It works out just fine for me, planning ahead with a mind to taking advantage of pre-preparation. Kind of a riff on the popularity of commercially available pre-prepared food products that make life easier for people who don't like to cook, or are perpetually short of time. Personally, I frequently feel short of time. There often doesn't seem to be enough time in the day to accommodate everything I'd like to do.

So on Friday when I do my baking, I also make up a bread dough for use later in the week. It's handy to have on any occasion when I feel like using it, and the basic dough itself has already been prepared. If I think I'll be using it for something like pizza, I make it a plain bread dough. If I contemplate using it for something like dinner rolls or croissants to accompany a soup, then I add to it. In this instance the additions were dehydrated milk crystals, shredded old Cheddar cheese and sesame seeds.

Because that combination in particular reflects perfection in our estimation. Hot out of the even, fragrant and tempting, crisp and flaky, they make a perfect accompaniment for any kind of soup; vegetable or pulses and vegetables. Yesterday it was a garden vegetable soup, heavy on tomatoes, garlic and onions. With the addition of celery, chopped fingerling potatoes, bell pepper, and last, corn kernels. The result is an aromatic, hot and delicious soup complemented by croissants. And fresh grapes for dessert.

The morning started with an extreme weather notice. That we were in store for a big snowstorm event. And true, at 0.3C, it was snowing early in the morning. But that soon turned to freezing rain, then spit, and finally, plain old rain, despite the thermometer hovering at freezing. The weather is confusing and must seem so to the area wildlife.

While I was in the kitchen making a batch of pancakes for breakfast, Irving called me over to the front door. There, on the walkway, in front of the porch was a pair of very large wild turkeys. WHERE was my camera?!!! In my frantic rush to locate the camera and Jackie and Jillie barking with excitement, the birds left, making their way down the street which twists and turns, so they were soon no longer in sight. All they had to do was cut through someone's backyard on the left, and disappear back into the forest.

We had anticipated a good ravine walk, with new snow down on the trails, this afternoon. But the rain continued, the elusive snow holding back. So at a freezing temperature with incessant rain, the prospect of making our way through the trails for our afternoon hike lacked inspiration. Jackie and Jillie didn't mind; their focus is always on their afternoon vegetable salad, and as long as that is in place as usual, their walk can wait. They run berserk through the house in excited anticipation when they know I've begun cutting up their salad.