Sandra Byrd's Blog, page 5
July 4, 2022
“Sin” Rolls
© Joan Nienhuis
Joan Nienhuis graciously shared bits of her mother’s life as a young wife on Whidbey Island and I used a few details when creating my fictional Johanna. (Fun fact - my Johanna was named, for my husband’s grandmother - before I knew that was Joan’s mom’s name, too. Johanna’s “Sin Rolls” were famous in their day. And now, they are famous in this day, too. Read, drool, and whip up a batch!
Joan Nienhuis’s Heirloom
There are many aspects of my Dutch ancestry I greatly value. At the top is my Reformed faith. Close up there are my mother's cinnamon rolls. Food was a major way my mother showed love to her family, providing lavish Sunday dinners for decades. But her signature creation was her cinnamon rolls. I have many fond memories of my family gathering on Saturday mornings at her house for coffee, cinnamon rolls, and lively discussion. Her rolls were always the first to be grabbed up at church or extended family potlucks, everyone wanting one of Johanna's treasured treats.
Johanna Hilberdink Nienhuis, age 20, about 1931. © Joan Nienhuis
I remember the first time I had a commercially made cinnamon roll at a coffee shop. I was shocked at the dry cardboard texture of the dough and the vain attempt to cover the inadequacy with sugary frosting. I had only known my mother's moist rolls, turned upside down with caramelized brown sugar and butter dripping down the sides. I decided to get her recipe but when I asked for it, she chuckled. She had made hundreds of batches by then and created them from memory. If there had ever been a recipe, it was long gone. I convinced her to let me stand by her at the next baking session. I struggled to take adequate notes on her method. How could I interpret on paper adding enough flour until it “felt right”?
Why cinnamon rolls? Perhaps it goes back hundreds of years. I have a Dutch brother-in-law who was raised in Indonesia. While his father was a translator with the Netherlands Bible Society, the Dutch presence in southern Asia was a remnant of the Dutch East India Company and the spice trade of the 1600s. The Dutch had a monopoly on the cinnamon trade for a hundred years. Is it any wonder that snickerdoodles and cinnamon rolls are Dutch favorites?
Cinnamon rolls are more than tasty treats to me. They are symbolic of my mother's giving nature, freely offering her rolls to relatives and guests as a sign of her loving heart. Family lore says she even brought rolls to soldiers from Fort Casey who were doing practice maneuvers in a field near our house during WWII.
My mom went to glory twenty-five years ago but her legacy of showing love through her rolls lives on.
© Joan Nienhuis
Johanna Nienhuis’s CINN ROLLS
Ingredients
½ c. warm water
2 packages of yeast
3 sticks butter
2 to 2 ½ c. hot water
¾ c. sugar
2 tsp salt
2 or 3 eggs
2 c. flour plus 5 additional cups
cinnamon
½ c (or more) brown sugar, plus additional for melting in pan
Instructions
Mix warm water and 2 pkg of yeast. Set aside. Set at least 1 stick butter in a small pan over low heat to melt. Get two 9X12 baking pans (or one 12X18 baking pan) and place on a very low burner. Put at least ½ stick of butter in each to melt.
In a very large mixing bowl combine 2- 2 ½ c. hot water, 1 stick butter, ¾ cup sugar, 2 teaspoon salt, 2 or 3 eggs, 2 c. flour.
Stir well. Add yeast mixture.
Add flour, stirring by hand, until not too stiff, about 5 or 6 cups in all.
Place dough on a large and well floured surface and roll into a rectangle about ½ inch thick or less. This will not be a “dry” dough and you may have to flour the top of the dough and the rolling pin a few times. (These cinnamon rolls are moist, not dry as you often see in commercial bakeries. The secret is a moist dough. Keep plenty of flour handy to be able to roll out the dough.)
© Joan Nienhuis
Pour the melted butter over the rolled out dough, spreading to cover evenly. Sprinkle lots of brown sugar over the dough and butter. Sprinkle lots of cinnamon over the butter and sugar mixture. Be liberal for a good taste.
Carefully roll up the dough, starting at the long edge. Again, this will be a moist dough so you may need to dust your hands with flour several times. I have been known to use a pancake turner to pry up the moist dough that has stuck to the surface. When the dough is almost rolled up, take the far edge and slightly pull it over the roll, pinching it a bit to secure it.
