CHRISTMAS WEEK!!!!

I am like a total kid; I LOVE Christmas!  I love all the festive lights and food and music and sweaters...wait, that might be going too far :)  Appropriately, here are my favorite Christmasy things:


5. Christmas Lights!  Check out this house!  Could you imagine being their neighbor??

4. Cake Balls.  If you do not know what these are, please refer to the Pioneer Woman's handy-dandy instructions here or her Halloween themed ones here.  Deliciousness.  Make these today!

Yum Yum Yum

3. Holiday Music.  I definitely turned on the Christmas music on the day after Thanksgiving.  I only bought like 4 new albums this year...my favorites are still the oldies, like "Blue Christmas" by Elvis, "White Christmas" and "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas."  Don't they just make you feel jolly??


2. White Christmas.  Yes, I mean the movie, but I also love a snow-covered Christmas Day!  I mean, if it is going to be cold, can't we have pretty snow to enjoy too?  Anyway, I love the "Sisters" song in White Christmas and how long the inseam is on the pants that Bing Crosby wears.  


1.  My number 1 favorite thing about Christmas is Christmas Morning.  Yea, you could say that is cheating because my favorite thing about Christmas is Christmas, but I specifically mean the morning.  I always try to sleep in, but I'm WAY too excited, even if I know what I am getting for Christmas.  I get excited to give my brother and mom their gifts and enjoy our traditions.  Even now that we are 21 and 24, my brother and I have an inability to sleep in on Christmas.  Sleeping in would be like 8:30...we used to get up at like 6:00, my mom loved it (not).  I am so excited for Saturday!


I hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas!

A Few Favorite Things...

Don't you have those random things that you happen upon that make you smile?  Here are a few of mine:


1. A Favorite Book.  I love seeing someone else, even a stranger, read a book that I love, especially little kids reading Harry Potter.  I get so excited for them to discover the world that I love so much.


2. Bubble Wrap.  Come on, who doesn't like bubble wrap??  I even have the iPhone app downloaded!  When I was out shopping this past weekend, I happened upon a random piece of bubble wrap.  I stomped on it.  It was great!


3. Old photos.  I don't mean old photos of your grandparents, I mean old photos of you and your friends doing ridiculous things.  Don't you have an old photo that just makes you laugh when you stumble upon it?  It's like you are suddenly in that moment all over again.  

4. Freshly Laundered Sheets.   You know how soft, yet crisp fresh sheets are?  I wish I could sleep on fresh sheets every night...maybe one day when I am a successful businesswoman and have a live in maid...but for now, I have to settle for doing it myself, so obviously they don't get changed everyday.  I like freshly cleaned sheets more than most people.  Yep, I just said that.


5. Mail and E-mails from actual people that I know.  Sure, I love a sale or new Coach styles as much as the next girl (if not a little more!), but don't you love it when you check your email and there is something from someone listed in your contacts; it's akin to handwritten letters of yesteryear...and no, forwarded chain emails do not count.  They give you that false sense of excitement and then are usually a letdown.  But real emails rock...so do E-cards.  The only form of communication that is better is getting a real letter (thanks Di), postcard (thanks Di), or a card!


Just some of my favorites...what are some of your faves?


You know you love me...
XOXO

Taking the dreaded Christmas Photo

Every year we take a Christmas Photo.  This photo is sent out with the annual Christmas Letter.  Both of these are painstaking for my mother.  First, she hates being in pictures.  Even if she isn't in the picture, she gets annoyed with my brother and I because about 3 pictures in, we start goofing around.  We, needless to say, enjoy having our photos taken.  (We think we must be adopted)  Second, my mom hates to brag (again, I must be adopted), so you can imagine how difficult it must be for her to write a letter to our nearest and dearest that basically outlines how perfect we are.

I love getting other people's Christmas letters, seeing the painfully perfect photo and how much people have changed and read about their year-in-review.  I hope all of my faithful followers (like all 3 of you) are now inspired to write your own Christmas Letter and will be sending it to me!

Coming to a Christmas Card near you!

Aren't we angelic?

Maybe Mom has a point about the messing around...

Merry Everything!

I'm baaaaaaack!

Don't worry, I'm back.  I apologize for my absence.  I have officially settled on this as my blogging platform...please update your bookmark, again.


To win you back over, I will entertain you with what I have dubbed, the "Pie Debacle."  On Tuesday, we had a Thanksgiving lunch at work.  Obviously, I signed up to bring pie.  To clarify, I am not a cook; I dabble in baking, emphasis on dabble.  I decided to use this fabulous recipe I had to make a Pecan Bourbon Black Bottom Pie.  I figured, how hard could it be?  I mean I can make a mean pan of brownies (no, not from a box), so I can handle a pie.  I was getting cocky.  I decided to wear my ADPi apron that has an embroidered pie in place of the "Pi."  Cute, right?  And, there was a KU basketball game on, so I was all like, Rock Chalk!  In retrospect, the game may have been a distraction.  


So, on to the pie.  I preheated the oven and got out all my ingredients.  First, I tried to put the pie crust in a red Paula Deen pie dish.  The pie crust did not come to the top so, I decided to use a glass dish.  Well, I went on my way and mixed everything and put it in the pie dish.  Well, the filling was exactly at the top, so I tried to scoop out a little bit.  I decided that it would probably be ok.   After 10 minutes in the oven, it was apparent that I was wrong.  The filling began overflowing, taking some of the pie crust with it.  All that sugar, then began burning in the bottom of the oven.  That burning then created smoke.  I didn't want my pie to taste like smoke, so I let it out of the oven and then had to open the doors and turn on all the fans so that the smoke alarm didn't go off.  That was all I needed, the fire department showing up.  Well, my mom wasn't home so after several phone calls, she came home and it became apparent that this pie wasn't going to work out.  After removing the charred overflow from the bottom of the oven, I had to have a second go.


The second time was much better.  I realized that I had used 4 times the amount of butter I was supposed to in the first pie.  Oops.  When I managed to follow the recipe exactly, the pie turned out spectacularly.  Lesson learned: Don't watch KU basketball while trying to make a pecan pie.


I hope you enjoy my misadventures :)