Tweens

Pot Roast & Bananagrams

Monday, April 4, 2011 By Sherra 4 Comments

Calm and quiet weekend here.

My favorite kind.

One darling daughter came home for one night.

We watched The Final Four basketball games together.

She took her baby sister to a movie.

And bought her new glasses. Her second pair of these fashion accessory only glasses.

She requested her favorite home cooked meal.

Pot roast, Granny’s noodles, mashed potatoes, corn and rolls.

Gosh, could I cram one more starch in to that meal?

We sent her home with the leftovers so her darling twin sister and friends could indulge in a homecooked meal this week.

Minus the pleasure of our company means it won’t be as good but I hope they’ll enjoy it.

I even included a dozen chocolate chip caramel cookies I baked on Saturday.

After dinner, we played a quick round of Bananagrams.

Have you played this fun game yet?

Back in February when Scary Baby and I played eleven rounds of Boggle and she said we were going to continue to play until she beat me, I had to tell her that was impossible.

When I shared Scary Baby’s relentless quest for a Boggle victory, my friend Ann said she had a great word game she would send us promising as much fun or more for the whole family.

We love it!

Not bragging, but no one has beat me at this one either.

Then we watched a little of the Country Music Awards while the boys headed to a movie together.

So nice to have you all to ourselves Wizzy!

We missed you Roger Leroy.

How was your weekend?

Filed Under: Finding the Funny, Food, Moments, Teens, Tweens

School Fundraisers ~ For Good or Evil?

Monday, March 21, 2011 By Sherra 7 Comments

I’m baaack! I’ll show you what I’ve been busy doing later but right now I feel ready to tackle this volatile subject.

I think I’ve mentioned before how much I don’t like school fundraisers.

Am I alone here?

I do understand that schools need money just as I understand that teachers are underpaid.

But under the tenet of providing a solid education for our children, please tell me the lessons a school fundraiser teaches.

Here is what we’ve learned at our house.

Lesson #1

Competition is a normal part of life.

We get that. We embrace that.

But pitting students against each other when the playing field is not level really gets my goat.

Side note: What is the origin of the phrase “gets my goat”? Was this back in the day when everyone had a goat? We’ve never had a goat.

Back on topic…

The competition increases significantly when you may have more than one kid at the same school. Perhaps you even have THREE kids at the same school…due to your head injury, poor family planning and God’s will. Just sayin’

Do you send all THREE kids out in your neighborhood of 52 houses. Oh wait, I forgot to mention your next-door neighbor has two kids at the same school.

Is it now a race to beat your neighbor’s kids?

Is it a race against siblings?

Or do you send the whole group out together to knock on doors and let the neighbors decide which child they will buy from?

To think I haven’t even addressed WHAT they are challenged to sell. I may need to save that for part two of school fundraising madness.

Lesson #2

Pit parents against parents.

Bobbysue’s dad took his form to work and because Bobbysue’s dad is the boss, everyone bought something and filled up Bobbysue’s order form.

Bubbajean’s dad is not allowed to solicit at work. In fact, this is in the employee handbook. Bubbajean and his two siblings (all at the same school) have an empty order form.

Guess who is going to win a ride THE HUMMER LIMO?

The mean girl in the neighborhood.

Lesson #3

Bribe your kids to not participate in the fundraiser.

Now I can hear some of you thinking that’s not a very good lesson.

Yeah, I know. But neither is the lesson of your school bribing your kid to participate in the fundraiser.

So maybe the lesson should be “Creative problem-solving during school fundraisers”.

Fundraising reps who visit the school with promises of amazing prizes are not my favorite people. These flyers are the equivalent of taking a 3 year-old to Toys R Us after they’ve been up all night and you fed them a Coke and candy for breakfast and telling them they can pick ONE toy.

Over-stimulation!

Note the amazing new sales tactic in lower right corner. Get those emails entered so we can contact your friends and family all year long and you get an amazing prize!

Don’t even get me started on “The Fur Bus” and the tears and yelling at my house.

