Decorations and COOKIES

Christmas is becoming pretty noticeable around here. The houses on our street are lit up with lights, and we are attempting to add to that, if only in the slightest way. The lights on the outside of the garage have decorative wreaths around them and we have a tree up this year, which will continue on in years to come now that we have our own.

We don't have much of a place to put it, but hey.. it's our first year. We'll improve next year.



We also hung some stockings above the fireplace and decorated with H's snowmen.



I've already gotten into the baking spirit. That usually doesn't happen until I'm back in NC and making chocolate chip cookies at both houses. I got a new mixer though and started early. I made both oatmeal chocolate chip cookies and the normal chocolate chip cookies. These recipes can be found on a box of Quaker oats and Nestle Toll House chocolate chips.




I want to try some sort of gingerbread cookie. I've never made those before. Actually, now that I have a fancy mixer I plan to try lots of new goodies. Maybe it's time I begin using that workout machine hiding behind the Christmas tree.

Scented Gingerbread Man

The best part of this craft is not how it looks. It's how it smells! I found an easy to cut gingerbread man template online and printed those off for the kids to cut and paint. We mixed in cinnamon and a touch of glue to the brown paint to make this painting a lot more fun. It smelled great and was a lot more festive than just using plain paint. The cinnamon mixed in also gave a small amount of texture to the gingerbread man.

After painting, the kids could decorate to their liking using a variety of sparkles and buttons by just placing them on the wet paint.

We only had thin paper to use, but I would recommend something a bit thicker to hold up to the paint and whatever decorations you put on top.

Here is my example.

Paper Monsters

I learned last year after doing a craft involving monsters that kids LOVE monsters. Keeping that in mind, I came up with this project with a little help from the internet. This particular craft lets the kids create their own monsters--cute, scary, whatever they dream up.

It's pretty simple. The body is just a circle, which I had all prepped and ready to go. You cut two circles, fold one in half, and glue it on top of the other for the mouth.



I put out a basket of scrap paper and googly eyes, and the rest was up to the kid. Some kids made wings, a tail, crazy hair, etc and it turned into a project that a lot of kids enjoyed.

Here is my example...



Once completed, these became instant toys for many of the kids.

Pasta Fagioli

I have only had pasta fagioli from the Olive Garden and I happen to think it's yummy, so when I came across a recipe for the soup on facebook awhile back I made sure to hang on to it. With the below zero temperatures we've had lately, I figured it was the perfect time to try it out.

I'm posting the way I did it, which was mostly like the recipe I came across, just a few small changes. Beware though--this makes a lot of soup. It filled my 6.5 quart crockpot to the brim and the two of us got four dinners out of this plus a lunch.

Ingredients:
1.5 pounds ground beef
1 small chopped onion
3 chopped carrots
4 chopped celery stalks
2 28 oz cans diced tomatoes, undrained
1 can red kidney beans, drained
1 can white kidney beans, drained
2 14.5 oz cans beef broth
3 tsp dried oregano
2 tsp pepper (you may want to use less, as I could tell there was a lot of pepper)
3 tsp dried parsley
a few shakes of chili powder
a few shakes of garlic powder
20 oz spaghetti sauce
8 oz ditalini pasta

Brown the ground beef and drain the fat. Add everything into the crockpot except the pasta. Once everything is in the crockpot except the pasta, cover and cook on low 7-8 hours, or on high 4-5 hours. I cooked the first hour or so on high, and then turned to low for an additional six hours.
Once the soup is done and you're ready to serve, cook the pasta for about a minute or two less than the package directions and then add to soup. I would actually suggest adding to each bowl individually. Otherwise, the pasta continues to cook in the hot soup.

Enjoy!

Q-tip Snowman Painting

Yesterday I did a simple craft with the kids at school--painting a snowman. However, we mixed things up a bit and used q-tips instead of paint brushes. It worked perfectly for the snow and gave the snowman a textured, more snowy look. The paintings are great for the various ages and allow each kid to bring their own creativity to the table.

Here is mine.