homemaking

What do iced sugar cookies, knitting and G.K. Chesterton have in common?

December 13, 2008 by Edie Wadsworth 10 Comments

Here at our homeschool, we’re following a strict curriculum. Today’s goal: Bake Grandma Evadne’s sugar cookie recipe in the shape of stars….and ice them. Recite G.K. Chesterton’s A Christmas Carol. Make snowflakes while dancing to “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Clause”. Punishment awaits those who do not fully participate!

You must try this recipe. It’s fantastic and comes from the north woods of Minnesota. Of course it’s always better when Grandma makes it….but we had fun and they turned out fantabulous. (And as side note, my kitchen looks like a nuclear fall-out shelter.

Notice the vintage aprons that we bought this summer while we visited Steve’s family in MN…

and ta-da……the most wonderful Christmas cookies ever.

and to make this festive celebration more vintage…..my sweet mother-in-law sent me three beautiful pieces of hammered aluminum…..THE most beautiful pieces that I have received or collected to date…..

and as if that weren’t wonderful enough, she knitted the girls the MOST ADORABLE booties you have ever seen. EVER.

This led us to a grammar lesson about ‘how to write a thank you note’ which the girls thoroughly enjoyed. There’s something so grown-up about addressing an envelope. And don’t forget to admire the snowflakes…..thank you Sandy for the link.

So there you have it…..a wonderful evening of baking…..

and enjoying the festivities of Christmas.

We finished it off by watching ‘The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

C.S. Lewis is a genius…..and his mentor G.K. Chesterton was too. So enjoy the following recitation of his poem “A Christmas Carol”. And here’s a shower of hugs and kisses to Grandma for making our evening so special. We’ll eat a cookie for you.

P.S. Thank you to brother Jeff for the email he sent to Issues,Etc…..which apparently won us blog of the week…….Hitchkicks are in order, I believe.

Grandma’s Sugar Cookie Recipe

Beat together and set aside.

2 eggs

1 cup sugar

4 T. milk

Mix the following together like pie crust:

3 1/4 C. flour

1 t. soda

2 t. baking powder

1/2 t. salt

1/2 t. vanilla

1 c. softened butter (2 sticks)

Mix the egg mixture into the flour mixture. Roll out and cut into your favorite shape. Bake at 400 for 8-9 minutes.

For the icing, I mix 1 stick butter (softened) with 1 stick of Land ‘O Lakes margarine (softened, and don’t try to substitute some other margarine, K? just get the right kind) and then add 1 bag (2 pounds) powdered sugar and 1-2 T. milk, a pinch of salt and 1 t. vanilla. I then pipe the icing onto the cookies and sprinkle. Have a wonderful Saturday and happy baking.

Christmas Tour of Homes………

December 10, 2008 by Edie Wadsworth 80 Comments

Grab a cookie cookie and come on in!

I am so excited to be linking to all these festive Christmas tours.

Ya’ll are gonna love this cookie recipe. We’re just making iced sugar cookies (recipe here) and putting the final touches on our decorations. The ‘little’ girls wanted to show you their tree first and then we’ll move on to the rest of the house.
They love this white tree and the colors we used coordinate well with their girly room. And we sorta have a love affair going on with ribbon. It’s a southern thing.

Welcome to this Christmas tour sponsored by the BooMama and Hooked on Houses and Kimba……and welcome to my home. I was so happy to participate in this linky party and in fact am using alot of the same pictures I used for Nester’s garland party…….so hope you don’t mind. These fun linky parties gave me the added ‘kick in the tail’ I needed to finish my decorating. I am so happy with how it all turned out and can only say that this garland probably weighs a good 30 or 40 pounds. I pray for the stability and stickiness of 3M tabs…..

And because I have more Christmas decorations than any sane person should, I ‘borrowed’ stuff from the house to make this years’ Christmas cheer fun but cheap. So I snatched the ‘W’ from the kitchen……
and the star I ‘borrowed’ from the breakfast room……
I started with a skinny little anemic garland and added lots of fresh magnolia, cypress and pine and then added my signature Christmas decoration……lots of ribbon!

I had the little evergreen trees from Thanksgiving and put them on candlesticks…..

and voila!! My best garland ever. Thank you Nester for the inspiration.
I took my skills from the garland on the bannister…..which is sadly not finished, so I can only show you this far up.
and I thought you’d enjoy this little jewel…..it’s a cute ‘family tree’ decorated with pictures of all of our brood……..
and this is my favorite tree this Christmas……simple and kinda old-school…..
then there’s the table top tree in the breakfast room…..
and my dining room with a bare but beautiful bird tree…
and a peak into my bedroom where I recently nailed pillow shams right to the wall for window mistreatments (a Nester trick from way back) and added some fun lights for Christmas.
That’s one sure fire thing about being Southern……we know how to do everything ‘big’ and ‘bordering on gaudy’. We tend to be of the ‘more is more’ persuasion. And if you’d like to know more about Southern women, I’ve given a short tutorial here. I would like to add that I’m a brand new reader to BooMama and L.O.V.E her blog. Apparently along with everyone else in the free world. Hope you are inspired to make your Christmas colorful and beautiful!