© Joan Nienhuis
Once the dough is rolled up, retrieve the pan(s) with the melted butter. Sprinkle a liberal amount of brown sugar in the pan as well. (Yes, these are sweet rolls.)
With a sharp knife, frequently dusted with flour, cut the rolled dough into segments of about one to 1 1/4 inch in length. (A sharp knife and a quick hand.) Place the segments, cut side down in the pan so they are touching. The rolled dough segments will be dripping with melted butter and sugar so you might have to be quick here. (This may take a bit of practice to see how many rolls you will make, depending on how wide you cut the segments and how large your baking pan is and how closely you pack them together in the pan.)
© Joan Nienhuis
Lightly cover and let rise until the dough is starting to go over the edge of the pan.
© Joan Nienhuis
Bake at 325 degrees for 30 minutes.
Serve warm. Have butter available. Eat by hand, unrolling the baked roll, and adding a bit of butter for each bite. Do not put frosting on the rolls, ever.
Variations:
If you want, you can place chopped walnuts or pecans in the pan with the butter and brown sugar before adding the cut dough segments. You can also sprinkle raisins on the rolled-out dough. My mother generally made the rolls plain, allowing us to savor the sweet bread experience without the distracting flavors of nuts or raisins.
April 24, 2022
Springing Back to Life
Spring.
The buds, somehow, push through toughened branch bark, and suddenly my neighborhood is alight with cherry, plum, and forsythia blossom fireworks.
© Sandra Byrd
A tiny seed produces a mighty plant, worming through hard winter soil now tenderized by rain, beginning a journey to create beautiful flowers and delicious fruit. While winter’s hush has its charms, spring beckons us back to life. Sometimes that is true, too, in my heart and spirit. I need to be wooed back to life, and God often sends just the right person to do it (See Rose of Jericho devotional, below).
Rose of Jericho
Plants – florals, edibles, and those that are both, play a huge role in my new book, Heirlooms, as does friendship, and sowing into others’ lives. To celebrate a wonderful, starred review Publishers Weekly awarded the book, and to recognize the seed planters and soul waterers in our lives, I’m hosting a fun event with a unique giveaway celebrating both you and a friend.
Join us! Follow the link at the bottom of the page!
Rose of Jericho
April is when I begin to think seriously about my garden. It’s time to dig out the weeds that are just starting to shoot evil roots. They are easy to remove now because the ground is wet and yielding. When planning what to add to my yard, I consider placing plants with biblical meanings, because this keeps the Lord before me even when I am outside. I consider the rose of Sharon, lilies, and others; one unique plant I just became familiar with is the Resurrection Plant.
The original plant is found in the Holy Land, in the Judean desert, and is called the rose of Jericho. It is a low-growing plant that, after spreading its seeds, curls up like a fist and dries up completely. It resembles a little tumbleweed. Unlike a tumbleweed, though, which is dead and disconnected from its roots, only a few drops of water will resurrect the rose of Jericho. It lies dormant, waiting for someone or something to sprinkle a few drops of water on it. Then it comes gloriously back to life.
I became a Christian as an adult, so I can remember what it was like to be thirsty for the hope, affection, and reassurance that salvation brings. The thing is, I didn’t know that I was curled up in a dry ball until someone showed me the Way. I’m so glad my spiritual parents, who held a Bible study at my college, led me to our Lord.
Everyone needs hope and encouragement throughout their lives. Is there someone in whose life you might sow a seed of cheer or offer life-giving water?
I planted the seed in your hearts, and Apollos watered it, but it was God who made it grow.
It’s not important who does the planting, or who does the watering. What’s important is that God makes the seed grow. The one who plants and the one who waters work together with the same purpose. And both will be rewarded for their own hard work.
1 Corinthians 3:6-8
Drawn from The One Year Experiencing God’s Love Devotional by Sandra Byrd
Click here for more information on my Spring Seed Exchange and Giveaway!Spring Seed Exchange
© Sandra Byrd
Hello and welcome to my first ever Spring Seed Exchange (Plant Pal)!
If you have participated in my Teacup & Coffee Mug Exchange (Tea Pal), you’ll understand how the Spring Seed Exchange will run. If you’re new here, welcome! I’ll explain everything below, and you can email me (sandra@sandrabyrd.com) if you have any questions regarding the exchange.
