My Favorite Holiday Traditions

I really love the holidays. It's weird because I am not christian and therefore don't "believe," but I do respect tradition and family and memories of holidays past. I also see my Protestant upbringing as part of my cultural heritage and the stories told through that religious tradition as the mythical stories I find most culturally familiar. So, it does not bother me to hear songs and messages about Jesus and the Bible; I think about them the same way I would think about Greek or Native American myths except that these are more familiar and somehow comforting.

In fact, as much as I did not enjoy church services most of the year, I really loved them on Christmas eve when the lights were low and we held candles and sang songs. It felt peaceful, the one time each year that we all just got quiet and spoke of peace and love. To me, that is what the holiday season is about.

I love the songs of Christmas because I love music, and I especially love singing. I do it secretly and only at home but when my voice meshes perfectly with a song and I know all of the words I feel so peaceful and joyful. In my household growing up both my parents loved music. My father, as a collector of music, always had the right song for any occasion and kept the music constantly playing in the house. My mother is a singer, always singing and encouraging all of us to join in and participate in the music. They probably have hundreds of Christmas albums, some better than others. Last year it was Donny Osmond, which I have to say I could live without. In my house I only have about 4 albums but I keep them playing on my ipod daily throughout December. I especially like to play them while cooking dinner and singing along. Mark does sometimes join in because, why not? We like to sing songs about our cat or with our cat's name in them so they can get pretty silly. We like to in invent the best new lyrics and crack each other up. We are playing the Christmas edition of that game now.

I love really bad Lifetime or Oxygen holiday movies. I watch them on the weekends and get excited to see the new ones or old ones I missed somehow. I can waste hours on this, but they help to put me in the mood and pass the time while I make crafts or write holiday cards. I am also encouraged to see that some of my old TV friends are finding new work, even if it is once a year. This is a tradition Mark especially hates. But he already thinks I have bad taste in TV.

I love baking for the holidays. I sometimes run out of time so I don't do it every year, but there is something about homemade holiday treats as gifts or to share with co-workers and friends. It reminds me of my Grandma's house and the endless variety of cookies she would have on hand. This year I made my grandmother's Snowball cookies, my mother's Chocolate Drop cookies, my aunt's Almond Rocca and my newest recipe, pumpkin cookies with white chocolate chips. Mark also requested Snicker doodles, which are not technically holiday cookies but whatevs.

I love holiday cards. I love choosing them and spend a lot of time on it. I choose several different styles each year and sit down to pick the perfect card for each family on my list. Bet you didn't know I put such thought into it? I think it's fun. I get this from my mom who would go out the day after Christmas to buy holiday cards half-off and she would buy A TON. We had a special cabinet at home that was bursting with boxes of holiday cards, way more than she needed in any given year. I wonder if she is still slogging through her back-stash? She also writes a letter every year. Letters are controversial, which surprised me when I discovered it as an adult. I thought it was just what you do. Sitting down to reflect on your year and how it changed you or didn't or what you learned about life and yourself. Even if you don't send the letter, I recommend you write one as a way to reflect on each year and live a little more thoughtfully. Or you could just brag. I will read anything.

I love buying presents, because I love shopping, and researching and researching shopping. I spend several weeks looking at all of my options and thinking about the person and what they would like. I narrow it down; I first decide what gifts I will make and what I will buy and have to choose carefully in order to have time to make everything. This year I did not and had to purchase a last minute gift which I hate because there is no time for researching. Sometimes I choose poorly and after the holidays I wake from my stupor and think What was I THINKING? but will probably keep making those mistakes in different ways for different people each year. Sorry in advance.

To me, the best parts of Christmas are the weeks leading up to it with the planning and projects and dreaming. So, I wish you much Peace and Joy this holiday season, whatever you celebrate, whatever your cultural or religious (or both) traditions. They all connect us to those we love and remind us to live in peace and respect for all of the parts of this season that each of us enjoy most.

