Michaelmas

St. Michael with Sword and with Shield

This year I decided to celebrate Michaelmas a bit differently than we did last year. I like the idea of it being a harvest festival, but we don't have a typical harvest season yet.  So I thought that we could take care of the fall cleanup that we needed to do and make a few yummy things to get into the "harvest" mood. 

The boys spent the day working outside mowing, weedeating, burning off, rearranging things and just getting squared away for the winter. They worked hard and I'm so thankful that they did. I love to mow, but I don't love running the weedeater.:o)

 

 Apple Butter in the Crockpot.

Auri and I spent the morning getting the apples peeled, chopped, and cooked down so we could get them in the crockpot for the day.  The last time I made apple butter I used the dutch oven and placed it in a low oven, but I didn't want to heat up the house.  I thought I'd try this method. It worked out great and actually seemed to give me more time between stirs in the beginning.

 

Apple Butter in the Jar.

We enjoyed putting our apple butter into our jars. We don't have much put by this season, but we're learning.:o) Every year gets better than the last.

 

Bread Dough Rising.

Kissy helped me make the bread this morning. She LOVES to stir. Of course, she also loves to taste. Everything. Yeast. Salt. Sugar. Eggs. Flour. 

Nutmeg. That one was interesting.

Ready for the oven.

I messed up the braid again, but it didn't affect the taste. I love this recipe. It is such a nice basic loaf. Slightly sweet. Delicious!

We enjoyed our dinner. I played the St. Michael song and we had fresh bread and apple butter. We didn't capture that "festival" feel that I usually go for. But I think we had a good focus for today. 

We needed to get our work done. 

We needed to work on working together. 

We needed to be able to appreciate the work that goes into some of the things around here. 

I think those dragons may not be thoroughly tamed, but I think we at least have an idea of how to go about it.

Ready for the table.:o)