Have you seen the muffin man.....

Okay...  so the primary focus of this blog is going to be the adventure geocaching the state parks, but a fair warning that I am going to stick in a bit of other stories and humor... this is just a good example of one...

Since I am spending a lot more time at home in the near future, I really want to make some good choices for food for Marcus.  One of things that Marcus enjoys is making blueberry muffins and, of course, eating them!  For the longest time we just bought the mix where you just add milk or water....  They are fast, they are easy, they are inexpensive and they are yummy (and Marcus loves them)... but have you ever looked at the ingredients?.... I finally did one day (see below)... Look at the number of ingredients.... did you notice they don't actually have blueberries?

Ingredients:
ENRICHED FLOUR BLEACHED (WHEAT FLOUR, NIACIN, IRON, THIAMIN MONONITRATE, RIBOFLAVIN, FOLIC ACID), SUGAR, DEXTROSE, PARTIALLY HYDROGENATED SOYBEAN AND/OR COTTONSEED OILS, CONTAINS 2% OR LESS OF: YELLOW CORN FLOUR, BAKING POWDER (BAKING SODA, SODIUM ALUMINUM PHOSPHATE), MODIFIED CORN STARCH, CALCIUM CARBONATE, SALT, EGGS WITH SODIUM SILICOALUMINATE ADDED AS ANTICAKING AGENT, MONO- AND DIGLYCERIDES, PROPYLENE GLYCOL MONOSTEARATE, CITRIC ACID, ARTIFICIAL FLAVOR, POLYGLYCEROL, SODIUM STEAROYL LACTYLATE, COLORED WITH (BLUE 2 LAKE AND RED 40 LAKE), CALCIUM SULFATE, NIACIN, IRON, TBHQ (ANTIOXIDANT), VITAMIN B6 HYDROCHLORIDE, RIBOFLAVIN, THIAMIN MONONITRATE, VITAMIN B12.

 Pillsbury Website with product information

So I decided to spend the extra $1.50 and go for a box that actually has REAL blueberries.  I picked these and I felt a bit better about the decision because at least now I knew the blueberries came out of a can and they were actual fruit (ignoring the fact they are packed in light syrup).  I felt like this was a pretty big improvement.  They are still yummy, a little bit more work, but Marcus still loved them.  Then I decided to look at all of the ingredients......  This was a lot better, but it still did not make me very comfortable.

Better Crocker Wild Blueberry Muffin Mix Info

I can admit that I am not much of a baker, or a cook for that matter, but I know that I have lot of years of muffin making ahead of me and I really wanted to find a better solution.  Enter Pinterest and the tons of recipes available.  Here is the plan I came up with.  I wanted to find a recipe where I could premix all of the dry items and put them in a baggy in the pantry so that I could make them at any time and it would almost be as easy as store-bought mixes.  Step one is finding a recipe and I thought that Pinterest was a good place to start.  I also asked my mom if she or my grandma had any go to recipes, but the answer was no.

I started my search for scratch muffin recipes and the game plan is to do one recipe each weekend until I find one that works for us.  Meaning: it has to be better for us, contain real ingredients, and, of course, be very yummy – if Marcus does not like it then there is no point in making them.

Last Saturday was my first attempt.  I pulled out all of the ingredients and Marcus and I got started.  Right from the beginning I was not sure about the recipe.  It just seemed like way too much flour..... and it was... they tasted pretty unfortunate and they did not rise very well.  Marcus would not even eat a few bites.  I felt guilty (I hate wasting food) but even with a lot of butter I could not love them, and I threw them away.  

Blue Berry Muffin # 1 Link

Today we started again and this week the results were a bit more promising.  They were not perfect and they still did not rise as much as I wanted, but they were tons better than last week's version.  I am worried that  the muffins are not rising because of a problem with the baking powder, so I threw it out today and bought a new can for next week.  I am going to repeat this recipe at a later date, but it is currently the front runner.  Marcus even had half of a muffin this afternoon as a snack!

Blueberry Muffin # 2 Link

The final product from Recipe # 2

Marcus surveying the disaster

I will update next week when I have the results on #3.    Here is a final fun video of Marcus helping us clean up after we were done.

And the Summer of 2014 Begins now.....Fort Snelling State Park

STATE PARK AVIAN GEOCACHE ADVENTURE BEGINS!!!

So the current plan for the summer is to take a little time off and actually enjoy a little bit of life.  I have a goal – and it is a big one – and we kicked it off today.  Luke and I have been doing some geocaching for years , but we never really did a ton of it.  There is a program that the Minnesota DNR is putting on at all of the state parks where each park has a multi-site geocache and I want to do them all.

There are a total of 81 sites: 76 parks and recreation areas and one state trail, 4 biomes (these are in a state park), and one final site that you can access only when you have visited the first 80!  This sure sounds like a huge challenge and a lot of fun.  There is one added challenge – this entire program ends in October 2014 so we had better get to it!

If you want more information on the program follow this link: MN DNR Avian Geocache website link.

So we started today.  The day started like this.  Marcus, wanted to go outside NOW!  So I figured it was a good day to start.

Marcus in the morning: take me outside NOW!

We decided that we wanted to test one park just so we could find out..... What are they like?  Are they winter-friendly?  Does our GPS equipment work?  To start a big challenge I like to set things up and understand as many future problems as possible.

So off we went....

Fort Snelling State Park

The weather was a little chilly and since the the park is low (down by the confluence of the Minnesota and Mississippi Rivers) there is still a lot of snow left on the ground.  So Luke, Marcus, and I arrived at the park and found our first site.  Since these are all multicache sites, the first one will always direct you to the next location.  

This is what the Geocache box looks like.

The bird for the Avian Geocache

We also took some time to walk around the visitor center.  Marcus LOVED the stuffed beaver and the fish tank.  While Luke and Marcus looked around, I tried to figure out how to add the second location into my iPhone GPS app – epic fail, and I never figured it out!  (However, I just figured it out for the future with the help of Google tonight!).  Good thing we had our old school, yellow eTrex GPS with us, so we were able to move on the second cache – just a bit down the trail.

Cache # 2

Marcus LOVED walking on the trail, but because the ice was uneven he was not able to walk very well.  He was so independent and he kept refusing to hold our hands.  He wanted to walk by himself.  It was pretty darn cute!

Marcus standing on the path

"Look at me on my own"

At this point we figured out at this point that it was going to be a long walk back to the car (even though it was not far – 0.3 miles when Marcus is walking can take a LONG time).  So Marcus and I trudged onward to the third cache.

Cache # 3

Coordinates to Cache # 4

We met up and drove towards the last site.  The ground was not very even and super slippery, so it was a long 0.15 miles from the car and then back.  It was pretty darn cute watching our independent little guy!

Marcus

Marcus

Marcus and Luke

  Watching Marcus walk across the ice was pretty amusing!

We walked and walked and we finally got there!

So you may be wondering what Marcus is holding right now.  This is the prize for getting to the final cache – it is a card that gives details about a native Minnesota bird – in this case a Warbler.

This was a lot of fun and I can't wait to do the next 80 of them!

One last video of Marcus walking about across the ice!

This is going to be a great summer!