Kindness

Kindness is essential in our daily lives.
I will share weekly a new post with a message of how powerful kindness really can be.

Monday, February 18, 2013

Josh Haulin' Wood

Today, being a very cold and blistery winter day, I made a decision to surf the web for a new recipe - one, of course, that required me having a close relationship with the oven to sort of take my mind off of the chill I could see out the window. Not in the mood for anything chocolate (ate too much on Valentine's day) d.i.l. Kelly recommended Monkey Bread. Oooh, the thought of warm cinnamon and butter sounded wonderful.

The recipe I chose to follow required making the dough in the bread machine - couldn't get any simpler than letting the machine do the mixing, kneading, rising, etc. After the machine was finished with the dough-making process I continued to follow the recipe looking forward to my finished product.

 
Joshua, Ginger and Libby Lu

Ring, ring - phone interruption, grandson Josh calling for
permission to come over for an alone-time visit with us - permission granted. He arrived just minutes before the Monkey Bread went into the oven for baking, and he could barely keep his excitement under control when he laid his big, handsome brown eyes on the bundt pan. Today he will be my taste tester. You see...he said his mom, d.i.l. Andrea, has her own Monkey Bread recipe... and he said that she makes it for the family many times throughout the year... and he said it's always delicious... and he said the family eats the whole thing hot right out of the oven...and it seemed like he said it all in one breath, one sentence. : )

Joshua and the Monkey Bread
Because this was my first attempt at making Monkey Bread, I was really
looking forward to hearing how Josh's taste buds would rate my effort.

Please don't be disappointed but this recipe and the results of the taste testing will be illustrated in a future blog post because today's writing will be dedicated to the title of this post, Josh Haulin' Wood.

Josh, as well as all the rest of my grandchildren, is very well behaved. Their parents have taught them to show respect to their elders and we are very appreciative for this lesson. Just like us adults they have their good days and not-so-good days; some days more energy, some days less energy.

Josh's energy level during his visit with us today was high, high, high as it is most other times he comes to visit. His grandfather was needing to bring in some cut firewood from the freezing outdoor elements and the help that Josh could provide would shorten the length of time to perform this task and lessen the wear and tear to an already aching body. Always looking to pitch in, Josh volunteered to help his grandfather bring in a few trailer loads of firewood from the brutal cold outdoors and re-stack them in the garage. Not only the all-you-can-eat Monkey Bread being provided as a snack today during his visit, Josh also had the privilege of driving his grand-father's garden tractor making the chore much more enjoyable. : )

He drove the tractor three times from the garage
to the woodshed empty
and then


he drove the tractor three times from the woodshed
to the garage
full of cut firewood.


He drove the tractor full of firewood inside the garage where he helped his grandfather empty the wagon as well as


re-stack it.

 I did notice that his sweet little cheeks were getting rosier with each trip out to the woodshed but


 what kind of grandparents are we that we never noticed he wasn't wearing any gloves!

Luckily the oven was still warm from baking the Monkey Bread when he came back indoors so I had him place his hands on the warm flat stove top to warm up his cold little fingers.

Thank you, Josh, so very much for lending us a helping hand today. You can be sure that from this day forward I will always make available to you a warm pair of gloves. I'm also considering taking out an insurance policy on your hands as they are worth a million dollars to us! We love you and appreciate you a whole bunch!

A hint to anyone wondering if Josh liked the Monkey Bread:

1. This picture represents the amount of Monkey Bread left on the plate before Josh went outdoors to help with the firewood.

2. I refuse to show a picture of the amount of Monkey Bread
left on the plate after Josh returned home because that would be a dead giveaway!













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