In The Beginning...

I have always enjoyed cooking. Even as a young girl I liked messing around in the kitchen. I say "messing around" because even though I was "cooking or baking" I know my mother just hated the messes I assuredly left behind in her kitchen! The first cookbook I wrote was a variety of recipes I gathered during the first 15 years after high school. I hand wrote some of the pages and typed (on an electric typewriter) the rest. The book was a gift for my son Cory. Fifteen years later in 2005 I compiled a second cookbook while I was an innkeeper at Walnut Grove Bed and Breakfast in Shelbyville, TN. Our guests regularly asked for "this recipe" or "that recipe" and I was constantly typing and printing out a requested recipe on the spur of the moment! Out of self defense of my time, I compiled a Friends and Family Cookbook containing some of my own bed-and-breakfast recipes, favorite family recipes and many special recipes given to me by friends.

I have found that when you enjoy cooking, friends and "friends of friends" regularly share recipes. After we sold Walnut Grove I intended to write a second book, compiling the many recipes the first cookbook prompted to be given to me! I wanted to include a daily scripture to share along with the recipe.

Instead, two and a half years later, a blog seems a fantastic way that I can share food for both body and soul!

Neither the recipes or the scriptures are in any particular order - other than my own daily devotions and my favorite recipes!
May this blog bless you - body and soul.

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Mother and I spent this afternoon baking the traditional sugar cookies and frosting in colors of red and green, sprinkle with colored sugars and silver balls. This is my Grandma Greathouse's Powdered Sugar Cookie Recipe.

Ingredients:
1 cup confectioners' sugar
1 cup white sugar
1 cup butter
1 cup vegetable oil
1 pinch salt
2 eggs
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 cups all-purpose flour

Directions:
1. Beat sugars, margarine, vegetable oil and salt very well. Add eggs and dry ingredients.

2. Make into balls, roll in sugar and place 1 inch apart on ungreased cookie sheet.

3. Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 8 minutes. For holidays or special occasions, roll in colored sugar instead of white sugar.

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Genesis 1 (New International Version)
The Beginning
1 "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

2 Now the earth was [a] formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.

3 And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light. 4 God saw that the light was good, and He separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light "day," and the darkness he called "night." And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day."