Bring It On!

Are you ready for a new year?

Are you ready to Get Organized ...

Looking for ways to Be Clutter Free ...

Maybe you need a little Waist Management ...

How about Keeping Your House Running Like Clockwork ...

or do you need Meal Solutions ...

A Closet Makeover ...

All Season Tips for Gardening ...

Can you spare 31 Days to a Healthier You ...

Need Tips for Saving Money All Year ...

or How to Make Changes to Last a Lifetime ...

or simply some Fresh Thinking ...

??????????

I love how all the January magazines entice you and promise that THIS year will be your best year yet.  If you just follow their simple little tips.  

Like this one:  to keep clutter from accumulating on kitchen counters, have a place for everything and put everything away when not in use.

Wow, like I never thought of that before.  However, what would really be useful is a tip on how to actually get the members in my house to realize that everything has a place and that they're perfectly capable of finding it.  Without my assistance!

Instead of suggesting that I get all organized with a chart and calendar system to let everyone in the family know when appointments are and who has what chore, how about a tip to remind them to actually LOOK at it?

I don't need suggestions on how to plan a week's worth of menus and make a shopping list.  I need someone to actually go to the grocery store for me.  That would make my life easier in '09.

I don't need a master plan for what to plant in my garden this spring.  I need someone to weed it for me!

And I don't care how many useful tips there are for cleaning a bathroom, it still never gets done unless someone is willing (or forced) to do it!

I fully understand that exercising daily, eating healthier, following a daily skin care routine, and a deep conditioning treatment on my hair once a week will make me look thinner, feel sexier and just glow with self-confidence.  But what I really want to know is when will my laundry get done, who's going to scoop the dog poop and why do we have yet another over-due library book?

I'm so glad I took the time to investigate some of these so-called time-saving, life-changing tips.  With all the magazines I've read, I figure I wasted probably an entire day and who knows how many trees, but now I'm armed and ready.  

All I have to say is ... 2009 ... bring it on!

Do I Know You?

Christine, over at Smiles and Trials, has a great idea.  It's a game to see who knows who in the blogging world.

I'll play!

Here are my friends from the blog list on my side bar ...

First, I have to start with Kristen:

She is the one that got me started blogging.  We have been best friends since our freshman year in high school.  We were both band geeks and exceptionally PE challenged, especially on the tennis courts.  Therefore, we were instant friends!

And is evident by this photo ... neither one of us has changed in the last 22 years!  If you've seen me lately, and disagree, just don't tell me.  I like to live in my delusional world.  And I know Kristen will support my delusions, she's that good of a friend.

I met Susan and Shawn, gosh I think it's been well over 10 years ago, in an online scrapbook loop.  We all bonded over our mutual scrapbooking obsession and became friends.  Shawn even hosted a get-together at her house several years ago.  That was so much fun!  I think it's amazing we've managed to stay in touch all these years.

Don was a really close friend in high school.  We were "neighbors", which in country living means we lived about a mile apart.  We could visit each other by riding our ATCs down the orchard, across the ditch and through a few more orchards.  I have so many great memories of hanging out with Don, his good buddy Mike, and Mike's sister, Marla, who was one of my friends.  Sadly, I am no longer friends with Marla, and I don't think Don and Mike keep in touch anymore either.  But I recently found Don through Facebook and it's been great to reconnect.  I have tons of photos of Don from high school that I'm sure he's grateful I did NOT post. 

I met Robynn and Reginia through our home school group.

Reginia was so kind to me when I was new to the group.  She made me feel so comfortable.  I love her willingness to listen and her offerings of prayer.  She has been a wonderful example for me over the years.  

Robynn is such a cool gal.  She is the one in the room you gravitate towards because she always has something interesting to say.  Her blog has some great observations on life.  And she's funny!  Robynn and I also bonded over our love of raw milk.

Speaking of raw milk ... one of the first blogs I began following was The Complete Patient.  David writes about the happenings in the real food world.  Raw milk is an always-going subject on the table.  And my own personal friend and dairy man, Mark McAfee, is a frequent contributor and topic of conversation.  If you're not interested in the real food, raw milk movement, this blog will probably bore you.  But how many of you can claim to have your own personal dairy man?

I found Christine through my friend Kristen.  She is a wonderful mom with a blog documenting her life with a great hubby and 11 amazing kids!  I had the chance to meet Christine and her son, Dennis, in person just a couple of weeks ago.  Dennis had a surgery out at Children's Hospital and my son and I went to meet them.  Dennis is such a cutie.  And Christine is a great person.   I'm so glad we had a chance to meet.  And if you check out her blog, you'll want to be her friend too!

I haven't had a chance to meet, in person, the other bloggers on my list.  But I still feel like we're friends.  I've looked into their lives, I know what their houses, spouses and children look like, I've tried their recipes, I've entered some of their contests, and I've laughed and cried right along with them.  That's the cool part about blogging ... you really do get to know people.  

I look forward to "meeting" other bloggers out there soon and adding new "friends" to my list!

So ... who do you know?

Christmas Day Photos ...

We had a great Christmas at our house.

I managed to get up early enough to make cinnamon rolls.  My parents were able to join us for brunch and opening presents which was really nice.  My husband and father-in-law insisted for the umpteenth year in a row that we include pickled herring in the Christmas breakfast menu.  It's some Swedish thing apparently.  Somehow they think this is a tradition.  But I don't argue.  I just cook some bacon to balance things out.  I wish I had some photos of breakfast to share with you, but pickled herring isn't exciting to look at.

My little one, however, was all about the excitement ...

My 3 year-old exclaimed ... this is my favorite thing! ... when she saw her new kitchen.

She immediately figured out how to turn on the oven and cook some pizza.

