Photo a Day in July #4

4.  Fun

I warned y'all I'm a nerd.  I'm sure I did at some point.   :)  Since we couldn't drive the four hours to and from Hot Springs in a day without spending most of the holiday on the road, we spent Independence Day at home.  We ended up sleeping in quite late because Hobie (our older cat) is not happy with his new food and kept demanding we feed him something else.  How does he demand anything?  He knocks things off shelves, chews on everything, comes and sits on my chest and stares at me, and nibbles at my arms, the last always being a signal that he is hungry.  He did this for a few hours before we were set to wake up, so we didn't get quality sleep last night.  :(

After breakfast, we lazed around the house before heading to Walmart and Braum's to pick up something to celebrate the day.  Let me tell ya--Braum's burgers are not good.  *bleh*  I literally had one bite of mine and couldn't eat anymore.  It's amazing because their ice cream is sooo good.  I tried really hard to get my husband to grill, but he didn't want to do it.  Maybe one day this summer we can scribble that off our Summer Pail List...

We took a nap in the afternoon; when I got up, I finished my curtain for the bathroom and then finished my Hogwarts castle!  Both of these things (sewing and anything Harry Potter-related) is fun for me.  :)  I thought about posting a picture of the curtain I made to cover the over-the-toilet shelf with all our magazines and paper products, but I didn't think a curtain would be as fun as Hogwarts.  Do you?  ;)  I have been working on the castle for a few weeks now, completing a few bags at a time, and today I knocked out the last two.  Zach and I have gotten me all of the Harry Potter LEGO sets except for Diagon Alley because it's expensive.  This is the first big HP set I've put together, not to mention it is the largest set I have ever assembled.  Can you believe I knew nothing about LEGO four years ago?

We had oatmeal and smoothies for dinner--I know, I know, that meal really says the Fourth of July, doesn't it?  *lol*  Then we went to see the fireworks in town, and now we are settling in for bed.  Hopefully, next year we will be able to go home and celebrate poolside in style (I didn't get to make my cobbler this year : ( ), but we did have a little fun on this patriotic holiday.

Photo a Day in July #3

3.  Best Part of Your Day

I love getting home and slipping off my shoes (sometimes high heels like today) and slipping into some comfy clothes, and--ladies, I know you will agree--taking off my bra.  ;)  I just didn't think that last one would be appropriate for the Internet, even though I revel in it.  I kinda wanted to show off my patriotic outfit (blue and white ombre dress with red shoes and red cardigan), too, so I decided to photograph my shoes...and my monkey toes.

No, seriously, they are monkey toes.  I used them to pick things up in the middle of the night when I had back surgery (bad scoliosis) and couldn't bend over and didn't want to wake someone up to come help me.  Necessity is the mother of invention, right?  Well, I didn't exactly invent my toes, but I invented a new way to use them...

Boy, today they were tired after running all over campus.  It's hard working the day before a holiday, especially in this Southern heat.

Hope you have your reds, whites, and blues ready for tomorrow!

Menu Monday: FOURTH OF JULY PHARR PEACH COBBLER

Happy Independence Day!

Over the years, I've become known for my cobbler recipe in our family. I have to admit it is damn good. :) In honor of the holiday, I decided to share it with you. You can use canned or fresh fruit.

Last year, blackberry was all the rage, although my mama and I stuck to peach for years. This Fourth I returned to the roots and whipped up a FOURTH OF JULY PHARR PEACH COBBLER!

FYI, as I have altered the original recipe from the one my mama makes, I have renamed it the Cobbler Pharr.

I like to add some fruit on top to make it pretty and professional when it's the full recipe. :)

-If using canned fruit, do not drain juice.

If using fresh fruit, mix 4 cups of fruit with 1 cup sugar and 1-1/2 cups water in a saucepan. Bring the mixture to a rolling boil. Simmer for about 10 minutes. Stir often to dissolve sugar. Drain ¼-½ of the syrup off fruit.

-Preheat oven to 350°F.

-Place 1-½ sticks butter in a shallow 3-quart baking dish and place in the oven until the butter melts. Combine the 2 cups self-rising flour and 3/4 cup sugar. To keep mixture from lumping, make an indention or crater in the flour-sugar mixture and slowly pour the milk into this, stirring thoroughly. This is your “cobbler” batter.

-Remove hot baking dish from the oven. Slowly pour in the “cobbler” batter in the baking dish. Do not mix butter and “cobbler” batter together. The batter will mix with the butter and rise as it cooks.

-Spoon fruit on top of butter-batter mixture. Spoon syrup over top of “cobbler.” Do not mix the batter and fruit together.

-Bake for 30 to 45 minutes until golden brown. Serve alone or with vanilla ice cream or whipped topping.

NOTE: If you do not have self-rising flour, you can easily convert all-purpose flour for your needs. Take 1 cup all-purpose flour minus 2 tsp. flour and add 1-½ tsp. baking powder and ½ tsp salt per cup of flour used. (This recipe would require 2 cups all-purpose flour minus 4 tsp. flour and 1 Tbsp. baking powder and 1 tsp. salt. I measure in the baking powder and salt first, then fill up the measuring cup with flour.)

NOTE: Be sure to scrub, peel, slice, dice, etc. the fruit based on what kind it is before stewing it. You can also use combinations of fruits, such as 1 cup blueberries and 1 cup raspberries. The amounts do not have to be equal one another, so you can mix 1-½ cups apples with ½ pears. Try to add up to 4 cups. (If you do not have exactly 4 cups of fruit, don’t panic. ;) The recipe WILL turn out. In the fall and winter, I throw in some raisins, dried cranberries, etc. with the fruit I’m using—peaches or apples work well—to make it an even 4 cups and to have a much more autumnal or wintry flavor.

In early 2010, I made a cherry cobbler with canned cherries, BUT I forgot to convert my all-purpose flour to self-rising. Thus the cobbler sunk to the bottom and the fruit rose to the top! However, it was ruby-red pretty. :)

Also, this one and the next two cobblers were half of the recipe.

I love how the blackberries look as they are stewing. The berries look like jewels.

This must have been the earliest blackberry cobbler of 2010 because it's in one of our dishes rather than my mother-in-law's.

This is the first blackberry cobbler I made at Zach's parents' house when we stayed with them last summer.

And this beauty was from the Fourth of July weekend last year!!

I hope you have had a wonderful holiday weekend. We spent it in Hot Springs poolside with family and friends over grilled BBQ chicken and my cobbler. While I love these things, I can't wait for cooler weather!