The older boy, many years ago.Tonight at sundown, the Jewish holiday Hanukkah begins! We have already begun celebrating; last night our old friends came over for a pre-holiday dinner (because we couldn’t match schedules during the holiday!) and we had our Annual Hanukkah-palooza. I wrote about it last year when I had about three readers, and frankly this year was almost exactly the same: same food, same people, same fun, so I think last year’s post still holds. Click here to read about our fun evening and see photos of the phenomenally fattening–but delicious–food we made. Now, a little about dreidels. Basically a dreidel is a four-sided top which has…
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Sugar Rush, Part Two
Seems like everyone who read yesterday’s post wants it, so here is the easiest truffle recipe you will ever make! The recipe is from a book called Homemade Candy: By the food editors of Farm Journal. It is a hardcover book, originally published in 1970 and cost my mom $4.95, according to the cover flap! Years ago when Julesie, our mom and I started making these yummy candies, I pilfered borrowed this book from Mom’s kitchen and just never gave it back*. Of course, I *did* write the recipe down for her, so she’d have it. TrufflesToo delicious for words to describe (it really says that, under the title!) 1…
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Sugar Rush
Nothing like a little sugar (okay, a lot) to take my mind off the pounding headache and nausea that came about partly as a result of my two hour, fifteen minute commute home from work in today’s blizzard (two hours longer than my normal commute). First, I want to show you the gorgeous candy gift I received from the younger son of Movie Maven, who is in my second grade Religious School class. Movie Maven told me she has been making this candy for years. It not only looks beautiful, but it tastes awesome, too! Next, tonight I finally got around to making those truffles I was tweeting about earlier…
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Who Knew An Empty Bag Could Contain So Much Bad Ju-Ju??
When my parents came up from Tennessee for Thanksgiving, they brought a big bag to me from Kate, which contained a few Yankee Candles I purchased from Bean during a preschool fundraiser (they’re getting those kids out earlier and earlier!). As I was taking the candles out of the bag, I noticed something in there that I didn’t expect: it was a quilted bag/purse that I had given to Kate two years ago. This bag is awesome. My aunt, who is a phenomenal quilter, gave me a couple of them and when I saw this particular one I knew I would have to give it to Kate because of the…
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A Really Sweet Weekend
So, my parents are on their way back home to Tennessee. It was a nice Thanksgiving weekend, though a little crazed with two extras in the house 24/7. I tend to walk around sort of wondering “Who moved my cheese?” because I’m such a creature of habit, and holiday weekends definitely throw a wrench into my cherished routine. We had a great visit, though. More about Thanksgiving dinner later, but I wanted to show you what my mom and I did on Thanksgiving morning. We baked. Yummy. First, we made a bunch of pumpkin bread and chocolate chip banana bread, and a pumpkin pie. The chocolate chip banana bread recipe…