Christmas Recipe - Hand Cream

Okay, so I know the idea here was most likely food recipes, and actually I do have a recipe I make every Christmas, so I'll put that here, too.  But first, the hand cream!  I was amazed at just how easy it is to make your own creamy, soft, yummy-smelling hand cream!  I found the recipe here. Just like the person in that post, I ordered the supplies I needed from Mountain Rose Herbs. Once you have the ingredients you need, it is quite economical to make, too.  I used half-pint Ball canning jars to package it.  I found some wide-mouth ones, which are perfect for the lotion! The recipe makes enough to fill 2 of these jars.

Here's the recipe:

• 1 1/4 cup hot water
• 1/4 cup emulsifying wax (I got mine from Mountain Rose Herbs)
• 1/4 cup olive or coconut oil (refined will keep the cream from smelling of coconut!)
• 24-36 drops essential oil (I got these from Mountain Rose Herbs, but had one I bought at my local health food store a couple years ago, too.)

Directions: Combine oil and wax in glass measuring cup and microwave on high for 1 minute, or until all the wax is melted.  Add the essential oil drops to this mixture and stir.  While you are doing that, microwave the water for 1 minute.  Add the wax mixture to the water (it turns the creamy white color at this point), and then pour the hot lotion into jars.  Let cool overnight and then enjoy!

The link to the original recipe also has a printout for jar labels, but I wasn't terribly fond of them, so I made my own in Microsoft Publisher.

Now for the food recipe!  Every Christmas morning, I make my grandmother's cinnamon rolls!  They are the most yummy rolls in the world! They are a bit time consuming, but worth every minute!  I actaully make mine the night before, roll them out and put them in the baking pan the night before.  I leave them in the refrigerator overnight (covered) and just let them come to room temperature in the morning before baking them. Top these with your favorite cream cheese frosting, and they are amazing!

A quick funny story about these though, especially since one of my college buddies Tina wanted to get the link to the lotion, and she would remember this!  The year after I graduated from college, Jerry was gone for a weekend on a business trip, so I invited some of my dorm mates to come stay at my place for the weekend.  I was so excited to be the keeper of my very own home and wanted to make amazing home cooked meals for my still-eating-dorm-food friends.  I decided to make this recipe for breakfast Saturday morning, but I had never made it before.  I had never made any yeasted bread recipe before for that matter! (Joanna, we should have experimented with yeasted bread instead of making so many variations on the green and purple swirly cake when we were in high school!) Anyway, it went very badly.  I didn't know how to knead dough very well.  I used my kitchen aid (which was brand-spanking-new at that time!), but the dough seemed so wet!  I kept adding flour, and by the time they rolls were completely done, they were like cinnamon rocks.  I think we ate cereal instead! :)

Grandma's Cinnamon Roll Recipe

• 3 eggs
• 1 cup milk
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup oil
• 1 stick butter
• 1 pkg. yeast (2 1/2 tsp)
• 1 cup warm water
• 7 cups flour
• pinch salt

Mix together eggs, milk, oil, and sugar in bowl.  In another bowl, combine flour and salt.  Make a well in the middle of the dry mixture.  Stir yeast and warm water and mix with the flour in the well.  Sprinkle with a little sugar.  Once yeast is active, beat in the wet mixture and soft butter.  Knead until the sides of the bowl are clean.  Let rise until double.

At this point, this dough can be used to make doughnuts, or continue to make rolls.  Roll out dough into large rectangle and spread melted butter over the top.  Top this with a cinnamon sugar mixture, and add nuts and/or raisins if desired.  Roll up lengthwise and press the edge to seal.  Cut into 12 rolls and arrange in a 9X13 baking dish.  Allow to double in size again.  Bake at 350 for 20-35 minutes (depending on the degree of doneness you like.  I like mine soft.)  Top with cream cheese frosting while still warm, and enjoy!

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas

I know I was supposed to post this 8 days ago, but, well, better late than never! Right?  You're not going to kick me out of the bloggy circle - right?

I love when the house is decorated for Christamas.  It looks so cheerful!  Andrew is really excited about the decorations this year, too.  If we get home from going on an errand, the first thing he does is run to the tree and ask us to turn on the lights!  He cannot stand to be home with the lights off!

