Tag Archives: Christmas

Dec 8 2014

Christmastime Giveaway!

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I love Christmastime and always like to celebrate it with my readers by putting together a little Christmas prize package to thank you for following me for the last few years.

I try to find some of the cutest baking supplies that pop up in stores at this time of year and supplement them with a few other fun things!

Here’s what you could win in this year’s giveaway:

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  1. Wilton Icing Decorations in the shapes of Santa, his elves, and his reindeer.
  2. Christmas paper straws
  3. Betty Crocker Shortbread mix (I used this mix to make the Chocolate-Dipped Shortbread Tea Bag Cookies earlier this year)
  4. Santa cupcake liners
  5. Mini Christmas cookie cutters
  6. Holiday sprinklesIMG_3682
  7. Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer movie bag
  8. Cupcake Stickers
  9. A charm bracelet with sweet charms
  10. A cupcake ornament
  11. Cake Batter flavored Chapstick
  12. Holiday socks
  13. Christmas colored Sixlets candies
  14. Candy Cane flavored Pop Rocks
  15. Swiss Miss hot cocoa mixIMG_3690_2
  16. And an extra special last minute addition: Nordicware holiday cake pop baking pan!

I found the baking pan during after-Christmas sales last year to save for this year’s giveaway and totally forgot about it when I was taking the initial photos for the giveaway. Luckily for you, I remembered the pan at the last minute!

Enter the Giveaway

To enter the giveaway, enter your name and email into the mandatory entry space in the Rafflecopter widget below. You are now entered to win this entire package!

For extra entries, and a better chance at winning, fill in any of the optional entries thereafter.

The giveaway ends at 11:59 EST on December 14th (my birthday! whoo!) and is open only to US residents who are 18+ years old.

For complete rules click here.

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Dec 24 2013

The Conclusion of 24 Days of Advent Calendar Fun: Days 19-24

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These last few days have been busy around here. So much going on for the holidays: baking, present wrapping, last minute present making, etc. With that, the advent calendar has been sort of on a back burner. I haven’t even been able to update the blog about it until now! Three of the days I gave my grandma chocolates, because we were too busy to do any extra activities. But we did get a few fun things done.

Since I’m covering six days in this post, I’ll skip Days 19, 21, and 22 because she only got chocolate those days and there isn’t much to say about it other than that.

Day 20

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On the 20th we made a cute Christmas paper garland kit that I found in the dollar section at Target. It came with stickers, little ornament shapes, and some string. Grandma helped me place the stickers on the ornaments and then I strung it up in our living room.

IMG_5195Day 23

Yesterday we worked on decorating some sugar cookies! I’ve always wanted to try royal icing for cookies but figured that it would be too complicated for my grandma to participate in, so I opted to frost the cookies with canned frosting and let her sprinkle things on them. I also decorated a few since that’s my favorite part of baking.

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I used a Betty Crocker sugar cookie mix for this project to make things quick and simple. They turned out fairly good. I might have made them too thin though, because they are a little crunchier than I like. One thing I thought was interesting is how different each batch baked. The first batch was cooked on a pizza stone, and the dough didn’t change its shape much but took way longer to bake. I baked the second batch on a baking pan lined with a silicone mat and they expanded much more than the first cookies and were done at least 5-7 minutes sooner. Of the two, I think I liked the pizza stone cookies more since they still resembled their original shapes.

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I found that detailed decorating with frosting is not very easy, this is probably why people use different icings on cookies but I think our cookies turned out pretty cute.

IMG_5225Day 24

Today we are going to watch another Christmas themed movie as our final advent calendar activity. I chose Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer this time. It’s a Christmas classic. I remember one time while watching this movie about 20 years ago, my family’s old grandfather clock that hadn’t worked in years, decided to let out one bong out of nowhere. It’s was really odd. That memory has always stuck with me. Maybe it was Santa letting me know he was on his way.

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I hope my grandma enjoys watching this with me today.

Well, that ends the 24 days of Advent Calendar Fun. I hope you had fun following us on our Christmas adventures this year, and maybe even tried some of the activities yourself. Have a great Christmas tomorrow!

If you’ve missed any of the previous days, here are the links:

You can find instructions for how to make this advent calendar at Holiday Crafts and Creations.

**The snowflakes in the title image are from www.obsidiandawn.com and www.graphicssoft.about.com**

 

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Dec 18 2013

24 Days of Advent Calendar Fun: Days 17-18

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IMG_5179Today’s post is covering Day 17 and 18 in the Advent Calendar of Fun. Yesterday was a mellow day and today was a fun one.

Day 17

I gave my grandma more candy yesterday so not much happened with it other than that.

Day 18

Today though, was “Have a Christmas Cocktail” Day! Whoo-hoo! My grandma loves alcohol or as she calls “kick-a-poo juice.” Doesn’t matter what kind: wine, beer, mixed drinks, etc., it’s all good. So I knew she’d appreciate a day where our activity was drinking an alcoholic drink.