Bribing Scary Baby with a Dollar Store trip worked for a few years but the enticement of hats and other cr*p proved to be too much.

Anyone else resort to bribery?

Lesson #4

Life is not fair.

Yes, it is our family motto.

This seemingly conflicts with my attitude against school fundraisers. Let me attempt to defend my position on this.

Kids have enough pressure in school without the addition of fundraising pressure.
We all know a certain (high) percentage of parents can and do sell for their kids.
We all know that many companies have strict policies about soliciting and forbid parents from bringing in little Jethro’s fundraising catalog.
We all know it is no longer safe to send our kids out to conduct door-to-door sales. Especially if you have creepy neighbors. (We don’t.) And what about those kids who don’t live in a neighborhood?
Fundraisers and lack of adequate funds put adult problems on our children’s backs.

Our Family Solution

I will tell you that after kindergarten and 1st grade with my first three darlings and shipping things to Illinois and Texas because they called the grandmas, I was done.

I called the school and asked what was the average amount the school made on fundraising per child. This seemed to be an odd question and required a few days for calculations since I guess they had never been asked.

It resulted in me writing a check to the school for that average amount times three and announcing that the Humpfreeze family would not be selling items, thank you very much. I did this for the next seven years until they entered public school.

Shoot me now but I then decided that we had paid taxes for the public school that we had chosen not to use so for the future years of fundraising we got a pass.

Until Scary Baby got sucked into the thrill of the fundraising frenzy.

She HAD TO do this.

She HAD TO have this hat.

In her defense, the hat was much better than the glasses that were also a drinking straw from the previous year.

The Fundraiser Victory Lap

Now your kid gets to sit in a room of 25-30 kids and watch the chosen few parade out for their fundraiser rewards which may include:

homework passes
ice cream sundae party
money grab
a LIMO ride (which also conveniently includes missing school for at least a half day).

These are the actual prizes from the fundraiser that Scary Baby just finished with last week.

Please tell me what a remote control cooler is and why a kid needs one?

These rewards are all in the name of your kid’s awesome sales skills.

Or daddy or mommy’s sales skills.

Imagine being the kid with lame sales skills or parents with lame sales skills or a lame mom like me who have to stay back in the classroom or worse yet, be sent to another classroom of misfits who aren’t invited to the fundraiser REWARD PARTY?!!

Breathe. Sherra. Breathe.

After receiving her purchases from Scary Baby…

Roger Leroy’s classic one-liner:

“World’s Finest Chocolate isn’t.”

There are just too many variables. There has to be a better solution.

What’s the worst fundraiser ever? Best fundraiser?

Any amazing PTA fundraiser-loving moms out there who can share some accurate statistics about the percentage of children who actually participate? I’m sure it varies and small schools have a higher guilt factor than large schools but I would really like to know!

Weigh in. Tell me why I should embrace school fundraisers.

Comment away while remembering our other family motto…

“Just Be Nice.”

Filed Under: Finding the Funny, Tweens

Snow Updates and Superbowl

Monday, February 7, 2011 By Sherra 9 Comments

The theme is still snow since I asked for Midwest blizzard snow pictures.

One came via my cell phone on Friday.

My cell phone only shows the phone number and no contact name so I opened the message.

“This is from my sister in Milwaukee area”

“Our mailbox is almost buried. The drift in front of my house is over my head.”

It took me a few minutes but I figured out it was from my friend Peggy. Wow, Scary Baby and Wizzy were impressed. They wanted more details on snow drifts and how they get out if the road and mailbox are buried in snow.

Thanks Peggy!

I sent some texts with a little bossy peer pressure for these next pictures.

My younger sister lives in a submarine

My niece sent me these pictures of their portholes.

Okay, just kidding. Submarines don’t have siding.

Did Grace do all the shoveling?

Abby said they didn’t have a yardstick or measuring tape. Abby is 5’7″ to give you some idea of snow depth.

My Shovel is Bigger Than Your Shovel

My friend Ann lives near the Quad Cities (Illinois/Iowa border) and they got a little snow too.

