Every January I try to make English Muffin Bread. It makes terrific toast, and who doesn’t like warm toast in January? With all the purging and packing going on in this house as we prepare to move it has been a challenge to get the bread made!

Thursday we worked on house things. I was getting tired in the late morning, but was determined to mix that bread! I had looked for a CD to inspire us while we were cleaning the pantry and could not find it. As my energy flagged I needed music to spur me on! Finally found the recording I wanted on You Tube music. If you every need a musical motivator try “Hooked on Classics.”

Muffin Bread is one of our son’s favorite foods. Measuring the flour with Mom’s flour scoop, I remembered how much she liked that bright yellow scoop. I think perhaps she got it through Gold Medal Flour? In the 1950s plastic kitchen items were uncommon. I am so grateful to have her flour scoop. It makes me smile.

Meanwhile, Hooked on Classics moved to Liebestraume by Liszt, the only piece of classical music that I remember my Dad liking. I was using a Kitchen Aid mixer. I only bought one a few years ago. (Wish I had owned it when the kids were growing up and I was baking all the time!) I remembered my daughter asking for one on her wedding registry.

Next thing I knew Hooked on Classics was playing the Wagner wedding march! All of these within a few minutes! You see, Hooked on Classics arranges the most memorable portions of classical music and puts those portions to an up tempo beat.

So much gratitude! Fatigue from cleaning the kitchen pantry, because we are going to move to a new house. Our son on an even keel and knowing he would enjoy his muffin bread. Our daughter, Emily’s wedding and stable marriage. My mom’s flour scoop all these years later. My dad’s favorite love song, because that is what Liebestraume means. My wonderful husband who has been working EVERY SINGLE DAY towards packing and cleaning up the holes in the walls and preparing for our move. Occasionally I can talk him into a day off, but not every week.

Before I knew it the bread dough was rising and I was out walking the dog! When was the last time you had an avalanche of gratitude in a short, intense burst? Did you give thanks?

Psalm 107:8-9 (NIV2011)  Let them give thanks to the LORD for his unfailing love and his wonderful deeds for mankind,  for he satisfies the thirsty and fills the hungry with good things.

Psalm 107:8-9 NIV