this and that

We came home last Friday night to brown leaves at the stoop, rain, baking weather. Our neighbors wouldn't take a cent for caring for the pets, a hamster and two rats, even though they wound up taking the cages into their apartment because of the heat.

I've been baking a lot to help with reentry and make the best of the end of summer, which went by far too fast. When I made these muffins and put them on the table I suddenly realized that just a year ago, if I had done the same thing, my little one would have taken a bite out of each muffin while I wasn't looking. No longer, she's got it now, you eat the whole thing. Well, except for the burned parts. (Mom couldn't gain admittance to the baker's guild.) It is amazing how something that one struggles with in children (bed wetting, especially) can suddenly end and you don't notice its disappearance for months.

I love my oven. Thank you God for my oven. It's incredibly fortunate to have one. I get the feeling that in earlier ages a village would share an oven, and all the different bakers would bring their goods there to bake, marking the bread, pie, etc. with an impression from their guild rings. Well, that's what I learned in Providence anyway, courtesy of the Johnson and Wales Museum. I heard they have one of those guild rings on display at their Culinary Archives.