Search Results for: read

If Mrs. Matlock Offers You Lemons, Take Them and Make a Pie

January 5, 2011 By Deirdre

Every week for about nine months I have written a post for Mrs. Matlock’s Alphabe Thursday. There are about seventy bloggers a week that join Jenny Matlock in sharing ideas, thoughts, reflection and more that begin with a particular letter of the alphabet.

Reading each of the posts along with the comments Mrs. Matlock leaves for all of her students or meme followers is a highlight of my week. (Yes, she visits every person every week and leaves amazing comments. She sends e-mails to her students if she has a chance too.)

During L week Mrs. Matlock’s post was called L is for Lemon. In her post, she mentioned she was going to give away boxes of lemons and peppermints. It sounded like she had a multitude of lemons growing in her yard. We love fresh fruit and peppermints at your house so; I left a comment stating that we would love to win a box.

Much to my surprise, we were picked by Mrs. Matlock to receive one of her special boxes. The box arrived two days before Christmas. We loved the luscious lemon scent of the box. I wonder if the mail carrier kept it in the front of her truck just to smell the lemon scent as she made her deliveries.

We had guests over for dinner that night and I cut lemon slices for us to have in our sodas and iced teas. They were as impressed as we were that this wonderful box filled with candies and lemons with leaves still attached had been sent across the country to us.

I loved having the Larsons for dinner, but I could hardly wait to begin looking through my cookbooks for a recipe for a lemon pie to make for the holidays. The first book I pulled out was The Taste of Home Cookbook my husband had given me several years ago. It was within its pages that I found a two page spread dedicated to lemon pies.

I settled on one that was label light and easy. With all the sweets we have during and before the holidays light was definitely needed. I am all for easy recipes that are guaranteed to come together.

The pie turned out so well. JDaniel and I were able to work together to squeeze the lemons and mix the ingredients. He did have to be distracted to keep him from drinking the lemon juice right from the measuring cup right after squeezing it. Mrs. Matlock’s peppermints were the perfect answer.

I could tell by the way JDaniel enthusiastically licked the bowl clean that it was going to taste good. Actually I knew it was going to taste good too. My fingers were dipping into the remnants left in the bowl as fast as his were.
>

So, if Mrs. Matlock offers you lemons I hope you will accept some and use them to make this lemon pie.

Here is the recipe:

Lemon Cream Pie

1 envelope of unflavored gelatin

1/4 cup of cold water
1/3 cup of lemon juice

1/3 cup of Splenda

2 6 ounce cartons of whipped fat-free yogurt

1 tsp. of lemon peel

1 carton of frozen reduced-fat whipped topping

1 graham cracker crust ( 8 inches)

Directions:

Sprinkle gelatin over cold water and let it sit for 1 minute.
Microwave this mixture for twenty seconds uncovered.
Stir in Splenda and lemon juice.
Add yogurt and lemon peel.
Mix well and then fold in whipped topping.
Spoon into crust.
Refrigerate for 8 hours.
Sit in front of a computer with a slice of pie and read the other wonderful posts from Mrs. Matlock’s Alphabe Thursday.

Grocery Store Made Santa Decision for JDaniel

December 28, 2010 By Deirdre

We had talked (JDaniel and me) about how Santa was based on a wonderful man that live long ago named St. Nick. I had mentioned that presents come on Christmas Day in remembrance of this wonderful man. We had also read books that had Santa in them. I tried not to make a big deal about him.

All seemed to be going well until we need to stop at our local BI-Lo for milk one evening. Seriously all we went in the store for was milk. We got a whole lot more than milk on this visit.

Right inside the doorway of the BI-Lo is a photo studio. (Not all BI-Los have them. The one closest to us does.) Right outside of the photo studio in front of the frozen foods was set up an area where you could have a picture taken with Santa. Sitting right on an emerald green wingback chair was Santa as happy and jolly as could be.

JDaniel had never seen Santa outside of a book. This man in a white beards and read suit stopped him cold in his tracks. Peeking at him from behind my legs JDaniel waved and smiled broadly. When Santa invited him to come and sit with him, JDaniel suddenly remembered we needed to get milk and guided me quickly away from Santa and through the frozen foods to the milk cooler.

After retrieving and paying for the milk, we headed out the door and JDaniel looked back at Santa’s chair and Santa was gone. “Where did he go?” JDaniel asked. I told him I thought Santa needed to go and eat dinner just like we did. JDaniel seemed think that made sense.

While eating dinner that night, I asked JDaniel to tell his dad who we saw at the grocery store. “I saw the real Santa,” he said, “Right there at BI-Lo.”

I guess we have seen Santa and for the next few years he is real.

How did you handle Santa at your house?

Snow for Christmas!

