A Very PW Thanksgiving

I had no idea that cooking an entire Thanksgiving dinner all by yourself would be so much work.

A few years ago, we hosted Thanksgiving at our house, but we had other people helping with food.  This year, however, our company was a bunch of college guys and it just didn't feel right to make them bring food.  Since there were only going to be a few of us, I decided to have a simple Thanksgiving--PW brined turkey, PW mash potatoes (but no sweet potatoes--sad), PW stuffing, Gramma Nadine's cranberry jello salad, some veggies (brussel sprout & asparagus), PW rolls and one pie.  Pumpkin.  Just your basic Thanksgiving foods.  Plus the special breakfast we needed to have (Gramma Nadine's egg sausage casserole, Bob's cinnamon rolls and pineapple & blackberries I found on super-sale).  I was actually disappointed that there weren't more people for me to cook for and that I was forced to do such a simple meal.  But on Thursday afternoon, after two days of cooking, I was very glad there was no one else coming.  Oh, did I mention that I decided I needed to make everything from scratch this year?  I've been reading too much Pioneer Woman, who is my new hero.  I'm just a little obsessed with her right now.  Ok, I admit it. I have a total crush on her.  Her food is easy to make, uses normal ingredients you have actually heard of before and will probably have in your kitchen, and it tastes delicious.  Plus, she has step-by-step picture instructions on how to make all her dishes.  You can never go wrong making one of her recipes (thus, the majority of my dishes were hers, some of them with my own little twist).

All my work was worth the effort though, because dinner turned out splendidly.  I was actually quite surprised and pleased that I didn't mess anything up.  Especially the turkey (last time I made turkey it was not so great) and my never-made-before, completely-from-scratch dishes--stuffing, gravy, cranberry jello, and pie crust.   Actually, I did totally mess up the jello salad and had to call my Gramma at 11pm her time for help. Fortunately, she was still awake making the very same jello for our east-coast family's dinner.  But that's the benefit of cooking things ahead of time--you can try again the next day and still have a wonderful dish to serve for Thanksgiving dinner.

Lessons I learned this year:

• It's ok to not make everything from scratch (stuffing from a box next year!)
• Start early (like days early) in case you mess up and need to do an entire dish over again
• Butter makes the best turkey baste
• Mashed potatoes can never have too much better
• Butter makes everything better
• Dried rosemary on Buttered Rosemary Rolls is not an acceptable substitute for fresh rosemary
• Pie Crust really isn't that hard to make
• Cooking turkey doesn't have to be a terrifying adventure
• Always have a Gramma available to call for help (or take the time to thoroughly read the recipe)
• It's not the best idea to plan a huge breakfast in addition to your Thanksgiving dinner if you're the only one cooking
• Never attempted gluten-free cinnamon rolls; nothing good can from it
• You can always trust the Pioneer Woman's cooking advice

Someone wanted turkey really bad


The cinnamon rolls...I started to frost them, then decided I should probably take a picture of the pretty swirls.  My MIL in gluten intolerant and I want to make these when she visits at Christmas this year, so I did a trial run and made some of these with gluten-free flour.  Gag. Me.  They were simply awful.  We threw them all out.  Poor, sad, gluten-intollerants.  I don't know how you do it.


Pioneer Woman Turkey Brine


My turkey was gorgeous, thanks to the Pioneer Woman. And much easier to cook than I remember it being.


Our spread (to me it looks very small for all the work I feel like I did)


Gramma Nadine's cranberry jello salad (2nd batch) not so prettily displayed


Amazing brussel sprouts


The stuffing had cornbread, sourdough bread and french bread.  Yum!

Thankful

For my gracious and forgiving Savior. For my kind and loving husband. For my precious baby boy.  For my family and friends. My home and health. For freedom.  We are underserving, yet so very, very  blessed.

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. And from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.
John 1:14, 16 

Lemony Lemon Loaf

My desire for lemony tasting foods tends to wax and wane.  Recently, it has waxed.  Profusely. Especially after I can across this recipe from Glorious Treats (who, incidentally, is one of my new favorites).  I felt like it needed to be made immediately, but I didn't want to eat the entire thing by myself (trying to lose that baby weight).  So I invited some friends over for a little girls night and got to work.

