The MIA Day 3

I don't think you would fault me for missing a blog post about Day 3 if you knew what my Friday was like.

It started at 6 a.m. with my run, followed by a Fried Food Coma at the State Fair for the entire morning, then on to Day 3's activity (apple cider, YUM!) and ending late with my discovery that I am somewhat of a Bunco champion (not to brag: but my first game and I won in both categories of Buncos and wins).

But onto the more important things: What did I eat at the Texas State Fair? Kidding. But you'll understand the Fried Food Coma joke if you know what I ate. Please bear in mind, I was sharing the food with my friend. And, really, the portions aren't that large.

Drum roll, please: Fried cheesecake, fried brownies, fried Oreos, fried Snickers, fried pineapple upside down cake and fried pumpkin pie.

It was all wonderful. What are the two questions I get most? Best one: fried pineapple upside down cake, followed closely by the Snickers. Question 2: No, I did not try the fried butter. Never in a million years.

The kids and I came home to begin our activity for the Halloween Countdown, namely, "make apple cider."

I forgot how difficult it was to find a recipe for homemade apple cider. Every recipe I came across called for apple cider in the ingredients.

Luckily, I linked the recipe in last year's post, which I shall do again (because it really is heavenly).

One thing I did different this year: I used ground cinnamon (like she says to) instead of the cinnamon sticks that I used last year (which is an alternate suggestion of hers). Because I do not use a cheesecloth, the cider this year was a little gritty with spices. I'll be using cinnamon sticks from now on. Also, I didn't have enough allspice, so I used 2 tablespoons of allspice and 1 tablespoon of ground cloves. Lane and I liked it better this year that way because it was less sweet.

First, Jane and I cut the apples (I cut, she put into the pan).


So serious.

We added our water and other ingredients and stirred.

After 1 hour on high and 2 hours on low covered, this is what the cider looked like:

A whirl with the potato masher, through a strainer and voila

instant success.



Lane gave them Frito boats for dinner (again), thus the hands. This boy dives into his food face first, thus the no shirt at dinner time. Mommy's little piggy!