Christmas thoughts

Today Elizabeth, one of my coworkers, asked me about Christmas. How things were going and all that. I actually answered honestly instead of the usual fine, or good, or GRRRRREAT!
I want to say that it has been super-fantastic-awesome! Not that it has been bad. But I don't have the usual traditions that I am used to and that is mostly due to this whole thing called marriage.

It's awesome that I am married and Brandon and I get to start our own traditions. But at the same time I was happy with my own traditions. I don't really want to change. And while I keep some, like with my family, I am also adding his family traditions and starting our own.

My perspective on Christmas and the spirit of it that I love and enjoy so much is not at all in Brandon. It's just a new thing.

What I love about Christmas is the hope and the joy and the love of the season. There is all this hope. The hope of the Savior coming and fulfilled that we read and hear during the season. The hope for presents, the hope for snow (that's me!!), the hope to hear Santa's sleigh, the hope that everyone can be there together to celebrate.

The joy of seeing a person get a gift, the joy of finding that perfect gift, the joy of music.

The love of family and spreading joy and hope to others. (sigh)


So I just wanted to share that thought.
Or those thoughts.

~Becky

Christmas Cookies!!

On Saturday mom and I had our Christmas Cookie Bake Off!!
We've done this for who knows how many years now. We bake a ton of different treats for the holidays and share with friends and others who have really helped us out this year.
It was a little different this year since I am now married and had to go back to Canby to my parents house.

We started at 9am...

The stage is set...



And we're off!!!


Mom starts with a Neapolitan rice krispie treat


I love making Spritz! And these poinsettias look awesome with the little drages in the middle!


Oh Christmas Trees...oh Christmas trees...


Peanut Butter Blossoms with Almond Kisses and Raspberry Drizzle


Chocolate Blossoms with melt away mints


And the classic Peanut Butter Blossoms!


These are delicious Mint Cutout cookies!


Look! I have little green men!! hee hee! ;)


Yum...here they are finished and drizzled with chocolate!!


These are my new cookies for the year! I found it in a magazine. They are called Chocolate Peppermint cookies. The chocolate cookie dough turned out really gooey and I gave up trying to fix it to follow the directions and cut out circles. So I rolled them into small balls and flattened them with a cup. :) And they turned out AWESOME!! And then of course they are dipped in chocolate and sprinkled with crushed peppermint! I ran out of white chocolate so I used regular chocolate too!


My Peppermint bark! Yum!


Mom's Fudge. It's not the crazy, rich, about-to-die-from-chocolate-overload fudge. But it's still good.


And Peanut Butter Balls.

12 hours later... we are finally done and ready to share!

I love Christmas time!!

~Becky

p.s. If you would like a recipe of one of these delicious treats just let me know and I'll hook you up ;)

Christmas Traditions

Last year my extended family decided that instead of exchanging gifts for Christmas we would do something for someone else. My Grandma introduced us to Operation Christmas Child.

The organization, headed by Samaritans Purse (click on the link above to see more) is really an amazing thing. Essentially you provide Christmas gifts to kids in impoverished places while spreading the love of Christ at the same time.



All you do is get a shoe box and fill it with toothpaste and hairbrushs' and toys and school supplies and soaps, and underwear and candy and other fun things like that!Then you add $7 or more in the box and drop it off at a specified location. You can pay online and then track where your box goes! (Which is what we are doing this year!)

My family gets together and we have snacks and drinks and then we put all our stuff that we bought for the kids into piles on the table and fill up shoe boxes till we are out of stuff! It is so super fun to shop and pack boxes! I LOVE it! And it's a great way to spend time with your family in a selfless way! It has totally become a new tradition with us.



We have to do it in early November though cause the dates to turn them in are in November. It's still not too late to do it though! It is so worth it! Check out the site and watch the video. Get some friends together or your family and start a new tradition this year!

Time for om-noms!!

I've been getting off work earlier this week so I'm home before Brandon. Which means I get to cook!!!!

For dinner I made a favorite from my teenage years.

Biscuits and chocolate gravy!!!

Cassie's mom, a.k.a. Man used to make it sometimes when we (the girls) were over. It is sooooo good!!! And it's like having dinner and dessert at the same time!!!

As Brandon said, It really sticks to your ribs.

Thank you Man for sharing your recipe with me!!!

~Becky

Heart of stone

I saw this heart shaped hole in this pillar today.

It figures that I move out of my hometown of little 'ol Canby and they get a movie theater...

The first picture is of the brand new theatre that just opened on Friday.

(The other pic is of a hole I found in this pillar today.It has nothing to do with the movies.)

But that's okay since I don't live that far away and tickets are only $6!!!
My dad gave Brandon and I two free tickets for the movies last night. We saw "Cirque details Freak: The Magicians Apprentice. " It was pretty good, definitely a movie from a book. I'd like to read the series of which there are 7 in the series. Hopefully they will make at least one more in the movie series because this one was left WIDE open at the end. If they don't then don't bother seeing it cause it will confuse you and leave you hanging off a steep cliff of endless confusion and dissatisfaction, which may end your faith in the capability of the movie industries ability to produce quality book to movie translations that satisfy our reasonable desire for quality entertainment.

Becky Bakes Beautiful Bounties

I really love to bake! I enjoy cooking but baking is really what I love to do.

I have discovered though some new uh.... joys.

