Today we are listing what we CANNOT live without in winter. There are, I’m sure many many more things, but these are my top items! The one thing I am absolutely sure of is that if I have a sore throat, dry skin, cold feet or hands, cold food or catch a cold I am NOT happy.
I drink a cup of green tea every night and try to make very balanced comfort food meals to warm up my family from the inside out. Here are a few of our favorite soups and stews links for you.
I’ve updated last year’s list.
Funny story here – I had herb savers on my Amazon Christmas list for 2 years. So last year I decided to buy myself a Christmas present and get the herb keepers so I could quit using a glass covered with a plastic bag.
So, a couple days before Christmas last year, hubby holds up one of the new herb keepers and asks, what’s this? So I begin explaining what an herb keeper is and he’s like, “No why did you buy them?” Long story short he was getting them for me for Christmas. This year we are forgoing gifts and doing stockings only since this house is eating up all our disposable cash so fast!
Over the years I have made everything, and I do mean everything at one time or another to create a handmade Christmas. I’ve made rolls and rolls of butcher paper into wrapping paper, cut grocery bags into handmade tags, made enough fudge, candies and cookies to feed a small country, as well as jams, jellies, soup mixes and Snowman soup!
My award winning jams were requested one year at the Church Christmas Boutique and I ended up selling for another 10 years before we moved. Now I make just enough for gifts for neighbors and family. I started making Snowman Soup about 20 years ago for the girl scouts and it was a HUGE seller at our gift wrap days and later for the Church Boutique.
2 years ago I missed the big Christmas Crafts Festival at the fairgrounds because of an ice storm, but last year I made it! For the things I didn’t make myself, I at least bought from local crafters.
As for receiving, I love ANYTHING handmade. I’m a BIG believer that it’s the thought that counts and that caring action ALWAYS touches my heart though I’m partial to cotton crocheted dishcloths, my brothers photographs, my mom’s quilted totes and ANYTHING food.
I’d like to say that our table looked just like the one in the picture. Well Christmas day was close, but Christmas Eve was much more casual.
One of my earlier memories is of a very warm Christmas Day, a backed up sink/garbage disposal (I don’t think we ever had a holiday in that house where the garbage disposal didn’t have an issue of some sort) and having to transport all the prepared food from my parent’s house to my granparent’s house via my grandmother’s RED (kind of like a Christmas sleigh) Chevy station wagon (remember those?) while my uncle and I sat in the back keeping the food from toppling over.
CHRISTMAS EVE – Served Buffet style since this was the night we did most of the present opening and the adults didn’t want to spend all their time in the kitchen – in later years we would have it catered (so to speak – they prepared the food, we picked it up and displayed it) from Rattler’s BBQ. We also began to use “FINE CHINA” as hubs calls it aka as decorated paper.
CHRISTMAS DAY – This is where we dug out the REAL fine china and crystal as well as the silver. I loved setting the table for this meal. There were always enough people that we had a KID’S table too. I hated the kid’s table – all the good stuff was sitting at the grown-up’s table.
When we go to my SIL’s family for Christmas (or any other big family get together) we do Hor’deouvres style. The family is so big that over the years we have found that if each person brings an hor’deouvres to feed 10+ people that we can make a HUGE feast. We just serve it buffet style and mingle and play – it is ALWAYS the best time.
Today’s category is an easy one for me. I start taping Christmas movies on Lifetime, Hallmark and INSP as soon as they air so I can watch all year long. I’m a sucker for a happy ending and let’s face it, Christmas movies have happy endings.
So this list could be reallllllllllly long, but I will just keep it to the top 5 MUST watch each and every year movies.
Christmas is the most important holiday to me and not because Santa comes, though that is pretty important to the kiddos, but more importantly, it’s a caring spirit, a sharing feeling, an attitude that I try to practice all year long. I truly feel good about giving – whether it’s the Angel trees I select gifts for or the smile from the Salvation Army bell ringer as you put your money in their red bucket and wish them Merry Christmas.
For 10 years I chaired an Angel Tree Program for FISH and I loved doing it! I prepared for it every year and I truly believe each year got better and better. The night before we distributed the gifts I would go shopping for the teenage girls. We were ALWAYS lacking in gifts for the teen girls no matter what we tried to boost things up for them. So now when I choose the angels from the trees in the community I seek out the teenage girls specifically.
Christmas means lots and lots of memories of family, some no longer with us, but always in my heart when I hang an ornament they made especially for me like my cousin Beth who we lost in October or a recipe that they always prepared like my dad’s Oatnut Sourdough Herb Dressing or Gram’s Christmas box full of goodies picked out just for each one of us or…
One of the things I try to practice is to make at least one homemade gift each year – nothing extravagant, but just something that says “I MADE THIS with LOVE JUST FOR YOU“.
The years that I host Christmas include a lot of family recipes. LOL coming up on the 10th I’ll share an anecdote about crazy Aunt Louise and her recipe that truly became a family favorite among us kids. They were addicting and one year she made them for me as a Christmas in July at the 4th of July pool party she hosted.
Last year I made Tangerine Pineapple Apple Sauce to include with each person’s gift. This year I made our Christmas cards (fortunately last July), but will not be able to make any food type items probably.
But most importantly, Christmas is the spirit of Love and Giving and it must be felt and shared. Christmas is a gift from above and each year as I grow older I realize more and more that Christmas is about Love, Peace, Sharing, Caring and just being together.
Thankfully, I’m not in the bottom picture because I remember what I was wearing! But I love my brother’s plaid pants and Monica’s floral blouse. If you don’t hear from me for a few days I’m Sure it’s because one them found me LOL.
Then on Christmas Day we did Christmas morning and “Santa” with just the immediate family and then we would do a BIG turkey with all the trimmings including my dad’s stuffing and giblet gravy with all the family as well as extended family, which included crazy Aunt Louise and Uncle Herb, but I’ll tell you more about them on the 10th. I replicated dad’s stuffing recipe a few years ago (Oatnut Sourdough Herb Dressing) and that is now a MUST for the Christmas meal whatever the meat is and I’ll tell you more about that on the 10th as well.
BAKED HAM with APPLE PINEAPPLE GLAZE
7-8 pound ham
2 medium apples (I like Honey Crisp)
8 ounces crushed pineapple
8 ounce jar pineapple preserves
1/2 cup tangerine juice
2 medium apples (I like Honey Crisp), peeled, cored and thinly sliced
It’s Christmas Eve and Santa Claus is coming to town tonight. If you have kids, or are just a big kid at heart, you can track Santa’s progress as he travels around the world on NORAD.
