Thought I'd start a new thread since we were at 18 and I wanted to give you my popcorn recipe for those of you that want it. It isn't lowfat so be prepared. Let me know if you skinny it down, how it tastes. It is fast, easy, the clean up is easy, you won't ever burn it and the kids and adults will both love it if they like carmel corn. Since I don't want to get in trouble with Harry and David's for calling it moose munch, which is their product, I am going to call mine:

CRITTER CRUNCH

2 microwave bags of popcorn popped (any type)
1 cup roasted peanuts (I used honey roasted but you can even use dry roasted or cashews or other nuts too as long as they are roasted and not raw)
1 cup lt brown sugar (don't use dark it will be too strong tasting like burnt sugar)
1/2 c butter
1/4 c light corn syrup
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 cup milk chocolate chips
1 tsp shortening

Pop both bags of corn and put them and the cup of nuts in a very large bowl or you can use a big paper bag with the top rolled down.

place chocolate and shortening in small bowl and microwave 90 seconds then stir until chips and shortening are completely dissolved and set aside.

place sugar, butter, corn syrup, vanilla and salt in microwave safe bowl, micro one minute, stir it up well, then if butter is not all melted, another 1 minute and restir, then 2 minutes so 4 minutes total. Remove and stir in baking soda, pour over popped corn and nuts and stir it up well getting the nuts, which will fall to the bottom incorporated into the sticky carmel.

place bowl or bag into microwave, microwave 45 seconds and stir or close bag and shake well, then another 45 seconds and again stir or shake and then 30 seconds and stir or shake.

pour mixture out onto a baking sheet. Drizzle chocolate over the entire popcorn/nut mixture and let dry and cool. Store in a covered container and enjoy!!!

Here are the hats all finished. Hopefully we can get a couple decent pics with them. The red ones are for Kelly's family and the white ones for Jay's. I got completely finished before I realized the two redheads should have been given the white hats, but Thomas's and Jackson's are different sizes!

Ok, here is your laugh for the day. Jackson is not allowed peanut butter or chocolate, stuff like that until after he is two to prevent allergies. I ask his dad about candy for his stocking and he told me he loves those dumdum brand little suckers. I didn't want him not to have anything since Thomas has a bunch of candy in his so I really wanted to find these suckers. I did find him some root beer jelly beans in an A and W root beer bottle (it is tiny and plastic) and I bought him a pez dispenser because Thomas always gets one from me for any of the candy holidays, ie Valentine's Day, Halloween etc. So I looked at the commissary, Target, Walmart, Walgreens and no one had them. Jack found them tonight in Krogers but the only trouble is I had to buy THREE HUNDRED of them! I have this huge huge bag of suckers now! I told Jack I will save some for when he comes down here and give the rest to Kelly next year for Halloween!

Talk to you all tomorrow. I am off to wash all my popcorn dishes and my key lime pie stuff. I am on the home stretch with cooking stuff, thank goodness!

Faye

Morning gals. Have to hurry my post as this is push to holiday day. I still have floors to clean, vacuum up stuff from Christmas decor droppings as we are going out this afternoon and buy a real tree. Executive order (ps I am vice president so you know where it came from) and I have bathroom and kitchen to clean. I plan on getting up from here and doing bathroom and mopping laundry room and bathroom and getting sweeping in entranceway done then will mop it when Jack is up and around. Jack washed my whole nativity set so I got that up this morning. The are about 10 inches high, and I have 18 pieces to it so it takes up some space. My mil painted them for me for Christmas over 20 years ago and they have been lugged around. Only two mishaps. My goat lost one whole horn and tip of other and my cow lost a tip of his horn. The paint has come off in bits and bobs from Jack having to clean them last night. They were in a box a couple years ago that got wet and bugs got in so all that gunk was on them. When I put them in a rubbermaid container we didn't clean them first like idiots so we had that to do last night. I imagine it will be fun keeping Jackson out of it.

