Ugly Sweater Cookie Decorating Contest

 We had a lot of visitors over the Christmas holidays.  It was so cold that outdoor activities were not an option.  I decided to have a cookie decorating contest.  But not just any cookie.

  

Years ago I had purchased a large T-shirt cookie cutter.  I think it was for Father's Day.  Now,  I thought it was a good substitute for a sweater and thus was born an ugly sweater decorating contest, but on a T-shirt cookie!

  

I found a sugar cookie recipe from Sally's Baking Addiction  that looked good.  In fact, it was great, so you can go to her post and make your own fabulous cookies.  I doubled the recipe and baked up a lot of cookies.  I made a few Christmas cookies with the scraps...because...Christmas.

  

I bought a blue and a yellow tube of frosting.  I also made a buttercream frosting recipe that I divided.  Half was left white and I made the other half green.  I placed them in decorating bags.  One had a narrow tip, the other had a star tip.  I had an assortment of sprinkles and then everyone started decorating.

  

Two year old Rachel also tried her hand at decorating.

  

Well, mostly she just ate a cookie.

  

And made cute faces for my phone.

I wasn't expecting much. I thought someone would make a Christmas tree or something like that. But I was very impressed by the artistic talent and creativity. Some were so good, they didn't really qualify as an ugly sweater.

Like this stained glass design.

  

And this one with a Christmas tree fire!

  

This one is nice....unless you went to UCLA (Trista) or Berkeley (Travis), in which USC is hideous!

  

Two designs involved sweaters that were ruined because of excessive holiday consumption of spirits of Christmas present.

  


This one started out as a pretty sweater and then the wearer had a bad moment.

  

This one was a bit problematical.  Trista explained that this was a rocket ship.  I am not sure that I believe her.

  

I'm pretty sure this is the ugliest.

What do you think?

The Wake Up

I just finished The Wake Up by Catherine Ryan Hyde.  I wasn't sure I was going to like it.  It is not the kind of book I usually read.  But then I usually read mysteries and romances, and the occasional biography.  This book is a character driven novel about a man named Aiden who wakes up to the empathy that he had pushed down for most of his life.  In fact, he was abused and such an empath that he became terribly damaged emotionally and so shut off all emotions.  This interfered with his adult relationships.  Aiden called the return of his overwhelming empathic feelings the wake up.  He woke up to all the feelings he had pushed down and it changed his whole life.

He met and fell in love with a woman and then found out she had a young son, Milo, who had been abused.  Milo's way of dealing with his emotions was to lash out and hurt others, including animals.  It took a long time for Aiden to see the parallel to his own life.

The love and trust shown to Aiden as a child by his stepfather helped him to do the same for young Milo.  The emotional journey between man and boy over two generations was a compelling story.  It did not happen overnight and had ups and downs that rang true to life.  The Wake Up was a satisfying and hopeful story that I really enjoyed.

Clay Mask Fun

I had some minor surgery on my leg before Christmas, so a lot of my shopping was done online. (Thank You, Amazon!!)  I don't remember how I came across it, but I found this clay mask that bubbled up and looked terribly silly.  It is called Carbonated Bubble Clay Mask.  I thought it would be a fun girly thing to do over the holidays.  My daughters and daughter-in-law would be here and we could have a girl's night.  Facials all around!

BEFORE

Tara had already gone home by the time we tried the mask, so Trista, Vanessa and I all tried it.  When first applied, it just feels like any silky smooth mask.

AFTER

Soon the mask starts to tingle and bubble up, until you start to worry that it will burn or take over your whole face!  Don't worry!  No burning or face eating occurred!

As you can see it did become quite silly, though.  The hardest part of this facial was getting it off your skin.  You needed a washcloth to get it all off.  Simply rinsing over the sink didn't do the job.

We all agreed that the next morning our skin felt much softer.  I'm sad to say that none of us looked 10 years younger.

But softer skin and a fun evening was totally worth buying this mask.  Plus, the whole name is perfectly silly, Elizavecca Milky Piggy Carbonated Bubble Clay Mask.  Try saying that three times, fast!

