Friendsgiving

Thanksgiving was a delightful respite from the every day... it may have been raining in Portland, but it was sunny with bluebird skies on Mt. Hood (isn't our mountain beautiful??), so that's where we spent the day! Skiing, snowboarding, soaking in the snow-capped mountainside... and then tightening our gaiters and mittens when that afternoon snowstorm blew in. By 3:00 pm we were buried under six inches of new snow. Our muscles sore and our stomachs growling, we headed home and hunkered up next to a fire, whipped up a crockpot turkey that had been stewing all day, and munched on delicious sides before passing out at 7:00 pm. Is there a better way to spend the holiday?

I'm thankful for family near at heart, even if far away, good friends with which to spend the holiday, and a beautiful landscape to play with them in.

What are you thankful for this season?

Candied Yam Muffins

Thanksgiving is right around the bend, and with it comes the joys of those tasty autumn treats... pumpkin, winter squash, cranberries, chard, apples, sweet potatoes... yum yum yum! Though I love the summer harvest with its delightful fruits and brightly colored vegetables, there's something earthy and comforting about fall and winter produce.

My CSA food drop this month brought me a medley of autumn delights, including yams! They were mixed in with the potatoes and I almost missed them, but once found, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to whip up something delightful after work. Not only that, but I came up with a recipe that is both healthy and sweet... the perfect combo to get you in the autumn mood!

This photo is take two. Take one involved me trying to take "one bite" of the muffin, devouring the whole thing in three seconds flat, and sheepishly going for another. I got three bites into the second muffin before I remembered I still had to take a photo...

{candied yam muffins}

3-4 yams, peeled
4 eggs (I used two whole eggs and two egg whites)
1 cup applesauce
1 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 cups all purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp salt
extra sugar and cinnamon for the topping

Peel the yams and boil in a pot of water. Depending on the size of the yams, and whether or not you cube them, they could take anywhere from 10-30 minutes to cook. I used three large yams and they boiled for 30 minutes or so. Test with a fork -- when you can easily push the fork through the yam, it's finished.

Let the yams cool a little and then puree them in a food processor or with a blender until creamy. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Place eggs, applesauce, sugar, vanilla, and pureed yams into a large bowl. Beat until light and fluffy.

Sift flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon and salt together in a small bowl. Stir dry ingredients into the yam mixture until just combined. It should thicken to a heavy paste.

At this point your recipe will smell a lot like pumpkin pie, and if you have a weakness for the stuff like I do, you're going to find it very hard to resist licking the bowl clean...

Get a hold of yourself and grease a muffin tin. Pour the delicious-smelling yam mixture into each cup, about 2/3 of the way full.

Cook muffins 17-20 minutes, or until toothpick inserted into middle comes out clean. I left them a little on the underdone side, and this made them pumpkin-pie creamy on the inside. Mmmmmmm.

Let muffins cool ten minutes. Butter the tops of the muffins and sprinkle a cinnamon-sugar mixture on top for sweetness. Enjoy!

DIY: Important Document Binders

As much as I love organizing, there is one area of my life that somehow missed my scrutiny, and that is the organization of important documents. It's shameful to admit it, but a few months ago if you had asked me where my medical records were, or my rental agreement, or my tax forms, I would probably be digging through a cluttered box of paperwork trying to sort through the mess. For someone as OCD as me, I can't believe this particular problem area escaped my notice for so long!

Then I discovered this {amazing post} through {i heart organizing} and it clicked. "Why haven't I done this yet?!" Not only would organizing all those documents keep everything important at my fingertips, rather than in messes all over the house, but it would make going to the doctor, checking past tax returns, and finding numbers for power outages so much simpler.

After much sorting of paperwork, a trip to Office Max for binders, folders, dividers, and a magazine file, and a few hours sorting, organizing, and beautifying, all my important documents are in one easy-to-find location.

Here's the scoop of how I did it:

I divided all the important paperwork into six different categories:

  • My Taxes (1.5" binder)
  • Tanner's Taxes (1.5" binder)
  • Medical Records (1" binder)
  • Home and Auto (1" binder)
  • Insurance and Retirement (1.5" binder)
  • Manuals (Magazine file)

 Here's the breakdown for each:

  • Tax binders
    • Tanner and I each have our own binder, complete with dividers for five years worth of tax returns. All the paperwork is hole punched and filed, and each year has its own pocket at the back to hold all of our payroll stubs and other small paperwork.
    • Medical Records
      • The divisions in this binder include: medical, dental, optometrist, specialist, and prescriptions.
      • Each division has statements from doctor visits, copies of prescriptions, doctor's notes, and past immunizations and physicals.
      • Since all this paperwork can get overwhelming, I also created a concise Medical Records page that lists both Tanner and my personal info, doctor information, emergency contacts, past immunizations, past doctor visits, and any genetic medical issues in our family. I know I have a hard time filling this "first time" paperwork out at doctor visits, so after doing some research with my extended family, I now have a cheat sheet to keep with me. You, too, can use my template! {Medical History Chart}
      • Home and Auto
        • This binder is divided into two parts. Within Home is currently all rental paperwork, housing agreements, renter's insurance, personal billing (ie, phone, power, water, sewage, etc), and emergency outage phone numbers. If you want fun templates to keep all this info, check out this post via {i heart organizing}... she has a bunch of great tools in her shop which will help you stay organized.
        • The Auto section holds auto insurance paperwork, copies of car titles, taxes, and plate information. Everything is either hole punched or kept in 3-ring folders within the binder.
        • Insurance and Retirement
          • The insurance section is for medical insurance: I have a lot of paperwork and manuals which I received through my employer, so I keep these in folders in the binder, including frequent important letters I receive through my health care in the mail.
          • The retirement section is also information from my employer; statements for my 401K and Roth IRA and the manuals and letters they send me in conjunction with that.
          • Manuals
            • The magazine file I bought to hold things that don't fit nicely into binders, ie, manuals! Anything Tanner and I own which has a manual with it is stored in the file. Currently it holds building instructions for a lot of our furniture, my camera manuals, computer manuals, appliance manuals, etc.

Really important documents (ie, passport, car titles, birth certificates, social security cards) are kept safely in a lock box, and only copies are stored in the binders for reference. In the future I'm going to also come up with a organizational tool for banking statements, checks, and accounts, but currently a lot of it is online or in safer locations.

So, there you have it! All my binders are kept in a bookshelf in the guest room, carefully labeled and set up for quick grab-and-go access, in case we need to quickly leave the house.

How do you organize your important paperwork?

Cape Horn

With the rainy, winter season almost upon us, days like this weekend are becoming little gems. Expecting drizzle and instead getting sun, blue sky, fall colors, and 50 degrees, we headed for the great beyond for some hiking and photo-taking.

A short(ish) uphill hike brought us to a jaw-dropping beautiful view of the gorge below... bright splashes of autumn trees, blue water and puffy white clouds will be non-existent in a few weeks. But for now... the moment was fully soaked in by three adventurers and an Irish Setter named Magee.