We have the kieflies to do first thing this morning. They take a good couple hours to do. Jack is going to bring down our short "church" style long table so we can sit and do them and have a place to put them when they cool. There will be 9 dozen. I will have some for tomorrow and the whole weekend then send a couple dozen home with Jay and Jack can take a couple dozen to work with him. Kelly loves them too, but she now can no longer have nuts and they have a walnut filling so I can't give any to her.

We then have to pick up the turkey today, go to Lowes and get a saw, a tree stand, batteries for the under the tree Christmas train, garland for my entertainment center and around fireplace, twinkle light replacements as needed and then pick out a tree. I have no idea how expensive they are, but I imagine quite a few $$$. They ship them here from Michigan as there is no where here in the south that grows them.

You wonderful ladies have a spectacular Thanksgiving and I thank God for the wonderful friends you have become even if we never meet face to face.
Faye

Good evening, ladies.

It feels good not to have to worry about making a holiday dinner and all that cleaning and decorating. I always did it for Stan. I'm going to church in the morning then on to my friends and the quilting will begin.

Faye, the popcorn sounds good. I love those hats. Hope you post some pictures on the heads of their wearers.

Jean, I hope you are all well and everyone else stays that way!

Maggie, I suppose you are busy cooking!

Ladies, have a great Thanksgiving. Don't do too much shopping on Friday. I won't be shopping at all that day.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING! I was a mess last night. My feet hurt, my knees hurt, I was tired and I still had so much to do before today. I finally said ENOUGH and went to bed. I woke up at 2:20 AM with cramps in both calves so bad I wanted to scream. I got up and got a big glass of OJ as I didn't have any bananas and drank it and they went away fairly quickly after that and I went back to sleep. I got up at 6 this morning, put all the ornaments on the tree, washed all counter tops, etc in kitchen and only have sweeping and mopping in kitchen to do. Then at 8 I will put the turkey in the oven to get it warmed up enough for me to debone it and will debone it. The rest gets hauled to Kelly's for finishing.

To put you in the Christmas mood, here is my tree and fireplace. Oh, the orange looking things around the tree are actually red and white striped. It is led lights that look like one continuous candy cane. It smells so nice in the house as I put in new airwicks around the house in apple cinnamon and I have little mitten ornaments that have packets of evergreen smell in them along with the live tree we ended up buying. Boy I can tell I haven't bought a live tree in awhile. I took 45 minutes trying to find just the right tree. Not sure I like this type as my heavier ornaments were had to get on, but it looks pretty I think.

I will talk with you all tomorrow. Have a lovely time with family and friends today!
Faye

Good morning ladies here on Black Friday. Though there are nuts around the country standing in front of stores freezing to death waiting for them to open at 4 am, I am just sitting here with a bit of a tummy ache. It is just a little nausea I get sometimes, don't know why. It will pass but right now I can't sleep so I came downstairs for awhile.

We are going to have Thomas and Jackson overnight tonight, which should be interesting. I don't know if it is such a good idea to leave the baby all night. He is still skittish around us and I am afraid when he wakes in the morning if his parents aren't here he will be very upset. I can't seem to get through to his parents that to him we are strangers again. It doesn't upset me, it is just the truth. He doesn't know us. He forgets us when he doesn't see us for months. I have to tell you, he is totally yummy. Thomas just adores him and Jackson follows T all over in hero worship. It was so beautiful here yesterday that we were able to sit outside and have drinks and appetizers and he played outside. Thomas has a little plastic picnic table that he is too big for and Jackson just loved it. It has little "holes" where the screws tightened down the top and Jackson would go and get leaves and dirt and try and stuff them into the holes. He would work and work at it. It was so funny. He puts just about anything in his mouth right now and has a fascination with his belly button. He is a thumb sucker and walks around with his right thumb in his mouth and his left finger in his belly button. It is hilarious to see.

