Holy Christmas! Cinnamon Rolls, year 2

I baked homemade cinnamon rolls again this Christmas.  The first reason is because I wanted to eat them on Christmas morning with homemade breakfast casserole which I blogged about a couple months ago when our friends stayed with us.  And we have a Keurig now and the thought of piping hot coffee with sweet rolls and breakfast casserole on a cold Christmas morning just sounded lovely. 

So one weekend day I spent several hours in the kitchen making these little gems.  I made one batch....which is about 40-50 rolls or 7-8 pans...then once I got started and realized how perfect they were turning out I decided to share some with our closest friends and family so they could enjoy cinnamon rolls on Christmas morning too. 

I had pans of cinnamon rolls everywhere.

And our kitchen smelled wonderful all day long while they baked. 

I used the maple-coffee frosting from the original recipe on The Pioneer Woman blog and sprinkled a few chopped pecans on some of them before packaging to deliver.

It was nearly impossible to not get a fork and just eat them from the pan as soon as they came out of the oven with icing drizzled over the top.  But, I did resist.

I sealed up the pans with a bag of icing and used these cute little place cards to put a little label on top.  What a good use for place cards, huh?

 I delivered 8 pans of rolls before Christmas day meaning we had 8-9 pans for here at home. Dangerous!  I kept out two pans for us then froze the rest.  I will try to not eat anymore for a month or so but Robbie just loves sweet things for breakfast so I will let him pull out a pan to reheat every once in a while.

I  found several variations to The Pioneer Woman's sweet rolls on her blog and would love to try to make the orange or caramel ones, maybe around Easter.  I love making these things!  It's a yeast dough but extremely easy to work with and there is no kneading involved.  I had several messages from friends and family about how much they enjoyed their rolls on Christmas morning.  I think it may have been one of the best gifts I gave out this year and will continue to be an annual tradition here at this old house. 

Christmas Eve 2013

We started out Christmas Eve at Mom and Tom's house this year.  We had some tasty fried chicken for dinner before opening our gifts and visiting for a little while...or I should say that I visited with them while Robbie and Bob fell asleep on the sofa. Robbie had been up since 4 a.m. for having to work; I have no excuse for Bob.  ha ha!

Mom and Duke...her little sidekick

                              

One gift I got was my maternal grandma's recipe box.  It was a neat gift and I've already looked through it a couple times to read over some of her handwritten recipes.  One I wanted was for Rum Cake and it was in there.  May have to make a second rum cake during the holidays.

Mom made Elvis cake for dessert this evening.  It was very good!

Once we returned home Bob, Robbie and I opened the gifts we gave each other.  Even though we were full from dinner we still managed to eat some sugar cookies and egg nog while opening gifts.

Me and Lucas in front of the downstairs tree.

 Robbie's big gift this year was his very own laptop.  He knew he was getting this so it wasn't a really big surprise. We each saved a gift to open on Christmas morning then will have breakfast before we head out for a day filled with family fun.

 

 

More to come later....

Tis the Season

We're right smack dab in the middle of the Christmas season and while I'm merry and soaking up everything that I can, I also want to just sit and enjoy the peacefulness of the season ever so often because as soon as I blink it will all be over.  We have been busy socializing up a storm for the past couple weekends and still have the actual holidays coming up in less than two weeks where we'll be in a 2 day whirlwind of visiting with family.   While I love to entertain and spend time with friends and family I have to have a break every once in a while which is why the upcoming weekend is our white-out weekend.  We have plans on both Saturday and Sunday....those plans will be to NOT have any plans or visitors at all.  To take time for Christmas movies not yet watched, do the last of the holiday baking and have some quiet in our home for two solid days.  So when we've been asked to do something that particular weekend my reply has been, "No thanks, we have plans."  Because we do.

