Dragon Tails and Normal Life

Have you heard of the Tail of the Dragon?

Source

It's an 11-mile stretch of 318 mountainous curves on US 129 in our area that motorcyclists from all over the world come here to "slay". (Yeah boy.)

Source

There are a lot of accidents on the road during warmer weather because some ride it hoping to take home bragging rights on how fast they took those 318 curves.

We've started to drive it several times, but each time there was too much traffic to enjoy it so as the weather has been too cold for the normal crowd to be there we decided to do just that.

 Gate & fence to a business along the way.
GOOD FENCES GATE SEEN HERE!!!

True, there were lots of curves... and this day lots of ice on the rocks along the side of the road...

And a few more dragon tails, but not much else. Oh, there were 100-foot drop-offs at the edge of the road, but my thoughts were unless you have a death wish, it's really not so pleasant of a drive. If you'd like to experience it via youtube click here for a safe ride from your chair.

Safely home, I made up a batch of pepperoni rolls. Any yeast bread recipe will do. After the first rising roll the dough into walnut sized balls then flatten...

Place a couple of sandwich-size pepperoni slices on the dough.

Roll...

 and seal the edge of the dough.

Then bake for about 15-20 mins. at 375º F until golden brown.
They make a great snack. I put them in Goodman's lunchbox for his afternoon break.

Normal is good. ;) Have a great week, y'all!

Linking up with.....        

The Nativity Story

Wishing you joy, peace and salvation.

Click to watch.

From the Foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains

See you soon, the Good Lord Willing.

Reclaiming Old Bars of Homemade Soap

Hello from the hills!

The baby chicks are growing, in fact they've graduated from their container in the kitchen to a stock tank in the basement. I turned off their brooder light for a few minutes and shined an LED flashlight to show off the Lavender Orpingtons pretty color.



I began cutting pieces for Bonnie Hunter's Celtic Solstice Mystery quiltalong, but I'm not sure I'll put my triangles together the way they're supposed to be for the quilt. I'm pretty sure these are components for colonial stars which I'm just not crazy about.

So I tucked them in a box until I decide how I want to arrange them in the quilt.

I make our soap from beef suet and had a batch turn slightly rancid before we used it all. (It probably had a bit too much fat for the amount of lye and water.) I didn't want to throw it out so I milled/grated it with my yard sale SaladShooter and added some herbs and food grade oils to make it smell good again.

 Here are some bars that I added orange and banana oils to so it smells a bit like bubble gum.

Peppermint leaves and oil really perked up these bars.

I added some cocoa powder and gingersnap flavoring to make chocolate/gingersnap bars. I can't wait to use this one.

I use the recipes in Norma Coney's book, The Complete Soapmaker for my basic soap and for the hand-milled bars. I added water along with the oils and herbs to all of these bars and will have to let them dry a bit before using. If you have homemade soap that you're not crazy about consider hand-milling it to give it new life.

Hope you're enjoying the season. See you next time, the Good Lord Willin'.

This post shared at: Farmgirl Friday Blog Hop, Encourage On Another, Make It Yourself Monday, The Homestead Barnhop, Natural Living Monday, Waste Not, Want Not Wednesday