I also love the Christmas tree because it drives the kids NUTS to see all the gifts under the tree and not be able to touch them! :)

I also have a set of three alpine trees that I really like.  These also must be lit at all times!

Another favorite place of mine is the mantle.  I finally got new stockings for me and Jerry this year.  I liked the ones we had before, but they were actually very large mittens so they didn't look right with the kid's stockings.  I really like these ones though.  I wish I could say that I knit them myself, but ...

You know, looking at that mantle, when our adoption finally goes through, we're going to have to get an exclamation point for Hannah's stocking! She really will be the exclamation point in our family after waiting so long for her, too.  On top of the mantle, there are two items that are extra special to me.  I have a wooden angel that I have had since I was a child.  It has a music box in it that plays "Angels We Have Heard On High." When I was small, my parents kept it in a box labeled, "Johanna's Angel" which made me feel very special.  The other is a wooden Christmas tree that has wooden ornaments that sit on little shelves.  I like this because it is cute, but it has no sentimental value!

Finally, I made mini wreaths to go on our doors.  I attahed one of those Command 3M Hooks upside-down on the inside of the door and attach the ribbon to the hook to hang these wreaths.

I also thought I'd show you a picture I took a while ago of our Jesse Advent Tree. It isn't fancy, but the kids have enjoyed putting the pictures on it!

Well, I'm a day late and a dollar short, but here's the current state of our Christmas decor.  I have to warn you, there isn't much.

First, our tree.  We leave on our trip in just 4 days, and didn't want to make a lot of fuss about unpacking (and subsequently repacking) a lot of STUFF.  As a compromise, I promised my husband that if we got the tree out of the attic and put it up, I wouldn't get all the other ornaments and decorations out.  Now that's it's up, I really like the simplicity of it.  It's got sparkly silver garland, silver bows, and the big silver star on top (nevermind that it's a little crooked...) My cat loves to sit underneath it, but of course as soon as I pulled out my camera she ran away.  I should also mention that there were gifts under the tree, but as we had 'Christmas' last weekend they've all been opened.

I did decorate the dining room table.  Meagan gave me this cute table cloth for my birthday, and once the tree was up I was craving a little more festive atmosphere in my house.  It was set really nicely and I had a pretty centerpiece and everything.  Unfortunately, all you get to see is the aftermath of dinner with the family this weekend.  See, I haven't even cleaned up all the dishes yet.

Finally, this is the last bit of decoration in my house.  (See, I told you there wasn't much.) I picked up this bucket at Michaels the day after Thanksgiving because I thought it was just super cute.  While I was trying to think of what to put in it, it just sort of got taken over by all the hat-knitting going on on the couch right next to it.  Oh well, it works :)

Christmas Sewing

This year I have a whole list of things I'm sewing up for Christmas gifts. Maybe you'll be inspired to make some of these this for someone.

First, I'm making 8 of these purses. Five for my girls, one for the neighbor's daughter, one for my niece and one for a friend that has requested one. The hardest part is cutting everything out. After everything is cut out, it goes together really quickly.

To match each purse, I've made these little wallets. These come together in about 20 minutes from start to finish and they are really cute!

For each little girl I want to make these little crayon rolls to go in their purses also, but I may not have time for that. We'll see.

I am making 12 balls for Sonya's kids.

I am making these hooded towels for my kids. I picked some coordinating fabric and Johanna currently has them and is embroidering names on them.

I am making two of these reusable grocery bags for my neighbor and maybe for me.

With everything that I am making, I would take a guess that we're saving a minimum of $200 by me sewing so much. It's a lot of fun!

On a side note: (if you have kids) does your diaper bag ever look like this?

Do your diapers get all smooshed up in your bag and then they're hard to use? It happens to me all the time! So I used this tutorial to make these two diaper caddies. Aren't they cute!?

Now see how my diaper bag looks? Lovely.

I learned how to knit a hat!

This is very exciting for me! Last month I took a class at a little knitting shop I just found on how to make a fair isle hat.  I'd never made a hat, used circular needles, or done anything fair isle before, but I was pleasantly surprise with how quickly I could pick it up.  It turned out really well so now my whole family is getting hats for Christmas.  Here's the first one I made for myself (pardon the ipod pictures, they start out ok but get worse as it gets darker outside.)

