Missions Trip Coming Up...

We leave this Thursday for our first-ever foreign missions trip with "our" college /young adult group! We are so excited, maybe a little nervous, and definately dreading the long flights!

We leave Birmingham at 1200 PM on Thursday, and 4 airports, one bus ride, and about 36 hours later, we will arrive in Niksic, Montenegro...some time in the wee hours of Saturday morning. (Local time. It'll feel like about 6PM Saturday for us. Yikes.)

I have made endless lists of the stuff to pack, supplies, and made more trips to Wal-Mart than I usually make in a month this week! And, unfortunately, I think I have to go back tonight!

Please pray for us over the next 11 days or so! I am really worried that all our bags won't make it all the way through!

If we get internet access at all, we will try to post updates on Facebook and Twitter!

Left-Over Wednesdays: Blueberry Muffins from Martha Stewart

Blueberry Muffins

from Martha Stewart Living, July/August 2000

This is my all-time favorite muffin recipe! The batter turns out absolutely beautiful, creamy and fluffy! Be sure to very carefully fold in your berries so you don't deflate the batter!


3 cups + 2 TBLS flour
3 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
6 TBLS butter, softened
1 3/4 cups sugar
1 whole egg + 2 egg yolks
1 tsp pure vanilla
1 cup milk
blueberries

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Prepare muffin tins; line with papers or spray tin well with pan release.

2. Sift flour, baking powder and salt; set aside. *I like to sift directly onto a large flexible cutting mat, rather than into a bowl. Makes integrating the dry ingredients later much easier!

3. In a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream butter and sugar together on medium speed until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add eggs and vanilla and blend well.

4. Slow mixer to low speed and alternate adding flour mixture and milk, beginning and ending with flour mixture.

5. Carefully fold in blueberries by hand. Scoop batter into muffin tins. Sprinkle tops generously with additional sugar.

6. Bake for approximately 30 minutes until golden brown.

Happy Bastille Day!

Or La Fete Nationale!

Today is the remembrance and celebration of the storming of the Bastille in Paris during the French Revolution. You can read the Wiki article here.

To celebrate Bastille Day here on Le Blog De Ree, I've included a few of my photos from our trip to Paris in 2006. Enjoy!

Where the Bastille used to be. Now there's residential, shopping, restaurants, markets...

La Tour de Eiffel!

Looking up into the Arc de Triomphe with the French flag

Announcing Ree's Cookbook!

I have decided to link up all of my recipes that I feature on my blog with a handy-dandy button! Look over on my right-hand side bar for the "Ree's Cookbook" button!

Thanks to Rachel for helping me learn some design tricks and making my Cookbook button!

Beach Time

We spent the July 4th weekend with 20 of our college students in Panama City Beach! It was plenty hot, but the breeze was nice off the ocean and the water was cool! Here's a few pics from our time there!

My view from my beach chair, under my umbrella. That is where you would've found me all weekend, napping and reading! I "color-sucked" the blue out and left everything else in black and white!

Even though they are not in college, the Long girls were home from Costa Rica so we took them along too! Love them!

The traditional girls' picture on the docks at Capt. Andersons!

Cub and Abby came too!

Silly...

Me and my sister!

Bonjour! Nouveau Design!

Le Blog De Ree has been under construction this week, so here's the final product!
Tres bien, no? My good friend Rachel over at Grasping For Objectivity is starting to dabble in blog makeover and design. She held a Reader Appriciation giveaway for a free design, but, alas, I did not win. But I hired her to help me do a custom blog design!

I was hesitant at first to create a custom design, because I like to change things around too much! If you've been around Le Blog for any length of time, you know what I mean! But Rachel has also graciously offered to teach me blog design too so I can do mini-makeovers myself!

I'm still working on my sidebars and my blog lists...a couple of weeks ago I lost all my bloggy links! So if your blog has been missing from my reading list, I'm sorry! I still love you and I'm working on getting you back!

In other news, we are headed to the beach with all the kids, 20 of them to be exact, but it will still be a relaxing trip.