Christmas!

 

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas! We were truly blessed with family, friends, food and presents. I'm so grateful for my life and the people in it and thank God on a daily basis. I was wishing for a white Christmas but we didn't have one ...we will definitely have snow soon though I'm trying to understand all that el nino weather pattern stuff and weather is a very interesting to me. Usually, we have snow on or before my son's birthday on February 2nd, Ground Hog Day.  

Some of my appetizers. We do an Italian anti pasta and charcuterrie and also some extra plates like these. The next day we had some again! 

A not so great photo of the dessert table. We had some home made goodies and favorites from our bakery. My husband and I go together the day before Christmas Eve to pick out what we want. Its become our tradition. This year we chose 5 ls of butter and Italian cookies, a Christmas Yule log cake, pignoli cookies and mini cannoli.

Nova was pooped after all the festivities. 

My friend Pat in North Carolina sent me two Christmas Amish fiction books; maybe I will get started on one of them before the New Year. Our New Year's Eve is quiet. We go out to dinner early and then relax at home. Yesterday I made a pot of ham and bean soup. It was yummy. I'm thinking I might have some with dinner tonight too.   On New Year's Day I take down the Christmas decorations (leaving up winter themed ones) while listening to the Odd Couple marathon on TV! I do this every year. It makes it easier to pack everything up. I enjoy the quietness of New Year's Eve and most times I'm awake for the ball drop.  2024 is going to be an exciting year for our family with my son's wedding,  and I'm planning my future daughter-in-law's shower . Plus Caitlin's Marine boyfriend comes home from deployment in the Spring! I'm looking forward to it all. 

Praying everyone has a healthy and happy new year. I truly wish that for all. Even for people who have hurt me I never wish badly for them. I can't.  I wish peace and good health to ALL. 

Gingerbread Party, Cookies & Giftie Boxes!

 Good Evening! On National Gingerbread House Building Day, I went to a gingerbread party! So much fun! And my walls didn't collapse! Okay, okay..I hot glued them! I know it's cheating but I don't have the patience to wait for the icing to dry! LOL I want to decorate and there were so many choices of candy t do that! Lots of fun!

I baked some cookies this weekend. So far I've done jelly shortbreads, butter crispies, and peanut butter kisses. My daughter will be making hot chocolate cookies and chocolate chip this week. Butter Crispies below. First batch of three! After that, I started a new Amish fiction book. And my friend Pat mailed me two new Christmas ones from North Carolina in my Christmas package.  

I can't believe its coming so fast! I'm both happy and sad at the same time! Trying to savor every day! I've done some crafts--a candy cane mouse (I didn't get to take pictures) to add to the packages of some little ones. Its funny how I found the kit as I was actually cleaning out my craft room and I found a stash of crafts I used to buy for my daughter when she was young. She loved doing the craft kits Michaels used to sell (they still might!) and I decided to do them! So far I made the candy cane mice, and a little cardboard Christmas Village! It was fun and they didn't go to waste! Actually my daughter and future daughter-in-law still enjoy doing those projects. When I was in Michaels recently i bought them each a Christmas painting canvas with the paints. I knew they would love it and they did a great job. It just makes the holiday more fabulous when you add to it! And even though y kids are almost 19 and 25, they still get their chocolate  advent calendar! 

 I did a Christmas card exchange with a country decorating Facebook group and that's been so nice receiving so many cards. I love Christmas cards. Even though most people now text or email, receiving that card in the mail is so special. I was thinking of how my Mom would write out all her Christmas cards when I was little and I was in charge of putting the Christmas seals on the envelopes! 

I'm planning a PA weekend very soon. We bought a new truck and its plenty big for me to do lots of Lancaster shopping! When my husband drove it home yesterday, he knew we'd need a road trip to christen her! 

Have a great night and keep the spirit of Christmas in your heart!

Getting Ready for Christmas!

I'm so excited for Christmas! I know some think that the hustle and bustle is tiring and that Christmas loses its meaning with commercialism, but I think you can keep Christmas in your own way and LOVE it! I know that's what I do! Just enjoy the process! I think you'll be happy you did.

