This Year's Christmas Tree

Based upon the number of needles this "evergreen" is dropping on a daily basis, I'm guessing she'd been patiently waiting at Home Depot (for dupable folks like us) since early November. We rescued her last Saturday (a late tannenbaum acquisition even for us).

But the story gets better. You knew it would, right?  I wrestled for quite some time with countless strands of Christmas lights (darn that Martha Stewart for saying "100 lights for every foot of tree" and on me for being so OCD that I am certain she is correct) and two strands of Christmas lights had some sort of weird electrical short and couldn't be persuaded to stay lit (after they were fully enshrouded in our tree - a rookie mistake, I know). Rather then lose countless hours of sleep for the next 3 weeks (wondering if I'd created a fire hazard), I ended up taking those strings of lights off  the tree (along with a few thousand additional Frazier fir needles) and went with what we had.

Finally, to add insult to injury, we had to forgo the heaviest of our ornaments because the tree didn't seem up to the task of supporting any additional weight.  My apologies to Yoda, my icicle snowman, Tinkerbell, the toy airplane and those countless sentimental ornaments who didn't make their way onto this year's tree.

At the rate we're going, our tree will look like this before December 24th.

Christmas Neighbor Gifts

Texans are friendly people, neighborly too. When we moved here, we were delighted and amazed by the number of neighbors who dropped by to greet us and bring us welcome gifts - cookies, bottles of wine, lists of restaurants and favorite businesses. To us it seemed pleasantly old school. Like a throw-back in time, when people knew who lived next door and stopped in the driveway to chat about their goings on. Though we had many great neighbors back in Atlanta, they were friendships built over time and this notion of being introduced before the moving van had left the driveway was new to us.  

At Christmastime, the neighborliness continues, with small gifts (often a homemade treat) and Christmas cards left on doorsteps. Last year, I wasn't quite as prepared for the abundance of neighborliness, though I did make some items and enjoyed every minute.  This year, I've settled on a less labor intensive gift. I've seen it on lots of different blogs in the last few months and it's a variation on a treat I made several Valentines' Days ago.

These Peppermint Pretzels are easy and delicious. 

Preheat your oven to 175 degrees (yes, that's all).  You will need:

Mini pretzels. I used the twists but the squares would work too. 
 Place these on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper.

These delicious Kisses.  Trust me, they're not too peppermint,
more like a butter mint.

No explanation required

Once you've gathered your ingredients, place an individual Kiss on top of each pretzel.

Place your cookie sheet in the oven for approximately four and half minutes (don't walk away!).  Once you remove them from the oven.  Allow to sit for about 45 seconds before placing an M & M on top (this helps them melt just a little extra). Place them in the refrigerator and allow to cool for at least 15 minutes.  

These treats are delicious.  I've decided to package them two ways this year. I found these cute food safe bags at Target.

They hold approximately twenty pretzel candies.

But for those in the neighborhood with smaller children, I decided to utilize these little reindeer cupcake toppers, which I bought online last year, to create a special container. 

Last year, I attached them to the top of a cute frame or two.  

This year, with the aid of a Sharpie - Rudolph magically appeared. 

I then used my glue gun to attach Rudolph to white mason jar lids I'd purchased at Walmart. (I got the mason jars there, too). The tulle and tag were the final additions and viola.

One Two One Two One Two

Today is 12-12-12, the last major numerical date using the Gregorian or Christian calendar for almost another century. The next time three numbers will align as they did on 9-9-09, 10-10-10 and 11-11-11 will be on Jan. 1, 2101 (just a mere 88 years from now), or 1-1-1.

Winter Wonderland?

In the 18 months, since we moved to Texas, I must admit the thing that has surprised me the most is, get this, the weather.  We'd been told (Can't remember now by who.Trust me if I could I'd be holding those folks accountable), that the weather in Dallas was remarkably similar to Atlanta's  "just 3 days earlier."  

Despite similar latitudes, Georgia is very humid and can be exceptionally warm and sometimes even hot, but we have found that Texas is arid, windy and hot.  Oh, did I mention, HOT? Yeah, it's HOT.  The weather here is, in fact, ridiculous. In the summer, it is often still over 100 degrees after dark.  

The dash in my car one September evening.

Even in the last few weeks the temperature has reached into the 80's.Thanksgiving was shorts and flip-flop weather. Our class Sunday School party was held, last Saturday night, poolside at our teacher's home (no swimming was involved, however). Yesterday, it was 75 degrees on December 9th. 

Yet, this morning, we woke up to a light dusting of snow.  Hallelujah! I'm guessing the weather will warm back up to the 70's before we say goodbye to 2012.  But for today, we're celebrating.