Cosmic Cauliflower

We interrupt this holiday season with a post about the last share of produce from One Straw Farm. It was about 3 weeks ago that we got our final produce before the long dark winter of frozen veggies. This lovely gem appeared on my kitchen counter. Mark explained that it is called cosmic cauliflower and is a cross between cauliflower and broccoli. We eyed it suspiciously for about a week until we ran low on any other veggies and it started to look it's age. We had to decide to eat it or throw it away. Both options had their merits because, look at it! It was scary. I am not normally wasteful so I decided one night to cook it up. I didn't tell Mark because I thought it should be a surprise so he didn't have time to object. We had already tried purple cauliflower and it was not as good as the original so this could go either way.

I cooked it up the way I cook most cauliflower or broccoli with a little olive oil and salt and pepper. I had to kind of slice it up and it crumbled quite a bit in the pan. But, it was good, it did taste like both cauliflower and broccoli which is weird but not bad. Mark was a little nervous when he saw it but agreed that it was OK. I still don't know why you can't just eat one or the other but it looks cool at least.

Handmade Holidays

I bring this up a lot but I realize it might be helpful to have some tools you can use to make this holiday handmade! I took the handmade pledge 3 years ago and have been pretty faithful with it. You can take the pledge here. I make some gifts and buy some gifts but most is indeed handmade. Including the soap I buy every year from the Officina Profumo Farmaciadi Santa Maria Novella those monks have been hand-crafting soaps for about 400 years!

Last year I made a scarf and some coasters for my brother, a stocking for my cousin's baby and some homemade ornaments. I also hand embroidered some handkerchiefs for my Dad and made a set of place-mats and napkins for my sister-in-law. I purchased quite a few handmade gifts including grocery bags, a hubcap clock, and reusable dryer sachets and natural handmade laundry soap all online from Etsy. I went to several handmade holiday markets to buy more stuff and save on shipping. I got a printed jersey scarf, printed kitchen towels, and I think some more soap. If you send out yearly holiday greetings, don't forget you can get those handmade too! Last year I got all my cards fromEtsy and hope to do it again this week (is it already too late?).

This year I plan to do a little more purchasing and less making myself because I was a little overwhelmed last year and when the sewing machine refuses to cooperate and you have literally hours to get a project done and in the mail it can be a bit stressful. There are so many wonderful handmade goods out there you are sure to find something perfect for everyone on your list. I really recommend going to some local craft fairs to meet the crafters in person and see everything in real life. Who knows, you might find a friend or a bargain or pick up a new skill.

If you are in the Baltimore area check out Holiday Heap on December 5

If you are in the Seattle area check out Urban Craft Uprising also on December 5

If you are anywhere else (and I would be surprised but hey) there is a complete list of upcoming craft fairs Here.

CRAFT magazine has a great blog and podcast series with some tutorials and fee patterns for a variety of crafts. That's how I found the stocking pattern last year. And if I have time I might make these cute felt holiday trees for my dining room table.

This year has been all about improving my cooking skills and since that is a craft too I am thinking of making some cookie holiday gifts. I just discovered a recipe for pumpkin spice cookies with white chocolate chips that are the bomb-dot-com!

No matter what, a handmade holiday is sooo much better than fighting the traffic at the mall. It helps keep the Joy and Peace in the holiday season.

Ta-Da!

Guess what? It's me! I have been taking a break from blogging because it kinda felt like a job coming up with postings and I had other things I wanted to do. Such is life I guess. But now I have lots of ideas buzzing around in my head and the holiday season is upon us so you might be hearing from me more often this winter.

Anyway - This post is about my holiday gift from #1 Super Hubby! We always exchange gifts in November because it's easier to budget the rest of the shopping and we are never home for xmas anyway. You might remember that last year I got a new computer which I am using right now. This year I finally got living room chairs!

Backstory - When we moved to MD we had to downsize from a 3-level 2 bedroom 4! bathroom finished basement apartment to just about 800 square ft. in our current place. We got rid of a ton of furniture, books, kitchen appliances and junk. There is something to be said for pairing down to the essentials and I am glad we did it but I sure miss my washer and dryer and I did miss the living room chairs. They belonged to my parents first so they were worn out and looked rough but they were comfortable and served the purpose. We always planned on taking the opportunity to finally replace them when we moved. Then the recession happened and pay cuts and debt repayment and they became a very low priority.