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving with lots of food and desserts and once that weekend came, my Christmas decorating really went into full swing. Now I'm 99.9% done (even though I keep going back to Hobby Lobby and finding MORE!) and I love that I have that "time" to enjoy it. My shopping is done and my daughter does almost all my wrapping!  I'm going to enjoy every second I can until the big day! Caitlin and I have been watching our Christmas movies every night and we dvr'd the ones we are waiting to see. We've got our cookies planned for next week. 

 Last weekend we went to Delaware to visit our nephew Chris and his beautiful wife Lauren and their little angel face, Olivia. We went to Shellville, which has a huge Christmas fair/exhibit/festival! We had so much fun and I was thrilled to have the family time with them  We stayed the weekend and slept in Rehoboth Beach I have two great nephews on my side of the family and Olivia is on my husband's side and I'll be so happy  as more and more are born! Shellville was worth the trip and Billy and I had the best crab sandwiches ever!  Watching Olivia looking at all the bright lights and decorations was heartwarming. The magic of Christmas in a child's eyes is pricelesss!

Well, I'm having some internet issues getting this post done so I think I better end it here and do a follow up of  my decorations. I hope you have a great day!

Thanksgiving Prep

 

Thanksgiving is close! I love Thanksgiving and love preparing for it. I'm trying hard to organize my time with shopping, preparing and also Christmas shopping and decorating. I did the bulk of my Thanksgiving shopping and I'm about to the point where I can just make my list of fresh ingredients that I will buy that week. It is a good time to also restock the pantry though. Try to take advantage of the sales. I do. I buy extras of gravies, soups that I use to cook with (cream of mushroom, cream of chicken, tomato), ham (cause every cut of ham is on sale) and dry ingredients and baking ingredients. 

The weather is colder here, and I am thrilled! Seasonal temperatures always keep me in a holiday mood. We actually put our Christmas tree up! My husband thought it was a good time because everyone was home! With jobs and such, sometimes it's hard to pinpoint a date to be together and we all love to do the tree together. Last year we bought a pre-lit artificial after much contemplation, and I couldn't be happier! We can enjoy it longer! 

We have a trip to Delaware planned in December. It's a family trip and we'll also get to see my nephew Chris and his wife and daughter. He organized it. He lives in Delaware and loves it. They told us about a Christmas village called "Schellville" with all different events. I can't wait. Have any of you ever gone?

Did I tell you about my new favorite recipe? Google "Eggplant stacker". It's a Martha Stewart recipe!

Have a beautiful day! I'm going to hunt down more boxes of Christmas stuff so I can have it ready Thanksgiving weekend when Christmas decorating is in full swing!

Twas the last days before Halloween...

 Happy Sunday! oooh TWO DAYS till Halloween! Why does this month go so fast? I did alot of what I wanted to do but still it seemed to go too fast! Believe me I will enjoy what's left of spooky October! 

Today I have a few things to do in the kitchen. I'm making sauce because I'm making chicken parm for dinner and I'm also trying out a Martha Stewart recipe that looked good ~~Eggplant Stackers! You actually slice the eggplant and roast the slices and then build an eggplant pile and layer with sauce & cheese. It eliminated the frying and the bread crumbs. (even though I fry my eggplant in flour not bread crumbs). 

Plus, because the kids will be watching football on this rainy day I always make finger foods for them to munch on. Its my fun Sunday thing to do. I actually text them what we will be having on Wednesday in a little Menu text adorned with footballs...They know their Mom well so they love the effort. I've always celebrated every little thing   Our favorite sport is hockey so when our NY Islanders play, it's Hockey Game food! Hocus Pocus movie watch night means food! Football? Food! Its so fun. 

The rest of the day I'm working on cupcakes and treats for my neighbors and making my Halloween crafts while I watch the game with the kids. I am not a football fan yet but I am learning the game  Making more smores too!

I've been enjoying everyone's Fall decorating on Facebook. So many talented and creative people. I just want to copy all their ideas! :) 

Some things I'm enjoying lately:

*Coffee with my half and half and cinnamon sugar!

