RIP Christmas - you kicked my butt this year

So, quick wrap up:

Daughter got an Indiana Jones whip complete with a John Williams soundtrack built in on Christmas eve. Every child that has touched it since loves it madly. It really doesn't hurt when it hits you in the face. More of a shock than pain...

Surprised Husband with Callisto figure (a villain from Xena, my daughter's favorite TV show.)






Presents were opened hungrily on Christmas Morning.



And homemade buttermilk biscuits and handmade cinnamon rolls were hungrily eaten as part of our breakfast feast. (All courtesy of Alton Brown of course!)

And up until Christmas dinner, the worst injury sustained was my boy. He wanted to cancel Christmas because he hurt his "present opening" finger.

Then came dinner. Oma fell over a baby gate while getting my girl some milk. She fell. Dislocated and broke her ankle. It was the most horrifying thing I have ever seen. It was like something from a zombie movie, since things weren't attached the way they were supposed to be. I managed to get the children out of the room before they saw or heard anything. Oma was in a terrible amount of pain. That was the worst of it. As the panic rose and so did the tears, I had to remind myself that of all the reasons to have an ambulance on it's way to the house, this one is alright. a broken ankle isn't life threatening. Oma is young, very healthy and active, so I knew she'd recover. I guess it is all about perspective. Easy for me to say - it wasn't my ankle!
She is recovering well now and the pain is under control. All's well that end's well I guess.

OK, on to happier things:

I did a lot of handmade things this year and received one as well!


Here is the present I received. Love it! How awesome is this pillow! My cousin-in-law made this guy. I am smitten. My daughter and I fight over it - I keep finding him in her bed.

I made presents that comprised of a few of these killer brownies and a salted caramel sauce. This pairing is to die for. Some notes on these recipes:
Brownies: I like a cakey brownie so I add an extra 1/2 cup of flour. It also makes the batter hold up in the shaped cupcake pans.
Sauce: The recipe calls for kosher salt. I have learned to use ground sea salt instead. it melts faster.

I made these stocking stuffers for my boy, and I will be doing it for every birthday and Christmas from now on. They are coupons. Eight " get out of eating your peas", 16 " Good for staying up one hour past bedtime to play Warcraft with Dad" and 24 " Good for one hour of Playstation." He really digs these as he isn't allowed to play Playstation on school nights. I love that I can recycle the used coupons and I didn't buy any more PVC toys to put in a landfill via his stocking.






I made ornaments for our friends and mailed them out. I love getting fun packages in the mail, so I thought it might be fun to send all of them a surprise!
Both types of ornaments were made using t-shirt iron-ons. The first one is on fimo clay that has been rolled and cut then backed with fabric. The second one is basically a little pillow that I ironed the image on. They were fun to make and not terribly hard. I made about 20 in three night's work. The clay ones were the hardest - it took awhile to master the transfer technique. All of the failures looked really cool, so I foresee that process appearing in my husbands work very soon.

Enough! Christmas is over so I need ot stop babbling about it! On to 2009.