Almost ready....

Hello, all!

If you haven't heard from Mom or Nay (or Facebook), I am taking a trip around the world starting.....next week! I wanted to give you the run down, tell you when you can visit me and where, as well as direct you to a blog that I have set up for my students to follow me on my journey. Bookmark it, love it, comment, treat it as your own! Golly, you can pass it on to your friends if you feel like it! I'm just dipping my toes into this whole (personal) blogging thing and I must admit that it is pretty cool.

Okay, enough of the dilly-dallying. My schedule is roughly as follows:

July - December: Nelson, New Zealand.

I'll be (hopefully) teaching in a number of public schools as a substitute teacher and (hopefully) making enough money to cover living expenses and (hopefully) not shearing sheep. Butcha never know.

December - February: Sydney, Australia.

March: Hong Kong, Shanghai and Beijing, China.
I plan on taking a train from HK through Shanghai and on to Beijing. People have asked me if tourists do this and the answer is "no". We'll see how it goes.

April: Cambodia and Thailand

May: India

June - ?: Eastern Europe, including (but not limited to) The Balkans, Hungary, The Czech Republic, Poland and Russia.

Whew! I'm going to be tired when I get finished!

The place I'll be updating most frequently (besides my silly quips on Facebook) will be:

www.missyoungsadventure.wordpress.com

Go ahead and put it in your "favorites" bar, you know you're going to love it!

Love all of you! If you have been to any of the places I plan on making it to, please give me any suggestions you have for lodging, sight-seeing, etc. I'll see you on the other side of the world!

Love,
Maureen.

You with Your Grandparents

As you all know, I have the family archives from Auburn. Most of these were photos each family mailed to Auburn, probably duplicates of your family favorites. In time, I'll get it much more organized, but I thought I'd share some photos along a theme from time to time. The current theme is Marge and Gene with their grandchildren.


John and Brian, Feb 1, 1969 in St. Joseph's Church for Frank and Karen's wedding.

Michael and John, 1981 in California wearing the Tiny's T-shirts that all of you have/had!

Nathan and David April 1983 in West Lafayette (thanks Gretchen for writing the date on the photo!)

Maureen in boots, probably fall 1983 in Auburn.

David and Andrew Fall 1990 in Auburn.

MORE TO COME WHEN I CAN!

Deans and Elys in San Diego

Gretchen and I had a terrific five days in San Diego last week. It was wonderful to see Tom, Marge, John, Chris, Karla and Allison and spend some quality time (even some asymptotic time) with all of them. A few photos for you here.

We spent nearly six hours on Wednesday crawling all over the USS Midway museum with Tom. We got on early, before it was open to the public and spent quite a bit of time on the "Island", the part of the ship above the flight deck. Here you can see Tom in his element, as he explains to Gretchen the system for communicating engine speed from the bridge to the engine room, a long, long way away.

Tom on the Bridge

We then moved from bow to stern, port to starboard and up and down about 10 deck levels on the ship. Tom took us a number of places where the public can't go (yet). It was awesome. I got a much fuller appreciation for what our sailors do and put up with.

Another treat was a chance to spend an hour on Friday with John as he produced The Ray Lucia Show on Friday. As a radio nut myself, I loved being in the studio, watching all the goings on with callers and news. John is a hoot and is clearly in his element doing this. I thought you'd enjoy this action shot of him.
John at the controls

We also went on a 4 hour sail Thursday to watch grey whales migrating north. This was a terrific time on a sailboat...very comfortable and enjoyable. We actually did see a mama whale and her calf come up for air about 5 times...wow, are they big and move so gracefully under the water. And, to prove we were there, here's a photo of the four of us.

All 4 of us

So, it was a fun time, a nice break from the Indiana winter for G and me and great to be with family. We spoke of each of you many times and enjoyed the blessing of good family over and over.

The Great Peanut Brittle Challenge of 2009: Baking like Grandma Baked

2/15/09

The day started with many feelings ranging from angst and fear to joy and jubilation. The angst and fear was attributed to our respect from the great brittle we all received from our Grandmother and the thought of duplicating a culinary masterpiece such as this was daunting. The technical language that was supplied in the previous post by our Aunt Karen also made us believe that we might need to touch up our knowledge of the periodic table. The angst was then superseded as we talked about our memories of G’ma in the kitchen and the love that she put into all the things she cooked for us in our youth. We remembered the apron, the smells, and the constant smile that she had on her face as one of us youngsters walked into the room.

On to the event.



Nay selecting a pot that is sufficiently "heavy duty".














So many thermometers!

















Carefully reading about the difference between "hard ball" and "hard crack".

















Ingredients purchased!

(Nay's tribute to the famous Matt pose)













Butter, water, sugar and corn syrup go in.



Nathan likes to do aaaaall the work while Maureen takes pictures for the blog.








Skies were clear.....or about as clear as were going to get in Portland.














Butter was our friend.





Lathering up the pan (notice that Nay is not using the Ely-approved Ziploc baggie method. There was a long discussion about how this could compromise the integrity of the project.)




