I don’t use a bread machine, but I’m not as hard-core as my mother, who ground her own wheat for every slice of bread I ate growing up (we never had store-bought bread, so I still don’t like it. I like thick and dense breads for sandwiches, store breads taste too spongy). I use my trusty KitchenAid mixer with the dough hook and do a bit of last-minute kneading myself. I’m altering the recipe today. Normally every loaf of bread I make has 1/6 of a cup of vegetable oil in it, which is not much, but I’m trying light olive oil instead, because it’s supposed to be better for you. We’ll see how it works out. I always stick some flax seed in when I bake things, too. Omega fatty acids and all that. Sigh.

I’m starting to worry that the house isn’t warm enough for a proper rise, which means I’m going to have a long first rise. I can do the second rise in the oven with the door open and set on warm, but not the first. This is why I don’t make bread as regularly during the winter. I get beautiful rises in the summer, but I’m cheap and keep the house at 70 in winter. I may have to raise the temperature, just for today. I guess it’s a trade-off.

My kids are busily wrestling each other on top of a pile of Legos in the living room. I’ve got Flogging Molly blasting on the stereo (by which I mean an iPod speaker dock, because I haven’t used – what were they called? Oh yeah – CDs for years and no longer own an actual stereo system). Soon I’ll be cleaning out the den/sewing room so I can actually move in there, and then tomorrow I’ll whip up the diaper bag I cut out two weeks ago for my sister-in-law, then I can get started sewing dinosaur costumes for Halloween.