Christmas 2010

We had a great time with Christmas this year. The kids were so excited to FINALLY get to open presents and I was SO glad all the work was done for the year. Here are the munchkins in their spiffy new pj's.

Grandma & Grandpa Gardner came down and spent Christmas Eve with us and we had so much fun playing games and munching on yummy food.

We were up bright and early for Christmas morning and then off for brunch at Grandma & Grandpa Hall's house. It was a rare day of ALL the kiddos being in one room so we took advantage of the moment and take a picture of all the grand kids.

This is my dorky brother wearing his babies Santa hat. I don't think I need to further comment on this picture, it speaks for it's self.

This was the FUNNIEST moment of the day, my (macho/cowboy) brother trying to put together a teeny tiny Polly Pocket house. He flipped his lid when he saw that you had to use a screw driver to get the darn thing out of the box. Welcome to parenthood, Ryan!

We had a wonderful day of laughter, food and Love. There could be no better Christmas. Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas season.

Merry Christmas

I want to wish everyone out there a very Merry Christmas from all of us at Rainy Day Farm. May your lives be blessed in all the ways you need. We will be celebrating with family and friends and hope you have someone special in your life to spend this wonderful holiday with. May you have peace, love and joy in your lives. I am thankful for all of your friendships, they mean more to me that you will ever know.

Baking with Boys

My nephew Matthew came to visit for a few day during Christmas break and one of the things we did was bake sugar cookies. I must say that baking with boys is a totally different experience that baking with girls. The bulk of the conversation was about poop, bums, toots and belches.

Even the red frosting ended up being blood.

There were frosting and sprinkles flying everywhere. Even a few frosting knives hit the floor.

Matthew tasting the goodies to make sure they pass inspection.

Can you tell a kid decorated this one. I ended up with more than a few empty bottles of sprinkles.

They even helped get the kitchen cleaned up, what a deal.

So I was looking back through my blog and realized that I have never posted my sugar cookie recipe. So, here goes. I got this recipe from an old church cookbook from the 1980's.

One Hundred Year Old Sugar Cookies

1 c. sugar

1/2 c. shortening

1 egg, beaten

4 T. Milk

1 t. vanilla

2 1/2 c. flour

1/2 t. salt

3 T. baking powder

1/2 t. soda

Cream sugar and shortening. Add egg, milk, and vanilla. Stir in dry ingredients; mix well. Chill dough fro 30 minutes. Bake at 325 for 10-12 minutes. (I bake mine at 350 for 9 minutes)

I love this recipe because it does not require a lot of refrigeration, most of the time I go straight to rolling and cutting. Make sure you don't over bake or the will get crunchy, unless you like crunchy. I am a soft and puffy girl myself. Merry Christmas.

Bob's new favorite place to take his cat naps is under the Christmas tree. It has wonderful lighting, is up against a wall, and is safe from Landon. He has been sleeping under it all month long, which is nice because then he is not on our beds bugging us. Merry Christmas Bob, we put up the tree just for you.

Christmas Baking

Yesterday I got together with my Mom, Sister, and Sister-in-law for our annual Christmas Baking day. We get together and go crazy with the sugar, butter, flour, and chocolate. We each make about 3-4 different items and then pool our resources and come home with a staggering amount of sweets. I am sure you are wondering WHY we have so MUCH, we do use these for gifts and put some away in the freezer for later.

The best part of the day is all the funny things we talk about. Kids, husbands, hunky movie stars, and of course food.

Don't these pretzel rods look divine?

It takes all day to come up with this sugar bounty, but it is well worth it. It has be come a fun tradition that we all look forward to every Christmas.

We are much more tired that we look here in the picture. That or we are hopped up on sugar!

Merry Christmas and happy baking!

Bazaar Preview

I have been a busy beaver this past week putting together a few things to sell in the booth at my Mom's booth at our local bazaar. I didn't think I would have time to get anything done and then remembered the $ I could make, so the kids and I have been scrambling to get a few things done.

Here are some of my felt turkeys that I have been making forever, but they seem to be a hit every year so I keep making them. Next to that is my version of a 2x4 Christmas tree and Showman. I got this cute idea from Under My Umbrella. Go check out her super cute blog and craft ideas.

