ambition

do you ever wake up early and feel inspired to bake? it happens to me occasionally, and it did this morning at 5:30 a.m., and this is what happened:

beacon said he could get into early morning baking. i need to get him a chef's hat.


of course a small red mug of coffee to sip whilst baking is necessary.


roommate a gets out of the shower and comes into the kitchen - "what are you baking? oh those look great." and i proceeded to give her a first one straight out of the oven and i think she ate three before she left. :-)


and when you start packaging mini pumpkin spice muffins with piped cream cheese frosting in a pretty tin with tissue paper at 6:30 in the morning, your roommate just might call you martha. don't know why. just sayin.


but this is is the note i woke up to the morning before, written by roommate a. click on the photo to magnify it and you can read it.


and just for s and g's, here's a photo of my new saddle and the saddle pad i bought to go with it.

isn't it a pretty pair? i love it.

so these are my two outfits now. i'm pretty happy with both of them. investing in good equipment is very satisfactory and rewarding, and i imagine that goes for whatever one is interested in.


and here's the recipe for the muffins. it came from pioneer woman's website. i decided to go with the mini muffins because then people in my office are more likely to eat them.

Pumpkin Spice Muffins (With Cream Cheese Frosting)

Muffins:

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 tablespoons butter, cut into pieces
1 heaping cup pumpkin puree
1/2 cup evaporated milk
1 egg
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
1/2 cup golden raisins (optional!) ******** i skipped the raisins altogether, thinking that chopped pecans made a lot more sense in pumpkin muffins*******
2 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Generously grease 12 muffin tins.

Sift flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and salt. Cut in butter with two knives or a pastry blender until all incorporated. In a separate bowl, mix together pumpkin, evaporated milk, egg, and vanilla. Pour pumpkin mixture into the flour mixture. Add raisins. Fold gently until mixture is just combined. Pour into greased muffin pan—batter hardly ever fills all twelve unless you keep it down to 1/2 full. Sprinkle generous amounts of cinnamon-sugar over the top of each unbaked muffin. *****whoops i didn't even notice that step. they're good even without cinnamon sugar, fyi*********
Bake for 25 minutes. Allow to cool in pan for 15 minutes, then remove and allow to cool. Ice with cream cheese frosting.

Cream Cheese Frosting

1/4 cup softened butter
4 ounces cream cheese
1/2 pound powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Mix all ingredients on high until soft and whipped. Spread onto completely cooled muffins, or place into a large pastry bag with a large star tip and go crazy!