Jean: So glad you had a nice time. We had a wonderful time, food was yummy and everyone pitched in to clean up. My dd decided to use china and the only glitch was when we went to clean up the dishes after storing everything, their water faucet wouldn't turn the water on so we had to leave everything sit. I felt terrible, but there was nothing we could do until they get a plumber in to see what is wrong with the inside of the faucet handle. They have one of those single handles you pulll up and turn left or right depending on hot or cold water. At least I was able to get all her baking stuff all cleaned up before we had dinner so she didn't have that stuff too.

Today we are going downtown as we figure no one will be downtown because there isn't a bunch of shopping. We are going to go to breakfast together then go see the Peabody ducks march. Jack and I may skip that and come back to the condo and get ready for everyone as we are doing Christmas today.

Everyone have a good weekend and hope it is warm and lovely where you are.
Faye

Good evening, ladies! No snow here, rather nice in the low 60s today.

I had such a good time with Glory. I went to Mass then to her house. I ended up making scalloped potatoes with cheese and ham in them. I took a bottle of wine and a cranberry apple torte and a small pointsettea. Glory made us endless cups of tea and green beans with bacon and ham and applesauce, and heated up a lovely french baguette. We talked and quilted. We had our dessert about 3 pm, but ate out dinner much later. Around 10 pm we decided to make some door hangers for the others in our bee. We ran out of steam at 1 am and were astonished at the time. We did go shopping today...to the quilt shop which wasn't crowded and had some darn good sales. I bought some quilting items for 2 of my friends, got a fabulous pattern for needle box - in the shape of an outhouse. It holds a small pair of sissors, a spool of thread, needles and pins. When you take the roof off, the sides fold down to hold the items and the center is the "hole". Glory and I are chairing the guild challenge next year and we are calling it "Have you read a good book lately?" Well, I think I'll be entering a quilt and also the outhouse (in the "other" category). I'll make several little books to put in the outhouse. I'll be sure to post the picture after I finish it. I also treated myself to a new sewing box. It's different in that it is round and just the right size to carry my applique projects to guild or bee.

Gas is $1.55. I can't believe it. I never thought I'd see gas under $3 in my lifetime.

It sounds like you all had a great holiday.

Faye, keep a bottle of quinine water around. It really stops those cramps. The nurses had me get it for Stan to drink when he had bad leg cramps. When I get them, I stand barefooted on the tile floor in the bathroom and it seems the cold makes them stop. I think Jackson will be okay with grandma and Thomas.

Maggie, please keep the snow there. I don't want to see any! All the pansies that were put out this fall are blooming and will last all winter if we don't have an ice storm.

Jean, Sorry Bob has surcumb to the "sickness". It's no fun.

Take care and have a good evening. I'm going to baste a quilt so I can do some quilting while I'm doing laundry tomorrow - after I go workout at Curves.

Just a short one this morning ladies. I have the crud. I don't know if it is something I ate or flu even though I had the flu shot. It is coming out both ends and I just sent the whole family to breakfast without me. Nothing for me today, that's for sure. I am going to have to be a wet blanket and stay home.

Jackson did fine and is such a joy and funny little boy. I will tell you all about it later. I am back to the bathroom! {{{SIGH}}}
Faye

Good morning, ladies!

Faye, it sounds more like something with the food than the flu. But the flu shots are not effective for every type of flu. So sorry you are feeling bad with the kids there.

Another of my quilting friends died on Thanksgiving. That's 4 since October.

Well, I have to clean the kitchen and mop the floor then I get to go to the sewing room for quilting fun.

Have a good day.

Good afternoon, ladies. 50 degrees and rain today.

I think I'm coming down with a cold - I hope that is all it is. Runny nose, stuffy head, and tight chest. I decided it would be better not to go to church today and pass on my germs.

I tried to attach a picture of the outhouse but it doesn't seem to have worked. I'll have to get Faye to tell me how to do it.

Jean, I hope Bob is feeling better today. Do you have an artificial tree or a real one?

Maggie, 100 tiny pieces of glass, that's what I get when I drop something on my cereamic tile floor! You have a lot of patience. Hope your snow is gone.

Have a good day!