Monday, December 20, 2010

Sweets and Singing

One of my favorite Christmas traditions is making candy, fudge and cookies for all my friends and family, and go deliver a nice plate of goodies to them.  As much as I love my family, there is no way I’m driving 3 days just to sing a carol and hand over a plate of yummies… they will have to settle for a Christmas card this year.
However, I couldn’t let that stop this tradition.
Today I worked so stinking hard!  I woke up and got the boys off to school which was a nightmare today.  Then I drove to my favorite grocery store Aldi to pick up what will hopefully be enough groceries to last us the week.  I didn’t get any coupons in my paper this week I almost cried, but told myself it was a blessing because I will save myself some valuable time from cutting coupons, so after Aldi I skipped my usual shopping marathon.
I came home and put away the groceries, did the dishes, cleaned my kitchen, folded and put away some laundry, and through another load in, picked up a couple of toys that are still hanging out at the bottom of my laundry chute, and then told myself I’ll find the rest of Little Princess’s room later… but I did find her snow boots!
Then my little charge got dropped off for me to watch.  He and Little Princess ran off to play with some little trucks, and I went to work on my goodies.
I had a bunch of bananas that were getting pretty brown so I decided that I should make some banana bread with it.  I made 5 cute little mini loaves of banana bread, (banana is really fun to type!)  then went to work of the fudge.  The recipe I have was given to me by my sis-in-law, which was given to her by her Mom-in-law, and who knows where she got it… but it is amazing!  It is so soft and sweet, but not overly rich… it’s a lot like the inside of a truffle.  Heavenly?  Yes!

Finally I had to make choco/scotch clusters.  This is my husband’s family tradition, and I LOVE it.  You melt 12oz semi-sweet chocolate chips, 12oz butterscotch chips, and 4 tbls. Peanut butter in a large sauce pan, then add 8 cups of Rice Krispies.  Mix it all up until the cereal is well coated with the melted chocolate, then drop spoonfuls onto wax paper.  I put them on a cookie sheet and refrigerate for about an hour.  Anyway, they are simple and delicious, and no your thighs no good.
Once little charge was picked up, and Doc (my hubby) got home we headed out to spread some Christmas cheer in the form of high calories.
We drove around to 6 of our closest friends, and had so much fun visiting with them and handing over the goodies… but first we had to do one of my favorite things… Carol. 
Now… with Little Princess only being 3 years old, I’m pretty much the only member of the family who wants to sing, so the on the way to the first home the boys came up with compromise.   
When we arrived at the first house they boys hid behind trees, or bushes, or even a snowman and when our friends opened the door I started singing, “We wish you…” and the boys would jump out and  sing “A Merry Christmas!”  and then hide and kept jumping back out at  “A Merry Christmas”.  It was so funny and they all loved it. 
I’m sure we didn’t sound like the beautiful traditional carolers


We were more like this:

But, except for the occasional bickering over seats in the van, the night was fun, and today I’m grateful for sweets, and singing.


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