Some people don’t mess with wimpy, little hand shovels.

That is an 8 foot privacy fence.

Aren’t you suppose to store or cover your lawn furniture before the snow does?

That is a poor little wiener dog.

Superbowl Fun

This year it was really all about the food and being together.

Because we weren’t really fans of either team. But since we needed to root for a team and the Bears or Colts weren’t contenders we went with the Packers.

Excellent choice I must say.

Christina Aguilera messing up the National Anthem was a blooper we had to rewind several times. She kept singing and covered but it was cringe-worthy.

Our professional assessment:

Half-time show: weird.
Commercials: marginal.
Game: Pretty good to watch.
Food: Very good.

PhilBillPaul picked up some boneless wings that I thought should have been called nuggets. I made a hot dip and a cold dip.

Recipe for Deviled Egg Dip that I only used about a teaspoon of hot sauce in.
Recipe for Mexican Cheese Dip that is ridiculously easy and very mild and you could spice it up if you want.

Plus bacon sour cream roll-ups that Scary Baby and The Grunter wanted.

My friend Ann wanted the recipe so I created this handy photo tutorial for her.

Make four rectangles out of your ~~crumbling expired reduced fat~~ crescent roll dough on a cutting board or wax paper if you don’t want to wash an extra item.

Divide the chilled filling between the four rectangles and spread out.

Don’t spread it all the way to the edges or the filling will ooze out like this when you roll them up. I’ve only made these about 40 times so I forgot.

Slice in about 8 pieces per roll.

Bake until golden brown.

What?

Oh, you want the ingredients?! Sorry, this is not a food blog and I almost forgot that. This is a very complicated Midwest recipe I got from my cousin Sally many years ago.

Bacon Sour Cream Roll-ups

1 can of crescent rolls
1/2 lb. bacon, cooked and crispy
1/2 C sour cream
pinch of garlic powder

Mix up and chill 3 filling ingredients. Spread on to 4 crescent roll rectangles (pinch seams together first). Roll up and slice. Bake at 375 degrees for 11-13 minutes or until golden brown.

Scary Baby helped make the Knox Blox pennants.

With very little enthusiasm. She poked herself with a toothpick. I told her we can stop this 25 year-old tradition any time now.

Side note: Yes, that is eye makeup, Junebug. No, we don’t allow it except on Sundays when she is bored and no, she did not wear it to church.

I saw pictures of these cookies last week and I knew I had to make them.

Chocolate Malt Sandwich Cookies – yum!

They were so chocolatey that I thought we should have something “plain” to balance them out.

Browned Butter Cookies were the perfect choice.

Our standard chocolate vanilla Carvel ice cream football cake was delicious too.

We missed the darling twins but had a nice cozy family night. Did you watch the Superbowl? Have you dug your way out of the blizzard?

Filed Under: Finding the Funny, Food, Friends, Moments, Tweens

Fighting Red Hens

Monday, January 31, 2011 By Sherra 6 Comments

Look who came home…

…to show us their new team logo.

Roger Leroy found the great picture of the hen and replaced a loaf of bread with a basketball.

Such creativity and not even an art major.

The girls are playing a little intramural basketball up at school.

Side note: Jenna wants you to know she won’t be wearing a collared shirt when she plays – she happened to be in uniform.

Scary Baby is following in their footsteps.

She’s playing basketball at church.

Wizzy is coaching her team and we had to squeeze in our first 6th grade orchestra concert before the game.

What a sweet sister to come back and forth from school to coach her little sister and attend her orchestra concert.

Fun times at the Humpfreeze continue.

While we’re still sick…

Filed Under: Moments, Teens, Tweens

We Survived Ice Week 2011!

Monday, January 17, 2011 By Sherra 6 Comments

We made it!

The ice and snow fun is almost all gone.

We ventured out of the house on Friday after FIVE school snow days in a row. For those who are math-challenged like me, that was the whole week.

Scary Baby loved it!

PhilBillPaul got really sick in the middle of the week.

The Grunter lived through one full week with no fast food.