*Dunkin Caramel Iced Coffee with extra carmel, almond milk and cold foam

*Bombas slippers

*TJ Maxx Halloween mug selection (i can't help myself)

Before I go I wish you a Happy Halloween! My candy bags are ready and its going to be a cool crisp Tuesday! YAY!

All the October Vibes

 

Good Morning!  October is my favorite month and I just want to fill it with so much! I've been doing quite a bit and I look forward to Thanksgiving and Christmas too! I already started Christmas shopping ~ I always start with the little ones first. I have three great nieces and nephews and one on the way. I love shopping for them. 

We had a great trip to Lancaster and we were glad to meet up with friends we have that live in Ronks.  We had a wonderful dinner with them at the Fireside Tavern in Strasburg. The trip was filled with many stops at farm stands and beautiful drives through the farmlands. Every road had mums and pumpkins for sale. 

We stopped at the Bird in Hand Bake Shop and they had wonderful inventory of colored pumpkins, stacking pumpkins and gourds. I was in my glory! My husband and I had pretzels and ice cream and coffee! I had the best ice cream EVER! Peanut Butter Overload is the name of it. I can't wait to go back and have a larger one!

I bought lots of vegetables from the Garden  Spot Farmstand. A huge head of broccoli and a n even bigger head of cabbage! I also got some banana peppers, cucumbers, tomatoes and plums. The cabbage was so large that i ended up dividing it 3 ways! !/3 for the freezer, 1/3 for my chickens and the other 1/3 I used to make sausage, onions and cabbage which was delicious!

Here are some photos of some of our stops:

I did alot of shopping at my favorite stores: Harvest Moon Candle and Sweet Ricky's General Store. Harvest Moon sells all kinds of prims and she markets her candles and melts which are my favorites. She originally comes from Long Island too! Anyway, her candles are very scented and seriously last! She now ships all over and many of the stores in Lancaster sell her candles too.  I bought a bunch of candles and also bought several prim crow decorations and bowl fillers, a beautiful set of indian corn made of wax, and more. 

Sweet Ricky's General Store is only two years old but he is doing well! I bought Several items from him again (last time I bought a beautiful lamp!) One of them is in the picture below (the shutter) I always leave with several bags from his store! 

We began to winterize our property and house. My husband brought in any palms and tropical plants to save for next year. I brought in my hibiscus plants and a few others. next up is the bulbs for our cannas and elephant ears. They will be stored and replanted next year! The chicken coop has been cleaned out and refreshed with new hay. Our landscaper will do our Fall cleanup probably close to thanksgiving.  Usually by then the bulk of the leaves have fallen. 

Look at the smores I made the other night when we were watching Hocus Pocus! My family loved them. Ridiculously simple! Buy the graham cracker cups, break up hershey bars in o them and cover with mini marshmallows. Bake at 350 degrees for a short time till marshmallows get golden and the chocolate melts!

I hope you  have a great day! As I'm typing this, I'm hearing on the radio that we may have a n'oreaster over the weekend  Ugh~ I hope it shifts and goes out to sea!  oh well,..I'mgonna go bake some banana muffins!

October!

Good Morning! After the storms we had, it certainly is nice to be able to enjoy this beautiful weather. And next week its going to be downright chilly! Bring it on! 

The chilly weather is my favorite. I do have to say I do love a rainy day too! I'm very productive on rainy days...I know not everyone shares that opinion! So below is my little gang of scarecrows. Not even all of them....I guess you can say it's an obsession. I can't resist their cute faces or unique outfits. I'm so sad Christmas Tree Shoppes closed because I always found new ones there. Thank heavens I still have my Hobby Lobby. I haven't gotten to Michaels yet this year. 

 My kids have been obsessed with TJ Maxx and I kind of avoided that store because in the past I always thought it was messy and I like organization! Consider me a convert! I do like their home decor and lots more. One of the many things I've bought recently were these mugs! The handles spell out BOO...I couldn't walk past those. My daughter surprised me with the espresso cups for Halloween too (I'll look for a photo) We also came home with Halloween to go cups in a big pack. Very necessary :)

I think this is my favorite spot this Fall. I love this little space. I found the Halloween sign at Dollar Tree. Its very old fashioned. Yup, this is my favorite spot!