Addison & Logan made these super cute candycane reindeer treats. I even found chocolate candycanes so they look more like reindeer. Aren't they adorable. I think they would make the cutest stocking stuffers for Santa. Maybe, I need to give him a jingle.

These reindeer are ready and rarin' to go for Christmas.

Addison and I made these candy ornaments for a tree decoration. They are red and white pipe cleaners twisted together and glued into a circle. Super cheap and fast. I have a few other crafts to make this week and when I get them done I will post part two. Wish me luck!

Christmas Morning Breakfast

One tradition that we have had for many years is making sticky buns for our breakfast on Christmas morning.

This is what you will need. Rhodes Rolls, frozen, butter, brown sugar, and cook and serve pudding. The recipe calls for butterscotch pudding, but you can use other flavors. I used vanilla, because the store didn't have butterscotch. I actually like it better with vanilla.

This recipe is from an old church cookbook that I have, and love dearly. This recipe is from my childhood best friends mother. She is a wonderful cook. I don't put nuts or raisins in my recipe.

Spray a bundt pan really well and place 18 rolls inside. Pour the dry pudding on top. Melt butter and brown sugar together and pour on top.

Place the pan, covered with a towel, in a cold oven. Let it sit over night. In the morning the dough will be raised and you can remove the towel and turn of the oven. Bake for 35 minutes. Remove pan and turn upside down on a large round plate. (just a note, I would place a sprayed peace of foil on top so the top rolls don't get too brown.

Don't they look yummy!

To make the cocoa even better have it in a cute little Santa mug. Merry Christmas.

Christmas Eve Traditions

For our Christmas eve traditions, we are pretty low key. We trade off years between families so we can stay home on Christmas eve. We have a simple dinner, this year we had lasagna.

We write our letters to Santa!

The kids leave them in their stockings, so Santa won't miss them.

We watch one of our favorite Christmas movies. It is a movie staring Jimmy Stewart. It has such a wonderful message. We love it!

We then read from Luke 2 and a few other Christmas stories. Then we each get to open one gift. It just so happens that that one gift is a new pair of pj's. We love getting new one each year.

And finally we put out the cookies and milk for Santa to come. The kiddies head off to sugar plum land and Mommy and Daddy finish up any final preparations. This year we started watching A Christmas Story and were so worn out by the day that we fell asleep and woke up at the end of the movie. It was kind of funny!

We love to leave the cookies and milk with the nativity, so Santa won't miss the best part of Christmas. This is one of the nativities that I have. This is the one for the kids, from Little People. What do you do for Christmas Eve.

Gingerbread Cottage

One of our family traditions is to make a gingerbread house. Since my kids are little and I feel crazy busy all the time I just buy a pre-made kit. You can find them at many different stores. I have bought mine at Costco and Walmart for about $7-10. They are not as elaborate as homemade, but the kids love it anyway. Someday, when they are older I will try my hand at making one from scratch.

The best part is sneaking a candy or two off the gingerbread house like Hansel and Gretal!

Merry Christmas

As I sit here and smell the gingerbread house next to me I am thankful for all that I have been blessed with from God. I have more abundance that I deserve. I just want to take a minute on the Christmas day and wish all of you the best Christmas ever. Thank-you to all of you out there who bring so much joy to my life. Merry Christmas.

Santa's Little Helper

When I got home from a long day today there was the most adorable little box sitting on my counter. I looked at who it was from and wouldn't you know, my long lost twin(not really, but we like to pretend) had sent little ole me a package. I new it had to be something great, so I grabbed the scissors and opened the box. Inside was the cutest rootin tootin cowboy I had ever seen.

Sorry for the cruddy picture. I had to use my flash and it works too well and makes everything look like lightening is in the room. Then I turn it off and everything looks fuzzy and dark.
Something about a man in a hat that gives out presents. What more could a girl want! Yeehaw! So a great big thank-you to my blog buddy Amy for this thoughtful little treasure that will adorn my tree for years to come. I love blog land for such great friends!

For Aunt Sharon

We got together, all the girls in the family, this weekend for our annual Christmas baking day! We go to my Mom's house and bake our little hearts out! We have so much fun laughing joking, sharing secrets and this year even a little dancing.