We had to cook dinner every night.

We like our pizza crust really thin so the crust from a can might look odd.

I took this opportunity to teach The Grunter how to assemble his own pizza. Big step for him.

Look at that enthusiasm. Yes, we live with that every day.

Who cares what it’s shaped like? (His looked like a turtle.) Add my homemade sauce, sausage, and lots of cheese and we don’t care what shape it is.

Scary Baby and Cloret liked theirs just fine.

Look Who Came Home

On Friday evening the college kids traveled down the mountain and came home. After they went bowling (note: activity #1).

To visit their dogs.

Thank you RL for permission to post this pretty picture.

They only brought five extra people with them for their first night home.

I was too late for photos in The Lounge that night as the guests had put on their pajamas.

I went downstairs and assembled a breakfast casserole, cheesy potatoes and double chocolate muffins for the crowd for the morning.

Saturday Morning

After the smoke cleared in the house, everyone enjoyed a hot breakfast.

I’m not a morning person so PhilBillPaul had so nicely put the casserole and potatoes in the oven. The casserole overflowed in the oven while he slept through the beeping timer and the smell continues to waft through the house as I type this.

Wizzy came home specifically for Scary Baby’s church basketball game.

Before the game we were down to six college girls because one went to work.

Wizzy is the coach of the team and this was their first game.

Sadly, Scary Baby has not experienced as many basketball victories as her darling twin sisters.

Jordan led the team prayer. Ashleigh helped her coach the team. Jenna kept the book. Rachel, Joanna and Jordan provided a very loud cheering section.

15-14 was the final score with a GIANT victory.

She whispered to her former coach of 12 years a.k.a. PhilBillPaul,

“That’s how it’s done.”

While Wizzy went to her doctor’s appointment with Jordan, the remaining four kindly took Scary Baby to lunch. Jenna headed to her own house so then there were five.

After a short nap and a small scene when the six of them walked out to Roger Leroy’s car…the Humpfreeze girls had to come back in and review:

Why we don’t put six people in a five passenger car
(it’s not just my rule – hello – IT’S ILLEGAL)

They were off to the roller rink for a few hours of skating (activity #2).

Wizzy stayed behind and another friend picked her up and she headed back to school with friends – she’d had enough of us.

They spent Saturday night at Jenna’s house (activity #3) while PhilBillPaul sipped on his codeine cough syrup and watched the Falcons get whipped.

We were down to three extras on Sunday and following an afternoon movie (activity #4) they came back to the house for a gourmet meal.

Cheeseburgers and kettle chips. Fan-cee as always!

Gave me the chance to put some patties in the freezer in case we have another blizzard.

I can’t stop the baking.

I mixed up these Caramel Chocolate Chip Cookies while they were at the movie.

I substituted caramel baking bits for the toffee bits I didn’t have. Recipe with toffee bits here.

A collective thumbs up from the group and the fact they are all gone means the recipe is a keeper!

Side note: Leigh Anne–try not to laugh at our first Dollar Store cake plate creation. The plate is a bit warped but that’s part of its charm, right?

Blog Shout Out to the Guests

We had cleaned The Lounge before they all arrived. The darling twins had left it in less than stellar condition at Christmas break. Major bonus points for restoring The Lounge to its original condition. The darling twins are piglets as we have previously revealed here and here so thank you Jordan, Joanna and Ashleigh.

Wizzy and Lisa did the same in the basement guestroom.

Is this a tiny light at the end of the tunnel? Please say it is.

Temperatures in the high 40′s this week so we’re looking forward to a *normal* week!

How was your weekend?

Filed Under: Finding the Funny, Moments, Teens, Tweens

Quality Family Time

Thursday, January 13, 2011 By Sherra 5 Comments

The snow and ice have slowed me down from properly documenting December.

The festivities of Christmas Eve were shortened considerably as some of us were working hard to get the Room Makeover complete.

We did stop long enough to have our annual fondue.

Nothing very fancy. PhilBillPaul and I were preoccupied with our unfinished project upstairs.

