'Twas a Success !

I hope you all had a great weekend - ours was absolutely wonderful - we spent it with family & friends, after all :-)

It's almost bedtime and except for driving my brother home this morning, this is the first actual thing I've done today.

The party is over & a good time was had by all :-)

As a lovely, tho' unusual and unexpected, development our guests started arriving mid-afternoon. Normally, everyone only shows up about and after 5pm. This gives them the day for themselves and the evening for us. Also, just about every year there is a problem, snowstorm, ice storm, work on the bridge, closed lanes on the bridge (everyone who comes has to 'cross the bridge' to get to us), etc, etc...THIS year there was nothing ! no storms, no roadwork, no traffic !

Supper was excellent, all the desserts turned out well - we stuffed ourselves silly - that IS what Christmas dinner is all about, right ?

Now with only 2 people in my house, I bake one thing at a time, things I know we like, but when I have company, I tend to try new things out on them. They are my guinea pigs and they're ok with it - most things turn out, but this group has been first hand witnesses to many failures ! Lemon pie in bowls eaten with spoons, comes to mind :-)

This year, my pies had 'made from scratch' pastry (only my 2nd attempt at this) instead of premade pie shells. The cherry cream pie was a successful first attempt. The eggnog ice cream was a hit - there is only about 1 cup left in the container - it MAY make it til tomorrow, but I wouldn't bet on it LOL, the buttered rum sauce was great on the ice cream.

The lemon filling didn't thicken (only the 2nd time this happened to me) but a bit of gelatin to the rescue and the pie turned out great. The lemon pudding and cheesecakes are both standard desserts for this party.

Every Christmas my Mom made each person's favorite dessert - we used to eat just enough dinner to get to the 'important' part of the meal LOL - with 8 kids, that was alot of baking. After setting everything out last night, I realized I'm carrying on this tradition ! I think there were more desserts than main meal dishes - hmm, I should have thought to take a picture of the lunch counter all laid out.

Anyway, my gift packages are now all opened so I can post pictures of what I made.

You all know about the weeks of cookie baking. Here is a box all packed and ready to be closed up (7 boxes - about 6 dozen cookies per box)



I always use knitted dishcloths for washing dishes - I haven't bought dishcloths in years. Most people I know like them but don't knit - so I decided to make everyone 2. Here are the first few, finished except for weaving in the ends.



During my blog reading, I found Angie at Quality Time's post of her version of criss-cross coasters. For the directions, she linked to the following site Allsorts.typepad.com (check out both of these sites for gift items)

These were way too cute to NOT try. I immediately tested one with some squares of flannel I had laying around and decided that everyone had to have a set. Is a fat quarter 1 piece of 18"x22" or 4 pieces ? WalMart had sets of 4 pieces of coordinating cottons and 1 set made about 11 coasters, give or take. Each gift package had a set of 4 and I've got all the leftovers.

Here's a pic of 5 sets of discloths and coasters ready for wrapping.

Pics of our Christmas decorations - the tree:

The mantle: (yes, 4 stockings - 2 people, 2 dogs, we all get one)

The table - almost ready (those towels DID get moved of the back of the chair before people arrived LOL) - you can just see the lemon pie on the counter to the right of the table.

And finally, like so many others, I'm going to copy Summerset's 'parting shot' - this was the view from my front door this morning. It certainly looks like winter has arrived !