Down and Out

Not surprisingly, Michael and I were two of the first people up this morning. We came down to find my mom at the kitchen table, though. We relaxed a bit while everyone else gradually made their way from their rooms, but after that, everyone was bustling around.

First, Marie and I made breakfast. I cooked up some pancakes (with the blueberries we picked yesterday, AMAZING!), while Marie did the bacon. I also heated up the hand pies in the oven. We all sat down for our feast, and then it was time to start loading up the cars to head out.

Michael remembered to snap a few photos of the newly-renovated house before we left:

Ah, it is so beautiful! I love it so much.

Then, we took our traditional photo beside the White Meadows sign (new sign this year, though--it'll take some getting used to, I think!):

Unfortunately, Susan and Vinny's kids weren't able to join us this year. It's so hard coordinating everyone's schedules! Even so, a great time was had by all, even though Doug and Nina were missed.

We'll definitely be back next year. (And next time, Michael and I will have a baby--possible toddler??--in tow.) But man, I miss it already. A year seems far too long to wait to go back! :(

If you're interested in seeing photos and recaps from our past Poconos trips, click here.

The drive home wasn't too bad. Tessa slept THE ENTIRE TIME (tired girl!) and has continued to sleep like a rock since we've been home. I think it's going to take her a couple of DAYS to fully recover from her Poconos adventures!

Read more...

Country Livin'

From year to year, we pretty much do the exact same things when we come to the Poconos.

For instance, we always arrive late on Thursday night and stay up too late talking and laughing with each other. We always grill for dinner on Friday. We go out to breakfast at the same local diner on Saturday morning. And then we always make a big homemade breakfast before we leave on Sunday.

It's all about tradition, people.

So it should come as no surprise, then, that we went out to breakfast this morning. YUM. Once back at "the farm," we set out to enjoy another day outdoors. We didn't see much sunshine today, but it was still nice out and the temperature was much more comfortable than yesterday.

We spent some more time down by the pond. Tyler and Marie played fetch with Miller in the water. He loves it now, they can't keep him out! He was so good at swimming out to get his frisbee and bringing it right back in for more.

Well, he does have to work on giving it back a little easier. It turns out he's into "tug of war," too.

When he'd come out of the water, Sashi would approach him and try to take his frisbee. She wouldn't do any of the work to swim out there and get it, though! (Smart girl!)

While Miller swam, Michael ran Tessa up and down the hill. She loves to run, especially when she's experiencing complete "freedom" off of her leash!

I think the Poconos is Tessa's version of heaven.

We eventually walked back up to the house, and decided to go blueberry picking with Susan. There is a wild blueberry patch across the road, and we knew we'd want some berries to make pancakes for tomorrow morning. So Tyler, Marie, Michael, Susan, and I set out with the dogs to gather wild berries.

Picking blueberries is time consuming! I have major respect for the people who do this to supply our markets with berries. The greenery was super tall all around the blueberry patch, so Tessa had a bit of a hard time making her way through everything out there. We had to stomp down a path for our short-legged little girl! :)

Holding the share of blueberries that Michael and I picked. Each and every one of them are precious, as they were obviously picked by hand!

When we got back to the house... more sitting and chatting, of course! Tessa took the opportunity to rest:

I decided to do a mini photo shoot with Hunter in Susan's garden, but the boy is INSANE. He just does NOT. STOP. MOVING. I got a couple of cute ones, which I'll probably share here once I have time to edit them, but in the meantime, I figured I'd share some of the "outtakes" so you can see what it's like to photograph a VERY ACTIVE almost-14-month-old.

Too busy to look at me.

Cute shots of his backside are much easier to come by, I assure you.

Little man is a stair climbing FOOL. Probably his favorite activity.

Forget smiling. If he looked at me, it was usually to make funny faces.

There is also a lot of running involved.

