And the Reindeer Goes To...

Early this morning I woke up Mr. Random Number Generator and asked him to choose a winner because if I had my way, I would be making 90+  more reindeer and I'm afraid that the Whopper shelves are bare. He chose:

#32! -One of these days I will figure out how to get that little box on my blog!
Congratulations Kerrylynn!

Your little package is all boxed up and ready to head your way as soon as you drop me an email and send me your address!

 I have to thank each and every one of you for chiming in. It was so much fun reading everone's comments and I've now got quite few  fabulous new things added to my baking list!

Blogland was a virtual giveaway mecca this past week! I hope y'all enjoyed the hopping. I have a few things to share from giveways, but I haven't taken photos yet so I'll get back to you on that. I can however, say that I have been doing the Snoopy Dance. It entertains DH.  Y'all are incredibly generous!

One kiddo arrived yesterday and the other one showed up this evening...can you say excited?! Praising God that we are all under the same roof tonight! Now that my baking buddies are home, the baking can commence so if you happen to be in the area and you see a hazy cloud of flour and powdered sugar on the horizen, you are getting close.

I also want to welcome all of my new followers! Y'all just tickled me plumb to pieces! I know how busy everyone's lives are and I am honored that y'all would want to spend a few of those minutes with me. I probably will be quite scarce until after the New Year. We'll have a housefull with people coming and going. Lots of washing of sheets will be taking place and I want to spend every possible minute with the kids while they are here. Our son will only be here for 2 weeks before he heads back to Camp Pendelton.

So I want to wish each of you a very Merry Blessed Christmas:

 May you make time to savor the precious  moments in each and every day and celebrate the gift of Christ's birth amidst the busy-ness. Love and hugs to all of you!

Caution: Reindeer Ahead (Blog Hop Giveaway!)

This giveaway is now closed. Thanks so much!




Yay! It's time! It's time! I'm so excited!  There are an awful lot of fun bloggers showing up at this party on the 10th and every one of them is giving something away. There will be over 250 blogs to hop to so get your hoppin' boots on! The first day this Blog Hop Giveaway was announced, I jumped in and signed up. Then I began to contemplate. Hmmm...
What should I give away? So I sorted...and stitched...and strung...and pulled...and dug...and glued. I wanted to give away all sorts of things. Then I needed a bigger box. LOL.

So, I settled on this:

I hope you'll like him. I've been making these for 14 years now. At least a dozen grace my buffet for giving every year.



I keep thinking I've given these to everyone I know and then each year, new people pop up. :)
Yikes! That's a lot of reindeer... and a lot of reindeer droppings.

 Yep. This little guy is not house trained, but I hope you'll welcome him anyway. LOL. He will arrive in this little gift bag which is the brainchild of Jeni .

accompanied by this little snowman who is covering up a giant Hershey Bar:

I'm thinking the fact that a candy bar will be hanging around here for an entire week without being devoured is some kind of record. He's the creation of Laurie Furnell and I am smitten with them.

Do I have any takers?
No rules. You don't even have to be a follower although I would love it if you were. Just leave me a comment and tell me what is your favorite Christmas baked good? If you haven't blogged about it, maybe you will and then I could hop over and add a scrumptious new recipe to my cookbook. :)

 My list is long and I would be hard pressed to choose just one, but the Birthday Cake for Jesus and the gingerbread cowboys probably get top billing.

 One year we moved between Christmas and New Years. We never have movers although one time we splurged and rented a Uhaul. Horse trailers are generally our mode of transporation. (Insert Beverly Hillbillies here.)  It was 5 hours one way and we made the trip 4 times that week with 20" of snow on the ground. We moved into a house where the heat didn't work and the water heater left us 3 minutes of hot water, but that's a rabbit trail for another day.

Needless to say, it didn't leave much time for baking and we were sad. My inlaws met us when we drove through town and my dear MIL loaded us up with Christmas candy and cookies. It was 3 pm, we hadn't eaten, and we proceeded to make ourselves sick in the parking lot of Paul's Vet Supply while the men visited and we raided the Cool Whip containers. LOL.

This giveaway will remain open until Saturday, December 17th and I'll announce the winner on the 18th.

Thanks so much for dropping by and y'all come back now, ya' hear?