This was finally the year and while they are modest chairs from Target they are mine and they are cute and they look so good in the room! Plus, Target furniture always means I get to assemble them myself which I actually love doing. Weird, I know but it's so cool to figure it out and put it together and feel like you really accomplished something.

Miss Gimp loved the chairs right from the start, she thinks they are her holiday gift. Which holiday? Festivus.

Handmade Nation!

I finally got to see Handmade Nation last night! I have been hoping this documentary would come to Baltimore and it did! Sarah and I went after work and it was a really good film. I felt like a craft groupie when I got there and saw Faythe Levine in person! The film is a great look into the craft movement.

I have decided I am more of a craft wannabe instead of a true crafter because I like the IDEA of doing a project much more than actually completing them. I have about 3 sewing projects in process, one knitting project and an idea for a new embroidery project. Just haven't been in the mood to dive in for a while.

I have been more focused on cooking recently, as you can tell from my cake post. We haven't bought bread in like 2 months since I taught myself how to make it. I have even made up a great recipe for herb bread and the secret is garlic salt (which should be the secret to everything). I am also into using our CSA produce in new recipes, tonight I created my own recipe for roasted veggie pasta primavera with vegan cream sauce and I rocked it out. May post it but no pics.

Handmade Nation made me re-think my crafts again and I just might get back to them. Artscape is this weekend and this is the second year for the DIY tents so maybe I will just shop handmade instead.

Happy Father's Day

Just want to give a shout out to my Dad because he is the greatest. That's him fishing with his father and here he is with me and my brother:


I just realized that I don't have many pictures with Dad because he was always the one taking the pictures. And I honestly don't know what is going on in this one.

There are so many great things about Dad, I always wanted to be like him because he seemed to know what's what. Still does. I am very lucky to have such a wonderful father and I am grateful every day.

It's CSA Time!

My favorite time of year - we picked up our first delivery of fresh produce yesterday. I should say Mark did. We chose to go with One Straw Farm this year instead of Cromwell Valley. We did this for several reasons. One - We really don't like having to volunteer on the farm because I hate nature. Two - It was a bit of a drive and when it was rainy and muddy it was not fun. Three - because we had to go there at a certain time and choose our produce, we quickly realized that we had to get there right when it opened or other people would take more than their share and leave only the broken and wilted produce. Getting there at opening was smack in the middle of a Saturday and totally inconvenient.

One Straw Farm drops off produce shares at various locations and one happened to be right across the street from us. It's also the location of a weekly farmers market which is totally awesome. Tuesday afternoon is our pick up time and because Mark gets home before me he is the one to pick up the share. I am a little concerned about this because I like to be in control and he gets to choose what to pick up. We get 8 items but they can be 8 different things or 8 of one thing or some combo. Someone said I should make him call me from the pick-up so I can help choose. Should I do it? I should just trust him, right? Maybe....

Mark picked up cabbage, kale, swiss chard, garlic scapes, strawberries, arugula and two lettuce. I decided to serve the kale and strawberries for dinner because the strawberries didn't look like they would last. After all the greens I ate last season I didn't think I would say this but I really was looking forward to cooked greens again. I became an expert in cooking kale and chard last year and this is how I made it last night:

Sauteed Kale
1 bunch Kale
2 tsp. chopped garlic
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon soy sauce
splash of white wine

remove stems and clean kale, set aside. Heat a pan on medium with the olive oil. add garlic and soy sauce when hot. Add the kale, toss with tongs and put the lid on, cook for about 5 minutes or until the kale has cooked down by half. Take lid off and add splash of white wine, replace lid. Cook another couple of minutes, its done when it is reduced and before it browns a lot.

This is my best guess for measurements, I just add what looks good, probably you should use less oil. Story of my life. You can drink the remaining wine while cooking, I usually do. Unless you are using actual cooking wine, I don't judge.

As you can see Miss Gimp preferres her greens raw and fresh. Yes she is on the kitchen counter; you can't stop a gimp cat, I've tried, it doesn't work, don't judge.