I snapped a few pictures. We almost forgot the chocolate fondue.

Thank goodness Roger Leroy dumped a bag of frozen strawberries in a bowl and sliced up a banana. Very sad.

And they all got to open that one traditional gift. I think I’ll make an album of 20 years of them sitting on the couch with one present on Christmas Eve.

Then they kindly modeled their new pajamas. The Grunter made sure they sat in birth order.

Side note: This photo was a reenactment of an actual moment just after they put on their pajamas. Scary Baby’s face is expressing her displeasure at being the only 6th grader on the planet without a cell phone. Next year we are starting a new tradition of a NO cell phone holiday.

Game Time

We all love games and I am proud of passing that tradition with the kids. We’ve had kids over that have never played any board games with their family. The times all six of us are together to play is rare with college and work schedules so I really do treasure the times we can play games together.

We were all too tired on Christmas Day to play anything. Finally we pulled it together to play on the day after Christmas.

The completed chalkboard wall screamed “Family Pictionary” and we promised Scary Baby we would all play together.

We drew numbers for teams and all is well as long as we let PhilBillPaul win.

We ended the evening with Apples to Apples.

The Grunter’s partner did not help him win.

Not all fun and games

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Wizzy’s most vivid memory of Christmas 2010. Everything at our house is rarely sunshine and roses. The blog highlights…the highlights.

I asked for a little help from the big kids cleaning up the downstairs after some relaxing, lazy days. After a bunch of back talk and complaining and moaning, I took matters into my hands and started to unwind the vacuum cord.

Wizzy, ever the peacemaker, tried to get me to stop and we started a “friendly” tug-o-war with the vacuum cord. (See we like games even when we are fighting.)

After a minute or so, I might have said something like this,

“If you don’t let go of this cord right now, I’m going to whip you with it…”

Her most vivid part of that memory was the last part of my sentence.

“…until you bleed.”

She has repeatedly imitated me saying this in yet another shining moment of motherhood.

I think I’ve told you before I’m not qualified to be a mother. Especially not to sassy mouthed 19 year-olds.

Back to the games

The night before the darling twins went back to college PhilBillPaul played Monopoly with them and apparently he took no prisoners and whipped them both.

But not until they bled.

Do you still play board games at your house?

Filed Under: Finding the Funny, Moments, Teens, Tweens

Yay-hoo Snow Activities

Wednesday, January 12, 2011 By Sherra 9 Comments

We interrupt our regularly scheduled blog post to give you more Southern snow updates.

PhilBillPaul wanted you all to have accurate photos of the total accumulation.

There are some great perks of having an impromptu snow vacation.

I’d like to clarify that some of these activities you see on the news are not fully reported when they put up sound bites and funny pictures.

People tend to laugh at Southerners more than in other parts of the U.S.

I’m not denying that I’m right there with them sometimes.

On Monday the local channels pre-empted all regular programming for the entire day. How many ways can you talk about and show snow and ice?

Reporter #1:
“I’m here at this shopping plaza in Lawrenceville where you can see that all the shops are closed except the grocery store. But there are only two cars in the parking lot because you can’t drive on ice.”

Reporter #2:
“Marietta is experiencing freezing sleet. [reporter bends down to poke snow] See that? There is a layer of ice on top of the snow. This is not good.”

Reporter #3:
“There is another car that couldn’t judge the center median. Their car is stuck on top of the cement they couldn’t see and that’s why their wheels are spinning.”

ALL. DAY. LONG.

Even so, I feel like I need to defend some of the snow activities during this Blizzard 2011.

First, not only do we not have many winter clothes, we definitely do not have winter toys.

We must improvise.

If you don’t have a sled…

Have your dad blow up your inflatable beach whale.

Pictures are blurry since PhilBillPaul was using the zoom from the porch. It’s really, really cold here – some of us are watching all the fun from the windows.

Second, can you even imagine being a wiener dog born in the South and stepping out in to this stuff?

Hello, they have short legs. How are they supposed to go to the bathroom when the snow makes their legs disappear?

