Mulled Dr. Pepper and Weekend Events

 

 

I was browsing through a Taste of Home Halloween magazine and came across a recipe for Mulled Dr. Pepper.  I love Dr. Pepper and I really wanted to try it.  I got the opportunity this weekend when a friend invited us to her Halloween party.  I had never heard of drinking Dr. Pepper hot, but apparently, it's been happening for years.  While reading some reviews of the recipe, I noticed several reviewers talking about having it when they were younger when they had a cold.  Then, at the party, one of the guests told about how her Dad would bring home Dr. Pepper as a treat and heat it up on the stove.  I thought it was a warm and comforting drink, similar to cider in the spices.  Just don't expect to get the Dr. Pepper burn.  It goes away on heating.

Mulled Dr. Pepper

8 cups Dr. Pepper
1/4 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice
1/2 tsp ground allspice
1/2 tsp whole cloves
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
3 cinnamon sticks

Combine all ingredients in a 3 qt slow cooker and cook on low for 2 hours.  Discard cloves before serving.  I used one of my tea strainers to hold the cloves so I didn't have to fish them out.

I also took these caramel apples to the party.  Find the recipe here over at Our Everyday Dinners.  The homemade caramel was so worth the effort!

Here's our costume.  I'm glad I have a cooperative husband.  We usually do a couples theme costume.

The rest of our weekend was filled with activity as well.  We had Caroline's school carnival.  Addie didn't go this year.  Since she is in Middle School now, she thinks she's too old for such things. :(

Sunday afternoon, the Girl Scouts presented the flag at a Mashburn Foundation concert.  I met Mrs. Mashburn in the waiting area of the Toyota Service Department while we were both having our oil changed.  We chatted about different subjects, including Girl Scouts, and she offered us this opportunity of presenting the flag and the girls got to attend the concert for free.  The music was great!  It was a tribute to soul and the girls knew a lot of the songs.  They were singing, clapping, and dancing along.  Check out the Mashburn singers.  They do a couple of concerts a year to raise money for scholarships.

Mike and the girls finished out the weekend by carving a couple of our pumpkins.

Feelings of Fall

Fall leaves photo by Mike

Fall is in the air! My favorite time of year. I took a long walk at the park this morning and I could feel it.  I could've stayed all day just walking and thinking and listening.  When I walk I listen to music and I think.  I had my music playing on shuffle and a Ricky Skaggs song came on.  Bluegrass is one of my favorite types of music.  And it just seems to fit the fall season too.  There's something about the instruments and harmonies that I love about it.  After that song, I changed my phone to shuffle through just my bluegrass collection.  So today I was joined on my walk by Ricky, Rhonda Vincent, Allison Kraus, and IIIrd Tyme Out.  If you've never listened to Bluegrass, try it.  We've seen Rhonda in concert several times and she's great.  I wish I would've learned to play the mandolin or banjo, or even the tall bass!

Rhonda Vincent and the Rage photo by Mike

The bluegrass made me think about Silver Dollar City, Dollywood, and the Smoky Mountains.  The Smokies are one of my top 5 vacation destinations.  And I've been 5 or 6 times.  Can't get enough of the place.  2nd recommendation of the day....Go there!  And skip the strip, go to the mountains and hike and see the waterfalls.  You won't be disappointed.  One thing I have not done that I want to do is go there in the Fall.  All of those beautiful leaves....on 2nd thought maybe I shouldn't....I may never go home.

Mountain Path in the Smokies photo by Mike

And from the Smokies, my thought process took me to this book.

Can you guess why?  Actually my Mom named me after this book.  The description on the back says, "Christy Huddleston left home at 19 to teach school in the Smoky Mountains.  There she came to know and love the wild mountain people with their fierce pride, their dark superstitions, their terrible poverty, their yearning for beauty and truth.  Christy found her faith severely challenged in these primitive surroundings; and confronted with two young men of unique strengths and needs, she found her own growing yearnings challenged by love."  Great book.  So my last recommendation of the day...Read it!  I think it's time I read it again.  And it was fun to find this on the inside.  I'd forgotten...

Get out and enjoy this Fall season!  Then go home and curl up with a good book.  Happy Fall ya'll!