Yesterday in the mail...

Jeremy and I received a goodie/gift basket from Mrs. Field's Cookies. I love the basket because it will be useful in the kitchen when we empty it. The weird thing is that we have no idea who sent it to us. There was no invoice, no way of telling the thought behind it. Would that seem suspicious to you? I don't imagine any of my few readers know anything about it, but if you do, please let me know. For now it's just sitting on our dining table.

Goodies in my Kitchen

Today is Keeping Creative Kitchens over at Alaina's blog. And while my cookie/candy excursions in the kitchen haven't been too creative or out of the ordinary, I thought I'd contribute the few goodies I have made. (I can't make too much because then it's just sitting around for Jer and I to eat and we really don't need that.)

Peanut Clusters (from Alaina's recipe blog)

Melt 6 oz. chocolate chips and 6 oz. butterscotch chips. Stir in until coated, 12 oz. salted peanuts. Drop by spoonfuls onto wax paper.

(I sent these to work with Jeremy this week and one of his co-workers took a couple and said that would be her Weight Watchers limit for the day, so they're pretty tasty and worth splurging on.)

Dipped Pretzels

Melt chocolate and/or vanilla flavored almond bark in the microwave (Candiquik or any such will work). Stir in a handful of small twisted pretzels, using a plastic fork with the two middle tines broken off, pick up a pretzel and shake off the excess coating. Place on wax paper to dry. To fancy these up, sprinkle candy sprinkles, or drizzle vanilla coating over chocolate pretzels and chocolate coating over the vanilla pretzels (my personal favorite).

Reese's Brownie Bites

Using either a box brownie mix (I'm partial to Aldi's) or make brownie batter from scratch, fill mini muffin tins about 2/3 full with batter and bake (probably take several minutes less than the recipe calls for...I think I baked mine about 15-18 minutes). While the brownies are baking, unwrap mini Reese's cups. Remove brownies from oven and while they are still in the pan and warm, push one Reese's cup into each brownie.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

Once again, just follow the recipe on the package. However, I make these minor adjustments (and they've been getting rave reviews at Jeremy's library): double the vanilla extract, add an additional 2/3-1 c. of flour, and add a 1/2 tsp of cinnamon. I also tend to bake them at a slightly lower temperature than the recipe calls for.

That's what I've made this year. I am hoping to make some peppermint meringues sometime soon, and perhaps some coconut macaroons. Enjoy!

A Matter for Prayer

It's difficult when there is never any good news about the economy. It's all glum. I've obviously found it discouraging as I've been job searching. In addition, with the reality that my brother-in-law was downsized out of his job back in November, it's scary. Jer called me this morning with the news that the public library he works for has to cut $2.2 million from it's budget this year. The scary part is that they knew and were planning to cut $1.6 mil already, but where's the extra going to come from? I've been impressed with the library as they planned ahead and starting making major cuts last year to hopefully keep itself from too much of a crunch and they haven't been cutting jobs--as I understand, much of the goal of starting now was to preserve jobs. And still, even with this news, there isn't talk of job cuts, but it still makes our hearts beat a little quicker as we ponder this all, especially knowing Jeremy is one of the newer employees. However, we know that God will provide because not only is He our Creator, but He is also our Sustainer. We are going to be praying for this and everyone else facing similar circumstances.

Tree Trimming

When my parents were first married, they started the tradition of having a Tree Trimming Party every December. This party involved special foods and Christmas tree decorating and just the two of them. Of course as they started having children, we joined in the fun. It was one of our favorite times of the year. Because this tradition meant so much to us, as we've gotten married, we've tried to share this with our spouses. Jeremy hasn't had much Christmas in the past few years. No tree and I know a couple years ago, he spent Christmas day alone. So, Christmas doesn't hold the same magic to him as it does to me. Nevertheless, I'm hoping to inspire more of the Christmas spirit by sharing favorite Christmas traditions and Christmas foods with him.
Last Friday night was our tree trimming party. It was more last minute than I'd anticipated, but it came off okay. I quickly pulled together a bit of "party food" and we listened to Bing Crosby croon Carols as we decorated. This was followed by a little snacking and a game of Scrabble where Jeremy soundly beat me.

Our little 3-foot tree perched on top of a bookcase. Jeremy's favorite part is the angel at the top of the tree. As he has no ornaments, all them on the tree are from my collection.
Jeremy playing with a slinky while admiring our tree. :)

My Christmas goody spread.

We had a cheese/cracker/meat plate (I made a tiny cheeseball with some cream cheese, sharp cheddar, green onions, Worcestershire sauce, and season salt), veggie plate (cucumbers and celery), chocolate dipped pretzel plate, and a bowl of Chex Mix. I made some Christmas tea and we had some Oliver's Rose Wine. It turned out quite nicely considering the party's hasty birth.

Us at the end of the evening. Actually, this was before Jeremy beat me by 100 points at Scrabble. I might not have been smiling quite as widely afterwards!

Keeping on

Do you ever have one of those weeks that kind of bolls you over? Last week was a bit like that. Several circumstances kind of collided in my head and I sagged under it.
A big part of it involved job searching. It's a pretty pitiful state up here. Last Wednesday, when I took myself out of the house and ran errands and asked around about hiring, I had this out of body experience where I was sucked into a walk-in interview at Bed, Bath, and Beyond. Now, before you congratulate me on getting any sort of interview, get this. They are hiring for a 10-day job in early January as they move locations. That's it. AND, they aren't hiring on the spot, they are having call back interviews for the people they are interested in. Seriously, it's a 10-day job. I looked around at the people and I suddenly felt really miserable. The dozen or so people were mostly scary looking guys, 50+ women, and what looked like probably high school drop-outs. I didn't like the feeling of desperation that hung in the air and I didn't want to identify myself with it. I took myself home very discouraged. For the record, I haven't received any second-interview calls.
Carry on, right? Something will happen eventually. Jer and I are both very grateful for his job being able to support us.

Keeping Creative Kitchens

Today I'm participating in Alaina's Keeping Creative Kitchens. I'm not too creative here, but was pondering my current lunch packing for Jeremy.

I pack Jeremy's lunch everyday and while it's typically leftovers (I plan this into the portion of food I cook), recently I've had a couple scrounging days. He doesn't eat sandwiches, which is of course one of the easier fall back food plans. One night last week--around 9--I quickly threw together some vegetarian chili. I had a can of black beans, can of corn, can of diced green chilies, can of diced tomatoes, can of tomato sauce. I spiced this up and sent it for his lunch the next day. The creative part came the next day when I made a mock-taco salad using that chili. I crushed chips, tore up lettuce and covered that with a couple spoonfuls of drained chili, cheese, plain yogurt, and a little Catalina dressing. It was quite tasty and very easy. Yesterday's crunch lunch for Jer, was boiled eggs, rice cake with peanut butter, celery, and yogurt. Not too bad. Okay, this is not the creative kitchen you were expecting, but it's all I've got for now.

My husband told me I needed to post a new entry.

I've felt dull at blogging this week. Yesterday I spent the morning running errands and trying to find someplace that's hiring. It was very discouraging and I came home and stretched out on the couch and watched Friends.
Today I got up and around early. A girl from church came over for coffee around 10. Her 18-month old entertained us for most of our visit. Then we drove downtown and had lunch at a Thai restaurant with another woman from church. I followed this with a visit to the library to see my husband and find a fiction book to read.
Tomorrow Jeremy's off work and I'm looking forward to spending some time with him. We have some boring errands to run, but I'm hoping to fit in some dinner and maybe even a movie.