Our traditional grand breakfast

 

Again this year, we had four of our local grandchildren over to carry on a tradition we've been tweaking for many years -- I would say at least a dozen years.  It used to be breakfast (or supper, once or twice) out, then Christmas shopping for their parents, followed by ice cream sundaes at Kellerhaus.

It has evolved over the years and most often began with breakfast out at McDonalds or a diner.  But ever since 2020, we have found it works much better to skip eating out and also to skip shopping (as three of them have jobs and can surely buy their own gifts).  Instead, after breakfast, we have a time of crafting, candy making, or both (and sometimes a spot of tree decorating).  I thought today I would share about this year's breakfast.

As usual, I kept breakfast simple but hearty with breakfast sliders 

 

and a Hash Brown Casserole.  The hash brown casserole is always a big favorite with this crowd. 

I also made the Cinnamon Fried Apples recipe you see at the top of the post.  I change that up a little in that I substitute 1/4 cup pure maple syrup for the sugars that are called for.  I also slice the apples rather than chop them.

I had planned on making this coffeecake to fill in any gaps.  I had made this in a previous year and the kids enjoyed it.  But even though it is super easy and fast, I ran out of time.  I had squares of pumpkin coffeecake, blueberry coffeecake,  and cranberry breakfast cake in the freezer, so I warmed those up instead.  

And that was this year's grand breakfast!  The company was even better than the food.

December happenings so far

 It's only December 9, and lots of holly-jolly happenings have already transpired around here, with many more still in the plans.

Let's see.  I really should go back to November 30, when we met friends for breakfast at Polly's Pancake Parlor.    I'm sort of counting that as December, since Polly's was already decorated for Christmas, and we've never been there in this season before.  The outdoor decorations were fun.  I didn't get photos of the food, but that was fantastic.

After leaving Polly's, we followed our friends to their home in Vermont, where we went for a nice winter walk.  The scene below is from our friends' back yard.  I took this as I stood on their back deck.

 

We were able to park on the road that leads to this farm.  It's a nice walking route, with just enough ups and downs to make it interesting and not over challenging. 

Here is the barn up close.  It was built in 1944 and is named Hillside Farm.

December 1 we met up with different friends at The Bacon Barn for breakfast.  This diner was new to us and also to our friends.  We ordinarily would not have planned back-to-back breakfast outings, but this one had been planned for weeks, working around the schedules of several people, while the Polly's meet-up was relatively spontaneous.  The food at The Bacon Barn was delicious and we would eat there again, but it was unfortunate we had just been to Polly's the day before.  The quality difference was observable.

Also on December 1 was a lovely gathering of our church ladies' group.  One of the ladies hosted in her beautiful dining room complete with crackling fireplace.  We enjoyed a wonderful lasagna meal, had a Christmas devotional time, and exchanged gifts and cookies.  The tray below was part of the gift I received, laden with Christmasy treats and snacks.  My friend knew we are trying to downsize, so chose a consumable gift for the most part.  I love this tray, though!

December 2 was a Christmas party with my hubby's former work crew.  He brought a cookie tray just like this one:

December 3, in addition to church, we enjoyed a lovely community Christmas concert at the historical society in a nearby town.  The weather was not the best -- raining and snowing -- but it was doable and we were so glad we did.  Our granddaughter is part of a youth orchestra that played several numbers, and there were other musical groups as well in addition to singing Christmas carols as a group.

 Let's see, on December 4th through the 7th we did a lot of Christmas preparations, especially baking.  My hubby has baked steadily for a week.  I also did some decorating.  On the 7th we set up the tree and got the lights in place.

On December 8 we had a fun plan with four of our grandkids for breakfast, cooked and served here.  After breakfast the plan was to maybe do a little candy making, a little crafting, a little tree decorating, before going out for make-your-own ice cream sundaes.   Grandson Sam helped Mr. T get the ornament boxes out of the attic and also did a bit of decorating with us before he jumped into crafting with the others.  

I didn't have specific crafts for them to do, but simply dragged out several boxes of Christmas craft materials.  The creativity that went on was simply astounding.  I didn't get photos of their creations, but there was everything from an amazing yarn-covered tree made from a paper roll to a tiny chest of drawers with little brass handles, made from three teensy matchboxes and brass wire.  And many, many other fun and beautiful ornaments.  It looked as if a craft store had exploded.  But so did the creativity!

Oh wait -- I did get a photo of a couple ornaments -- I had bought these at Walmart intending to trim a Christmas gift basket with one of them.  And I did.  Two said "Merry Christmas" and the others were intended to say "Holly Jolly".  Instead, they read "Holy Jolly."  I thought Josiah could probably transform them, as indeed he did.  They are the ones with beads on the hangers.  Check out the details on the one below left!

