Carter's: January 2010

Monday, January 25, 2010

Good Compyany

I've always been grateful for you.

You're such good company!

Love you guys!

(I'm grateful you are old enough to give me some fashion advice now. Goodness!)

Sunday, January 10, 2010

Christmas is Not Over at Our House

This week Emma said, "I'm sad that Christmas is going away. " or something like that.

Gracie is taking care of it though by playing "Jingle Bell Rock" by Amy Grant over and over. I'm not ready for Christmas to be gone either so I've been turning on the Christmas lights and the music too. Oh well, I do always seem to be last to arrive, and, according to John, the last to leave, everwhere we go. I'll get your Christmas cards out soon!

Wednesday, January 6, 2010

30's Big Band Inspiration

Last night, after dinner, we received a little inspiration....

I was slogging around in the kitchen, trying to clean up the dinner mess and not feeling very enthusiastic about it. John pulled up a music station on his little Blackberry cell phone and set it to play 30's to 50's Big Band style music. He set it in the kitchen window and started helping me with the dinner clean up. We laughed that we could brag that with 60 to 80 years of hard research we can now brag that we have just as wonderful sound quality (you know, small, tinny sounding) as they did back then.

However, even given the small sound, the music inspired us and we couldn't help but dance a bit while we cleaned up.

I love to picture the people singing the big band music;

microphones and sequined dresses,

romance,

swing dance,

waiting under the apple tree for a loved one to come home from the war.

I felt grateful to have a great husband, at home.

Grateful too that he even felt inspired so far as to do kitchen repaires!!! Yay!

Two Favorite Recipes

We loved these new cookies made for us by a friend this Christmas. I'm not into using store bought mixes but these were so easy with the mix it was worth it!

Orange Cream Cookies

*1 pouch (1 lb 1.5 oz)
*3 tablespoon butter or margarine, melted
*1 teaspoon orange extract
*1 teaspoon vanilla
*1 egg
*5 drops yellow food color
*2 drops red food color
*1 bag (12) white vanilla baking chip (2 cups)

1 Heat oven to 350 degree's. In large bowl, stir all ingredients except baking chips until soft dough forms. Stir in baking chips.

2 On un-greased cookie sheets, drop dough with 11/2 tablespoon cookie scoop or by rounded tablespoonfuls about 2 inches apart.

3 Bake 9 to 10 minutes or just until dough is set (do not over bake) Cool 1 minute; remove from cookie sheets to cooling racks.

Annie's Recipe for Banana Muffins (Excellent)

1/2 C oil
1/2 C honey
1 1/2 C bananas (3 bananas work)
1/2 Cup yogurt
2 eggs
2 C Flour (I used all whole wheat and it was really yummy)
1 tsp. soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
nuts if you want them
Chocolate chips - As much as you like.

*I think you can use applesauce instead of the bananas

Mix it all up and bake at
350 for 40 minutes if you are making a loaf
275 for 18 minutes if you are making muffin cups