We had our first taste of winter around here on Tuesday when we awoke to several centimetres of snow and horribly icy sidewalks and roads. That morning Thomason and I barely made it around the block and that took almost twenty minutes. UGH!! With lots of leaves still on the trees no one was quite ready for it on November 3rd but if you live in Canada you get used to this sort of weather!
By Wednesday most of the mess had melted and as of today the high is +20ºC!! So once again everyone has hurried outside to rake and to plant bulbs for next spring. Ha!
In the Day Camp world things are starting to come together for “Carols & Cocoa-Coast to Coast” and we have already achieved our “Coast to Coast” objective with musicians participating from Halifax Nova Scotia to Vancouver British Columbia. Yay!!! I’m also super pleased that Kelvin has agreed to be our host for the event. He is a very personable young man and having been a Team Member and Leader for 6 years is well acquainted with Day Camp friends in several provinces.
Mikaela, from the Day Camp committee is already doing a great job working on contacting Team Alumnae encouraging them to participate in the Advent Program we are also planning. I do hope we get a good response as it will be a way to bring the community together.
Outside of office hours I have, of course been frantically trying to get the garden closed down. Thursday and Friday I did a ton of raking and this morning was finally able to spread compost on one of the perennial beds. If the warmer weather holds I will be able to plant my Hyacinth bulbs tomorrow and then can breath a sigh of relief knowing the garden is pretty well “put to bed”.
Evenings I have made good progress on the overalls I’m knitting for baby Sean. It will be tricky to get them delivered to him but hopefully we can make a plan.
Thomason and I just got back from our afternoon walk so now it is time to turn my attention to some baking. I need to get creative today as I am out of several key ingredients like butter and eggs but I had some frozen egg whites and so am going to bake macaroons as well as a batch of bagels, a pan of Granola and roast some beets for a soup.
That means we had better wrap up this post so I can get to work.
This Coconut Macaroon recipe comes from my mother’s handwritten cookbook and I suspect it is one given to her many years ago when we lived in Kitchener by a Mennonite neighbour. It is a real crowd pleaser for coconut lovers. 😊
Coconut Macaroons
- 2 large egg whites
- 1/3 cup white sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1/2 teaspoon almond extract
- 2 1/4 cups shredded coconut
Combine egg whites, sugar and extracts. Fold in the coconut and place heaping Tbsps. of the mixture on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Bake for 15-20mins. in a preheated 350º oven. Cool on a rack, Makes 15 macaroons.