I decided to bake a pie for the FORGE potluck tomorrow! YUM!!
And instead of using a pre-prepared crust I decided to make my own. I've never done my own pie crust before.

The ingredients started easy enough, flour, salt, shortening. and then I needed a pastry cutter to blend them together...but I don't have one of those!!
Fortunately they suggested using two knifes if you dont have one! :)

Phew! That was close!

The dough is done!

Then I needed to roll out the dough. Uh-oh! I don't have a rolling pin!!

Fortunately I DO have a smooth water bottle! It turned out to be pretty useful!
The rolling was pretty easy... The hard part was moving it into my pie pan. It kept falling apart and cracking!! It was aggravating. I finally got in there and repaired it the best I could.



Now it was time to make the filling. I decided pumpkin was fitting for the season.
Don't you hate it when you start something and realize you don't have a key ingredient? Well I forgot I didn't have any eggs...so it was off with the oven and off to the store for eggs.

15 min later I'm back in the kitchen finishing my pie.

Here it is going into the oven


And here it is coming out! (of the oven people! Come on!)


Lessons learned:
~I have taken advantage of my moms baking tools and I really need to get some of my own now i guess.

~You don't always need a mixer to make things. I've already made 3 cakes, 2 pies, cinnamon rolls and a few other things without one...but it would be nice to have one.

Here is one of the cakes I made recently by hand. And I mean by hand!
Remember NO MIXER

My mom asked me to make a cake for my brothers birthday. I wasn't sure what to decorate it as and I have this one "fancy" cake pan that is flowers in a pot.



To make it more "boy" friendly (a.k.a. no flowers) I made a bouquet of skulls.


You're welcome Alex :)

~Becky

My favorite toddler!

I was very excited to get a call from Alexis asking me if I would be interested in watching Emma and I totally was!

Brandon came with and we hung out with her for a few hours.



Emma showed me her moms hat. She looked very cute in it!





Emma was very happy to show me her room. I love the way her room is set up and everything is at her eye level (good job Alexis!!)



She showed me her table and her very own chair, which she was very proud of. And we colored on her white board.



Emma showed me her marble works.



And her animal stickers.



And her sponge numbers!



And a big red balloon!



We went downstairs and Emma showed me her friend Chloe.



Then she shared some snuggles with Brandon!

And that was pretty much our evening!

I Loved it!

Today is cinnamon roll day!!

A group of us made these delectable goodies today to share with each other (and the world) our products.

After a long morning i finally started my rolls! Alexis suggested using a little more flour than what it called for because they were really sticky. (Thanks Alexis :) )



To make my cinnamon rolls more personalized I added chopped walnuts. I don't usually like nuts in my food but I thought i'd try it out.



Here are my cinnamon rolls all cut out and put in my pie dish! I discovered I really need more counter space. I didn't have quite nine cinnamon rolls and they were kind of small but I didn't have a lot of space to stretch them out.



20 min later the delicious aroma of cinnamon and brown sugar filled the air and 30 min later delicious cinnamon rolls came out. Which I promptly drizzled my icing on! Mmmm...they are so good!



I think that I would add more cinnamon and nutmeg (which I didn't have today) to the filling and more brown sugar to the dough. Just a hint.

Here is the recipe for those that wish to make some! It is so super easy and i have a feeling that the basic dough recipe can be used for other things.


_____________________________________________________________________________________
Recipe:

Quick Cinnamon Biscuits

Adapted from The Moosewood Collective’s “Moosewood Restaurant New Classics”

Yield: 9 biscuits

Cinnamon Sugar Filling

1/4 cup brown sugar
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon nutmeg
Biscuit Dough

2 1/2 cups unbleached white flour
2 tablespoons brown sugar, packed
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups plus 1 tablespoon heavy cream
Icing

6 tablespoons confectioners’ sugar
4 to 6 teaspoons milk or heavy cream
1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.

2. For the Filling: In a small bowl, combine the brown sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg. Set aside.

3. For the Dough: In a large bowl, stir together the flour, brown sugar, baking powder and salt. Add 1 1/2 cups cream, and stir until the dough forms a ball, about 1 minute. With your hands, fold the dough over a few times in the bowl, until the dough is smooth.

4. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Lightly flour your hands, and pat the dough into a 1/2-inch-thick rectangle, about 9 X 13 inches. Brush the surface of the dough with the remaining tablespoon of cream. Sprinkle evenly with the cinnamon sugar topping.

5. Starting from the long side, roll the dough into a cylinder. Slice into 9 equal rounds. Place the rounds, cut side down, into an ungreased 8-inch square baking dish or a pie plate. Bake for about 30 minutes, until the biscuits are lightly browned.

6. For the Icing: While the biscuits bake, mix together the confectioners’ sugar and milk or cream until smooth. When you remove the biscuits from the oven, immediately drizzle them with icing. Serve warm.

Mancaotti and football

Corey invited Brandon over to learn how to cook manacotti, while I came along as "morale support". Which really means I came to eat. :) Wonderfully Charis was there too to help in the support!! And watch some football!!





Brandon and Corey stuffing the cheesy goodness into the noodles!! Yum Yum!






And this is what Charis and I did while they cooked. Watched football!!!




Ready to go into the oven!



A well deserved break.



Yummm...Fresh goody-goodness!



Time to dig in!!

Thank you guys for the awesome meal!! You rock!