Today is cold and rainy out and I am sick with a cold myself so I decided to start some baking for Christmas.  Or fermenting, anyway!  I had some Amish fruitcake starter in the freezer so I combined it with some sugar and a can of peaches.  The recipe says to wait 10 days then add more stuff and ferment some more, but I think I will speed things along a bit.  So I added some orange liquer!  I have to have these cakes ready to give as gifts for Christmas...Any other bakers out there?  I found a good rum cake recipe in the local paper and will try that out too.

We are finally getting some rain and cool weather in Georgia, and the fall leaves are gorgeous!  I was inspired to do a fall painting.  I had just watched a show about grizzly bears, "Growing Up Grizzly II" on Animal Planet, and I was struck by the sense of fun that the young bears had.  I looked through a reference book on bears and found a beautiful pale blonde grizzly cub, so I imagined her jumping into a pile of leaves for the painting.