 And then I took a photo of the one and only ornament I made, one I've been wanting to make for years.

No candy making ever did get done, and we didn't leave for ice cream until 4 pm.  So lots of snacking on breakfast leftovers, crackers and cheese, and Christmas cookies, took place during the crafting time.

At top you see Ari with her ice cream sundae, and also Grampa's and mine.  The one below belongs to Miss Julia.

What a fun day it was!

And that brings us up to date on December so far! 

A belated happy birthday to my hubby!

 

Yes, we celebrated his birthday this week.  I will write more later about some of our time with our Nevada loved ones and all that we did during their time with us, but for today I wanted to put these up just for fun.  You may wonder what that is with a lighted birthday candle stuck in it.  It's a variation on a Cornish pasty -- a savory meat pie which we have taken on picnics often over the years.  I tried using puff pastry this year, as I had been given a large package of it.  It worked out very well.  I made beef and potato pasties and also turkey and rice ones.

Our birthday celebration was in Franconia Notch.  No picnic tables in this particular area, so we all found seats on the rock wall at the profile plaza.  You can see most of our group in this picture.

I'll be back with a Scripture post on Sunday -- and hopefully I can share some of our family fun with you all next week.

One new thing ...

 

Here goes with another One New Thing post, once again inspired by Becki at Field Lilies.  Becki is posting each week about at least one new thing she has tried or done.  

This week I'm going to post about something very new to me: reading a book from a genre I have seldom -- no, I'll just say never -- dipped into: middle-grade fantasy involving rabbits with swords.  Several of our grandchildren are huge fans of the Green Ember series of books by S.D. Smith.  They even own, and love, t-shirts celebrating this series.  

This rather inadequate Kindle photo shows Julia wearing her Green Ember t-Shirt in Nevada in Spring 2021.

 
Why did I decide to read this book?  Well, when one is acquainted, as I am, with a 15-year-old bookworm who has read hundreds of books already, and that bookworm describes a series as "quite possibly the best books I have ever read", one tends to take that a bit seriously.

The Book Overview of The Green Ember from Thriftbooks reads as follows: "Heather and Picket are extraordinary rabbits with ordinary lives until calamitous events overtake them, spilling them into a cauldron of misadventures. They discover that their own story is bound up in the tumult threatening to overwhelm the wider world. Kings fall and kingdoms totter. Tyrants ascend and terrors threaten. Betrayal beckons, and loyalty is a broken road with peril around every bend. Where will Heather and Picket land? How will they make their stand?"

Obviously, this is a story with wider implications than just a fantasy about rabbits.  And there are many more books in the series -- sequels, prequels, and others I have yet to learn of.  I've finished The Green Ember but am reading through it a second time to catch details I undoubtedly missed along the way.  Granddaughter Julia assures me that there are plenty more where that one came from.  And I do plan to read them.  We're living in  a world that is crazy at best.  I will be interested to see what I can learn from Heather, Picket and the other Green Ember characters on their journey through a perilous world.

Check out S.D. Smith's author page on Amazon to see more.

New Year hodgepodge

 

Wednesday again, and time for the Hodgepodge at From This Side of the Pond, where Joyce asks the questions and bloggers provide the answers.  Here goes!

1. Share one happy moment/memory from the holiday season. 

Probably getting to be in a room with four of our grandchildren and seeing seven more of them via Skype at the same time.  Oh, and here's another.  We were able to stay at our camp two mild nights in December.   On the second evening, three of our grandchildren came over for a visit before supper.  It was pure joy to chat with them all as our teenage grandsons sketched (one of them comfortably stretched out in the plaid recliner) and 7-year-old Arielle alternately nibbled at a candy cane and swung from the rafters.   After their mom called to say supper was ready, they headed out onto the dark forest path with their lights and we could hear them humming a lively hymn as they plunged into the woods.  An unforgettable memory!

2. Let's be reasonable with our expectations going into this new year, k? What is one thing you'd like to accomplish/improve/complete/do in 2022? 

Get the entire house decluttered and downsized. 

3. Every January 1st (since 1976) Lake Superior University has published a list of words they'd like to see banished from the Queen's English. Words may be banished due to misuse, overuse or just general uselessness (go here to read more about how the words are chosen). Here are the words/phrases they'd like to see banished in 2022-

wait, what?-no worries-at the end of the day-that being said-asking for a friend-circle back-deep dive-a new normal-you're on mute-supply chain

Which of these words/phrases do you use regularly? 

 Once in awhile I will say "no worries".  I don't use it often.

Which of these words would you most like to see banished from everyday speech and why?

 Supply chain.  I'm tired of hearing about it.  I don't care much for "asking for a friend" either.

 Is there a word/phrase not on the list you'd like to add? 