December 26, 2010 By Deirdre

Yesterday was a Christmas Day for the record books. The newspaper this morning stated that Greenville, South Carolina hadn’t had snow on Christmas for forty-seven years. My husband had never had a white Christmas in his life until it started to snow yesterday afternoon.

Watching the snowfall outside our windows as we sat down for our Christmas lunch was wonderful. It was a little like sitting inside a snow globe. For most of the afternoon and evening, the snow fell but did not stick to the ground. It looked like it would only add up to a slight dusting not nearly enough to play in.

This morning we woke up to a few inches of snow on the ground and damp roads. It was just the right amount of snow to play in and play we did.

After dressing JDaniel in snow pants, hiking boots, and a big winter coat my sister Kate had sent us in a hand me down box we headed out to play.

After almost an hour my husband and I were ready to come in from the cold and he still wanted to stay outside and play. JDaniel’s cheeks were bright red, but the rest of him was warm and toasty.

We promised JDaniel more time in the snow after lunch and a good nap. He wasn’t happy about it, but he did finally agree to come in from the snow.

Christmas Time Game of Tag

December 21, 2010 By Deirdre

I have been tagged by Noelle from Jumpin Bean. She is a great blogging buddy and friend. I have answered the questions below and have tagged a few bloggers at the end of this post who will hopefully continue the game.

When do you usually know and feel that it’s finally the holidays? We wait a long time to put up our Christmas decorations. When the lights are up outside and the tree is up inside, it finally feels like Christmas.

What do you want for Christmas this year? I would love a new cell phone and a computer monitor. I believe Santa is bringing a cell phone.

Do you go all out with decorations? We put up several crèches and a tree in the living room. The kitchen has an advent calendar and Christmas Countdown chart. We don’t go all out. I am not sure where we would store a lot of Christmas decorations during the rest of the year.

What are you doing Christmas Eve? We will be having a simple dinner and opening one gift. It will be just the three of us.

What are you doing Christmas Day? I have my mom coming for a Christmas lunch and my father will arrive from Virginia around dinnertime. I will be serving my dad a Christmas dinner. I can also see playing with new construction equipment a lot on Christmas Day.

It’s Christmas time. What are you reading? We are reading a lot of children’s books about Christmas and I am reading a non-Christmas related Nora Roberts’ book.

Favorite movie to watch during the holidays? I love It’s a Wonderful Life. I love the part when Clarence arrives on the scene.

Favorite Christmas song? I love Mary, Did You Know? It has wonderful words and the music puts me in the right frame of mind for Christmas.

Favorite holiday drink? I love hot cider with caramel. It has a great mixture of spicy and sweet.

How is your Christmas shopping going? I need to get stocking stuffers. The big presents have been purchased and need to be wrapped.

If you could spend Christmas Day anywhere else, where would you spend it? I love being home for Christmas. Traveling over the holidays is lots of fun, but I love being home Christmas Day.

Any holiday traditions? We are waiting until Christmas Day for Jesus to be placed in the crèche. We have shepherds that have been circling around the house waiting for Jesus’ birth. They will arrive on Saturday. We are having a birthday cake for Jesus on Saturday too.

Favorite thing about the holidays? I love getting cards from family and friends. I get to see what they are up to and how their children have changed and grown up in a year.

I am tagging the following bloggers:

Two Bears Farm and the Three Cubs

Spell Outloud

Life of a Sippy Cup Mom

Birds and Nature

Manger Prayer Challenge

December 18, 2010 By Deirdre

While sitting in a pew at church last Sunday, I was thinking about the blog posts I needed to write for Christmas. I know I should have been focusing on church, but I wasn’t. What came to mind was the Manger Prayer Challenge I am writing about in this post. I don’t write about my faith often, but I thought it would be perfect as Christmas draws ever closer.

Ever since the idea was planted in my head I have been praying through it. It has helped me ready my heart for Christmas. I hope you will take a few moments and reflect on the Manger Prayer below. If you do, please let me know you took the challenge. I would love to know how it affected you.

The Manger Prayer

Mary’s Section

Mary has been called blessed in the Bible.

Take a moment and thank God of the blessing in your life.

Joseph’s Section

Joseph was handed a challenge by God. His bethrothed was expecting a child that wasn’t his and yet when commanded to by God to do so he took her as his wife.

Take a moment to thank God for the challenges that God has carried you through in your life.

The Star Section

God placed a star in the sky to guide people to His son.

Take a moment to thank God for the guidance he has given you through His word and through people He has placed in your life.

The Shepherd Section

The shepherds shared with all who would listen to them the message the angels has shared with them.

Take a moment to pray that God will guide you to people you can share Him with.

The Wise men’s Section

The wise man came to bring treasure to the King.

Take a moment to adore God and all the He is.

