Monday, December 6, 2021

Virtual Cookie Exchange 2021

 Welcome to the Virtual Cookie Exchange and blog hop hosted by Carol at Just Let Me Quilt. I am excited to share a favorite Christmas cookie recipe that I started making just last year. Part of this exchange is to share a family tradition and quilt too.

One family tradition that we enjoy almost every year is to visit a local house that goes way overboard with the decorations. They do it for the community and they collect donations for St. Jude's Children's Hospital. Last year they collected over $18,000. Each year they raise little more than the previous year. Enjoy the photos and videos.

This first video is a new addition to the display.

There is a reindeer barn. You can see Rudolph in the center.

There are carolers. Don't you just love the pup on the sled.


Santa is checking his list and Mrs Claus is enjoy a hot chocolate. This is in the home's garage.


Here the elves are making and wrapping the gifts.

The entire front lawn is covered with more Christmas displays.

Even the animals get a nod. Look at the penguins roasting marshmallows and the swaying squirrels as well as the skaters.


There is a nativity, but my photo didn't come out well. The penguin igloo construction company has this sign on display. Don't you love the name of the company....Igglouie Construction Co.?!

 Finally here is the bear Christmas Tree lot. 

The quilt that I am sharing this year is one I made for my daughter several years ago. She is a big fan of "A Charlie Brown Christmas". I found a fabric panel online and made her a pretty lap quilt to keep her warm each winter. She asked me to add a sleeve to it and now she hangs it as a decoration sometimes.

Last year, for the first time, I made Oatmeal Gingersnaps. The recipe was in an old Country Woman Christmas book Volume 1. I loved them, though they were a little too sweet for the rest of the family. I plan on making them again this year as I liked them so much.

Here is the recipe:

Below is the list of all the Virtual Cookie Exchange participants. This is a great way to find a new cookie to add to your recipe box. Please spend some time exploring the blogs.

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Sunday, December 5, 2021

Santa

Santa will now be my sole focus for the next few weeks as I will be finishing the secret stitching this weekend. Yay! Then it needs to be washed, ironed and brought to the framer.

I have been working on Santa whenever I get the chance while watching TV as the secret stitching got to the point where I really had to concentrate on what I was doing. After several hours yesterday morning I managed to get the difficult part done. All that is left is French knots which are fairly easy for me. I know there are those who hate them, but I seemed to have figured out what works for me each and almost every time. 

So here is what Santa looks like now. I have been working on his mitten. 

I have also added some rows to the Baby Elephant blanket. You can just see some pink starting on the top row that will be the ears. I have completed 50 of 106 rows of the graph. 

Last Sunday Hubby decided to hang the Christmas lights on the house. 

 I put together the nativity, hung the bows and wreath and added some colored lights to the bushes.
Santa says "Hi"!

Hubby and I drove around our neighborhood looking at the decorations Friday night. One family had a great display in an upstairs window.


You can see another wonderful house display tomorrow when I participate in the Virtual Cookie Exchange. Participants share a cookie recipe as well as a quilt and a family tradition. The last is where the house display will be shown.

Below is the list of all the blogs that are participating.


I hope you take the time to visit some of the other blogs throughout the week.

Today I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching. Pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are stitching. 

Thanks for stopping by! 

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Sunday, November 28, 2021

Second November Stitch along update

Wow, these past three weeks have flown by for me. I thought I was doing a whole lot of stitching, but it wasn't on Santa, that is for sure. I had the day before Thanksgiving off and decided to spend a little time adding some stitches to him. I also added some on Thanksgiving day as it was a fairly quiet day. 

This is how the Santa Stocking looked three weeks ago.

Here is Santa now with more of his arm completed on the left side.

A special thanks to Avis at Sewing Beside the Sea for hosting this Stitch Along every three weeks and sending us the needed posting reminders.

Grab yourself a cup of coffee or tea and take some time to visit the other talented bloggers below who are part of this stitch-along. You will see a wide variety of stitching projects. These talented stitchers are from all over the world so please allow for the time differences and check back for each post. 

Avis, Claire, Gun, Constanze, Christina, Kathy, 

Margaret, Cindy, Heidi, Jackie, Sunny, Megan,

 Deborah, Renee, Carmela, Sharon, Daisy,

 Anne, AJ, Cathie, Linda, Helen  

Thanks for stopping by!




 

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A few more items to reveal

On Thanksgiving day here in the US, I made a turkey breast, stuffing, mashed potatoes and stringbeans as well as a pumpkin pie. I brought half of this meal to my mother's house and we had a quiet Thanksgiving celebration together. The other half of the meal I gave to my husband and he had Thanksgiving dinner with his mom at her house. It is just the way it had to be this year. 

On Friday, Hubby and I made the long drive to Boston to have a true Thanksgiving dinner with our daughter, her husband, her in-laws and our son. I brought the second pumpkin pie that I made to share on that day. We had a wonderful family celebration. My daughter, son-in-law and my son made a delicious feast.

We were also joined by my son-in-law's parents.

On Saturday we took a walk to and around a local reservation.
The weather was sunny and cold with a slight breeze.

There was some large rocks for pup Ruby and my son-in-law to play on.


You can see that my daughter just watched.
So did my son.


We drove home last night in order to avoid the majority of the traffic. It was only a slightly longer than usual drive from Boston to Long Island, but not quite as long as my son's trek to PA. It took him over 7 hours to get from PA to Boston on Tuesday. 

I previously told you that I had been stitching some small ornaments at work when I didn't have any students to help. I finished three of them last week to bring with me to Boston. I made one each for my son and his fiancee, my daughter and her husband and another for my daughter's in-laws. They are all basically the same with only slight differences. They were quick and easy to make and a Christmas surprise at Thanksgiving.

I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching. Pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are stitching. I am hoping to get some cross-stitching done today. 

You can also see my latest Santa update here.

Thanks for stopping by!

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Thursday, November 25, 2021

Happy Thanksgiving!

 


Wishing all of my family, friends, fellow bloggers and readers a Happy Thanksgiving. I am thankful for all of the encouragement and support I receive from each and every one of you.

Thanks for stopping by!

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