How it works:
You fill out the form and let us know you’d like to exchange a seed packet with a new Plant Pal. Sign ups will close Sunday, May 1st!
You’ll be paired with a partner (due to agriculture laws, only US participants - sorry!).
You and your partner will email each other to exchange contact information so you can ship each other a seed packet.
Get to know your new Plant Pal! Tell your friend what you like, your interests, and maybe a favorite gardening memory. From this, you can decide what type of seeds to send. This is a great way to make a new friend, too. I’ve met several pals through the Tea Pal exchanges of years past who I’m friends with to this day!
Visit your local garden center and select a seed packet to send to your Plant Pal.
Package and send your seeds to your friend by Wednesday, May 11, 2022.
Share a picture of the seeds you received from your partner by Wednesday, May 18. (Submission guidelines will come when you are matched with your partner.)
From those submissions, we’ll draw the name of a person who will win a $25 Starbucks gift card with a beautiful “thank you” card (see below) to send to anyone you wish who has planted good seeds in your life plus a $25 card for yourself!
© Sandra Byrd
Sound fun? Sign up to participate in the exchange below! Please note that you must be a newsletter subscriber to participate, so if you haven’t yet signed up, do so at the bottom of the page in the teal footer section.
Click here to sign up to participate in the seed exchange and giveaway!March 20, 2022
Eavesdroppers on the Party Line!
Chicken thieves, flower gardens, and eavesdroppers on the party line? Yes, please!
On rare occasions, a real place meets and bests my imaginary book settings. And so it came to be that the Anderson Farm in Langley, Washington, on Whidbey Island, offered itself as the setting for Heirlooms.
Built by the current owner’s great-grandpa Anderson in 1907 on twenty acres he purchased for $500, Tamara Knapp renovated the home several years ago to its midcentury glory. Tamara and her mother Dorothy Anderson generously share their historic property: they offer sixteen plots for community gardens and stays in the property’s warm home through Airbnb. Don’t garden and can’t spend the night? Take home a bouquet from the over 800 Dahlias they’ll plant this year.
I cooked in the kitchen, slept the rooms, harvested bouquets, and sat at the sewing machine as Helen, Eunhee, Cassidy, and Grace did. I stopped by the poultry-yard after reading how, in the fall of 1939, 3000 pullets were thieved in one night – leaving only an open door and the odor of chloroform to tell the truth of what had happened.
I ate an apple from a tree in the small orchard (initially planted in 1908) and sat in the swing under the apple trees, just as Cassidy, Nick, and Grace did when facing a difficult choice. I walked the garden where Eunhee and Helen started their plots.
Early in the twentieth century, Tamara’s great-aunt Ester picked strawberries to pay for school clothes purchased from the Sears, Roebuck, and Co. catalog. Summer fields were lush with ripe berries until weevils arrived and demolished crop and hope. Farming has never been financially practical, so Mr. Anderson, also known as “Graveyard Anderson,” dug graves to help pay the bills. But working the land feeds not only the mouths but also the spirit, so he – and Cassidy – persisted.
Photo by Oliver Hale on Unsplash
One day, I opened a drawer in a bedroom to find a phonebook from the fifties. Chockablock with fun advertisements, it also offered instructions on keeping good manners while using the area’s party line. According to ATT’s Tech Channel, party lines were “shared/group telephone subscriptions ... an integral part of American culture until they were phased out primarily between the 1950s and 1970s.”
ATT says, “By 1950, 75% of all residential customers (nationwide) were on party lines... Party lines had a few features that affected telephone usage greatly: you could listen to your neighbors’ conversations, so phone lines weren’t always thought of as secure or private; telephones on party lines would ring with a particular pattern unique to a household, so the customer would only answer the phone that rang with “their” ring.”
In a way, it was kind of a reverse of today’s ringtone. Instead of telling you who was calling, it let you know it was your turn to pick up the call. And possibly, an invitation for everyone else to pick up your call, too, and eavesdrop.
I’m offering a chance to win goods from a different kind of party line! Click below to enter my Sophistiplate Rafflecopter giveaway to celebrate spring, flower gardening, and a celebration of family and friends.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
October 19, 2021
Cover Reveal!