Next, this hat is for my husband.  I still need to fix the loose ends and block it.  Oh, and can I just say that I've never blocked one of my projects before and it is just amazing.  I think I was always a little scared of soaking it in water and somehow ruining it... I don't know.  But my hat was too small after I got done with it, but then I blocked it and magically it fit perfectly. Amazing.

This next one is for my mom.  It is a little bit different pattern - rather than a ski hat it is supposed to be a tam.  I guess I am supposed to block it with a plate inside and it will get somewhat of a beret look to it.

I still have to make one for my dad and one for my brother.  And they all have to be completely done before we leave on our trip next Saturday. 12 days for 2 hats?  I better get off the computer and get back to my knitting!

That is pretty much all I am making this year.  My husband is making a set of cornhole boards for his parents.  Come to think of it, though, I'll probably help paint them since that seems to be my job around here.  Anyway, he's working on them tonight so I ran out to the garage and snapped a picture:

Christmas Gift Inspiration?

The Christmas gifts have started appearing under our tree!  Care to guess how many of these packages contain a handmade gift?

Yeah, that's right.  A big, fat ZERO.

Remember that one year that we all were making gifts galore and there were multiple posts going up here daily in order to showcase all the handi-work we were producing???  Wasn't that fun? Life has gotten in the way of my crafting.  Sure, I have ideas - but getting them into reality just isn't happening. 

I did pick up this paper crafting kit last January at Barnes & Noble on the "take an additional 75% off" table.  We are going to be doing these this week, as well as making snacks to take with us to our family reunion later this month. However, that is the extent of our creative Christmas making... So, instead, I am going to share some links of stuff I would make if I were making things.

• Free e-book full of recipes for Christmas treats: Holiday Treats download
• Cute gift tags to print and put on those Christmas treats!
• Turn last year's Christmas cards into gift tags
• Homemade Christmas Gift free e-book download
• Easy Christmas Crafts for Kids free e-book download
• Quick and Easy Recipes for Holiday Entertaining free e-book download
• Homemade Hot Cocoa Cones
• Lots of ideas for homemade gifts for children
• Handmade gifts from the kitchen
• Homemade Sugar Scrub

Advent Resource

I know that there was some commenting that people weren't really sure what Advent was or hadn't thought to put some spiritual aspect to it.  I wanted to share some information with you all about Advent. The word advent actually means, "coming," and it is a time when we reflect on the time when Christ came to earth (Christmas).

The other day, Cathi At Granny's House posted a link to another blog called A Holy Experience. The writers of that blog have put together an amazing Jesse Tree free e-book.  I did a Jesse tree with my children 3 years ago, and it was really good.  I think this one is better.  It has scripture readings for every day of Advent (starting Nov. 30, but it's okay to jump in a bit late!) and pictures that go with the readings that can be cut out and put on a tree.  We are making a paper tree to put on the wall and putting the cut out pictures on that.  Anyway, click on the link in the post at Granny's blog or go directly to A Holy Experience if you want a resource for making your Advent idea have a spiritual aspect to it!

What's an advent calendar?

OK, so maybe the post title is a little exaggerated, but I don't think I've ever done an advent calendar.  (Is "advent" supposed to be capitalized? see... there's so much I don't know.)  Perhaps I remember decorations from my past that were calendar-ish, where each day had a door that revealed a picture behind it? As you can see, they had a profound impact on my life. But, I have to say, it is interesting to read what you all are doing!

Our countdown to Christmas is going to be a little different from normal this year.  We aren't following many of the traditions we have in the past, mainly because we will be out of the country. In exactly 19 days we are getting on a plane and flying to Morocco!  We will spend Christmas day riding camels in the Sahara Desert (I can hardly believe it) and will spend the night in nomad tents in the dunes.

I am completely thrilled about this trip, but I do find that giving up a traditional Christmas has been a little harder than I anticipated.  We will be eating couscous and drinking mint tea rather than sugar cookies and eggnog.  I'd like to come up with a few traditions we can bring along with us, so to speak - do you guys have any suggestions?  I've thought about reading the christmas story from the bible while we sit around the fire in the desert.  We don't have room to pack any gifts, so that's pretty much out. But the trip itself is a huge gift, and we will be with (some) family (my husband, parents and brother) so really, what more could I ask for.

