Potchin' Around in the Kitchen

"Potchin' around," as my dad used to call it, was something Dakota had never heard of before I said it. It just means messing around, when there is literally a mess involved. When I was a kid, I used to love playing in the kitchen sink, splashing water, making bubbles, you name it, and my dad would always tell me to quit potchin' around. Over the years, it came to refer to anything we did in the kitchen that resulted in a mess. So that's why when Dakota came home the other day and asked what we had done that afternoon, I told him that Emma and I had been potchin' around. Some of the pears we picked a couple weeks ago are ripening, and I thought I'd make another batch of pear sauce (for baby food for Ashlyn) before they go bad. Emma loves helping with things in the kitchen, so I let her get in on the action. She helped with the food processor for a while, and then when we moved on to banana baby food, she wanted to be in charge of the camera. I think it's funny when Emma tries to take pictures with our camera. She loves it, and we always get some of the strangest shots. When I downloaded the pictures later, there were about 4 pictures of the bananas and 5 or 6 shots of my elbow. (See below)
After we made the pear and banana baby foods, and got that all cleaned up, we made some banana-apple bread. I'd never made banana bread before, but this turned out so moist and tasty, that I'm sure we'll make it again. Here's the recipe:
1 stick butter, at room temp.
1/3-1/2 cup brown sugar (I used 1/2 and it was still pretty sweet)
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
3 large ripe bananas, mashed
2 tart apples, peeled and chopped
Preheat oven to 350, grease 9x5x3 bread pan. Cream butter, sugar and vanilla until creamy, then add eggs. Slowly add in dry ingredients. Fold in bananas and apples. Pour into the pan and bake 50-60 mins or until toothpick comes out clean.
Happy Baking!