Answering a woman’s desperate call for help, young Navy widow Helen Devries opens her Whidbey Island home as a refuge to Choi Eunhee. As they bond over common losses and a delicate, potentially devastating secret, their friendship spans the remainder of their lives.
After losing her mother, Cassidy Quinn spent her childhood summers with her gran, Helen, at her farmhouse. Nourished by her grandmother’s love and encouragement, Cassidy discovers a passion that she hopes will bloom into a career. But after Helen passes, Cassidy learns that her home and garden have fallen into serious disrepair. Worse, a looming tax debt threatens her inheritance. Facing the loss of her legacy and in need of allies and ideas, Cassidy reaches out to Nick, her former love, despite the complicated emotions brought by having him back in her life.
Cassidy inherits not only the family home but a task, spoken with her grandmother’s final breaths: ask Grace Kim—Eunhee’s granddaughter—to help sort through the contents of the locked hope chest in the attic. As she and Grace dig into the past, they unearth their grandmothers’ long-held secret and more. Each startling revelation reshapes their understanding of their grandmothers and ultimately inspires the courage to take risks and make changes to own their lives.
Set in both modern-day and midcentury Whidbey Island, Washington, this dual-narrative story of four women—grandmothers and granddaughters—intertwines across generations to explore the secrets we keep, the love we pass down, and the heirlooms we inherit from a well-lived life.
Coming July 5, 2022Please click below and add Heirlooms: A Novel to your Goodreads Want to Read shelf!
September 8, 2021
7th Annual Teacup and Coffee Mug Exchange!
Welcome to my Seventh Annual Teacup and Coffee Mug Exchange!
Love tea? Coffee? New friends? Join us and get a beautiful treasure and a new tea-pal in the process. It’s easy to participate! You agree to send a carefully packaged teacup and saucer (or a coffee mug) to someone, and she agrees to send one to you. Please select something to give that you would like to receive as a gift, and you can include little treats or accompaniments if you like. You must use tracking and insurance, as I cannot be responsible for lost or damaged mail. If yours doesn’t reach your tea-pal, you’ll be responsible for claiming the insurance and sending a replacement.
PLEASE NOTE: To be able to continue keeping this exchange fun and fair for all involved, anyone who signs up for the exchange but who does not send their partner a teacup and saucer or mug may be charged a $20 fee via Paypal to cover the cost of sending a cup or mug in their place. Once all of the names are gathered, my assistant, Renee, will match partners and send each set of new friends the email and mailing address of their tea-pal. 
You and your tea-pal will correspond via email if you like, and ship your treasures to one another by Monday, October 11, 2021. You must be a newsletter subscriber to participate. If you are not a subscriber and would like to participate, please sign up for my newsletter HERE.
Please send a picture of your teacup and saucer or mug to Renee, after you receive it. She will place everyone’s teacup photo in a collage to feature on my website and social media pages. If you send in your photo by Friday, October 29, 2021, you’ll be entered to win the lovely Cardamom, Culinary Rose Petals & Rose Water Prize Pack pictured above so you may bake this year’s shared recipe on your own! While the Teacup and Coffee Mug Exchange is open internationally, please note that due to high shipping costs, the prize pack giveaway is open to US entrants only. Thank you!
Hugs, Sandra
Prize Package Rules: The prize package is open to US residents ages 18 years and up. Void where prohibited. I am not responsible for lost or misdirected items.
September 6, 2021
Rose Cardamom Shortbread Cookies
In my forthcoming book, Heirlooms (July 2022), gardens and flowers play a big role in all of the characters’ lives. I thought it would be fun to explore floral elements in this year’s Teapal recipe to honor that. I also love the sweet & spicy combination of cardamom, a spice I normally only bake with during the Christmas season, when we make Julekake. Cardamom tastes wonderful in these cookies, elevating the subtle rose flavor to a new layered level.
I used the recipe from Bigger Bolder Baking for my cookies, but followed the guidance from Milk and Cardamom for dipping them in white chocolate (wafers work best, as that recipe’s author notes) and sprinkling with rose petals. I didn’t use pistachios as I have developed a sensitivity toward them, but you might sprinkle those on, too, if you like!