Probably far too many to choose just one -- most of them from the past 2 years.

4. Best thing you ate in the month of December? 

Difficult choice!  Maybe the roast beef and gravy that my daughter prepared on Christmas Day.   But those caramel thumbprints Julia is displaying below were pretty amazing also.

5. January 5th is National Bird Day. Are you a bird lover? What's your favorite bird to see in the wild? Choose a phrase from the list that follows and tell us how it relates to your life currently...eat like a bird, bird's eye view, early bird, bird-brained, free as a bird, a little bird told me, or kill two birds with one stone.

I do enjoy birds.  My favorite bird to see in the wild may be a pileated woodpecker.  Owls are fun to see in the wild, too.  Free as a bird sounds good to me.  I've been dealing with issues from sciatica for a month but just got in to see the chiropractor this week.  I'm hoping in the next few days to feel free as a bird and able to get around easily.

6. Insert your own random thought here. 

Hmmm ... Not sure how it is that today is January 5th and I've yet to post any new year goals or come up with a potential word for the year.  Life has been oh so busy since New Year's Day!

Graphic from Abby at Little Birdie Blessings

Wouldn't you like to join in, too?  Head over to From This Side of the Pond to get the questions ... then answer them on your own blog and go back to link up!

A favorite gift from this Christmas

 

One of my favorite gifts this Christmas was made by two of my granddaughters (Julia - 15 and Arielle - 7) with a bit of help from their mom.  I guess you would call this a luminary, or maybe a candle jar.  Whatever you call it, it is pretty!

Photo at top is not the best picture as it was taken with a flash.  However, I do love the reflected tree lights in the photo.  I took another with my Kindle so will try adding that in also to give you a closer look.   Ah yes, this looks better.

I also took a couple Kindle photos in the daylight to show the details better.

The girls also made these for their music teachers (Julia) and Sunday School teacher (Arielle).  It looks as if they decoupaged sheet music, cut to size, and with a snowflake shape cut out of it,  to a pint mason jar with (probably) Mod Podge.  I haven't asked for the crafting particulars, but they did say that their mom cut the snowflake shapes out for them.  The sheet music is a Christmas carol, as you see: mine is O Come All Ye Faithful.  I think this was probably a sheet music printable, but am not sure.  It's lovely, anyway.  Then a simple jute tie around the top and some sweet red berry pips complete the project.  I love it!

Below is a little video of the jar with a flickering tea light inside.  It looks lovely with a real tea light candle (that's what it came with), but the one I used for the video was a battery operated tea light. 

 Isn't this a sweet project?

Two more of the candy recipes we used

 

 I had promised to share recipes from our candy-making day with the grandkids.  Over on my Christmas blog, I have shared the links to recipes for Creamsicle Fudge and Rocky Road Fudge.  I will share the links for the other two candy recipes here at my kitchen table today.

One is the Candy Cane Fudge.  You see Sam preparing the first layer of it above.  It's the type you make in the microwave, using chocolate chips and sweetened condensed milk,  which makes it relatively fast and easy.  (Of course, if you don't have a microwave or prefer not to use one, the melting steps can easily be done using a saucepan on the stovetop.)  Unfortunately, I misread the recipe and thought it called for 1 cup of crushed candy canes in each layer, rather than a total of 1 cup.  You sprinkle half in the bottom of the square pan before adding the chocolate layer, and mix the rest into the white portion for the top layer.  

 We also failed to find the mini candy canes the recipe calls for and thought it would be no problem to use the large ones.  But Sam (who is incredibly strong) found it quite a task to crush the larger candy canes and ended up doing so out on the porch using a hammer!

All in all, though, in spite of my mistakes and missteps, this candy turned out well   It seemed a little too sticky at first (and that could have been due to using too much crushed candy), but after it set in the fridge for awhile, all was well.  Here's what it looks like (Taste of Home photo):

And then the last candy we made was Chocolate Dipped Orange Slices.  This has become a huge favorite among our family and friends, and is so easy!  You just melt chocolate chips and then dip the orange slice candies (the ones at our supermarket are naturally flavored!) in the melted chocolate and place them on waxed paper to harden.  I use dark chocolate chips to make them really good.  Julia made these and I failed to get any photos of the process.

There you have it!  I hope to try one more fudge recipe this week, but we will see.

A simple but festive breakfast

 

 I promised to share recipes from our recent breakfast with four of the local grandkids.  We kept it very simple:

Homemade Breakfast Sandwiches
Hash Brown Casserole
Cinnamon Fried Apples

This menu worked out great!  Here are the recipes:

HOMEMADE BREAKFAST SANDWICHES
English muffins, toasted and buttered
Fried eggs
Canadian bacon, fried
Sliced or shredded cheese

I buttered the split English muffins and placed them on a large baking sheet to toast in the oven while we cooked the Canadian bacon and then the eggs.  When the muffins came out of the oven, I added cheese to each toasted half (a small amount of shredded cheese or a half slice).  Then I added the eggs and Canadian bacon (which is the perfect round shape for these sandwiches, and is so yummy), and put the tops on the sandwiches.  Then I wrapped each one in foil, placed them in a crockpot and turned the temperature to Low to keep the sandwiches warm until we were ready to eat.