So here's a simple dessert I brought to a get together last week. Just a few ladies for coffee/tea and we play Rummy 5000! It takes several get togethers to reach 5000 but the winner is taken out to lunch at the restaurant of her choice and its paid for by the losers! Lots of fun. Anyway, we all bring goodies to snack on during the game and I brought these:

All you do is buy a roll or two of Pillsbury cinnamon rolls. In the compartment of a muffin pan, shape 1 roll into a little crust and make a "well" inside it   Fill with apple pie filling and bake! When they are done, drizzle the icing that came with the cinnamon rolls on top! Yummy! Everyone enjoyed them! 

I also made a broccoli quiche this week! I had a visitor for lunch and quiche is probably one of my go to lunch items to prepare for a guest. Alongside a nice salad and a few other sides, its wonderful.  

I think that about catches me up for right now. I appreciate all the comments and anyone who reads my little blog! I'll post lots of photos when I return from Lancaster!

 

Welcome Autumn!

 Well, it took me almost 10 months, but I’m back again.  Unfortunately, as much as I love blogging, I am  much more consistent with my daily Facebook pages and tend to put off blogging ~ which makes no sense.. But I will try again to be consistent because I do love sharing, and I do love hearing from anyone who reads my little page. I started blogging in 2009 and I just enjoyed sharing and learning from so many wonderful pages.

Since my last post, so many things have happened in our family that have been wonderful. So many moments that would have made special blog posts. My daughter graduated high school, we had an awesome engagement party for my son, and my husband and I did some traveling. I'll elaborate as time goes on!

We also had a very successful summer of planting.our gardens and they are still blooming despite the temperatures dropping and the recent storms. This time of year I used to remove my flowers and replace them with mums and ornamental cabbages. Now I don’t have the heart to remove my flowers because they bloom so beautifully, and I don’t remove them until November. I just buy mums for my front porch . I think the secret this year was that we planted in compost, and we do have our sprinkler system go off twice a day until mid September.

Now it’s Fall and it’s truly my favorite time of year. I dream of Fall all year round. The colors of Fall just match my house so beautifully so I’m constantly decorating in my mind! I have always loved Halloween but not the scary, bloody kind of Halloween! I only like the traditional Halloween of or the family friendly style! Jack o lanterns, black cats, not scary witches! The Halloween I grew up with!

 I find Fall to be a very cozy family season. I love the idea of being cozy in my house now that the sun sets earlier. I constantly meal plan~`not necessarily on paper but I am forever planning meals and snacks and appetizers and in the Fall I find it even more fun! 

I started my decorating for Fall the third week of August and I’m so glad I did. I’ve added Halloween in now at this point and I feel like I can really enjoy the season. I’m not rushing with just a couple of weeks left before I have to take it all down. I do decorate a lot for Thanksgiving, which is one of my favorite holidays and I add that to my existing whole decor after I have put the Halloween away. But decorating early allowed me to really embrace everything without feeling rushed and do everything that I want to do each year. I’m one of those people who keeps lists and notebooks of everything that I like to do or make or bake and I try to accomplish things on that list but I always end up running out of time.  Instead of making Halloween desserts at the end of October I’m making them all month long. And it allows me the time to make a variety of things that I wanted to try. Why wait? The months go by so quickly and before you know, it we will be decorating for Christmas. I am determined to make the most of my Fall. Despite what the naysayers say DO IT NOW! You'll be happy you did!

We have a trip in October to Lancaster and I will get my pumpkins there. Usually I have them already, but I decided to wait and buy them on our trip I have several different Amish farm stands to purchase pumpkins, gourds and mums.

So on this rainy day, my plans include crafting in the afternoon and preparing snacks for football tomorrow. I'm a hockey fan but I'm trying hard to learn football! But who am I fooling...its the game snacks that draw me in!

Have a great day!