She also received a little digital camera, which is really nice since she's always trying to sneak mine away from me to take just one picture Mom!

How cute is the little chef's hat and apron?

My son is happy with his new RipStik.

If you can see outside behind him, it was too rainy to go out and ride it though.

My oldest is a huge Clue fan.  She was so excited to get the Harry Potter edition of the board game plus the movie Clue.  Which has several different endings I hear.  We managed to get in a game while I was preparing dinner.  Just for the record, I have never lost at the game of Clue.  So now at least my kids have a goal when they play ... 

beat Mom!

For our Christmas dinner I did a prime rib, with mashed potatoes and gravy.  I threw in a side dish of some assorted braised greens, just for fun.  Yes, I love greens ... chard, spinach, mustard ... I even used some beet tops.  It's super healthy.  I'm just passing along some nutritional FYI there.

 Then I made Pioneer Woman's Whiskey Glazed Carrots.  Let me just tell you this ... you HAVE to make these carrots!  Here's why ... 

I do not like cooked carrots.  I just don't.  I'm sorry.  

But ... we get carrots in our weekly produce box.  Like every week!  That's a lot of carrots.  I will juice them, but that's about it.  Well, after seeing Ree's recipe for these carrots ... I thought what the heck, it looked so easy and at least I'll have another side dish for Christmas dinner.  They were sooooooo yummy!  That glaze ... it just oozed delicious.  Seriously.  So needless to say, I will be excited to get carrots every week from now on.

I made a Christmas rum cake for dessert.  

Wait a minute ... whiskey glazed carrots, rum cake ... 

no wonder we had such a happy Christmas!

We ended the evening with a few hands of poker.  My son received a World Series of Poker set.  The kind where the chips click together with that nice chip-clicking sound when you play with them.

So there's a little glimpse into our apparently liquor-enhanced, friendly gambling, sort of Christmas celebration!  

There was more ... a lot more ...

 But look what my 2 girls end up playing with ...

Candied Nuts and A Cool Thing-a-ma-jig

These are Penuche Nuts.

My mom has made these nuts for Christmas every year that I can remember.  Now I'm carrying on the tradition.  

She always used walnuts.  I was always using walnuts.  

This year I tried pecans.  

Equally as yummy!

These are so simple to make.  And if you wrap them up in a cellophane or a pretty tin they made excellent gifts.  This might not help you at this stage of the game, but you can file it away for next Christmas.  Or make them for New Year's.

You'll be glad you did!

Here's the amazingly easy recipe:

Penuche Nuts

1 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1/2 cup sour cream

1 tsp. vanilla

2 1/2 cups nuts

Cook the sugars and sour cream until the temp reads 246* on a candy thermometer.  Remove from heat, stir in vanilla and nuts.  Spread on waxed paper to cool.  Break up into chunks.

Enjoy!

And here's another fun thing to do ...

This could be a great project during the remaining winter break when your kids are bored.

Make a Treasure Bottle!

You'll need a label-free, empty, clean and dry water or soda bottle.

Fill it with several "treasures" ...

we used buttons, beads, tiny toys, marbles, coins, shells ... 

and some star confetti ...

the possibilities are endless, as long as it fits into the bottle.

Can you see the Monopoly hotel and the green turtle?

Then fill the bottle with sand, leaving about an inch of empty space so you have some room to move things around.  Did you know you can get a 50 pound bag of sand at the hardware store for less than $5?  This totally made my day!

If you're worried about little ones removing the cap, you can hot glue it on.

Then hunt for the treasures inside the bottle.

You can make a game out of it.

This is so cute, and it's really a lot of fun.

Finally ...

Merry Christmas to all my blogging buddies.

Hope you create wonderful memories with your families this Christmas ...

Wishing you all many blessings.

Pop Pop Pop

So we went to hubby's office party last Saturday night.  It was quite an amazing evening.  I might share more details in a later post.

But for now, here was the gift I came home with ...

A new popcorn popper!  Now how many of you get a gift from your husband's boss?  I was quite surprised.  So today I decided to put it to use and make some caramel and nut popcorn.

Look how clean the inside of my oven is!  I hope hubby notices that.

Then I started thinking ... what do you give the boss who gave you a popcorn popper?  Um, some of that caramel corn of course!

I wish you could smell this!

Now I'm off to make Penuche Nuts.  Stay tuned ...

Wicked Good ...

I made these ...

My son said they are "wicked good!"

They're called Port Balls.

I found the recipe at Noble Pig.

If you haven't checked out this blog ... you must!

I have found so many great recipes there.

Thank you Cathy!

If I don't eat them all, I will wrap them up and give them away as a gift.

Tonight for dinner we're having Alton Brown's Christmas Soup, potato latkes and kugel.

The kugel recipe, once again, comes from Cathy over at Nobel Pig.

Did I mention how much I love that site?

We're also watching a Christmas movie tonight.  Haven't decided if it's going to be A Christmas Story, It's a Wonderful Life, The Santa Clause, or A Christmas Carol.

What's your favorite Christmas movie?

Wake Up to This ...

Several posts back I talked about how I love my morning Latte.

And how I love it in this mug ...

I had it down to a science with the perfect amount of milk and sugar.  It was the perfect mug.  And then last Sunday hubby took it out of the dishwasher and the handle fell off.  

These things happen.  Oh well.  

So all week I've had to have my coffee in a Scooby-Doo cup.  As much I love good ol' Scooby, it just wasn't the same as my Salt Lake City mug.  

Well it just so happens that hubby had a business trip to Houston this week.  He had to change planes in Salt Lake City.  

And being the thoughtful hubby that he is ... he found another, almost identical ... mug for me.

This one has a logo on BOTH sides ...

"Honey, when I saw this mug I immediately thought of you!"

Gosh, I love that man!