We had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday at my parents' house. My Dad smoked a turkey, which turned out awesome. And we had about a thousand side dishes, all made from scratch.
All from scratch, except the cranberry sauce, which was going to come from a can. But when my son arrived from college, and discovered that I wasn't planning on making my famous fresh cranberry sauce, he protested. So at 3:30pm on Thanksgiving Day, he drove me to the store (which was pretty empty by then) for the ingredients. And in about 45 minutes, my cranberry sauce was made, chilled, and perfectly jelled.
If you want my secret recipe for Barbara's Cranberry Sauce with Raspberries, you can find it on my blog:
Gingerbread is a baked treat that dates back to the Middle Ages. It is thought to have first appeared in the U.S. in the nineteenth century, when the Swiss monks of St. Meinrad Archabbey in Indiana baked gingerbread on holidays, and gave it to the sick. Over the years, baking gingerbread cookies and building gingerbread houses developed into a popular American Christmas tradition.
Celebrating Christmas: Gingerbread House 101
"From very simple designs for busy moms and dads to challenging art projects for those artists among us, we've got it all. ... Let the decorating begin!!!" Celebrating Christmas offers a potpourri of gingerbread house advice, from how to plan a gingerbread party to recipes for gingerbread tree ornaments. Highlights are six gingerbread house blueprints (including a log cabin, chapel, country store and Victorian) although you will need to enlarge the patterns before using them
Flickr: The Gingerbread House Showcase Pool
I'm trying really hard not to say "a picture is worth a thousand words," but if you are fishing for gingerbread inspiration, what better way to find it than at this collection of more than 600 gingerbread house photos? To find specific kinds of houses, you can search within the pool with the search function in the upper right-hand corner. You can find more gingerbread pix by following tags such as "gingerbread" or "gingerbreadhouse."
Highlights Kids: Design Your Own Gingerbread House
To add a little computer fun to today's topic, this pick is an online game. Decorate your virtual gingerbread house with the usual Candy and Icing, or go crazy with silly Food and Stuff such as a whole fish, a tennis ball, or alphabet blocks to spell out your name. Move items onto the house by clicking once to pick up, then again to release onto your house. Controls include Rotate, Resize, Flip, Start Over, and Print (so you can hang your finished creation on the refrigerator door.)
Surfnetkids Printables Club Members also get the following printables to use in the classroom, the computer lab, the school library, or to send home with students:
Gingerbread Houses Printable
Printable Christmas Word Search
Gingerbread Wikipedia Printable
Christmas and Hanukkah Crafts Printable
Holiday Sweets Printable
"The hardest arithmetic to master is that which enables us to count our blessings." ~~ Eric Hoffer (July 25, 1902 – May 21, 1983) American social writer and philosopher.
Dear Reader,