a little summer even as we embrace the new season. I love this straddle of a season and the changes coming in. I look forward to the vibrant colors and comfort foods. Welcome!
What do you love about fall? What changes are you welcoming right now?
by Sara Barry | Sep 16, 2015 | Uncategorized
Step outside in the still dark morning. Close your eyes. Listen. 
It’s changing. The summer sounds are fading. The wild cacophony of spring that shifted into the confident, strong sounds of summer is muted. Not done yet . . . not done yet . . . not done yet.
Step outside early in sky brightening morning. Feel.
The grass was not silver-tipped this morning, though grass was heavy with dew. Your feet begin to ache like they do at the beach when the wet sand tells you it will be hard to get into the water.
Step outside under a sky pale with clouds. Look
The basil is starting to get anemic and you need still to make more pesto. The crabgrass loved this dry summer. Your feathery cosmos were felled by the heavy rains a few days ago. Your dahlias still smile, even where they droop. A bird darts across the garden and then away.
Turn back to the house where your feet will be warm. Turn back to the house where hot coffee waits for you. Turn back to the house and see one—two—three—four morning glories singing praise the day. Stretch back, raise your face to the sky.
Breathe deep. Forget the change in night sounds and the tired plants. Breathe in this moment, the cold dew, the deep red, the feather fronds, the sky-blue trumpets. Open to this day.
I’ve been starting my day this week by stepping outside and just noticing—the smell of damp earth, the rattle-clank of a truck sounding 
particularly loud in the half-darkness, shape of the trees still bearing all their greenery.
Step outside. Be still. What do you notice?
by Sara Barry | Sep 9, 2015 | fall, milestones, parenting, traditions, writing
“Let me take your picture before we eat,” I said imagine chocolate smears from the muffins all 
down her first day of school outfit.
As I grabbed the camera (I still don’t have a cell phone), she raced to the stand in front of the flowers where her sister had stood for her first day of school picture last week.
“Only with K!” she demanded wanting her sister in there too. Then quickly she changed to, “I wanna take a selfie.”
My preschooler wanted to take a selfie.
I didn’t go to preschool, but when I was in school, I didn’t know the word selfie because it didn’t exist. When my first day of school pictures were taken, my mom took them with a camera. With film. Long after school started, when we finished the roll and remembered to drop off the film and remembered to pick it up, we got that film developed and actually saw the pictures.
These days, my kids want to see the picture practically before I take it. “Let me see. Let me see!” Digital means you know if you got a good shot or not, but there’s no waiting, no anticipation. Sometimes it feels like everything is RIGHT NOW all the time.
But last week, my big girl headed off to school on Monday and the little one turned to me as the bus pulled away. “I’m bored. There’s no one to play with.”
Despite everything feeling “on-demand,” she had to wait for more than a week for her school to start. But today was her day. She was up early and dressed in the outfit she had picked out, the one that wasn’t my favorite on the rack, but was so her, bright and bold and sassy. She was all big grins that she had the same kind of muffins her big sister had had for her first day of school.
She waved her sister off and then hurried to the car. It was her day, and she was r
eady to start.
Both my girls are back in school, and I’m settling back into my own routine, including writing more regularly.
Are you writing today?
Think about what’s different now than when you were a kid. Make a list or zoom in one change. How do you feel about this change?
by Sara Barry | Sep 3, 2015 | fall, finding time, noticing, writing
I don’t know where to start, so I’ll start here, with this cool morning that made me pull a sweater 
over my pjs, at least outside on the porch. I curl my hand around the smooth glaze of my coffee mug, the curved walls fit my hand perfectly. I feel the warmth, watch the steam rise up.
I take a bit of bagel, crisp then chewy and taste the sweet then bitter peach marmalade. More coffee. My eyes are still grainy with tiredness. I know more coffee isn’t the answer, but it’s warm and says wake up if only by routine.
There is a high, vibrating noise in the distance. I think alternately coyotes and a swarm of bees, but now it has settled into music, closer. And then again, far away, the high pitched yelp, and above me, “Caw, caw, caw!”
I’m distracted by cold feet, but I won’t go get socks, not until the kids wake up. I want this quiet time, but still, that vibrating hum far away, and within me. I’m restless, feeling the change in the air, school starting, new routines. I’m ready to settle in, get back to writing, back to running or walking, back to knowing when my work time is. And I’ll miss the lazy mornings, when we stayed in pajamas and read book after book and wandered out in the dewy garden.
I look up from my journal. The paint on the porch is peeling, white chips fallen or waiting to fall, patches where it’s been scraped already. It’s supposed to be painted this summer, one more thing of the endless to do list. Over the railing, the garden waits to be weeded. I see the last zucchini plant, shrived and brown taken down by powdery mildew.
And then motion. A bit of red. Hummingbird. I watch it hover, wings abuzz. Does it ever get tired of so much motion?
I hear the feet on the steps before the, “Mom?” at the screen door. And then it opens and a new part of the day begins.
I’ve been reading Madeleine L’Engle’s A Circle of Quiet, and she talks about five-finger exercises and how even the pages that you throw away have purpose. This idea that writing is like running or playing the piano or any thing you do that you need to practice and keep up with isn’t something new. It’s something I know, something I’ve said, and sometimes I still need that reminder.
It’s been a busy summer and I’ve fallen out of practice with many things, writing among them. So I’m here, doing my finger exercises, getting back into the habit of sitting down and putting words on the page. I almost didn’t come here today. I thought, “Next week, when both kids are in school,” but I’m tired of waiting. I’m doing an exercise challenge with my sister, and this morning I can feel in my legs handful of lunges I did last night. I need to feel my writing muscles again too. So I’m here, and I’m writing.
What are you warming up to do again?