Poor Dudley.

Major News Update

The Grunter even went outside.

He and a friend had a snowball fight. Outside. Shut up.

The only thing better would have been if the darling twins had been home trapped with us. I know that’s what they are thinking too.

But they were already back up at college.

At least they sent pictures to show us how yay-hoo soldiers improvise up in the North Georgia mountains.

If you don’t have a toboggan…

Just blow up your raft.

Make the kids sledding on pieces of cardboard jealous.

I love their creative thinking.

The raft doubles as an excellent snow-hauling vessel.

Such talented snow-sculpting soldiers they are.

Side note: Roger Leroy why are you not wearing your gloves?

Love, your mother.

We’re embracing our third snow/ice day but The Grunter is getting nervous about our food supply.

In fact, I think he’s getting the shakes because this is the longest he has gone without some type of fast food since he started driving.

Stay tuned.

Filed Under: Finding the Funny, Friends, Moments, Teens, Tweens

Room Makeover Goal

Thursday, January 6, 2011 By Sherra 14 Comments

It’s the time of year where I’m suppose to make some resolutions and set some goals for the new year.

The control freak in me objects to this January system. I prefer to make a plan in a random month of my choosing. Preferably sprinkled with a little spontaneity.

A perfect example of this is a tiny goal I set the week before Christmas right after we cleaned up the kitchen from our little baking tradition.

First, I want to make it clear that PhilBillPaul was the catalyst for this great idea. He spends way too much time perusing Craigslist and looking mostly for girlfriend parts. But after his bargain refrigerator find, he has been expanding his search.

He found 350 square feet of laminate flooring for $100. Once he secured this and wasn’t killed at the pre-arranged meeting place (a hotel in a seedy area near the Atlanta airport) and brought it home, I had the brilliant idea that he should put it in Scary Baby’s room BEFORE Christmas.

On the Saturday before Christmas, I suggested that since the darling twins were home with their friend Jordan that he should use the extra hands to help him get the flooring installed.

I’m excellent at delegating.

Did I mention that we bought paint two years ago for her room that still has 20 year-old disgusting carpet in it and the painting should ideally happen before the flooring goes in?

PhilBillPaul loves a challenge and Roger Leroy and Jordan said they’d be glad to help.

I was assigned to go to Walmart to buy paint supplies and get the 2 year-old paint shaken. I almost hate shopping on the Saturday before Christmas more than home improvement projects but felt like I had to do this since I put the whole project in motion.

I also had convinced Scary Baby to not go with one blue and one hot pink wall. Why had we bought hot pink paint 2 years ago? A weak moment for sure.

Anyone need a gallon of hot pink paint?

New room design plan:

“Wouldn’t you love a chalkboard wall instead of a hot pink wall?”

The project began…

We didn’t take a lot of before pictures but her room was a lavender pigpen.

Blurry picture compliments of Roger Leroy.

They got the painting done on Saturday.

Well, mostly PhilBillPaul got the painting done. Seems the big girls needed to take a break and go to a movie.

Flooring installation on Sunday.

Blurry picture compliments of Scary Baby.

Special thanks to Jordan who may have helped with manual labor more than any of the Humpfreeze children. Definitely more than Wizzy and The Grunter in that category!

This is apparently an important part of floor installation.

The Grunter’s main contribution was to complain that all her stuff was in his room.

The paint and flooring obviously wasn’t a surprise.

The end goal was to add some fun surprises to her room for Christmas morning.

For the first time ever, I couldn’t get all the Christmas Eve things I usually do after the kids go to bed. Instead, Wizzy finished wrapping and The Grunter filled his sisters’ stockings while Roger Leroy and I finished hanging everything in her room. And PhilBillPaul put another coat of paint on the chalkboard wall.

We finished at 3:00 a.m. like the crazy people we are. Right after I put up this threatening sign.

After a short nap and thank goodness Scary Baby slept until 9:00 a.m. we enjoyed a lovely Christmas morning with the very last thing being her opening her room for the big reveal.