The top of his head is just as easy to get as his backside. At least we'll always have these parts of him captured. ;)

Tonight, my mom, Susan, and Vinny had a wedding to go to, so they left for that around 5:00 p.m. Us kids relaxed a bit more, showered, then relaxed again. The guys cracked open some beers, and the girls some wine.

We took some photos in front of the White Meadows Pub sign (outside of the bar that is in the carriage house):

The girls chatted and cooked up a delicious pasta dinner (meat sauce, garlic bread, salad!) while the guys watched a movie. After our meal, the guys started a small fire in the fire pit and we roasted a few s'mores before retreating indoors to watch a movie together.

All in all, not a bad day in the country. It's really too bad that it's already time to go home tomorrow. :(

Read more...

The Great Outdoors

After our roadtrip (and stop for frosties, of course), we arrived in the Poconos around 10:30 last night. We were given a tour of both the main house and carriage house, as they're both pretty different than when we were here last year! A fairly large addition has been put on the main house, and the renovations in the carriage house are complete. Very nice, I must say.

When we were finished unloading the cars, we all settled on the porch to catch up with each other. It was a really warm night, as even the Pocono Mountains have been touched by the Northeast's heatwave. Everyone else enjoyed drinks while I just enjoyed the company. :) Once we realized it was after 1:00 a.m., we all decided to get to bed so we could be up to take advantage of the day today.

Unfortunately, I don't have many pics to share from today. I didn't even break out the SLR yet. Oops! But the thing with the Poconos is that we don't ever *do* much. It's a completely relaxing getaway, so it's hard to remember to take photos sometimes.

We all woke up on our own time, ate breakfast, and walked down to the pond to hang out in the sunshine (or inside the shady gazebo, where it was considerably cooler). Tessa became "nature girl" and really enjoyed her time off of the leash today. She even abused it a little by wandering into some really tall grass in a field--Michael had to go chasing after her so we wouldn't lose her. Little stinker!

Marie and the boys did a little fishing...

...and Miller did some wading/swimming. Amazing, since Tyler really tried to get him into the water last year, without much success. Today, Miller was swimming like a pro. When Tyler was out fishing in the paddle boat, Miller actually jumped in and swam out to the boat to get in!

Pretty. So, so pretty. (The scenery. Not Trevor. HA!)

Hunter and I, hanging out in the gazebo.

In the early afternoon, we put together a grocery list of things we were going to need for the weekend, and my mom, Susan, and I took a ride into town to do the shopping. When we returned, we all had a late lunch, then spent more time talking and being outdoors. Around 4:00 p.m., everyone was feeling pretty tired (up too late last night!), so most of us retreated to our respective bedrooms. I didn't think I would nap (I tend to be a terrible napper), but like two pages into reading my book, I was out. Next thing I knew, Michael was waking up, saying that it was 5:45. Nice! And let me just say, afternoon naps are SWEET. I wish I could do that every day.

We all gathered at the bar in the carriage house, where Vinny made everyone (minus me, *SIGH*) some happy hour drinks.

We took them to the picnic table outside and--you guessed it--just sat and talked and joked and laughed. Eventually, we all got cleaned up and showered, and it was time to get started on dinner--I made roasted potatoes, we had a great salad, and the boys grilled corn on the cob, burgers, and white hots. We didn't eat until after 9:00 p.m. But who cares when you're on vacation, right?

After getting eaten alive by mosquitos tonight (bastards!), we're all zonked from the sunshine and fresh air. We're hitting the sheets at a more reasonable hour tonight so we can get up and do all of this over again tomorrow.

Have I mentioned how much I <3 the Poconos? I look forward to this trip every year. It's so great to be here.

Read more...

Another Year, Another Frosty

On our way down to the Poconos, we made our traditional stop at Wendy's for Frosties. As always, we had to share with Tess!
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Read more...

Blueberry & Strawberry Hand Pies

Pies.

Mini pies.

Pies that fit into the palm of your hand.

And can be eaten with your fingers.

Need I say more than that? I mean, really.