We had a Christmas music station on that played everything from Bing Crosby to Hansen. We were laughing at one of the hip hop songs and before we knew it my Mom and I were shaking our junk. My Mom even busted out a little Beyonce move. We were laughing so hard about throwing our backs out that we were just in stitches. I am pretty sure that my sister-in-law Randy thinks she married into the weirdest family in history. We did have a sad note, Courtney, my other sister-in-law, really did throw her back out and couldn't come! She was missed. She is the sweetest thing and lots of fun. We hope she gets better.
Kiss cookies are a family favorite. We dive into these first for sure. (Side note, if anything looks good to you, email me and I will get you the recipe. www.rainydayfarmblog@gmail.com)


My sister in her cute gingerbread apron.

My sister-in-law Randy making her rich and yummy Chocolate Raspberry Bar Cookies. Yum!
Candy and Mandy! (Family Joke)

My Dad was brave and took my nephew Matthew and Logan to town shopping with him. They, of course, ended up at the motorcycle shop and made out their wish list. Yeah right! Nice try. Then, my Dad the sucker, drove all over town getting different food for everyone. He ended up at Chinese, Subway, and KFC! What a sport. When they got back they started diving in!

Look at all that yumminess! Sugar cookies, Kiss cookies, Turtles, Peanut Brittle, Meringue Cookies, Peppermint bark, Chocolate Crackles, Almond Roca, Rolo Cookies, Crunchy Peanut Butter balls, Red velvet cake balls, Creme Wafers, Coconut cups, and Fudge, oh my! I hope I got it all! I think we out did ourselves this year, and our waistlines are going to show it!

We're done and still smiling. It was a very fun day. We are sorry our Aunt Sharon was not there to help us. She is a big fan of our cookie day! Maybe one of these years she can pull herself away from the warm sun of Arizona and join us! We hope you all have a wonderful Christmas. We will all be buzzing on sugar overload.

Merry Christmas!

Christmas Funny

This is just plain funny! I was emailed this the other day and could not stop laughing at what the guy said! Enjoy, and stay tuned for our big baking day and yummy recipes!

"Good news is that I truly out did myself this year with my Christmas decorations. The bad news is that I had to take him down after 2 days. I had more people come screaming up to my house than ever.Great stories. But two things made me take it down. First, the cops advised me that it would cause traffic accidents as they almost wrecked when they drove by. Second, a 55 year old lady grabbed the 75 pound ladder almost killed herself putting it against my house and didn't realize it was fake until she climbed to the top (she was not happy). By the way, she was one of many people who attempted to do that. My yard couldn't take it either. I have more than a few tire tracks where people literally drove up my yard."

Family Tradition

In my quest to make nice Christmas gifts I continued a long standing family tradition by making Lemon Butter. My Great-Great Grandmother was given this recipe by an English lady and my Great-Grandmother made it every Christmas. I am not a very big lemon fan, but this stuff is to die for. You can put it on french toast, waffles, muffins, rolls, or quick breads, or eat it straight out of the jar with a spoon.

So I emailed my Aunt Sharon for the recipe and got to work. It was very easy to make and took about a 30 minutes total. I doubled the recipe to get enough for 4 pint jars.

Lemon Butter

2 cups sugar
1 cube butter
4 eggs, beaten
1/2 cup lemon juice

In top of a double boiler add sugar, butter, beaten eggs and lemon juice. Cook on medium high/medium, stirring till smooth then can be stirred occasionally. When it starts to thicken slightly and the thin white foam on top disappears cook just a few more minutes and poor in jars.

I've been told it does not work in a regular pan. If you don't have a double boiler you can use any pan with water in the bottom and a heat proof bowl for the top part.

I don't have a double boiler so I put a metal bowl on top of a pan and went to work. It worked great.


This is what it will look like what it is almost done. Next, pour butter into cute jars and let cool. Refrigerate after cool. Butter can be frozen. Use within a few weeks of making, if it lasts that long! This makes a wonderful gift. People will ask for it again and again.

My Aunt told me that I would be the 5th generation in our family to make this recipe! That made it even more fun. I love having a connection to the past and my family. That is what life is about. Thanks for sharing this recipe, Sharon!

We now have a 6th generation that loves this stuff. He could not get enough of the Lemon Butter! He even liked it on his french toast. Hope you enjoy it too! Let me know how you like it!

Merry Christmas

I have linked up with Fresh from the Farm for the Holly Jolly Recipe swap. Go check out all the cute recipies.