Deep Breath Before The Plunge

Here in Southern Maine yesterday was so amazing! It was sunny and warm with a gentle breeze. The smell of decomposting leaves was fragrant and earthy.  The above pic is of me when I took a trip to the beach a couple weeks ago by myself to just listen to the ocean and let it speak to me.  As with my trip to the beach that day, the sun yesterday was very healing and wonderful!

I had the door open much of the day as my son ran in and out, playing with his toy trucks and trying to get his older sister to push him on his swing.  We are really trying to enjoy what is left of warm days like this before the dark of the year fully settles upon us.  I got quite a bit of cleaning done in my bedroom, but I still did not make it into my closet. I was glad to organize 3 of my drawers, however, which got lots of folded clothes up off the floor.  With the door and a few windows open, I was also able to give my room a good airing out before it is shut up for winter.

Today I'm going to do the same in my son's room so I can clean off his dresser to put a small space heater in there.  There is no heat in his room, so what I do is really cover his window well. I put 2 layers of plastic (a layer of the super thick kind and then a layer of the see-thru shrink wrap w/ a dryer kind), then at night I layer 2 flattened boxes (perfectly sized to fit snugly in his window) that have had a layer of Reflectix taped to one side into the window. Then I draw a heavy wool blanket (that serves as a nice light-blocking curtain for naps as well) over it all.  I keep a box cutter on a tall shelf near the window in case of a fire - I would easily (and quickly) pull the boxes out (they are only snugly sitting in the window and not attached in any way) and then make a long, verticle slice thru the plastic and pop the window open to climb out.

When his room is nicely insulated, I can keep his door open for about a half hour before his bedtime to get it nice and toasty (from the heater in our livingroom).  Then he sleeps in warm jammies and under warm blankets. His room will slowly cool off during the night so that around 2am it'll need another shot of warm air (for about 20 mins) from his heater to toast it back up again for the rest of his sleeping hours. I'm getting a timer this week so that his heater will only come on for those 20 mins around 2am and then will not need to be run the rest of the night. We sleep right in the next room, which makes me feel a little better about the heater situation.

Well, I made a really yummy bread yesterday that I want to share the recipe with you. I took a recipe I found online and tweaked it quite a bit. Feel free to tweak it to your own liking as well!  Enjoy!

Banana-Zucchini Blueberry Bread

3 eggs (can use egg substitute if you want)
1/2 cup applesauce
1/2 cup brown sugar (or equivalent)
3/4 cup stevia (or honey, or try maple syrup or regular white sugar)
1 cup grated zucchini (I peeled mine first)
2 bananas, mashed
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup almond flour *
1 cup oats*
1 1/2 cup whole wheat flour*
1 TBSP cinnamon
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1/2 cup berries (I used frozen blueberries, you can use dried berries of any kind as well)
1/2 cup nuts & seeds of your choice (I used some raisins, almonds, walnuts, sunflower and pumpkin seeds, & flax seeds - but you could use just 1 kind or none at all!)

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.  Grease 2 8x4 bread loaf pans (I used 1 8x4 and did the rest as muffins).
2.  In a large bowl, beat eggs until light yellow and frothy. Add applesauce, sugars/sweeteners, zucchini, bananas, and vanilla; blend together until well combined.  Stir in the flours, cinnamon, baking powder, baking soda and salt.  Mix in berries. You can then mix in nuts/seeds if using, or you can save them to sprinkle on the top (or both!).  Divide the batter evenly between the 2 prepared pans/muffin tins.
3.  Bake in preheated oven until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 50 mins for the bread or around 25 mins for muffins.  Allow to cool in the pans on a wire rack before removing and serving.

* You can use any combination of flours so long as it totals around 3 1/2 cups.  I bet some corn meal would also taste yummy in this bread.  I like to cut back on carbs, so the more almond flour I use the happier I am (and I LOVE the flavor of almond flour!).