I've seen a few different versions of these pop up on food blogs that I frequent, but when I saw them appear on Beantown Baker last week, I decided that I simply *must* make them while strawberries are still in season. And then, I thought--why just stick to strawberry? I shall make half of them blueberry instead.

And so I have a boatload (OK, not really--the dough recipe made exactly 20 for me, just like it says) of itty bitty strawberry AND blueberry pies waiting to be carted off to the Poconos with us this weekend. Wheeee!

As you'd probably expect, these are a bit on the time-consuming side. At first, I kind of panicked about how long it took me to make just two hand pies, but after that, I fell into the swing of things and my technique got better, so it wasn't as bad as I thought it might be. And they're cute, aren't they? Totally worth a little extra effort.

One thing you should know is that these aren't as sweet as you'd maybe think--even though they are sprinkled with extra sugar on the outside. I find that the fruit filling is actually a bit tart! (Scrumptious, of course... but tart.) I saw on Delicious Meliscious that she actually brushed the outsides of her hand pies with a sweet glaze. I might try that next time for a little additional sweetness.

I can't wait to try these with apples in the fall.

Note: I made half of the strawberry filling from Beantown Baker, and half of the blueberry filling from Delicious Meliscious, and only one recipe of the pastry dough. These are the measurements and amounts I've included below. However, if you'd like to stick with one flavor or the other (strawberry OR blueberry, but not both), make sure you double the filling recipe back up so you'll have enough to go around.

Blueberry & Strawberry Hand Pies

(Sources: Beantown Baker and Delicious Meliscious)

Ingredients:

For the pastry dough:

- 9 1/2 ounces all-purpose flour, approximately 2 cups
- 2 tsp. baking powder
- 3/4 tsp. kosher salt
- 2 1/2 ounces shortening, approximately 6 tablespoons
- 3/4 cup milk
- 1 egg mixed with 1 to 2 teaspoons water

For the strawberry filling:

- 1 pound of strawberries (~2 cups, hulled and chopped into small pieces)
- 2 tbsp. flour
- 2 tbsp. sugar
- Pinch of salt
- 1/4 tsp. vanilla extract

For the blueberry filling:

- 1 cup blueberries, fresh or frozen (thawed)
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 2 1/4 tsp. cornstarch
- 1/4 tsp. cinnamon

Directions:

1. To make strawberry filling, mix all ingredients together and set aside.

2. To make blueberry filling, mix all ingredients together and set aside.

3. In the bowl of a food processor, combine the flour, baking powder and salt. Pulse for a few seconds and then pour into a large mixing bowl. (Since my food processor parts were dirty and in the dishwasher already, I skipped that part and simply whisked the dry ingredients in the large mixing bowl. Funny that I didn't notice any ill effects from doing so--surprise, surprise! I think Alton Brown makes things more complicated than they need to be.)

4. Add the shortening and knead it into the flour with your hands until it is crumbly.

5. Add the milk all at once and mix in with a spatula until it begins to come together.

6. Lightly flour your hands and the countertop and turn the dough out onto the countertop. Knead the dough ball, folding over 10 to 20 times.

7. Using a rolling pin roll the dough to 1/3 to 1/2-inch thickness, then cut into rounds using a 2 1/4-inch ring. Roll each round as thinly as possible or to 5 to 6 inches in diameter. (This might take a little practice to get right--but the dough should be REALLY thin, just one step above tearing apart.)

8. Spoon 1 to 2 tablespoons of filling onto the dough, brush the edges of half of the dough lightly with the egg wash, fold over and seal the edges together with the tines of a fork, dipping it into flour as needed. Gently press down to flatten and evenly distribute the filling and snip or cut 3 slits in the top of the pie.

9. Brush a little bit of egg wash on the outside of the pie and sprinkle with decorating sugar.

10. To bake pies, preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Place finished pies onto an ungreased cookie sheet and bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until golden brown.

Read more...