Side note: The Grunter informed us the white dresser is out of place in the room. We appreciate his decorating tips but she’s eleven and it was my dresser when I was little and is actually the nicest piece of furniture in the room. (Big Lots bed, Ikea table, Walmart desk…we’re big spenders.)

Inside the photo box is a hidden jewelry box where she discovered some more surprises.

Thanks Grandma!

She had to test out her bed because there were two surprises in the bed. She had been begging for a memory foam mattress cover which cracked us up. And Granny sent a new electric blanket!

We even did the closet.

Wizzy helped me pick out pictures and send them to Walgreen’s to print on Christmas Eve.

$7.00 Walmart frame collection that PhilBillPaul painted silver the day before was the best investment in the room. She said the pictures were her most favorite thing.

And the sequined curtains. And the chalkboard wall.

Later in the day, she spun around on her desk chair and said,

“It is better than anything I could have dreamed.”

We’re not going to try to outdo ourselves next year.

And I have no specific goals for 2011 so far.

Filed Under: Finding the Funny, Moments, Tweens

Happy New Year!

Monday, January 3, 2011 By Sherra 2 Comments

Phew.

We lived through the holidays with all six of us together under one roof.

That is very rare for us with the big kids and their busy, busy schedules.

I’ll document a few of the things from our holidays and post for posterity later this week.

For now, did you hear the most exciting news that happened ’round here?

Snow on Christmas Day in Atlanta

Two of the Humpfreeze children (plus one visiting friend) ventured outside and built this awesome snowman.

As you can see, we don’t have a lot of winter gear on hand for snowy days. (Yes, those are PhilBillPaul’s weird gourds on the deck.)

Wizzy tested her new coat and scarf.

I know for many of you snow is just no big deal. In fact, you may be knee deep in it where you live, but here in the South snow on Christmas Day is really magical.

I hope your Christmas was magical. Happy New Year!

Filed Under: Finding the Funny, Teens, Tweens

Crazy Baking Tradition

Monday, December 20, 2010 By Sherra 11 Comments

Can I have an hour of your time?

Because this is really a 2 or 3 part post that I’ve crammed into one giant long post that may have the most words and pictures in my personal blog history. Accept my apology now. This is an important family document that I needed to write.

I’ve been discussing when this crazy baking tradition can stop.

It keeps getting bigger and bigger and I’m down to one kid’s teachers.

I’ve suggested that Scary Baby can take over next year.

She said I wouldn’t let her use the oven.

I said I would absolutely let her use the oven.

In previous years, we’ve used baskets or gift bags as the vessel that holds the baked goods.

I have to say we outdid ourselves this year and you must remember how NOT crafty I am.

That dang over-achieving crafty friend of mine inspired us to embark on a trip to Goodwill.

If I was trying to keep up with her craftiness, we would have been looking for men’s sweaters at Goodwill so I could whip up a skirt for Scary Baby.

Oh wait, I don’t own a sewing machine and am still stressed about that quilted vest from 8th grade Home Ec we had to wear to school so I’m probably not going to make a sweater skirt for anyone.

I know Scary Baby will thank me for this later.

Cake Plate Craftiness

Instead we chose a different crafty project. Scary Baby watched her video from way back in April. We actually practiced before Thanksgiving on our own plates and candlesticks from the dollar store.

Mostly I just want to brag about the cost of our little craft project because I love, love, love bargains.

We were on a search for candlesticks and some pretty plates.

We scored 5 pretty plates for $3.33. That’s .67¢ per plate for you non-math folk.

A coincidence that Scary Baby needed 5 teacher gifts? I think not.

No candlesticks so we headed to Hobby Lobby where I refused to pay retail for candlesticks but found these unpainted wood ones that I thought we could glue together to make them a bit taller.

6 pieces per bag and they were 50% off. Woo-hoo. $2.49 per bag and .50¢ for the round discs which meant $1.33 for each base. (Edit: math correction 2 bags of six at half off makes each piece .21¢ x 2 plus .50¢ disc = .92¢ per base. I know some math wizard will correct me.)