Exclusive giveaway for those participating in my 7th Annual Teacup and Coffee Mug exchange, I’m offering an ingredient prize pack drawing for those who email a picture to Renee of the tea or coffee mug that their Teapal sends. Even though my Teacup and Coffee Mug Exchange is open to all, please note that this giveaway is for US TeaPal participants only due to shipping costs! And please let me know if you bake these cookies. I’d love to hear your thoughts!
In case you’d like to make these on your own, here are my sources:
March 14, 2021
Attagirl!
When I pray, coincidences happen, and when I don’t, they don’t.
William Temple
We are created in God’s image, and therefore a sense of compassion and justice is embedded into our sensibilities. The needs of our neighbors and family are well beyond our ability to resolve for them—at least on our own. God can work his will and has unlimited resources. We say we believe this, right? Why then do we pray so little, relatively speaking, to ask him to bring about victory and relief?
Perhaps because deep down, we don’t believe he will act. Most of us believe he has the power to act in response to our prayer. But because so many prayers seem to have been unanswered, or answered too slowly, or not in the way we’d wished, we wonder if he has the will.
One of my mentors told me that we need ten attaboys just to overcome the memory of one put-down. I wonder if it might likewise be true that our minds cling so tenaciously to the one prayer in which the answer seemed to tarry that we forget the nine which were resolved?
Maybe it’s just that we spend too much time worrying instead of praying.
I’d been telling a friend about a situation which had the potential to cause harm to my family. At some point, though, God gave me the strength, and the words, to acknowledge his kind sovereignty. “The situation is completely out of my hands now,” I told her. “So I’m not wringing them.”
Just then, I heard it, deep in my spirit. God was saying, “Attagirl!”
The situation was in his good hands. Rather than wringing mine, I could unclench them and put them together in prayer.
You know what? I’m still waiting for the answer to that prayer, to that situation. But in the meantime, many others have been swiftly resolved. I either believe, or I don’t. He tells me that my prayers matter, that he is listening, and that they are powerful and effective. “I love the Lord because he hears my voice and my prayer for mercy. Because he bends down to listen, I will pray as long as I have breath!” (Psalm 116:1-2, nlt).
Try it. Yep—right now. What would you like to ask our good God for today?
The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.
James 5:16
Devotion drawn from my The One Year Experiencing God’s Love Devotional. Available now from Tyndale.
Main photo used with purchase permission from Shutterstock.
An Abundant Life: Attagirl!
When I pray, coincidences happen, and when I don’t, they don’t.
William Temple
We are created in God’s image, and therefore a sense of compassion and justice is embedded into our sensibilities. The needs of our neighbors and family are well beyond our ability to resolve for them—at least on our own. God can work his will and has unlimited resources. We say we believe this, right? Why then do we pray so little, relatively speaking, to ask him to bring about victory and relief?
Perhaps because deep down, we don’t believe he will act. Most of us believe he has the power to act in response to our prayer. But because so many prayers seem to have been unanswered, or answered too slowly, or not in the way we’d wished, we wonder if he has the will.
One of my mentors told me that we need ten attaboys just to overcome the memory of one put-down. I wonder if it might likewise be true that our minds cling so tenaciously to the one prayer in which the answer seemed to tarry that we forget the nine which were resolved?
Maybe it’s just that we spend too much time worrying instead of praying.
I’d been telling a friend about a situation which had the potential to cause harm to my family. At some point, though, God gave me the strength, and the words, to acknowledge his kind sovereignty. “The situation is completely out of my hands now,” I told her. “So I’m not wringing them.”
Just then, I heard it, deep in my spirit. God was saying, “Attagirl!”
The situation was in his good hands. Rather than wringing mine, I could unclench them and put them together in prayer.
You know what? I’m still waiting for the answer to that prayer, to that situation. But in the meantime, many others have been swiftly resolved. I either believe, or I don’t. He tells me that my prayers matter, that he is listening, and that they are powerful and effective. “I love the Lord because he hears my voice and my prayer for mercy. Because he bends down to listen, I will pray as long as I have breath!” (Psalm 116:1-2, nlt).
Try it. Yep—right now. What would you like to ask our good God for today?
The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.
James 5:16
Devotion drawn from my The One Year Experiencing God’s Love Devotional. Available now from Tyndale.
Main photo used with purchase permission from Shutterstock.