It’s a bit cold here today so I chose to make Hot Buttered Rum for us. Never made it before, but now I don’t think I could live without it. I used, I believe, a Rachael Ray recipe from the Food Network website. It was delicious. Although I don’t know how spices, butter, rum, brown sugar and honey couldn’t be delicious. It’s a tad strong (although I did put a little more rum than called for because my bottle was almost empty), so if you don’t like strong drinks, add less rum. I also chose to substitute dark rum for the spiced rum. It should be good with spiced rum too but dark just sounded better to me today.

IMG_5170I didn’t have glass mugs so I used my dad’s beer steins. Doesn’t matter what you drink it out of, it’s going to be good.

I used slightly less honey than was called for and it was still pretty sweet. I might leave out some of the brown sugar next time.

IMG_5167In the next few days we’ll be baking again, so don’t miss it!

If you’ve missed any of the previous days, here are the links:

You can find instructions for how to make this advent calendar at Holiday Crafts and Creations.

**The snowflakes in the title image are from www.obsidiandawn.com and www.graphicssoft.about.com**

 

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Dec 12 2013

It’s Time For A Christmas Giveaway!

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It’s time for a Christmas Giveaway! I love the holidays and found a few items that will help with your holiday entertaining needs. There’s even a special handmade item from me!

Here’s what you get:

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  1.  Cardboard Christmas Themed Cupcake Stand
  2. Christmas Tree Candy Mold
  3. Santa Cupcake Toppers
  4. Christmas Themed Cupcake Liners and Toppers
  5. Cupcake Corer
  6. Decorative Paper StrawsIMG_5078_2
  7. Card Display Kit
  8. An Ornament Frame
  9. Plastic Mustache Party Shot GlassesIMG_5080_2
  10. Fingerless Gloves
  11. Handemade Kitchen Themed Half Apron

I’ve been in the sewing spirit lately and made a pretty apron for you guys! Here’s what the fabric looks like up close:

IMG_5089And here it is all spread out:

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Enter the Giveaway

To enter this giveaway fill out the Rafflecopter form below. All that is mandatory is that you enter your name and an email address I can contact you with if you win. The rest of the options are optional, but will give you a better chance at winning the more you complete.

Rules

This giveaway is open to all residents of the US who are 18 years or older. Void where prohibited. For complete rules please read the Official Rules page.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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Dec 11 2013

24 Days of Advent Calendar Fun: Days 9-11

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IMG_5060Days 9 through 11 of our Advent Calendar are done and the results were great.

Day 9

On the 9th, I made it easy and gave my grandma a bottle of nail polish. She loves to have her nails painted, so I added another color to her stash. This one is called Mistress. How scandalous!

IMG_5055Day 10

Day 10 was a fun activity. We made a popcorn and cranberry garland for our Christmas tree. I’ve never really made a popcorn garland before and found that it’s trickier to do than I had expected. You have to search through the popcorn to find the right kind of puffy popcorn to string, otherwise they break apart easily.

IMG_5035I used fishing line to string them on, because I figured it would tangle less than thread (which was the case), but it still would get tangled every few minutes or so. If you make one of these, plan to devote a lot of time to it and have patience. You’ll need it.

IMG_5036It ended up looking really pretty though. I think the added cranberries make it look a little classier than a normal popcorn garland and the cream and dark red colors are very nice against our tree.

IMG_5046It even makes our new Martooni ornament stand out nicely.

IMG_5041This activity was a fun one, and my grandma was able to help me by pulling the popcorn and cranberries down the string and keeping them untangled.

Day 11

Today was dedicated to getting Grandma’s Christmas cards written up and mailed. Over the years she’s received a bunch of cute Christmas card sets from organizations she’s donated to so we picked a few cards to send from her stock.

IMG_5051The closer we get to Christmas, the more excited I get! Check back in a couple of days for another installment of 24 Days of Advent Calendar Fun!

If you’ve missed any of the previous days, here are the links:

You can find instructions for how to make this advent calendar at Holiday Crafts and Creations.

**The snowflakes in the title image are from www.obsidiandawn.com and www.graphicssoft.about.com**

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Dec 8 2013

24 Days of Advent Calendar Fun: Days 7-8

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Days seven and eight of the advent calendar were successful! We did activities for both of the days.

Day 7

On day seven I had my grandma help me color an ornament of a framed picture of Martooni, our cat. She was able to help me out a little bit on this one, but she had to strain her eyes to see the lines on the ornament, and so I took over after a while.

IMG_4992I think this is a great addition to our tree. Martooni is wearing an elf hat in this picture. I’m so glad this cat puts up with my crazy ideas, even though I don’t think he likes it so much.

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 Day 8

Today we made brownie pops! I love brownies. I think I love brownies more than cupcakes. Maybe this blog should be called Shane’s Killer Brownies.

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