What-What?! Week of November 29th

Happy weekend-after-Thanksgiving!

We've had our first Thanksgiving at our new house, which was immensely satisfying.  I am so thankful for all the help we've had getting here.

The spread, with waiting children.  They were super excited!

And I did a lot of cooking... actually, I should say that we did a lot of cooking, because the husband and I always cook Thanksgiving dinner together.

Dessert was pumpkin pie (not shown, looked like pumpkin pie), mini apple pies, and lemon tart things.  The pies were delicious!  I really liked being able to just pick up the apple pies and eat them out of hand.  I am going to do that again, for sure.  The lemon tarts were a disaster, because they fell apart and just needed help.  Next time will be different.  I already have a plan.  And a lot more lemon butter, too:

I still feel like I should've made a double batch, though.  The stuff is scrumptious.

Now, something that's not food... not food... Not?  Food?  Hm.

How about Legos?

Osric made all of these robots.  He builds robots all the time.  We had to clean them all off the dining table so there was enough space for Thanksgiving dinner.

In other news, my daughter has an extremely loose tooth, so today I'm sewing her a tooth pillow.  It'll be rabbit-shaped with some pink patchwork bits.  Will post a photo next week, for sure. :3

What-What?! Week of September 20th

ARRR!  Yesterday was International Talk Like a Pirate Day!  YAR.

We didn't do too much, though.  We had pirate ship sandwiches, which we ate too fast to take pictures of (oops).

Peach pie.  YUM!

This past week, I actually did some cooking.  I made the grossest vegetarian chili, which the husband says wasn't too bad, but I was thoroughly disgusted by.  It had good bones, but I have to do some research before trying again.

We picked up a lot of apples, which we're eating, and will turn into applesauce or other things.  I made a caramel cream cheese dip yesterday that turned out really delicious with these apples.  I bet graham crackers would be fantastic, too.

The kids did some craft stuff.  I printed out some coloring pages, then put them into sheet protectors.  Then the kids could add decorations using playdough.  Surprisingly, the one who was most into it was Corwin.  Saffron tends to be more art-oriented, but this just caught Corey's imagination.

What-What?! Week of November 30th

Warning:  This week's post is all about food.  If you don't want to read about food, then I suggest reading about how to make knots, or maybe just stare at pretty colors.

Edit: It snowed!  And now the snow has partially melted, and turned into ice!  Yay, ice skating!
(Yay, right?  ...Right?)

We survived Thanksgiving, yay!  The husband had a short week at work, which was absolutely marvelous.

The Dinner was pretty simple this year; turkey, cornbread stuffing, homemade cranberry sauce, roasted sweet potatoes, and gravy (of course).  Dessert was Kentucky Pegasus pie and pumpkin pie.

We did some minor shopping on Black Friday, mostly online.  I grabbed Saffron an inexpensive winter coat from Goodwill -- it's bright, shiny purple and she loves it.  Also bought two more turkeys from Target, because the price per pound was unbeatable.  No more space in the freezer now, and we'll be eating turkey for a month... oops, I guess? :P

Kentucky Pegasus Pie via Food.com

I've made this pie before, but it's been quite a while.  It's akin to eating a cookie that is also a pie, and it is delicious.  Because it'd been about a year since I last baked it, I followed the recipe closely, only adding a bit of salt.  Next time, I think I'm going to use half brown sugar and half granulated sugar, and add more pecans... a lot more pecans.

(The history of the Pegasus pie is also pretty interesting, if you're into reading about food history).

Homemade Cranberry Sauce

Usually, I follow The Pioneer Woman's cranberry sauce recipe, which is good, but a bit too fluid.  Wanting a thicker sauce, I used this recipe from the Food Network, and adjusted it so:

Ingredients:

• 1 - 12oz package cranberries
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 cup water
• Pinch of salt

Put all ingredients into a large pot (larger than you think you'll need --my cranberry sauce always splatters).  Bring to a simmer over medium heat, and let cook for about 10 minutes.  Let cool, and enjoy.