Advent At Our House

I didn't think I would be the first person posting in our themed weeks, but here we are on Sunday (my day) and the topic is Advent, so here goes nothing!  Growing up, we did things in a very traditional way.  Christmas decorations always went up the weekend after Thanksgiving and didn't come down until January 6. We did Advent devotions together as a family each night during the Advent season, and had the traditional Advent wreath on our table with the purple, pink, and white candles all month.  We got to light the candles on the correct Sundays, and I have fond memories of it all.  Each year I determine that I am going to get an advent wreath, but they are not sold everywhere anymore (probably as Christmas has become more about Santa, and less about Christ with many in the world).  So we have yet to form a spiritual Advent tradition that has stuck, but I have some ideas for this year!

We have two Advent calendars that have become beloved in our family, though.  The first is one that hangs on the wall, and was given to me and Jerry shortly after we were married by Jerry's parents.  I thought it was funny at the time because it is clearly for children, but we hung it every year, and faithfully put the pieces out one per day until the full nativity scene was completed by adding baby Jesus to the manger on Christmas morning.

The Advent calendar as it looks before Advent begins.  Aaron grabbed it and put it up as soon as he saw it in the box, so clearly the children love it as much as we do! 

I put a bunch of the pieces on so you could get the idea.  I even put baby Jesus in the manger... ::gasp!::

 These days, the pieces don't go up one a day with all the characters going in the proper places.  The kids love to put them up and take them down and don't really use this one to actually count down the days until Christmas.  I even find donkeys in the sky and fallen stars on the ground at times, but it's okay. They have lots of fun with it!

The newer tradition that has taken over as our family favorite is this wooden house that my parents gave us three years ago.

It has a door for each day in December counting down to Christmas.  The first year I put a little candy in the box for each day, and then we moved to small trinkets and candies mixed together.  Last year, after learning of all of the food allergies the kids have, we couldn't really do candy, so when I discovered that Michael's had all of their little $1-$2.50 trinkets on sale at half off, I grabbed up 24 days worth for both of the boys and got Advent gifts for the kids for under $30.  I put a clue to where each toy was hidden in the box and the kids went on a scavenger hunt through the house to find them.  That was a lot of fun, but I have decided to change gears this year for a couple of reasons.  First, I am so over having lots of little trinkets in our house that are super exciting for 31 minutes and then just clutter up the place for years after. Plus, I mentioned missing the spiritual part of our Advent devotions growing up, so I am going to fix these two issues this year.  First, for the prizes in the box, I am going to get a lego set for each boy and divide the pieces up into 24 little baggies.  The first day they will get the directions and a bag of pieces that they need for the first step, then each day they'll get a few more pieces.  By Christmas, they'll have the full lego set built! No crappy little toys and I know they'll like it for years to come.  As far as the spiritual side goes, I think I will put a Scripture verse reference in each box with the clue so that the kids can look up a verse that goes with Advent each day.  We can do it together as a family, and I think that will be fun!

Anyway, that's how we do Advent at our house.  How is it at your house?

My Ornament

Look at this beautiful ornament Tina made for me!!  I absolutely love it.  It must have taken so much effort to make.  It is flawless.  Thank you so much Tina.

Joanna, considering you are the only one who hasn't received anything, and I'm the only person whose name hasn't been mentioned for sending something, by now you probably have figured out that I am the lame-o who has your name and didn't send anything in time for Christmas.  You'll be happy to know that I did send something today - Priority Mail, no less - and because you are such an awesome lady and had to wait so long, I added a little special something to the package to sweeten up your raw deal a bit.  It should be there in 2-3 days!

What's Been Keeping Me Busy...Besides the Obvious

Our church is having a benevolence event this December: Women's Christmas Coffee. Women from church volunteer to host a table where they will serve coffee, tea and some light snacks. There will be entertainment...I don't know what kind of entertainment. Anyway, tickets to get into the Coffee are a minimum $20 gift card to Wal-Mart or Publix. The gift cards will be used to help families in need throughout the coming year.

My mom loves to do this kind of stuff. She “drags” me into it and then I end up totally having a great time. I enjoy crafting, decorating, preparing food for people...I just don't enjoy chit-chatting with a table full of women I don't know. Not good about chit-chatting...with strangers.

