Pre-Holiday Weekend Wrap Up

It is hard to believe that we are just 4 days away from Christmas. Someone observed that time moves a whole lot faster in December if you are an adult. This is so true! As a kid, it seemed to crawl by as we waited for Christmas.

SNOW!

This weekend kept us pretty busy. We got about an inch of snow on Saturday night and when Ella woke up she saw the ground was covered. So after breakfast, the kids and I suited up in snow gear and went out to play in the yard.

It was fun to see Andrew all bundled up. He looked so funny trying to walk in his boots and snow pants. The snow wasn’t “snowman” ready, so we really couldn’t build one. But we did get to run around and throw snow at each other. He really had fun once he got over the “awe” of it. Ella? Well, she just loves to run and jump in the snow.

Cookie Time!

Our Elf on the Shelf, Twinkles, had the idea to decorate cookies this weekend.

She is obviously a Sam’s Club member!

The kids had a blast decorating them.

Ella had her “Bucket O Princesses” with her as she decorated hers. Andrew was eating them as fast as he decorated his …

Picnic

Yesterday, Ella wanted to have a picnic. So we put a blanket down in the living room, I whipped up some grilled cheese sandwiches, and they had a picnic.

Note the “Bucket O Princesses” are with her at lunch, too! LOL!

I probably should have thought about giving them applesauce pouches. That blanket needed a good wash after the picnic was over.

Say “Ahhhh”

This morning, when Sam got home, we had to take the kids to the dentist. Ella did ok, but there are things that she won’t let them do. Sam went back with her and I guess she started to freak out about getting an X-Ray. We will probably need to see a pediatric dentist who may be able to get her calm enough to get them. Andrew had no issues at all, He was a champ.

After our visit to the dentist, it was time for a visit to Santa. Ella was so excited to go see him. More on that in my next blog!

One Final Story

Last year my dad got us an Amazon Echo. You have to link it to an Amazon account, so I linked it to mine.

Sam and I decided that we were not getting each other anything for Christmas this year. I decided to get her something from the kids. So I took $20 I won on an instant lottery ticket and put it in the account I used for my DJ business (so she wouldn’t know) and ordered her something on Amazon.

She was standing by the fireplace yesterday where the Echo is yesterday. She see’s something that pops up on the screen.

She asks me, “What did you order from Amazon?”

“Nothing,” I said.

“According to the Alexa, you have something arriving Thursday that YOU ordered,” she says.

“Don’t worry about it!” I told her, hoping she would drop the subject.

She didn’t drop it and says, “We don’t have the money to spend. Did you put this on your credit card?”

“No. It’s not anything big. It’s something from the kids to you.” and I explained that it was from the lottery ticket money.

She finally drops the subject, until today.

“By the way, I know what you have coming from Amazon,” she slyly says.

I look at her flustered. “Every time I try to get you something as a surprise, something spoils it!”

She then says, “What made you think to get that?”

I don’t say anything. I told her to just act surprised when she unwraps in.

Then she laughs and says, “Yeah, I don’t know what it is. But I was hoping you would tell me by telling you I knew what it was!”

“Wife Trickery” at its finest!! Man, I almost told her what it was! Somehow I think she knows what it is anyway, but we’ll see.

Craving Christmas Cookies

I posted a quick Facebook status about this earlier today. I was surprised to see that it is something I have not blogged about.

Today, for whatever reason, I was thinking about one of the cookies that grandma used to make each Christmas. Among the many types of cookies she made were chocolate chip, oatmeal raising, sugar cookies, icebox cookies and the ones pictured about – pizzelles.

I am unsure if this was an Italian Christmas tradition or what, but she always made them for us around the holidays. In some Italian bakeries, and even at some grocery stores, you can find packages of pizzelles, but to me, they lack the “homemade” taste. I can tell these are mass produced and they just aren’t the same.

I believe I have grandma’s recipe at home for these. If not, my brother has it with her pizzelle maker. The pizzelle maker is literally an electric waffle iron, but for cookies.

I’m sure that my grandma’s maker is probably 30-40 years old, easily! If memory serves me right, the recipe was on the box, or maybe in the instructions. I did a brief search online before writing this blog and remember that some recipes were made with Anise extract, while others were made with vanilla extract. It has been so long since I had my grandma’s that I can’t recall what she used. She may have even used both.

I may have to eventually spend the $40-$50 and buy a pizzelle maker one day. This weekend I am going to pull out the recipe cards and see if I still have her recipe. Some of my friends on Facebook (and who are Italian) mentioned that they have their family recipes, so I may have to “borrow” one of theirs….

Here is one I found online:

Ingredients

  • 8 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and slightly cooled
  • 8 tablespoons margarine, melted and slightly cooled
  • 5 large eggs
  • 1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
  • 3 cups all-purpose flour
  • pinch of salt
  • 2 teaspoons Anise extract
  • 2 teaspoons baking powder

Instructions

  • Cream the butter, margarine and sugar together. Add the eggs and Anise and beat until the mixture is creamy.
  • Sift the flour and baking powder into the batter and mix until blended. If the batter is too thick you can add a tablespoons of water, or a little flour if it’s too thin.
  • Bake the Pizzelles according to the manufactures directions. Store in an airtight container.