The day after……

November 28, 2008 by Edie Wadsworth 5 Comments

In the afterglow of a wonderful day of food, family, football, and fun……I am ready to relax. I have my books (A Christmas Carol, Uncharted, and Organizing Solutions for ADDers), and my knitting and I’m snuggled on the sofa by the fire…..with the sweetest little snuggle bunny you’ve ever seen. There’s a small…..very tiny….part of me that wishes I was shopping with my sister. Or at least drinking coffee and people watching. As people nearly kill each other to get whatever it is the HOT items are this year. But mostly, I’m just so thankful…..to be here today with my family, eating leftovers…….and admiring my new ‘picture wall’ I made for my office. With 8×10 pictures that I printed on regular paper.
This project started itself really. I was printing 4×6 pictures to put on my ‘family tree’ tree and accidentally printed one of them as an 8×10. So as not to waste a beautiful picture of someone I love, I secured it onto my cork board in my office. Then the madness began…..and I love how it turned out.
And since I didn’t manage to get hardly any pictures of the Thanksgiving feast(I guess I was a little busy), I thought you’d enjoy this project.

So whether you’re shopping or relaxing like me……have a wonderful day! And remember that Sunday is the first day of Advent. We’re putting our advent wreath out today along with our calender. You should try it….it’s a great way to teach your kids about the coming of our Lord.

Now, should I have creme brulee or apple pie for breakfast?

A little Christmas Cheer…….

November 19, 2008 by Edie Wadsworth 17 Comments

I’m on of those people……that my brother-in-law hates…..that decorates for Christmas before Thanksgiving. Always. Every year. Since I can remember. And it’s not that I don’t love Thanksgiving. I do. It’s my favorite holiday. But I have a lot of Christmas decorations. And if I waited until after Thanksgiving, I’d be stressed trying to get it all up. So in the name of having energy and sanity left for thankfulness, I do it early. Furthermore, we are Lutheran so we follow the church calendar….and certainly want to have our decorations up when we start our advent calendar. Which is quickly approaching. It makes me cheerful and gives everybody in the house a little spring in their step to see all the decorations going up so soon. So I make no apologies: I decorate and bake with thankfulness in my heart!

I also ‘host’ my extended family for Thanksgiving, so I love decorating the dining room table and coming up with fun ideas for the kid’s table…..and cooking. Lots and lots of cooking. So I take my cues from my mother in law who is the queen of cooking lots of wonderful holiday food. And her secret: start early and freeze what you can. So tomorrow, I bake pecan and pumpkin pies.

I’m also working on my placecards and making sure all my linens are laundered and ready to go. I also put up 4 Christmas trees today. Don’t throw things at me through your computer. I leave several of my trees decorated all year and store them ‘ready to go’ in the basement. So let me rephrase that: I carried up 4 trees today. There, is that better? So here’s the tour so far.

The tree in my breakfast room….
oh look , a beautiful cardinal flew in and nestled into the ribbons…..
I love birds by the way…..and have them tweeting around everywhere…..
This sweet little table top tree is in my living room. It’s mint green and I love it with all my heart. This is it’s 3rd Christmas with me…..and it’s third different spot.
Meet my banister garland….not yet finished but getting there……
see how much more fun after I add a pair of peacocks…….(my version of two turtle doves)
and probably my signature Christmas decorating ‘move’ is ribbon……lots of ribbon…..everywhere. And this year I added blue to the mix. Don’t ya love it?
I love to layer with ribbon….different colors, patterns, sizes…..with extra long ‘tails’…….

I always look for whimsical patterns….polka dots or something similiar, and mix that with more majestic colors or textures.

and this my friends is a little gift I gave myself today. New makeup and lip gloss bags from TJMaxx. I love the pattern. And since as you know all my personal belongings got stolen, I needed a little ‘pick-me-up’…..not bad for 9.99. Now all I need is lip gloss.

and for all you purists out there, I’m decorating my dining room table with traditional Thanksgiving Day fare….complete with a menu…….printed out and featured on the plate. I’m completely obsessed with silhouettes too and am working on a tree decorated with mostly silhouettes…….and lots of ribbon.