Kicking off December or "I Can't Share That Yet"

December 1st brought us our first storm of the season and snow is forecasted for tomorrow. That's good news after the scorching, dry year we had. Moisture of any kind will be welcomed with open arms and the cold air will be greeted with a cup of hot cider and a cozy quilt. Hoping the wind that they are forecasting does not materialize though. 60-70 mph means the dirt will be flying. Oops! Too late!

More good news. The 1st round of the National Finals Rodeo is on tonight. 10 days of good horses and great competition. I'm ready. This year's NFR will find me stitching the binding on Christmas presents that you won't get to see until after they are delivered, but I spent part of the morning pulling fabrics for one of them:

I'm stitching up something  extra to send to my seam-ripper-giveaway-winner, but I can't show you that yet either.

I made some 4-patches and got them in the mail for Regina's 4Patches4Hope project:



I'm working on another giveaway too. They are so much fun! Can't share that yet either, but I'll announce it on the 10th and I'm joining in on the fun over here:

I want to share something , but everything's under lock and key this time of year.

My Scrappy Western Many Trips blocks are on the back burner until after the first of the year. Half of them are complete. I'm hoping it'll be my first finish of the new year.

I'm eager to get back to my abandoned Granny Squares quilt too so today I did dust that off and sew up a few blocks just so it wouldn't think I had forgotten it. I can share that!

My ongoing-longterm-hexagon project is...ongoing:

I opened the box the other day to add a few more stitched pieces and was surprised to see how many there were:

I'm planning on making Bonnie Hunter's Hexagon Medallion Quilt in blues and browns and I laid some out a while ago just to get a feel for it:

I hope I still like blue and brown when I finish. Right now it makes me grin.

I hope that y'all are enjoying the "Most Wonderful Time of the Year" and finding peace amidst the hustle and bustle. I know that your lists are long and that time is short, but I hope that you will make time to "Be still and know." It's so easy to get caught up in the busy-ness of this world and then we miss the most amazing everyday moments that God truly wants to bless us with. I'll be repeating that daily as a reminder to myself.

Gotta run. The NFR is calling!

And the Seam Ripper Goes to...

Oh my goodness! Y'all are so much fun! I loved all of your comments. Thank you so much for sharing them with me! Makes me wish our children were still young because there are so many traditions I want to add! It's hard to choose just one favorite tradition because like, y'all I am sure there are many.

One of the other things we did was let the kids sleep under the Christmas tree the first night we put it up. It's a tradition my friend, Amy, shared with me years ago and we adopted it. It was always so fun to pull out the sleeping bags and string popcorn and cranberries in our pj's.

Another favorite tradition is baking Jesus' Birthday Cake. It's always the same cake and it's the only time we ever bake it. We sang Happy Birthday to Jesus and blew out candles. If we spent Christmas at Grandparents' homes, I took the cake with us.

I also want to welcome my new followers. I'm so excited that y'all actually read my little blog. I guess this is the modern day equivilant of gathering together for coffee and cake. Makes me want to bake something, but then I would be sad because no one actually shows up. So thank y'all for taking the time to stop in and listen to me chatter.

Time to reveal the winner of the seam ripper! I'm so excited. Honestly, I am writing this Tuesday night and waiting for midnight so I can close the giveaway and find out who wins. It's actually after midnight, but I'll give you west-coasters your extra hour. LOL. I'm not a night owl and it'll be a short night, but I told you I was excited. :) But, it's 12:20 and I'm fading fast and sleeping in is not an option.

Yep. Sure enough, I fell asleep so I am dragging my feet this morning and viewing the world through bleary eyes. However, the magic random number generator is bright eyed and bushy tailed and it cheerfully popped out the winning number:

25!

I have got to figure out how to post that little box.

Barbara said:

Hm. My favorite Christmas tradition is seeing all the old ornaments on the tree that have been in the family for years. Each one takes me back to a special memory. Also setting out the ceramic nativity my grandmother made for me. The date on the first piece (baby Jesus) is 1965. I still have all the pieces and none are chipped or broken. I hope this stays in my family long after I'm gone. It's very special to me.

Congratulations Barbara! What a treasure you have in the nativity your Grandmother made for you. I've sent you an e-mail to let you know that the seam ripper will be headed your way!

Thanks to all of you!