Honey Whole Wheat Bread

I love making homemade bread. Something about the smells and the warmth are so cozy on a fall day.
Breadmaking is known to be difficult, so every time I succeed, I feel accomplished and get complete satisfaction out of it.
Plus, kneading dough is fun and feels pretty radical. I love squishing and punching and twisting it in my hands.
Today I got called off work. It was rainy and chilly outside, and I had nothing but time on my hands. This equates the perfect breadmaking day.
While I was waiting the two hours for my dough to rise, I snuggled in a blanket, caught up on all my girly shows Eric won't watch with me (Pretty Little Liars and Gossip Girl don't appeal to him, really?) and did some reading.
I love days off. And homemade bread. Did I already mention that?

Honey Whole Wheat Bread

1 package active dry yeast
1 cup warm water
1/4 cup milk
1 1/2 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoons salt
1 1/2 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon honey
2 1/2 to 3 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
Nonstick cooking spray or butter (to prevent the bread from sticking to the bowl and pan)

Mix the yeast according to the directions on the packet.
Add melted butter, milk, sugar and salt to the yeast mixture and stir. Add two cups of flour. Start stirring, and then add the flour about 1/4 cup at a time every minute or so.Keep stirring and adding flour until the dough is still slightly sticky, but it doesn’t stick to your hands in any significant way.

Lightly cover counter or tabletop in flour where you will knead the dough. Knead for about ten minutes. To knead, take the dough, punch it flat, then fold it back up into a ball again, and repeat several times. You can also squeeze and twist it.

After ten minutes, shape it into a ball and place ball of dough into presprayed or buttered bowl. Cover bowl with cloth and place it somewhere fairly warm for an hour (I turned on the heater and set it in front of the vent).

After an hour, your dough should be roughly double in size. Punch the dough down, then lay it out on the floured area and spread it out into a rectangle shape, with one side being roughly the length of the bread pan and the other side being about a bread pan and a half long. Then roll it up and tuck the ends in underneath. Cover with cloth again and let sit warm place for one more hour.

Then, place loaf in sprayed bread pan and bake at 400 degrees for 30 minutes.