PhilBillPaul said he thought he should drive a screw through the three pieces for more stability.

Sure. That’s what I was thinking too.

And I totally requested that he countersink those screws before he spray painted them silver.

Not.

Bought the magical glue with a warning that the fumes can kill us and glued those suckers to the bottom of the plate.

The Baking

PhilBillPaul got his part done so he wouldn’t be in my way for the cookies, cake, bread, etc.

Chocolate dipped pretzels that Scary Baby needed 30 bags for the holiday party.

Chocolate and maple fudge. I swear packaging takes longer than the making.

Sugared pecans don’t photograph well. Everyone got about 3 pecans because pecans are expensive. I forget to save some for us.

Note to Granny: please send your 3 pecans back to Georgia when your box arrives in Texas.

Then we got into the serious baking…

One of Scary Baby’s jobs was unwrapping the Hershey’s Kisses.

Her other job was food photographer.

I think she did a great job and this pictorial essay will help her next year when she takes over baking all this.

These are our old-time favorites ~ Illinois Soft Sugar Cookies. Scary Baby loved sprinkling the blue sugar on these for the teacher cake plates.

These are a change from an Andes mint cookie I usually make ~ Candy Cane Kiss Cookies. I coarsely chopped the Candy Cane Kisses and spread them over the top after the first dozen with the Kiss in the middle. Not as pretty but we liked them better this way.

These are our newest favorites once we tried them last year ~ Chocolate Turtle Cookies. I mean they are the favorites for those of us who love nuts which means Wizzy and Scary Baby won’t go near them.

Leftover caramel with a little coarse salt is delightful on the top the chocolate cookie base when you run out of Candy Cane Kisses. Yum!

Poppy Seed Bread is a family favorite.

Let’s not talk about why the batter is smeared all over the pan because I forgot to put the 3 eggs in the batter and had to scrape 6 mini loaf pans back into the bowl and re-mix. Or the second batch when I thought the flour scoop was a 1/3 cup measuring cup and it was actually 1/2 cup. (Recipe calls for 3 cups of flour for math folks who want to figure out how much extra flour I put in one batch.) Ahem.

The third batch was perfect.

Mini Maple Cakes were a cute addition but it’s a shame I can’t frost anything worth a darn. It’s all about the taste, right?!

Let’s also not talk about the first batch of frosting that I burned so badly because PhilBillPaul called me from Kroger about what color sugar sprinkles to buy and I lost track of time. My rubber scrapper turned gray and smelled disgusting and I made him throw it away along with the bowl of molten almost black frosting.

I am a baker, hear me roar.

I can’t forget that I also made 4 batches of Cajun Chex Mix.

Everybody needs a little salty with all the sweet.

I also made these super simple Eggnog Muffins.

No one in this house will come near eggnog. I thought they were good.

Couldn’t get these creative Truffle Hot Chocolate Balls out of my head.

I did save these for our family. I rolled half of them in crushed candy canes. Don’t tell Roger Leroy they are in the freezer.

Scary Baby arranged the first plate with me and headed off to bed.

She loved picking out the colors and fun fonts for the tags. Yes, I must label all food because I am a freak about knowing what I’m eating.

We built a kind of tower of food.

In the end, even with the countersinking of the screws, the plates were wobbly so in the eleventh hour we added a small white plate to stabilize them and prayed they would be dry for transport to school in the morning.

They were.

Scary Baby was quite proud of our creations and PhilBillPaul helped her get them delivered to all the teachers.

I changed the blue and silver tags to red and green because I found these cute cardboard trays at Hobby Lobby. Again, total bargain for two trays at 50% off of 2.99 making each tray just .75¢!

I made up trays for some people at work and we mailed off six boxes.

I’m now going to sleep until the New Year.

Right after I get done wrapping Christmas.

I’ll have to show you later what the crazy baking family did this past weekend because we weren’t tired enough from last week’s baking.

Enough about our craziness…are you ready for Christmas? What are your favorite traditions?