Be creative. It doesn’t have to be expensive. Last year, I was in a Christmas home tour and decorated a tree in my son’s room using playing cards, poker chips , large bulb lights and a piece of burlap for a bedskirt. I did something similiar in the little girls’ room with flashcards and ribbon. Think outside the box…..and make it your own.

Hope you’re inspired to put on some Christmas music and tie some ribbons.

Knitting, Blogging, and Better than Blogging Brownies

November 9, 2008 by Edie Wadsworth 6 Comments

Remember in this post where I said I was gonna be sitting on sofa knitting when my company arrived? Did I mention that my whole family would be ‘lying’ on the sofa knitting. This little knitter is a phenom. She already finished her scarf (with a little encouragement from Grandma) and her stitches look better than mine.

We built a fire (maybe slightly exaggerated) so we could knit outside……..
Grandma worked on an afghan (her, I don’t know, 11th maybe this year) and I worked on my sweater…..which may be finished in 2015…..and will probably be too small for anyone to wear…and will likely be out of style…..and probably unravel. I’m no natural at this. But I do love doing it. You should try it. But don’t make a sweater. I should’ve made leg warmers. ‘Cause I’m a dancer, ya know. Stop laughing. Are you laughing at me as a dancer or me in leg warmers? It’s not that funny. I think I will knit me some leg warmers….to wear to my ballet class. Then I will post pictures of me…..dancing……in my hand knit leg warmers. Now, I’m laughing.
But I did finish this pretty little scarf….to give away to you in just a few days. It is knit with lots of love…..whoever gets this scarf is one lucky friend of mine. While I knit this for you, I thought a lot about blogging and how it has changed my life……so that is what my 100th post will be about…..you, my sweet blogging friends and how my life is different now because of you all.
And besides knitting and ‘building’ a fire, we made homeade chocolate brownies. The name of them from the recipe book was “Helen Traulich’s Favorite No-Fail Brownies”. No disrespect meant to Helen, but c’mon. So, I renamed them “Better than Blogging Brownies” which tells you that I mean business when I say that you need to make these brownies. NOW. And because I love you all I’m including the recipe. Here’s to Helen!
1 stick butter

4 eggs

1 cup sugar

1 can Hershey’s syrup

1 tsp. vanilla

1 cup plus 1 T. flour

1/2 cup chopped nuts (optional, I didn’t put them in mine)

1/2 tsp. baking powder

1/4 tsp. salt

Frosting:

6 T. butter

1 cup sugar

1/3 c. milk

1/2 c. semi-sweet chocolate chips

1. tsp. vanilla

Mix ingredients together for brownies and place in greased 9 by 13 pan. Bake for about 30 minutes on 350. For frosting, melt butter, sugar, and milk and boil for 1 minute. Remove from heat then add chocolate chips and vanilla. Stir until slightly thickens and spread over brownies.

Prepare to enter chocolate heaven.

Surprised by joy…….

November 7, 2008 by Edie Wadsworth 8 Comments

“If we discover a desire within us that nothing in this world can satisfy, we should also begin to wonder if perhaps we were created for another world.” C. S. Lewis

Do you ever have days or moments where you feel like all is right in the world? Those moments are wonderful and fleeting. Or when the longing for something turned out to not quite satisfy like you thought it would? That longing or desire is God-given. And will never be fully realized in this world. That said, let me show you a few sights that come close.

…snuggling with Grandma….

…watching your daughter add the “mom” leaf to the “What we’re Thankful for” tree…..

…spying on your children as they stage a puppet show with Grandma…….

…dipping pretzels in white chocolate……

…sneaking a few (handfuls) of these pepper nuts that Grandma made….

…..admiring your newly painted and decoupaged bookshelf…..

and newly made sign….

….and feeling almost giddy about this most beautiful butter crock that Grandma had specially made in Minnesota…. you can store your butter in the cupboard (next to the bacon grease) so that it’s always soft when you need it….and I need it…a LOT.

…..scarfing down a mighty large piece of pumpkin creme pie with oreo crust…..my very own creation. It was delish. I used a coconut cream pie recipe…left out the coconut and added pumpkin….I know, brilliant. I should have my own show…….

We get glimpses here of sheer joy…..but they leave us, and for some…..seldom even come. For my children, those moments often come when Grandma and Grandpa are visiting. Mine seem to be fleeting moments in time that I can seldom foresee and never produce on demand……the way my son smiles, Elea falling asleep in my arms, my daughter answering her phone in her best country voice saying “Huva Got”, my husband tucking my girls to bed….and making sure the cover is just right. Those are the moments that we can’t hold on to, that often overcome our emotions and reason…..and leave us wanting more. Those, my friends, are glimpses of heaven, or Eden, for which we were made, and to which we will return.