This is the second time I've tried this crockpot trick for breakfast sandwiches.  It works great!  This time, I made a dozen sandwiches so used two crockpots.

HASH BROWN CASSEROLE

 
As I'm sure I've noted in previous posts on this subject,  this casserole is at its absolute best when one uses a homemade cream soup substitute rather than the canned cream soups.

I prepared this casserole the night before, refrigerated and baked it in the morning.

CINNAMON FRIED APPLES

This recipe made our youngest daughter, the kids' Auntie JoJo from way out in Nevada, a part of our day.   As part of a Thanksgiving package, she had included a couple pages of recipes clipped from their local Everything Elko magazine.

As you see, this apple recipe was one of them.  I planned to serve some type of fruit with our breakfast, and someone had given us four very large apples, so I gave the recipe a try.  We really liked it and every scrap was eaten.  I just made a couple of changes to the recipe as written: rather than cut the apples in bite size pieces, I sliced them and cut the slices in half; and I used only half the amount of cinnamon called for.

That was our festive, simple breakfast last Friday before jumping into candy making, crafting, and visiting an ice cream shop.  Just what we needed to fuel our adventures!

The tradition continues to evolve ...

 

Yes, the tradition we began with three, now four, of our local grands, continues to evolve.  As some regular readers may remember, we've done all sorts of things on the special day we set aside for Christmas fun with them.  It has usually included breakfast out, either at McDonalds or a diner.  Most years it's included taking them Christmas shopping, and going for the ice cream sundae bar at Kellerhaus.  Sometimes we've taken them over to Mill Falls to see the waterfall, which is often frozen around the edges this time of year and is lighted at night.

Last year, readers may recall, we had to tweak this tradition in a major way because of the prevailing paranoia and overreach.  This year we changed it up even more.

I did the breakfast all at home (and I should have looked up my post from last year so we could make that coffee cake! I'd forgotten that we had that.).  I'll write about this in a separate post and share recipes.  But briefly, we had homemade breakfast sandwiches, hash brown casserole (a perennial favorite with most). and cinnamon fried apples.

Instead of shopping this year, we tried something completely different and planned a time of candy making and simple crafting.  When I mentioned to their mom that the kids were going to be horrified that our Christmas tree wasn't up, she suggested we enlist their help.  So Mr. T put the tree up the light before, and the boys added the lights in the morning.  Mr. T also produced a surprise "snacking plate" of Christmas cookies for the kids to nibble on as we decorated, crafted, and made candy.  We also kept the leftover sandwiches warm for snacking purposes.

 
We made four kinds of candy -- chocolate dipped orange slices, rocky road fudge, candy cane fudge, and creamsicle fudge.  The orange slices are always a favorite, but the top favorite fudge was probably the rocky road.  The candy cane fudge turned out sticky, the creamsicle was declared "too sweet" and we didn't have the proper food coloring to turn it orange.  (I've already made a plan for what candies to make next year!

Sam with the first layer of candy cane fudge

Ari mixes peanuts and marshmallows into the rocky road fudge

Julia preparing to spread the rocky road in a pan.  Ari is licking the chocolate saucepan.

Josiah measuring sugar for creamsicle fudge as Sam offers moral support

Rocky road being spread in the pan by Julia

Oops, we had to turn the creamsicle fudge green and call it lime

Creamsicle fudge going into the pan; the white part will be swirled into it

 
I didn't get a photo of the orange slices being made (Julia did that) but here's what they look like:

Such an easy candy, and so delicious!

 
For a simple craft, I chose to use an idea that's been simmering around in my brain for awhile.  It was easy and uncomplicated, but with enough options that the kids could get as creative as they liked.  And they sure did!  I will hope to get them to scan their creations -- I forgot to get pictures -- so I can show you what they did.  I'll probably write about this project on my Christmas blog.

Around 1 pm, we headed out for Kellerhaus and ice cream.  Such a fun spot, we were so happy we could visit again this year.  I failed to get many photos, sadly.  We forgot the camera so had to use my Kindle.

Spoons poised and ready!

There's a corner chalkboard to add your name to if you like.  Ari and Julia (not shown) both added a message.

We then returned home to cut and package the fudge while the kids finished up their projects, then took them home, singing some familiar Christmas tunes and carols en route.  It was another wonderful time with these four grands!