Christmas Goodies, Nomnoms!

Hey everyone! Heh, finally managed to remind myself to take pictures that I needed to of certain things and with that, I shall introduce you all to the Christmas goodies!

First off comes Christmas dinner! We ate at home this year, and let me tell you, it felt very nice to not rush, to not force ourselves to pack everything up and be ready by 10am or Noon. This was probably one of the most relaxed Christmases I’ve had in a long while!

The Christmas dinner consisted of chicken; which we covered in bacon and smoked for about 4-5 hours the few days before Christmas, pinto beans; not canned, but home cooked, homemade rolls, German potato salad; done up in a Texan way using cilantro and Texas beef sausage in the mix, cranberry sauce, and of course a holiday meal would never be complete without a grand serving of gravy, which was homemade with chicken stock, fats, as well as oils from the sausage when it was cooked! The meal was very filling (seriously, that’s without eating anything but candy the beginning of the day) and it was extremely delicious!

The next goodies? Desserts! Homemade candies in the flavors of:

Cherry, lemon, mint, peppermint, maple, and caramel! I had a blast making the candies, and although I may have lost some feeling in my fingertips from when I made the lemon drop candies, it’s something I’d happily do for years to come. The mints, both flavors, are made with a sugar paste which is basic fondant, and it hardens to a melt in your mouth quickly kind of strongly flavored candy.

The next big thing I spent an entire night+ working on, were my pumpkin spice flavored,Christmas tree cupcakes!

I immensely enjoyed the process that went into this. The gift boxes and the ornaments are made of the same fondant as the mints, and were formed and dried before being painted with food coloring, decorated with a fondant bow for the boxes, and stuck on the trees and painted for the ornaments. The more I look at the above pic, I see a cute little tree in its stand, waiting for some giant to come by and pluck up one of the gift boxes!

I hope everyone of you had a very wonderful holidays and Christmas, and I hope you all have an amazing new year. I’m blessed to have been able to make all these items, share them with not only family, but share the images and my thoughts of the experiences with all of you. I’m extremely thankful for all of you. I know I haven’t published any of my Bloggaries, but don’t you worry. Come the new year’s celebrations passing, I’ll be pumping out the Bloggaries (finally!)!

Thanks for reading everyone. Much love to all of you! ❤

Bloggary with Briana: Page One!

Well, hi there! This is my first Bloggary post, so let’s experience this randomness togetharrr!

(04-02-14)
Delivered a BEAUTIFUL standup desk today. The place we delivered to has a policy that someone from the firm that you’re delivering to has to take the item up, but you are allowed to accompany it. I’m pretty sure I had a ‘Scratch it, and you will die’ scowl on my face the whole time I was walking with the guy who had it on a furniture dolly, even though it was wrapped in moving blankets.

My Dad had to take the truck around to the parking garage across the street, so awkward me was standing with the customer’s/the Firm’s Secretary and the guy with the furniture dolly, and just playing around on my phone between between telling them about the right lane being closed and speculating when my Dad would be up to the 21 floor. The guy transporting the desk was really careful, and the customer said the desk was amazing^_^.

Here’s the desk. Isn’t it beautiful? Baltic Birch top and poplar stiles and legs stained Dark Walnut :D.

It was near lunch time, so the garage was pretty full; meaning my Dad had to park on the ninth level of the garage. I’m not the best with heights, and while I’ve been higher up, nine floors up and looking down at the street is still enough to make my head spin.

(04-03-14)
Some stuff happened today.. I’d rather not talk about it. Let’s just say my dog betrayed my trust, and I’m not happy or proud of him right now. I probably won’t talk to him the same way for a while…-sigh-

(04-04-14)

Oh, what happened today..I…uhhhh. I made fried egg sandwiches for lunch today! Finn is trying to apologize I guess. You know that look a dog gives you when you haven’t spoken to him because of him doing something bad, and deep down he knows was bad? Yeah. Getting a lot of that from him today. (I spoke, like, two words to him and he went bounding off happily. He knows he’s still in trouble though, because he’s smart enough to know what he did was awful.)

My Mom and I trimmed around our Rosemary plant, and it looks a ton better now. A tree limb had fallen on it a couple years ago, and made the middle branches fan out.  It was really ragged looking, buuuuut.
           

                    See?
Just needs a little more trimming up, and it will look perfect! 😀 Also, while taking this pic of the Rosemary, this moth was flitting about on the ground!:

Now..what am I doing the rest of the night…? First, going to eat some super delicious salad, made up of iceberg lettuce, tomatoes, boiled eggs, spring onions, and cheese, with a lovely russet potato! Looketitlooketit!! Nomnomnom!

And theeennnn later I’m gonna have some vanilla ice creaaam and, since it’s Friday night, we’re watching some movies and I’m micromanaging the pixelated lives of people by playing Sims 3! I’m kinda obsessed with Sims 3….and the family I’m playing right now, especially, since they’re the first family I’ve played that I’ve picked a grown child from to continue on the family! Woo!!

Aaand while you’re here, why not check this out? I’d be super duper grateful!

Bloggary with Briana