Those peanuts. A pound!




Not "hard ball" yet.....that's 255!






The peanuts and vanilla go in....starting to smell good!






Getting sticky! This was right before the peanuts started to smoke.






Onto the pan (and not a well buttered tabletop as Anne offered as a Marge Ely-approved alternative to a cookie sheet).







Spread out thin, because that's the Ely way!




Smidgening it to death.....




We would like to report that the brittle now resides in a plastic bag on the counter but is dwindling by the day! It was delicious! Thanks, Grandma!

Love, Nay and Mo

Marge Ely's Peanut Brittle

We all have fond memories of peanut brittle from Auburn, so thin, crisp, and crunchy packed in baggies or cans. It was a part of every Christmas package! Maureen and Nathan are wanting to try their hand at it in an upcoming visit, so I'm including the recipe in Grandma's handwriting along with some comments based on some experiences Amy and I have had in making it.

Believe me, there is a lot of chemistry involved which Mother knew so well! There are some key points in getting the supersaturated sugar solution just right!

I've scanned her recipe, such as it is:




Peanut Brittle
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup water
1 cup white syrup
2T. butter
Bring to hard ball

Add 1 teaspoon vanilla
1 lb raw peanuts

Bring to hard crack

Add 2 teaspoons soda.

Pour out.

Now this sounds simple, but there is a lot that isn't written in the recipe. The package of raw peanuts (Wal-mart) has a recipe that is essentially the same with a few more instructions. We compared it with several cookbooks and they are all pretty much the same. Then we read the section on Behavior of Sugar Syrups in Harold McGee's milestone book "On Food and Cooking" (1984 edition--a classic). His graphs and microscopic photos of the crystallization process are incredible. In the end, you see that the RATE OF COOKING and balancing evaporation of liquid to crystal formation is the key. Amy and I made peanut brittle a number of times and we enjoyed talking about Grandma and the science she understood better than we did! So here's my advice:

Use a recipe on the package of raw peanutes or one similar to this one:
Good instructions:
http://www.thenutfactory.com/kitchen/dessert/peanut-brittle.html


But this one has excellent reviews
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Old-Fashioned-Peanut-Brittle-2682


A couple of things about equipment:
a) use a large heavy duty pan. It expands A LOT as it cooks.
b) use a candy thermometer (Grandma could tell the stages or "soft ball" or "hard ball".... we can't)
c) lubricate the cookie sheets and utensils (or your fingers) with butter. It is very sticky and hard to clean as it hardens
d) stretch it thin...... that's the Ely way!

And most of all, enjoy talking about Grandma and Auburn things while you do this!!

Snow in Ohio

Lots of snow in Cincinnati the past two days also. These photos are mainly for the Californians who are missing out on all the fun! Marcello and Sofia won't understand the incredible fun of a snow day! The top one is Frank and Karen's house during the snow with the newspaper on top of the ice. The next three are at Amy and Scott's house. Abbey made snow angels and Emily loved her first sled ride. What fun!

Snow Day

The kids stayed home from school today because of all the snow, but since it wasn't too cold we got to play in it.



Bunny got to wear her new bunny hat that Anne made and the boys had a good time using the big pile of snow that I made as a slide.



When it was all said and done they were a little tired and Bunny fell asleep on the couch. We are so proud of her. She is only 2 1/2 and already snoring at a third grade level.

A Quiet Sunday Morning with Drew and Nathan

Sunday morning is a peaceful time of the week. Calm. Reflective. Even more so with two little boys. Enjoy the bliss and tranquility with this vignette.



Ringo Starr, where are you now???

Gene Ely's 94th Birthday

On January 8 we all will be thinking of Daddy/Dad/Grandpa/GreatGrandpa on his 94th birthday. I found these photos that will bring a smile for sure. Perhaps some of the more recent family members haven't seen them.

Dad with Otis
The colt is Otis, son of Jackie (I think) taken on a rather cold day. Daddy usually didn't wear a coat unless it was really cold. Of course, his OshKosh 'B Gosh bibbies hold a precursor to the Blackberry! This was probably taken in the early 1980s.

Dad with Seco

The horse he is riding is Seco. I believe this photo is from the 1970s but I'm not totally sure. As I dig deeper into the family photo archives, I'll be able to put more accurate dates on these.

The Happy Couple
This is from the tack room, taken in May 1993.

Over the holidays, we played a very cute group game called "Whoonuit?" in which you have cards with phrases and a the group members select things that the person who is "it" has to rank according to personal preference. The cards have sports, foods, activities etc.

For example, Makenna made a list with Blowing Bubbles #1, watching cartoons #2, etc
Quinn made a list with T-Shirts #1, jelly doughnuts #2, …. It is a lot of fun to find things that someone else would like!

So, to celebrate January 8, let's make a list of things Grandpa REALLY liked:

horses, pumpkin pie, Notre Dame, Rotary, Bonanza, …. (add some more!)

ed. note: This post written by Karen Eichstadt with technical assistance from Joe Ely, both honor students of Kenny Hutton :-)