MANGIA!!!!

The Always Fully Stocked Pantry

My friend Margaret posted this picture on my Facebook page today saying that it “reminds me of visiting grandma’s pantry!”:

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I totally laughed out loud at this picture!  The dude has a shopping cart!!!  I can totally relate to this!  My grandma’s pantry was literally a grocery store! Perhaps this is because she lived through the depression.  I really don’t know, but she was always bargain shopping.  I remember my dad taking her to three different grocery stores on the same day because of the different sales going on!  Coffee is on sale at Farmer Jack …..

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Toilet paper is on sale at A&P ….

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They have a sale on paper towel at Kroger ….

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The pantry

We rarely went into my grandma’s basement.  I don’t really recall why.  Perhaps that’s why I can only recall certain things about it.  I remember there being an extra stove down there, which she used for baking Christmas cookies.  I remember the washer and dryer and laundry area.  There was a huge freezer where she stored Wonder Bread, and meat.  I also remember a small area with peg board where my grandpa had some tools.  The one thing that I can remember vividly, is the pantry!

The pantry was directly under the stairs.  I think there was a sheet or a curtain that was used for a “door”.  In the middle of the pantry was a string that hung down from a light fixture that you pulled to turn on the light.  Once you turned on the light, you could see countless shelves, stocked fully of everything and anything!

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It was insane!  It was SO full, we used to call it “Kroger”! The above picture would be a fairly accurate comparison to my grandma’s pantry, except it was hardly as wide!  Looking at this picture made me chuckle, because as I look at it, I see many similar items that grandma had.  I see the countless boxes of noodles (which my grandma ALWAYS had).  I remember her having Prince noodles.

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There was a Prince facility close to our house (off of Groesbeck Highway, I think) which had a sign, which was a HUGE box of noodles.  On the back of it was their slogan “Wednesday is Prince Spaghetti Day!”

One thing that I see in the pantry pic that would NEVER be in grandma’s pantry is jarred spaghetti sauce!  As I have said in previous blogs, grandma made her sauce from scratch every Sunday!  So instead of the jars, there would be can after can of Contadina Sauce, Paste, and Puree.

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I remember there being hundreds of cans of Contadina!  Cans of all sizes lined the shelves of the pantry!!

I made more frequent visits to the pantry when I had moved to Ludington when I was 21.  I would come home every other weekend and see my folks, my girlfriend at the time, and my grandparents.  I always left with a box of stuff to take home.  She made sure I always had things I wouldn’t necessarily think about.  Things like dish soap.

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Always looking for the bargain, my grandma probably had the cheapest dish soap ever made!  It was this pink generic brand that hardly made a bubble when you washed with it!  The pantry was full of this!  It was so cheap that I think I used an entire bottle every two weeks!  I can’t describe the smell of it, but I’d know it immediately if I caught a whiff of it today!!

Another thing she always sent with me was bath soap – Lux to be exact.4d3cabc87712e9cd28271ecab52e7bd7

I think my entire family razzed her about this soap!  She didn’t care.  She was an advertiser’s dream client!  When I asked her why she bought so much, she told me “Movie stars use that!!”  She obviously had heard commercials and seen print ads featuring Loretta Young, Jean Simmons, and Natalie Wood!!

As far as I know, there were no Lux ads with men promoting it!

Another shelf was loaded up with Ketchup.  I’m sorry, Catsup.  I remember grandma using Del Monte for most of my childhood, but at some point, switched to Hunts or Heinz.

del monte

Just what is the difference between Ketchup and Catsup anyway?!  We must have used a different brand at home, because I remember the ketchup at grandma’s house tasted different.  Maybe because (according to the picture above) Del Monte used PINEAPPLE to make it?!?

Another thing that was always in grandma’s pantry was Velvet peanut butter! It had three faces on the front and they all had names (kind of like Rice Krispies Snap, Crackle and Pop) Fresh, Pure, and Delicious.

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I remember grandma making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with crunchy Velvet and apple or strawberry jelly.  She always saved the glass jars that the peanut butter came in.  They became storage for things like screws and bolts for my grandpa, as he had them lining his workbench under the pegboard.

The other things I remember from the pantry were not kept on a shelf.  There was a little area off of the door where grandma kept her storage containers.  These would be the various containers that would eventually hold the numerous cookies that she would send home with us every year.

My favorite was always the Better Made Potato Chip Can.  She would place a layer of different cookies in it starting at the bottom.  One layer would be ice box cookies, next would be sugar cookies, next were sesame seed cookies, followed by oatmeal raisin and chocolate chip.  It seemed like a million cookies in that can, although it probably only held a little over 100.

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It’s truly amazing how something like a picture can bring back something you had totally forgotten about!  Thank you, Margaret, for the laugh and for allowing me to revisit grandma’s pantry, I mean, Kroger!  Until my next visit …. let me just turn off the light ….

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