Please indulge this shift in my typical Saturday post.

Christmas Ornament Memories

December 14, 2010 By Deirdre

Over time you start to collect Christmas ornaments. Some may be from places you visited you want to remember. Some maybe gifts from friends or family. Some may represent a hobby or interest you have. Whatever the reason you have to obtain your ornaments within a short time span you may have enough to cover a Christmas tree.

For many years I didn’t put up a tree in the condo I was living in. I lived alone and spent most Christmases at my mother’s house. This didn’t stop me from being given Christmas ornaments from my students. I had a thriving collection of tin school houses with my name engraved on the bottom. There were also a few hand-painted or crafted by students. Those I cherished and still have. The tin school houses seem to have disappeared over time.

One year about fifteen years ago everything changed. I decided to not only get a tree but start collecting ornaments for the tree. I started working as an educational trainer that year and spent many weekends flying around the United States teaching other teachers how to use an online educational site then called Marco Polo. (I taught over thirty training sessions over the year and a half I worked for them) I decided to try to find an ornament to represent each training that I conducted during that time.

Some of the ornaments represent the actual place I visited and some represent what I learned from that training.

There is a dove that represents a training I did in Hazelton, PA. The teachers there were awesome and encouraging. I had done a training session in South Carolina that was horrible for many reasons. The materials didn’t arrive until lunchtime, they liked the site manager better than me, and the list goes on and on. Before I walked in the school to do the Hazelton training, I prayed for guidance on how to meet the needs of the teachers that would attend the training along with peace on my part that everything would work out.

I have a lovely wooden tree that I picked up when I went to Chuckey, Tennessee. I had a free afternoon and traveled down to Gatlinburg to visit a craft school I had attended one summer when I was in high school. I love the simple lines of the tree. The training went well there if you discount the fact that the internet set up at the school as designed for no more than ten users at a time and I had twenty in my training. Thankfully I was given CD each teacher could work off of. It was a lovely group that ended up with a simple lesson.

A small biplane represents the size of the plane I had to fly in and out of Paducah, Kentucky on. When I got ready to fly out of Paducah we were all asked to move to the back of the plane to take off. There huddled in the back of the plane were three other passengers and I along with the stewardess.

The final ornament I am going to share with you is Santa on a tractor. It represents a training I did in Pleasant Plains, Illinois. While getting ready to leave the training, I saw a school bus full of teens drive by. It was the middle of the summer and I didn’t think they were summer school students. It was explained to me by a teacher at the school that they were coming back from the fields after a day of detasseling. Detasseling is the process of taking the pollen-producing tassel out of the corn stalk. It sounded like hot and tiring work. The teacher was shocked I had never heard of it.

JDaniel and I rifled through my box of ornaments to choose the ones that would decorate our Christmas tree this year. Our tree is tiny and didn’t need many ornaments so we only selected a few. The ones I described to you above are the ones we selected to put on the tree along with a couple of colored balls and a few other ornaments.

JDaniel loves each of the ornaments for different reasons than the ones I selected them for. He loved the plane and the tractor because he loves vehicles of all shapes and sizes. The dove he said looked pretty. The tree was due to its texture.

No matter what the reasons were for his selections when I look at them on the tree, I remember trainings that I went on all those years ago that inspired them along with the wonderful and challenging people I met on my journeys.

Muffin Tin Monday- ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas

December 13, 2010 By Deirdre

Today’s tin is bassed on Kat Whelan’s version of ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas. In this version the characters are all mice. The illustrations are filled with whimsy and actually sparkle on the pages.

The tin was so cute as I prepared it and served it to JDaniel. It wasn’t until he had inhaled it that I realized the picture I had taken was awful. The foot of the stocking isn’t displayed and the reindeer are fuzzy.

Instead of trying to remake the meal, I have decided to describe the tin with a lot of humor and make the best of it.

Here is my tale:

‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house

Not a creature was stirring, not even a Swiss Cheese mouse;

The red apple stocking was hung without notice or care. (The mouse had not seen that it had way too much worn.)

In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there;

The children have nestled all snug in their beds,

While visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads;

And mamma in her ‘kerchief, and I in my cap,

Had just settled down for a long winter’s nap,

When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,

I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.

Away to the window, I flew like a flash,

Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.

The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow that was really a flake made of sugar cookie dough.

When what to my wondering eyes should appear, but a miniature sleigh, and three fuzzy chicken nugget reindeer.

JDaniel wished he could spring to his sleigh and to his team gave a whistle.

He was glad mom hadn’t tried to feed him a thistle.

But I heard him exclaim, ere he finished his last bite,

“Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good-night.”

If you have a Muffin Tin Meal based on a book, please think about linking it to

Disclaimer: I received ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas from Tiger Tales to review.

