Sweet As Honey

I must have really not been feeling well yesterday. Even though I didn't go to bed that late, I slept until 10. By that time, yoga was half-over. Oh well, it was worth it. My head was still a little achy, but otherwise, I felt much better.

Since I was feeling better, I decided to reverse my schedule and volunteer at the Oaklyn Library today instead of the Collingswood Library. It was past 12:30 when I finally got moving. The sky was blah and cloudy, but it was quite warm. Not as warm as last week, but above the norm for late February in southern New Jersey, probably in the lower-mid 50s. Which meant that yes, everything was melting again. The snow on my porch was half-gone when I headed out.

The Oaklyn Library was fairly busy when I came in, mostly with people doing the computers. I worked on organizing the DVDs and the children's books. In fact, I would have stayed longer, but the library closes for the afternoon at quarter of 2.

Went for a stroll on the White Horse Pike next. I bought a pretzel and an unsweetened iced tea with a small squirt of cherry syrup at WaWa. I then hiked to the other end of Oaklyn and stopped at CVS for vitamins and their dishwashing liquid sale.

Since I went past Uncle Ken's on the way home anyway, I decided to stop there and say "hi." Dolores greeted me in her car on her way out to pick up her grandchildren. Dad was working on the computer. He showed me a cool purse his girlfriend Jodie got that is made out of a huge can of Campbell's Soup. (Jodie works for Campbell's headquarters in Camden.) Uncle Ken was watching Rachel Ray.

I thought I'd take the shortcut on the path over the train tracks. Most of the snow was gone from the tracks, and it was smooth sailing...until I got to the route under the trees between the VFW parking lot and the tracks. Someone had piled up dirt and cut down trees, effectively blocking the path! I had to make my way through sticker bushes instead that caught on my hands and jacket.

Spent the rest of the afternoon inside. I discovered when I got in that Mom had sent me a text message. I'm not very good with texting, so I just called her instead. She wanted to know if I had the g, h, and i sized crochet hooks. Yes, I did. They came as part of the pack of hooks I bought last year. Turns out she's sending me piles of her old acrylic yarn for me to use for my dolls and for practice. She's also sending me a big needle to be able to sew the crochet items together and a couple of books of doll clothes patters - sewing and crochet - that she had for years. I used to love paging through those magazines when I was little.

(Actually, part of the reason was I wondered why the Barbie dolls used as models in those magazines and the style of clothing they wore was so different from ours. Turns out the magazines were from the early-mid 70s, and the dolls were the ones that were available then, either the sophisticated heavy-lashed lasses with the bubble cuts or the fresh-faced Malibu Barbies.)

Spent the rest of the afternoon working on editing some of our most recent Bowery Boys role play stories. Look for them tonight or later this weekend.

After that, I made a Honey Cake inspired of an episode of Good Eats that revolved around honey, "Comb Alone." Since the recipe called for orange blossom honey and I had none, I used the organic wildflower honey I had and added vanilla extract. Other than that, the recipe was exactly the same. I overbaked it, but otherwise, it came out very well, moist and just sweet enough.