Our first Friday Bake Along of 2025! I thought we’d start with something super simple. And simple these are! Enjoy!
Yield: 18-24 servings
The Best Blondies
Prep Time15 minutes
Cook Time25 minutes
Total Time40 minutes
Ingredients
240 grams all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon kosher salt
151 grams unsalted butter, melted and cooled
373 grams packed light brown sugar
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups chocolate morsels – I use a mixture of mini semi-sweet and milk chocolate
¾ cups sweetened shredded coconut (optional)
Instructions
1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees C (350 degrees F). Line a 13x9-inch baking pan with foil or parchment and spray with non-stick cooking spray. 2. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt. 3. In a large bowl, whisk together the butter and brown sugar. Add eggs and vanilla, mixing until well combined. Gradually add in dry ingredients and mix until just combined. Stir in chocolate morsels and coconut. 4. Spread the batter into the prepared pan. Bake in preheated oven until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 25-30 minutes. 5. Cool in pan completely before cutting
it has been my intention for over a year now to get back to my blog but when I tell you 2024 was not a good time to try and write, I am not exaggerating. Blogging has to become a habit. Something you do at least every few days. And it’s good for an old brain such as mine to write things down so we do have some record of our lives. So let us take another swipe at this blogging thing. If you are looking for religious or political discourse you are on the wrong page. I will talk about family, food, homemaking, crafting and leave the rest for other people. I want this blog to be a tiny little space that flings something positive out into the Universe. Thanks for being here.
Oh how lovely 2024 began. We even squeezed in another trip to Scotland. I suppose it had no way to go but down. And thankfully I think we have turned a corner. Rolling along, figuring things out as we go. Winging it, if I’m honest.
But amongst all the heartbreak and sadness, two of our offspring got married! Our middle son in April and our youngest daughter in November. We didn’t get to celebrate with our son but we love his bride. And we love them together. Two halves of a whole.
Our daughter’s wedding was a beautiful evening and we could not be happier for the couple. She and A have been together for 6+ years and they were ready. The groom is already a part of our family and we love him like he’s our own. Family came from afar to help us celebrate them and this next chapter of our lives. R did everything for their wedding except the cake. J and I baked and decorated it and it turned out lovely. It was just a happy night of celebration. Everything was just so lovely. If I get permission I’ll post a few pictures of both weddings.
I wrote this on May 10, 2024 and posted it to FB. It is still surreal at times and Jerry and I can’t talk about the family that they had been building for 23 years without crying. I don’t know when that will get easier for us, so when I say I have no idea how our daughter and her son have coped, I mean it. At this point Jerry had been moving a rig from Trinidad to Australia for 6 weeks with 4 more to go and no way to get off it and come home until they got to the port in Mauritius. He made it home the first weekend of June.
May10, 2024 from FB
I haven’t really known how or what to say about what happened to our family Tuesday. We lost our precious son-in-law J. Our sweet S’s daddy. J’s most beloved husband. Our family loved him so much as did everyone who knew him. He was kind and sweet and he loved our daughter with his whole heart. He leaves such a hole in not only our family but his, of course. His Mom and Dad and sister are devastated and I don’t really know how they are still functioning. Not to mention all the extended family and friends who will miss him dearly.
Somehow with lots of support and all the love we have, J and S will get through a painful and terribly unfair loss that no one could prepare for and certainly shouldn’t have to go through at such a young age.
J’s siblings considered him more than a brother-in-law, he was their brother. H loved him so much and got really close to him when she stayed with them some when S was first born. She was with J at the worst moment of her life and didn’t leave her side until I was able to get to Colorado. R lived with them for a while when she was in college and was inconsolable when I had to tell her they were unable to save him. Z has known J since they were little guys and again – not a brother-in-law – but another brother and never ran out of stuff to talk about from their days working together at a grocery store to a movie they’d seen. N was the third wheel when J and J were dating before he could drive and is heartbroken. B doesn’t remember him not being in our family – again just another older brother who gave him his first gaming computer on his 12th birthday and who shared his love of building Gundams. They are all grief stricken.
Jerry and I couldn’t have asked for a better husband for our daughter and we loved him so much. He was such a genuinely good person. Kind to a fault. We never worried for one moment about what kind of husband and father he was. He was just simply, one of the good guys. I can’t imagine our family without him, but we are going to rally around our daughter and S and give them all the love and support we possibly can. S is such a gift to us and as he grows, I am sure he will remind us more and more of J because he has that same kindness and tender heart.
In all this somehow J, S and I made it to Louisiana mid-May for J’s June 8th memorial in our hometown. Finally Jerry is home after 10 weeks. The last four the hardest of my life (our lives) to this point.
So now let us add a little more horror to our already broken family.
June 21st S’s other grandparents had him and J over for a meal and the grandfather was riding him and his two cousins (twin boys 3 days younger than S) in a golf cart and for some unknown reason (S’s words) he let one of the cousins drive and when he took off and S flew off the back.He had a complete break of his right femur, honestly it was shattered. Little man was in surgery from 1130pm -3am Saturday night into Sunday morning and has a rod inside the femur from his hip joint to his knee. I am so angry and so hurt for him and J. She didn’t need this-EVER but especially right now.
Update: S had the rod removed from his femur last month and is doing great. He’s a resiliant little guy and we miss him. We are home for Jerry to have knee replacement surgery, then we will head back to Colorado to be with S for his 10th birthday. By that time we will have three of our 6 living in Colorado within 30 – 45 minutes of each other. I am so happy for them all. It’s a beautiful place with some of the nicest people I have ever known. We have had the privilege of getting to know some of J’s & S’s friends, teachers, doctors. They have a wonderful support system.
Anyway – that is the condensed version. I won’t write all my feelings here. Maybe someday. No way I will forget anytime soon how I have felt.
WAY back on January 19 I posted a few pictures of a little kit Jerry gave me for Christmas – along with many other things! Well.kit one is finished and it is ADORABLE.
I have finally started on Kit Two. In between the kits I made a batch of candles for someone’s birthday. And an Easter egg wreath – I’ll show you that later. Anyway – here is what I have finished on Kit Two.
Kit two is a Book Nook! Can’t wait to get it finished and put it on my witchy bookshelf!
