What was I thinking....It's almost midnight!

What was I thinking when I decided to start pumpkin bread at 8:30pm.  Let me rewind a bit and maybe we can figure this out together.

I got a call earlier today to remind me of activity days for Ellie tomorrow after school.  The girls are going caroling to some families in the ward.  While on the phone, I was asked to make something for the girls to give one of the families.  I said yes.  I'm always happy to help.

Since this was an "Ellie thing" I wanted her help in making it.  On the phone, she mention it would be an elderly couple.  I decided bread would be the better choice over goodies and pumpkin bread has been sounding good for a while now.  I knew I had to make it today with her since there would not be time after school tomorrow.  So I had Ellie do her homework and take a bath first that way I could get X Factor down for bed before we started.  I wanted to make it special for her without extra little hands interrupting us.

By the time we got started it was 8:30.  I didn't think this through all the way.  I forgot to consider that the bread would have to bake for at least an hour and then cool so I could put it away before I went to bed.  Poor Ellie didn't get to see the end result before I sent her to bed.  But she was thrilled when I told the kids they could eat pumpkin bread for breakfast.

Of course I had to try one while they were hot!  It's been years since I made good (when I say good I mean full of gluten!) pumpkin bread.  My mini loaves only took 30 minutes to cook, but the larger loaves took well over an hour.  There is a bigger one still in the oven when I took this pic.  It took almost an hour and a half.  

So now I'm just sitting here blogging, waiting for them to cool, so I can go to bed.  Even though I wasn't thinking when I started these, I'm glad I took the time to include Ellie.  She has been having a hard time with X Factor and she really needed some one on one time with me.  I love my little Jelly Bean.  She is so sweet.