Banana Bread

I hope everyone had a fantastic Thanksgiving. 

Since my last post, I went on a Girl Scout camping weekend with these two - Tiffany and my daughter Bailey.



We had a super weekend.  I think the girls had a blast.

Here's one more picture from that weekend - the area was beautiful.



So, now back to a quick recipe.  Normally when I have over ripe bananas, I make my chocolate chip banana muffins, which are awesome, but I wanted something more basic this time.  This recipe fit the bill.  I actually doubled this recipe and made two loaves - which was nice because I gave one away.  I got this recipe from here.

Here's the details:

3 or 4 ripe bananas, smashed

1/3 cup melted butter

1 cup sugar (can easily reduce to 3/4 cup)

1 egg, beaten

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 teaspoon baking soda

Pinch of salt

1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour

 

(The recipe says you can mix this with a spoon, but I ended up using my Kitchen Aid mixer anyway)

 

Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C). Mix butter into the mashed bananas in a large mixing bowl. Mix in the sugar, egg, and vanilla. Sprinkle the baking soda and salt over the mixture and mix in. Add the flour last, mix. Pour mixture into a buttered 4x8 inch loaf pan. Bake for 1 hour. Cool on a rack. Remove from pan and slice to serve.

 

I peeked into the oven about 45 minutes into the cooking time and the bread looked perfect - golden brown and ready to go.  I did the knife test (stick a knife into the middle and see if it comes out clean) and it failed.  The bread was not done yet - so it did cook the full hour.  So, don't be fooled - it will take an hour.

 

 

 

Enjoy!

 

 

 

Dallas Arboretum - Part Two

This is a continuation of last week's post about our trip to the Dallas Arboretum. Here's the first post in case you missed it.



Here's Rominal and me, and this was his first choice of poses.



I made him turn around though.



Here's some more pictures from our trip.





This time of year all of the walkways were lined with pumpkins.

 Everyone loved this.





This was one of the knockers on a door on the property.











I handed over my camera to another visitor and she got this picture. Very nice!



We saw this little critter on the walkway. We waited and made sure he got into the safety of the flower beds before we left him.

Dallas Arboretum

This weekend we went to the Dallas Arboretum. I've been wanting to go since Spring because they have a Chihuly exhibit that Mom and I wanted to see. However, the thing with living in Texas is that you have to wait until it not so hot outside. We tend to do a lot of indoor things during the summer.

This weekend was hot still, but not flaming hot.

We got there right when the gates opened and had a lovely walk. I've got tons of pictures and here's the first half.



I love how you can see the fuzz on this flower.





Here's some of Chihuly's work, surrounded by the flowers.



My mom was with us, and she took this picture of the three of us.





It's hard to see how tall this really is, but it was huge.









This little cutie was getting her picture taken in the gardens. Lots of people go there to do that, we even saw a wedding! I couldn't help but sneak a picture too.



And the last one for today - my Mom and me.



We had such a great time.  I'll post more pictures next week. 

Girl Scouts and the State Fair of Texas

2012 is the 100th anniversary of the Girl Scouts.  This remarkable accomplishment is being celebrated at the State Fair of Texas this year and my troop got to participate.

Each night at the fair there is a parade that goes all around the fair grounds.  The Girl Scouts have a float in this year's parade and my girls got to be on the float the other night.  It was a ton of fun!

I have so many pictures to share, so, sit back and enjoy.

Here's Elizabeth and Bailey in front of the building where the Girl Scout exhibit is being held.



Here's Tiffany, Bailey and Elizabeth.





This is how they planned to waive from the float. I didn't actually walk around the route with them, so not sure if they did this the whole time or not.









This is another float. I just liked the colors in it.



Unfortunately, we didn't have time to wait for the wheel to go around so that "Texas Star" was right-side up.



Some fair eats - that we didn't have time to stop at. Maybe next time.



So, after the parade took off, we took a short cut through the fair and met back up with the parade as it was nearing the end.

Here comes our girls!


The girls had a great time.


Too bad you can't tell.


Updated - we went back another night and we found a picture of Bailey from about five years ago in the display for the 100 year celebration of Girl Scouts. How cool is that?



And we almost didn't recognize her picture, because the picture was taken when she was at camp. She's the one in the yellow life vest on the right.