The recipe was just a little more labor intensive than your average loaf recipe (probably mostly because of all of the lemon zesting and juicing), but it was oh so worth the effort.  This bread is Ah.Maze.Ing. And not just because I was craving something lemony.  My non-lemon craving friends thought so too.  And my husband, who kept sneaking past when he thought I wasn't looking, cutting off slices (I think he ate almost a fourth of the loaf).

I ended up with two full loaves and one mini loaf.  We devoured one of the big loaves, I gave the small loaf away, and the second big loaf is in my freezer, patiently waiting to be consumed.  I'm waiting for just the right moment to pull it out.  I should probably invite some more friends soon.

Anyway, if you're feeling overwhelmed by the urge to eat all things lemony, or are just needing a yummy non-holiday bread, head over to Glorious Treats for the recipe.  Oh, I bet you could even use oranges instead of lemons to give it a little holiday flare.  Hmmm....maybe I'll try that next.

My Very Own Cooking Show

I just love the Food Network.  When we had cable, it was my absolute favorite to watch. And it's pretty much the only reason I'm sad that we no longer have cable.

I also love food.  I love to read about it, buy it, cook it, bake it, and, of course, eat it.  I also like to pretend that I'm Rachel Ray or Alton Brown or [angles singing] the Pioneer Woman (oh my goodness, isn't she amazing!?) or any other number of celebrity chefs with their own cooking show.  And I've always thought it would be so fun to have my very own cooking show.  Prior to Henry, I would pretend in my head and no one would know.  But now that Henry is here, I have a captive audience on which to practice my cooking show.  I just plop him up on the counter in his Bumpo and start working, talking through the various ingredients I'm using and the multiple steps taken to create a delicious dish.  He's learning many interesting things and will hopefully one day enjoy cooking for his family as much as I enjoy cooking for mine.

Learning the proper technique for chopping onion


Juicing and zesting lemons for Lemon Bars


Making the yummiest chocolate chip cookies in the world


Cutting more onion; we use a lot of onion. And garlic. Yummmmmm!


Even Daddy got in on the fun and taught Henry how to make brownies

Twin Boys Vintage Toy Baby Shower

One of my good friends, Laina, has a sweet little girl who just turned one.  Last year, some friends and I threw a baby shower to welcome sweet baby Kaylin.

About 7 months ago, Laina found out that...surprise!  She was pregnant again.  And even more surprising....she was pregnant with twins.  As you can imagine, Laina has a lot to prepare for.  In just another month or so, Kaylin will be getting 2 baby brothers. And yes, they'll only be about 13-14 months apart.  Yikes!

Seeing as Laina will be needing doubles of almost everything, and that most of her current baby stuff is all pink, I decided she needed another shower.  Plus, it gave me an opportunity to plan and host another party, which I love to do.  So I enlisted the help (and amazing party-hosting house) of my friend, Sara, and threw a vintage toy baby shower for Laina's "2 Sweet Boys."  We were very pleased with the results--both of our party planning and of all the good and much-needed stuff Laina received--and decided that we should probably start a party-planning business.  So if you ever need a party planned for you, you know who to call.  :-)

Sara painted this sign--she's an amazing painter!

We held a diaper raffle--one baby goes through tons of diapers; just imagine how many 2 go through!






We decorated with tons of vintage toys; some we already had and some we bought. I love vintage toys and hope to eventually compile a bunch for Henry to play with.


Twin sock monkeys!

Sara painted the "Toys" sign on the mantle (like I said, she's amazing). We'd seen something similar (a tin, maybe?) on another blog and decided we needed one. She also painted the ABC blocks.



We played Mommy Memory, which was super fun. Basically, match baby/maternity terms and receive a prize that goes with the word. For instance, match "Twins" and win Doublemint gum.

A table full of sweet treats for to celebrate the arrival of Laina's 2 sweet boys!





Blurry picture of AMAZING oreo truffles. Oh my goodness, they're SO yummy and so easy to make!





Vanilla Chai Cupcakes with a Chai Cream Cheese frosting. Oh. My. Delicious-Yumminess.


This tin had ice and milk--next time I'd try to find a smaller tin--this one was a little big.



I made all the windmills--super cute and easy little project. And AK was kind enough to drink all the soda so we could use the bottles to decorate.



This is part of the invitation that someone used on their gift--such a cute idea!

The beautiful mommy

A much needed gift: My Breast Friend nursing pillow for twins

Mommy and Me and Kaylin