We've had a great month so far this December.  I've done a lot of decorating, baking new Christmas sweets, entertaining friends in our home and of course enjoying the snow.   We saw The Nutcracker performance, the muscial Elf, gone to the movies and dinner with friends,  attended holiday parties, shopped at the mall and online, and I've spent a few minutes here and there just staring at the Christmas tree lights while sipping some cocoa. Every year during the month of December I listen to Christmas music every single day, watch Christmas themed movies over and over and burn  holiday scented candles.  I even have a cinnamon scented car freshener hanging in my car for this month.  Love it!

It's all great and wonderful but can get overwhelming after being constantly on the go.  Taking some time to recharge for a couple days will hopefully give us the energy and attitude we need to push through the the season in a jolly mood instead of spending the last week of the year exhausted.  Hope everyone else takes some time out for themselves to sit back and get out of the hustle and bustle for a couple hours, or a couple days, to be able to enjoy all the beauty around us during this magical time of year.

Photo Dump

I have no idea why I'm behind on blogging. I'm not giving it up but sometimes cannot think of any good stories to tell although we have been busy doing stuff and I'm sure something good happens everyday. Anyway I did upload theses photos this morning and can share those. 

The first several are from Thanksgiving with the Fishers.  We had deep fried turkey which is the only way to eat Thanksgiving turkey these days.  It was a cold day but Bob braved the temps to get the bird done for us.  We soaked it in a brine for about 15 hours the night before and we think it really made a difference.  The meat was unbelievably juicy! 

I love cooking Thanksgiving dinner and this year made several things including learning to make oyster dressing with Phyllis.  It was delicious and I look forward to making it again next year.  Also pictured is my pumpkin pie and Phyllis' pecan pie.  Jennifer made a chocolate pie.

I think our food is so awesome on Thanksgiving because we make everything (but the gravy) from scratch....Jennifer's homemade dumplings, Bob's mashed potatoes, Phyllis' yeast rolls and my sweet potato casserole (no canned yams either!).  Kevin made green bean casserole and Phyllis also made cranberry salad.

And since I like to take pictures of my food here is my plate below with nearly all the above mentioned.  I ate what I wanted on Thanksgiving Day and was able to get back on my healthy eating plan the next day.

Me and Phyllis after packing up leftovers for everyone to take home.

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Okay, now we're moving onto Christmas.  I've cut back on what I bake for Christmas this year since none of us need to eat 4 dozen cookies in a month.  I did try out some new candy recipes as well as some old ones and served them up when had friends over this weekend during the snowstorm.  There's peanut butter fudge, lemon coconut bars, chocolate chip cookie dough brownie truffles, and Ritz cracker candy.  I asked our friend to each bring a little sweet something so in addition to what I made we had peanut butter pie and another assortment of homemade candy. 

I  made homemade turkey tortilla soup, O'Charley's potato cheese soup and set up a Panini bar.  For the paninis we had orange marinated chicken, turkey breast, bacon and honey ham.  I also set out several toppings like raspberry preserves, pesto and a few different kinds of cheeses.  The 6 of us had a nice time staying warm with spike Wassail, eating good, hot food and a lot of laughing. The nice thing is we've had plenty of leftovers to tide us over all weekend long so I haven't had to cook.

Last but not least...here is a photo of a really old Nativity set I have that belonged to my dad's side of the family.  It's from Germany and who knows how old it is.  The figures are made of this really thin clay-type material and are very fragile.  I don't think the "stable" is original to this collection but I guess it's the one my grandparents last used to display the scene in.  I think I'm going to get some moss to cover up some of the green and red spray paint one of these days.

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We've enjoyed the winter weather this weekend.  We stayed in on Friday and watched the ice and snow come down and finally ventured out yesterday morning to exercise at the mall then see The Nutcracker last night.  Today we'll venture to the mall again to walk a few miles then hang out and watch some football.  I may do a little online Christmas shopping from the comfort of this old house.  We already have Robbie's big Christmas gifts purchased including his very own laptop and printer (he doesn't read my blog) and will go shopping for gifts for a few of my clients later in the week. 

That's it folks!  Hope y'all are doing well.