Sunday, December 20, 2009

Adventures in cooking- Christmas candy

Every year at Christmas time I make a list of all the Christmas candies that I want to make to give to those who make our lives easier each year. Shortly after I choose the recipes I want to use and make the list, I give up and decide that its going to be just too much work to tackle. And so gift cards are then bought in lieu of Christmas goody tins. But this year, well, this year I didn't throw in the towel. Instead, I wised up and pitched the idea of an afternoon dedicated to candy-making to a friend who I knew just couldn't resist. So my friend Katy was generous enough to offer up her kitchen (a new swanky IKEA kitchen none the less!) and her help so that this year I finally was able to give Christmas goody tins to friends and family. Katy's husband is Swedish and it just happened to be Santa Lucia the day we got together so we started off our afternoon with some saffron buns and glogg (sp?).
Saffron bunsEmilia with the saffron bun that she made

Conner and Lizzie had fun playing with Marcus and Emilia while the men watched football and the ladies slaved over the hot stovetop. All together we made peppermint bark, haystacks http://www.cdkitchen.com/recipes/recs/857/Butterscotch-Haystacks127552.shtml, chocolate peanut butter cups www.marthastewart.com/photogallery/homemade-holiday-candy#slide_2, and chocolate covered pretzels. And I think all of it turned out well since most of the tins were empty less than 12 hours after presentation to the lucky recipient.

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Uh, IKEA, I think we have a problem

Dear IKEA,
I realize that a mission of your company is to sell furniture and home furnishings at dirt cheap prices to global markets but I think you might have dropped the ball on this item. The hooded towels that I recently purchased for my two children looked so cute hanging up in the store and at the price of $9.99 who could resist? Funny thing happened when the towels were actually placed on my kids following a bath and I put the towel over the head to keep their little ears warm. I've attached a picture for you to interpret as you will but maybe next time you are designing hooded towels, put the towels on a model to ensure that your design is going to be interpreted as you intended. I'm just saying...

Saturday, December 12, 2009

Who's on the nice list this year?

Conner and Lizzie both raise their hands to indicate their right for placement on Santa's nice list this year. May be the last year for a while, we are about to embark on the terrible two's and are super excited to get to experience it double!

Wednesday, December 9, 2009

Nice ass hooks

This past weekend we were visited by Grannie Elaine as she arranged a quick visit on her way back to Nebraska from a work trip in New Jersey. And of course Grannie insisted on spoiling the kids as all good grannies do. So we headed down to IKEA to pick up some Christmas present for the kids since its kind of hard to bring a play kitchen on an airplane to Nebraska! IKEA was great and I was incredibly impressed with the lengths the company goes to to accommodate families with children. We loaded up our flatbed with a play kitchen, a table and chair set, and a storage unit for the children's ever expanding toy collection. Then on Sunday morning a Mom recovering from too much champagne the night before and one patient Grannie put together all the toys for the eagerly awaiting children.
Conner and Lizzie loved their new kitchen. Conner first put his snuggly blanket into the microwave, probably hoping to nuke all the nasty things living in it. Lizzie liked pretending to wash her hands in the sink and using her new step stool to reach the microwave.
And the new table and chairs come in handy for eating an afternoon snack while watching Sesame Street. Seriously, have we reached the ultimate in laziness yet? Please disregard Lizzie's outfit in the picture, she was out of clean shirts at school and was put into one of Conner's shirts. And the pants, well, tye-dyed pants are standard issue at the Montessori school!

But my favorite purchase of all at IKEA were some hooks for the wall in the form of a dog's rear end. They were just too cute to pass up and I thought they would be perfect for hanging up the kid's backpacks on. Chris scoffed at them when I brought them home but then I hung them up on the wall and as soon as Chris noticed them he commented on the nice ass hooks. Indeed, those are some nice ass hooks.