wintery thoughts

This post is mostly for my sons, to whom I read this book... again and again...

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Today seemed like a good time to look again...

If you are ever fortunate to get a copy of this book, the pictures and verses will draw you in...

(it has been out of print, but I think it is once again available)
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Since winter storms have settled here in the blustery mid-west, this seemed like a timely post.

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What's the weather like where YOU are?

Come on in...

Come on in and see the tree!

Since we are fortunate to live in a wintery, snowy part of the country, it is quite easy to get into the Christmas spirit. I start Christmas music early and love to decorate early as well.

I just thought you might like stopping by to see the tree today...

it's out in our "river room" - a name we gave to our four-season porch addition because from it one can see the river...

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When we added on the river room we purchased an artificial tree because we wanted a nice tall tree to compliment the high ceiling.

The decorations are actually quite simple and Scandinanvian in flavor with lots of sweet straw ornaments (Swedish-me) and candle lights (similar to my Norwegian husband's tree).
I added shiny red balls, some berries and baby's breath and red ribbons.
This year I found these darling little sweaters and added some of them to the tree as well.
They are so cute! Here are a few up close pictures:

And yes, the background on my blog right now is from my tree.

I hope you are enjoying the Christmas season!

Little cook

Ah, I can't express how fun it is to bake with a grandchild.

Today my oldest grand-daughter came for a visit and made some gingerbread men.

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She quickly had to put on an apron. I was surprised how adept she was at rolling dough.

I asked her how she knew and she said she learned it making lefse.... I forgot, her mom's family has a big lefse making party... if you're not Scandinavian, you may not know what lefse is... maybe I'll do a blog post on it soon...)

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And then I gave her brief instructions on decorating with royal icing and using the piping bag.

She experimented on the waxed paper and then went right to town on her cookies.

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She was very creative and needed no help whatsoever.

Oh, grandma is sooo proud!

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Boys. Toys.

I captured this photo today of this grandson happily enjoying this old race track and car.

After unpacking one old train track and two old race tracks.... we finally got ONE race car on ONE race track to actually work!

No luck with the train track.

No luck with the largest race track that had a number of decent cars -

but much to his delight... we found one car that worked on this smaller track. He sure had fun!
Who knows how long it has been since this race track was used....

Weekend update

This was a lovely weekend and very special for the family pictured above...

the "Queen" in the center celebrated her 100th birthday yesterday!!!

She is a lovely lady and her daughter (my good friend) , sitting next to her on your right, and her daughter-in-law sitting on your left, and their families were all in attendance to help celebrate the wonderful birthday.

I took some pictures and thought a few of my blog readers, who know this family, would be happy to see everyone.

Happy 100th Birthday Lillie!

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Friday evening we had overnight guests and, of course, I had to be sure to get a cute picture of them Saturday morning while we enjoyed coffee and sweet rolls together.

K and B, we sure enjoyed visiting! Come again!

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Winter is so beautiful!

It snowed. Everything looks so clean and pristine.

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The view out of our bedroom window shows snow on every branch....
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Taking a walk brings more snow laden branches to photograph.

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The majestic oak tree in front of our home brings to mind that poem...

"I think that I shall never see a poem as lovely as a tree..."

Isn't that the start of a poem? Seems I learned that in 9th grade...

anyone remember the name of the author?
In any case, I so agree!

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Hmm... I guess not everyone gets to just go outside and take pictures....

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My kind of day...

This was my kind of day. Wintery, snowy, picturesque and cozy.

A good day for Christmas music and some lovely baking.

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In anticipation for overnight company, I made sweet rolls.

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In expectation for bringing a meal to a friend who is hosting lots of company,

I made buns...

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In the spirit of the season, I made more cookies!

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I did make enough for hubby to have some too....

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Either later tonight or tomorrow morning with coffee for breakfast...
or BOTH!
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And, just for fun... gingerbread men!

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Yup, my kind of day.

Happy Birthday ... 93!!

Happy Birthday today to my sweet mom, who celebrates her 93rd birthday!

She is one perky lady too!

It's someone's anniversary....

47 years ago today my dear sister married my wonderful brother-in-law Brian...

however, the only picture I have from the wedding day is this photograph taken in our home prior to the wedding....

does anything strike you funny about this picture???

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FYI: I was the maid of honor and the other two men are brothers....

and what we DIDN'T know at the time was that brother number 3 was 8 1/2 months away from being born! surprise, surprise...

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Happy Anniversary to the happy couple!

Too cute

This was just too cute not to share.

Grandchild # 9

Wearing the outfit I bought for her big sister about 5 years ago...

Easy cookie house

Recently I purchased this plastic form to use to make a cookie house.

I decided to simply use my sugar cookie dough instead of gingerbread and it seems to work just fine. Roll out the dough and press this form on it to make the shapes of the walls and roof.

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I used the royal icing to glue the walls together. But before I did that, I piped the decorations on the walls while they laid flat on the counter. I thought it might be easier that way.

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There was a front door and a back door.
It takes a little practice to glue the walls together and I propped them up using some cans of soup after I applied the icing. It takes a while for the icing to harden and the walls need to stay upright while that happens, obviously.
Then the roof comes on and then the chimney.
After that, I decorated the roof and chimney.
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I decided the house needed to sit upon something firm so I purchased some cardboard in the cake baking section of my local Walmart.
I added these cute trees and walkway and two little snow people (one in front, one near the back door).
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I love the results!
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(I thinned the royal frosting with water and painted it on the cardboard and then sprinkled the walkway with silver sprinkles (called "cupcake gems" by Cakemate) After that, I painted the thinned frosting on the remainder of the cardboard and sprinkled with white sparkling sugar by Wilton.


It just makes you want to come for a visit, doesn't it?

Even coming in the back door is inviting!

Come drop by!

10 reasons why I am thankful!

Words cannot express my thankfulness...

our sweet grandchildren!

Krumkake...ah......

Did you know that yesterday was "hug a Norwegian" day? Yup, I read that on facebook.

Of course, around here, everyday is hug a norwegian...

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And, since my Norwegian likes krumkake, I thought I should bake some today...

Batter on the handy electric krumkake iron.. Close and bake for less then half a minute!

There you see the pretty design...

Quickly roll it into a cone.

And before you know it, you have a nice 2 dozen or so...

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Of course, this is just the start...

Birds of a feather...

It seems that the three things I post most often on this blog would be

1. grandchildren 2. food and 3. .... birds.

It's been a while since I posted some of my feathered friends.

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Today, as it was snowing, the birds were really feeding and I couldn't get far without stopping to take a quick picture.

Here are a few from today.

Mr. Bluejay, above picture, was really all fluffed up. Perhaps he noticed I had the camera...

There is no contest - Mr. Cardinal is my favorite and it is a treat every single time he stops by!

Cardinals are not plentiful here but we have been so fortunate that a few cardinals have established themselves in our woods for a number of years now.

Against the snow, they are sooo photogenic... but also...

quite skittish about being photographed.

You have to have the camera ready to go before they do!


Ah ha, haven't seen one of these for a while - a shrike.
While they are attractive, they are nasty little fellas, going after other smaller birds.
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They look sort of menacing, do they not?
Right after this picture, he flew down and tried to eat a little bird.
Not sure how that turned out....