Through the Windows

  

We woke up to a snowy day.

  

I didn't want to go outside.

  

So I took pictures through the windows.

  

It's beautiful out there.

Quilting Again

Years ago I bought what is known as a jelly roll when my favorite quilt shop was going out of business.  A jelly roll is  a bunch of fabrics that all work together, cut into strips for quilting or other projects.  Then I started making my fabric baskets and the jelly roll sat on a shelf in my craft room.

I have sufficient baskets, so I decided to take a shot at a new quilt.

My friend, Doris, showed me a fun way to use jelly rolls to make a lot of fabulous quilting squares.  This technique was originated by 3 Dude's Quilting by way of Missouri Quilting.  You can see the video here

  

Take four strips and sew them together.

  

Cut them into squares.  Place one square with the strips running vertically.

  

Then cover that square, with the right sides together, and the top square running horizontally.

  

Sew a 1/4 inch seam around all four sides.

  

Cut the square from corner to corner, making four triangles.

  

Press them open and that is the basis of the finished square.

  

I have been having fun trying different ways of putting these squares together.  I have tried using two squares from different strips.


  

Next I tried two squares from the same strip set.

  

I like them all!

I have quite a few finished squares and will spend then next few weeks making up all of my strip sets into quilt squares.

  

This technique is quick and I am having fun putting them together.

  

Sadly, now I need to go back to the fabric store to but the rest of the fabric to finish the quilt top.  It is always a risk going to a fab ricin's store.  I may need to buy some extra fabric for more baskets.

RJ Meets His Niece

  

RJ the Wonder Dog lives on the top of a great hill.  He spends his days chasing off all other animals, except the cats that live in the house.  They won't budge and RJ has learned that trying gets him in trouble. RJ doesn't like to get onto trouble.

RJ and his family recently celebrated Thanksgiving.   RJ likes Thanksgiving because there is the potential for bits of turkey to be snuck to him by various family members. Even Tara, who is a vegetarian, has been known to hand him a bite now and then.

  

But this time Tara brought her new dog, Rosie.  RJ loves it when other dogs visit.  This doesn't happen often, so the excitement level was high.

  

The cats did not share RJ's enthusiasm for Rosie's visit.  Ashley spent the whole time up here, except when Rosie was locked up in her room for the night.

  

RJ is getting older, so he knows he runs out of enthusiasm for enthusiasm.  When this happened RJ's family would get in the big red Mule and drive all around the property while RJ and Rosie followed along. This would tire them out. For a few minutes.

All in all, RJ enjoyed the visit and the cats are glad the visit is over.

  

Shall we warn them about Rosie coming for Christmas?

Downsizing

I haven't written anything lately.  We have been visiting our granddaughter and making some life decisions.  Our 57 acre farm is getting to be too much for us to maintain. It is time for us to downsize.

Lee still wants about 5 acres.  He has gotten used to not seeing any neighbors.  He also wants to be able yo build another shop so he can continue to work on vehicles.  And he wants to build this one to hold his cab-over diesel truck.

We thought about moving to California.  Our granddaughter is a powerful lure.  But it is so crowded and expensive and BROWN.  We have really come to love the green and seasons of Virginia.

We don't have to make any plans, yet.  Our realtor has told us it may take as much as two years to sell our house.  We just need to find the right buyer. This house really calls for a family with children.  The woods and the stream would be such a great play space.  The six stall barn and two pastures would be great for horses, alpacas or any other large animal that a family would have.

The shop would be perfect for a car lover.  It has a lift for repairs and room for three cars, in addition to the 2 1/2 car garage attached to the house.

It is hard to leave this place that we spent so much time building, but we are ready for the next chapter of our lives.

Our realtor is Dayna Patrick at Remax in Daleville.  She sent two photographers to take pictures inside and out.  The drone photographer came three times to get the right light.  There is even a virtual reality tour that is amazing.  The pictures are so fabulous we are worried we will have second thoughts about leaving such a beautiful home.  We will never live in a more beautiful home and in a more beautiful place.

Please check out the pictures and let me know what you think.