Homemade pretzels

I have loved eating pretzels since childhood, they are the one fairground treat I can always call upon myself to enjoy. The taste of salty goodness mixed with the doughy & buttery bread makes for a very happy Amy. Now, as much as I love a good pretzel, you'll seldom find me in the places where pretzels are born; fairgrounds, movie theatres or malls. You can imagine my dilemma when a craving for pretzels came over me the other day, there were no fairgrounds to visit, no movie I dreamed of seeing and it felt silly to visit the mall only for a pretzel, so I took to Google and found a homemade pretzel recipe. I made them as soon as I read the ingredients list and they ended up tasting just like the ones I remember eating as a little girl. Here's to never giving up on the foods we loved in our childhood!

What you'll need for 8 fluffy pretzels:
2.5 cups of all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon sugar
2.25 teaspoon instant yeast
1 cup of warm water 

1/2 cup warm water
1 tablespoon baking soda
vegetable oil 
coarse sea salt
3 tbsp unsalted melted butter

To follow the recipe I followed step by step, visit fifteen spatulas.

Note:  The recipe calls for 9-10 minutes but mine were ready in 7 minutes. Oven temperatures may vary so be careful not to burn your precious pretzels. I will certainly make this recipe again, but maybe next time I'll add a little cinnamon or stuff the dough with mozzarella. Enjoy.

The month of October

I rise in the morning to see the sun bouncing like a ballet on window blinds. I am living and travelling through my days while the October air feels warm and inviting. Autumn has arrived but the trees have taken their time in dying and becoming dormant. If not for their colourful coat of leaves, I would believe it was still summertime. The colours here are those you'd only expect to see in sunrises and sunsets, not even the flowers of July could produce such cosmic reds and golds. I live to watch the leaves dance away into the gutters and gardens when they can no longer hold onto the branches. 
Autumn is a sight to behold.

It has been months since I last wrote a proper blog post. As you may know, I was bridled with a broken camera and a wait-list from the repair shop, but my camera has since been returned to me and I am ready to post once again! I hope the world has been beautiful to you while I have been away. My world is full of tuning guitars and banjos, learning new songs and trying my best to sing like the wild goose that I am. I hope you have been singing too.

Here is a little taste of Autumn from my side of the world. 

(If you read my post where I lamented the passing of summer, you'll know how glad I am to have such warm weather carrying us through the seasons...)
 The Outfit
Dress  Marshalls
  Hat Winners
Boots – Value Village

The Location 
Ravine behind my house, Calgary Alberta Canada

A broken camera

I apologize for my lack of blog posts and updates. My dear camera broke while I was taking photographs. 

The beautiful thing about not having a camera is that I've relearned how to take photographs with my mind. To take a photograph with your mi
nd, you must be cognizant and willing to feel the world around you. You cannot rely solely on the click of a button to tell yourself the memory card is holding your memories for you. You have to store the memories in your own mind. To do so, you have to be in touch with all of your senses. Either that or you just have to live in the moment and not try to make it into a memory.

I'll always love taking photographs, but sometimes it is nice to put the camera down and keep these moments for myself. Thank you to my camera for falling apart, even though I am going to be out $250.00 to have it fixed, learning how to live in the moment is nourishing and priceless.

Blog posts should resume as soon as my camera returns from the repair shop. 
I hope you're having a beautiful October!