So my mom volunteered to host a table. At first I was dubious, but then I lost my mind. The tables are to be decorated like some high-class event. Mom and I have been having a great time running around town, buying fancy-looking table decorations on a budget.

First there are the chargers and napkins. I saw these (charger and napkin tutorial) at Moda Bake Shop (I *heart* that blog) and was instantly under the impression that I should make some, but had no excuse. Well, the Christmas Coffee was the perfect thing. We used all my Japanese fabric and some filler fabric. They went really quickly.

For favors we've got these candles and stockings. I saw the idea for these in a Joann's flyer I got in the mail. We found the candle holders and votives at Pier 1 Imports and got the paper and ribbon at Joann's. We'll punch stars in the paper and add a couple of the gold sticky stars. The little stockings we want to stuff with a few items (a small bottle of lotion and some Kisses and a candy cane maybe?). I had intended to use the stockings for a Advent calendar. I might as well admit it to myself that I am not an Advent calendar-remembering type of gal. So, the stockings are for favors. I have 20 more to do...something with. I got the pattern for that here, from Stardust Shoes.

The napkin rings were also got at Pier 1 Imports. Aren't they cool? I never would have thought they would work, but I think they look nice.

The centerpiece was purchased in separate parts at Old Time Pottery. The water glasses we also got there. So far we've spent less than $100. We plan to use these all at our own Christmas table, also,

My Christmas Cranberry Tea...

Doesn't this just make your mouth water?!?!?!

It is super easy, but it has to be done beforehand, so prepare this in advance.

I actually started it at ten o'clock at night on Christmas eve, and finished it up at lunchtime on Christmas. This time I added the strainer to the sugar and water before I added the cranberries, since I don't own an actual strainer. But this worked really well, and I would do it this way again in a heartbeat....

Need the recipe???

Thank Joanna.

Christmas Projects, Part 3

As Savannah calls them, these are her Christmas Balls.... I call them ornaments though. We had fun with these this year, though i really think she would have been able to do more of the project if she had been a little older....



Savannah and I took inexpensive Christmas balls (the harder to break but still glass solid colored ornaments that are 18 for $2) and she "painted" them with a 50/50 solution of Elmer's glue and water. Then we added torn tissue paper to the balls before I did a top coat of glue to put down all the edges. Savannah had a blast, I couldn't get her to stop touching them she was so proud, and we added them to all of her school friend's goody bags, wrapped up for their mom. (Hopefully they made it home in one piece....) Like I said, Savannah was so proud of them.

In the goody bags were the ornament for mom, a sticker book (or Christmas pencils when we ran out of sticker books), two candy canes, and a can of playdoh. Nice and easy and inexpensive.... we made fifteen bags for about fifteen dollars.

For the teachers, we went in on a group basket, but I also made chocolate covered pretzels. I didn't think to take a picture of the finished project, but I made them plain this year so it was just the stick pretzels with chocolate on them. Really easy to make, just take the bakers chocolate, melt by 30 second intervals in the microwave, then do whatever you need to to cover the pretzel with the chocolate. Usually I use a dinner glass to melt the chocolate, cause if it is deep enough you can just roll the chocolate onto the pretzel, though this time I used a knife to spread it on.

Here are the bags and chocolate pretzels all ready to go, in the back of the van, off to school (with some thank you notes for other church friends on top.)

Christmas Projects, Part 2

So right before Christmas, I found this really cool pattern for making a rag doll from the Emily over at the Inside a Black Apple blog after she appeared on Martha Stewart's show. Well I was hit with the doll crafting bug and after I made the first one using the template (but not enlarging it), I changed it and just cut out the basic shape that I thought it should be. (You'll notice that it is basically the same, but I couldn't enlarge it here at the house and I am too lazy to drive somewhere to get it enlarged....) So here is Zoe, showing off the first Meagan Original....
which was a birthday present for one of our neighbors little one year old.

Then Christmas eve I decided that I wanted to give Savannah's Cousin Ella something more than the little toy train we bought her, and went ahead and made this baby doll for her. I started at 11 pm and finished by 2 am. That was with having to recreate the pattern on the fly and all, except for the face embroidery, which I did Christmas morning.... (and the scarf type thing used to be a hair ribbon from when I was a little girl....)

And Ella really liked it.

Merry Christmas Ella!

Tutorial anyone?