Keeping Calm When Your Crane Won’t Open is Excruciating

December 9, 2010 By Deirdre

If you want to have a toddler present meltdown, than give him a present in its original toy packaging that cannot be removed while staying in a very nice resort far from home. There may be other factors that contribute to the meltdown, but have a crane screwed to the bottom of a box without a screwdriver nearby doesn’t help the situation. JDaniel just didn’t have the self control to keep his cool when after removing part of the packaging of his new remote controlled crane realized we would need a Philips head screwdriver to remove the rest.

This real life situation got worse when JDaniel had to go through it surrounded by a circle of my husband’s relatives waiting for his reaction to the wonderful gift Nana has just given to you. He had all eyes on him.

Here is how the situation unfolded from JDaniel’s perspective:

You feel the heat start to rise in your face and your demand that it has to be possible to get it out of the box. Mom has just removed a talking garbage truck you have also been given from its package. This present should be able to be freed too. Words of frustration start to fly out of your mouth and your feet start a little stomping dance.

Your mom and dad look like their faces are turning red. Your mom tries to calm you down with the reasons you have to wait and why the garbage truck is enough to play with just now. You think they just don’t get it so, you try telling them what you need again. Mom decides what you need is time out of the conference room the family has gathered in to have a Time Out in the hall. She warns you that if you can’t settle down you will need to go to the hotel room and get ready for bed. All the while she is hugging you tight and trying to help you calm down.

You finally calm down and can be walked back into the conference room. Dad sits you on his lap and you get to watch the other two young children in the family get to open their gifts. They receive dolls that are easily removed from their boxes and you wonder why remote controlled cranes are so difficult to remove theirs.

When your cousins finally finish opening their presents, you quietly drag the partially boxed crane and garbage truck under a tablecloth draped table and try to enjoy the rest of the evening resigned to the fact that the crane will remain in the box until you get home.

Lesson I learned as a mom:

Carry a small set of tools on a family vacation.
Pray that the toy packaging design for young children’s toys will change.
Remove all packaging before giving a child a gift. They don’t need it in the original box.
Work with JDaniel on handling different situations a little better even though you know it is hard at almost three. Helping my child through tough times will help him handle them better later on.

Muffin Tin Monday- Decorated Crescent House

December 6, 2010 By Deirdre

I have seen beautiful gingerbread houses decorated to the nines on blogs lately and we didn’t make one. The house we made looks like it needs renovations, but it tasted delicious.

We took four crescent rolls and make a bread house by flattening them with “clean” hands. Then I spread cream cheese across the baked bread house and finally we decorated it with yummy foods contained in a Christmas tree in.

The decoration tin contained Roma tomatoes, cucumber sticks, cheese in triangles (aka “big” cheese by JDaniel. He says the cheese from the deli is really big.), carrot sticks, banana chips and dried fruit.

We had the best time making this house. I placed the door and windows in the house. The rest was completed together.

Disclaimer: All the carrots and cucumbers were peeled off the house and placed in front of me. I was not offered any cheese or banana chips.

Jesus Has Left the Crèche

December 1, 2010 By Deirdre

I love starting traditions with JDaniel. I loved traditions growing up and have been waiting until he was old enough to understand what is happening at Christmas time to start some.

In my family growing up, there weren’t many traditions. My mom would set up a crèche. We would always have a crooked tree. (It didn’t matter if it was a real tree from a lot or one we cut down or an artificial tree from a box.)We opened one gift the night before Christmas. We visited with my dad’s mom on Christmas Day and would then load up the car and drive to my mom’s parents in New Jersey. We would arrive late at night and would have Christmas morning all over again the day after Christmas.

Since we spend Thanksgiving with my husband’s family, we always have my mom over for Christmas dinner. My husband has a friend come for dinner with us too. I try to make a wonderful Christmas dinner. We open presents that are under a two-foot tree due to my fears of JDaniel pulling down a tree and ornaments crashing everywhere. There are also small gifts in stockings hung by the mantle with the care that everyone gets to open.

This year I am finally ready to introduce some new traditions and maybe a full-size tree. We have put up the crèche, but this year two things are missing. Jesus has been put away and will make His appearance on Christmas Day. The shepherds are also missing. They will begin their journey to the manger on the far side of the house and will move slowly toward the living room where the crèche is located every couple of days. (Shepherds have to move slowly so they don’t lose their sheep.) They will arrive after dinner on Christmas to celebrate Jesus’ birth.

I really want JDaniel to understand that Christmas is about the birth of Christ and not just about great toys and beautiful lights so, following a wonderful Christmas meal I will be serving a birthday cake for Jesus. I hope we sing and rejoice in His birth the same way the shepherds and wise men did thousands of years ago.

What Christmas traditions do you have?