Healthy scones

Yesterday it was a gloomy and rainy Sunday. A perfect day to make some scones. The scones I make are healthy and and the kids love them, so I thought that I would share the recipe with you.

Scones:

650-700 gr of flour

0.5 tsp sea salt

2 tsp baking powder

200 ml plain yogurt or Greek yogurt (I use Goat yogurt)

100 ml water

1. Oven to 480F/250C.

2. Mix flour, salt, baking powder in a bowl.

3. Add yogurt and water and make into a dough.

4. Make them into any shape that you want. I like triangles:) About 8 ones with gluten free flour, 12 with ordinary flour.

5. 10-12 min. in the oven.

You can add oregano, thyme, rosemary, raisins, or honey if you want to experiment with different flavors.

Enjoy!

Yesterday, we had our scones with goat's cheese and red pepper and cucumbers, ham and cheese, and raspberry or apricot jam.

Peter Callesen: A master of paper cuts

It is not only the Japanese who can make beautiful things out of paper.

In Denmark, Peter Callesen has created some fantastic pieces of art out of paper. These paper cuts are ingeniously made and brings the paper alive in more than one way.

Enjoy!

Half Way Through, 2006

Running fire II, 2010

White hand, 2007

And here are some of his framed paper cuts.

Dead angels, 2007

Saving himself, 2007

The painter III, 2008

The birds of the air, 2009

The roots of heaven, 2009

For those of you who have not seen the documentary Between the folds, I can highly recommend it. It takes you beyond most origami creations that you have previously seen.

Delayed Christmas presents

This week I got a package from Sweden with Christmas presents from my sister. I was happily surprised to discover that my sister had bought me Anna Kraitz's candle stick "Fire." I love this candle stick, and I have cutouts from magazines of this piece of art.

Thank you so much sister for this beautiful Christmas present.

I love you, Justin!

No, I am not talking about Mr. Bieber or Mr. Timberlake. I am talking about peanut butter.

Did you think I did not have any vices as regards to food. Well, I do.

Justin's nut butter is delicious, especially the ones with chocolate. If you have not tried it, do. PCC and Safeway sell their products.

Their peanut butter cups are pretty awesome too. And their products are gluten free and vegan.

And for the Swedes who remember nötcreme, they have an equvivalent:)

Cool hotel

We spent our last night in Arizona at a really cool hotel in Phoenix. The weather was nice and warm, so, of course, the girls hit the pool.

I will definitely return to Arizona, because there were some things that we never had time to do and see, such as hiking, visiting some more historical sites, and following in Frank Lloyd Wright's footsteps. Mr Wright spent some time here and one of his followers, Paolo Soleri, is building an experimental town, Arcosanti, which is meant to improve urban conditions and lessen the destructive impact on the earth.

Sedona

On our trip to Arizona, we spent a couple of days in Sedona. Sedona is a small town surrounded by beautiful red rocks.

One of the days, we took a jeep ride in the "outback". The only animals we saw were cows, but our driver taught us a lot about the trees and bushes that the Indians used for food.

There is a large New Age community in Sedona and, apparently, there are many high energy places here to visit. If you are lucky, you can see people spending time chanting in some of these areas.

We also did some walking. And I just kept on looking up and the sky wondering why I am living in Seattle when the sky above my head could look like this most of the time.

I guess I fell in love with the trees and sky in Sedona.

In Seattle all the trees are green, which I really like, but there is another kind of beauty to these trees, don't you think?

Zoe and Irene liked the trees as well.

Montezuma Castle

When visiting Arizona, we stopped to visit the Montezuma Castle cliff dwellings. The name of these cliff dwellings is indeed misleading. This national monument got its name from the discoverers who thought it was connected to the Aztec emperor Montezuma II. And it is not a castle either, but was the living quarters for pre-Columbian Singuan people who built and lived there around 700.

Protected from storms, rain, and animals, these cliff dwelling, which were built into the limestone on a high cliff, have a location to die for.

The area surrounding the dwellings is beautiful with a small river making it an excellent spot for living and farming.

The dwellings contain 20 rooms and housed around 50 people. 

Around 1425 these dwellings were abandoned. Researcher do not know why, but theories include warfare and drought.

2012: It just felt good to write this

I hope all of you had a relaxing holiday with just the right amount of food.

I spent half of the holiday here in Seattle and the other half in Arizona.

In retrospect, we should not have spent so much time in the car. We were all tired and slept in every morning, something that left us running to catch the sun before it disappeared behind the red rocks.

One of Arizona's major attractions is Grand Canyon. Both Christer and I had been there before, but it was time to show Zoe and Irene, and since Zoe has been studying rocks in school we thought it would be a good idea to explore the Grand Canyon area.

The Grand Canyon is an amazing place and the view is spectacular. However, it has changed tremendously since I was there 21 years ago. I strongly recommend avoiding the Visitor's Center and head east or west to have the views to yourselves. Read up on the history and explore on your own.

The Grand Canyon is 277 miles (446 km) long and between 4 and 18 miles (6.4 to 29 km) wide. It feels like it goes on forever.

Even though the sun was nice and warm, there were patches of snow here and there.

After a long day in the car, it was time to head south to Flagstaff to get some sleep.