Friday started off with "CHRISTMAS/Advent Yoga" which was relaxing AND a workout all rolled into oneJ Romy always does such an amazing job coordinating these 'special event yogas.' The whole practice was based on spreading Peace, Love & Joy. Awesome way to kick off this season.
And since my best friend joined me AND we both had worked out for two hours, we (+ Scott!) decide to break into a few 'CHRISTMAS cupcakes' from Crumbs...
The Peppermint Hot Cocoa was good, but I FLIPPED over the gingerbread!!! It was just sooo sweet AND spicy...too festiveJ
Saturday brought my Mom, Aunt, cousin & I on another house tour. This time to the 50th Anniversary of the Stanton Holly Trail in Stanton, NJ. We lucked out with a picture perfect day and some SPECTACULAR homes to tour...
My favorite.
Commence drooling now...
...don't even get me STARTED on their kitchen...J
And what was awesome & unique about this tour was that all of the house had a "decorating committee" that worked from JANUARY until the first weekend in December to HAND MAKE all of the ornaments & decorations in each home! So as spectacular as the SETTINGS were, the decorations weren't anything you couldn't make for your own home! It was AMAZING to see the ideas people came up with, starting with handmade luminaries up all of the driveways....
Not sure if you can see these, but this row of jars were made out to look like ANGELS!
How cute are these 'all edible' ornaments made of WAFFLES...
...and bird seed (perfect for outdoors!)...
...and even Fruity Pebbles!
I also LOVED the wreath (in the window) made of cookie cutters...
Needless to say, we were charmed...
...at every turn...
It was amazing what a little time, creativity & 94 hot glue guns could produceJ These folks did a SPECTACULAR job!
Even the school buses that took us around from house to house were each uniquely decorated. It was IMPOSSIBLE not to be in the holiday spiritJ
But the HANDS DOWN favorite of our group was the village made of PEANUTS!!!
Peanuts roasting marshmallows, anyone??
They were just so fun & cheerful!
We even got some yummy treats along the way...
Can you BELIEVE that someone would open their home to serve tea & cookies to over 1,000 people?? Yep...that's what happened here...
There were cozy seats by the fire and elaborately decorated kitchen tables for us to rest our feet & warm up...
Not to mention the most YUMMY homemade cookies! My pack had ROSEMARY OLIVE OIL cookies (too die for!) & a Salted Chocolate Molasses. Oh man, so happy I got the 'salty & sweet' pack!
And we even tea & coffee: SERVED IN ACTUAL TEA CUPS! I wouldn't want to do all of THOSE dishesJ
Nice touchJ
Our homemade dinner was a cup of Asparagus soup, a slice of cheddar & leeks strata, salad & rice pudding...yum
It was such a fun and JOLLY dayJ....of course until my car got stuck on the side of the road in the pitch black when we were on our way home and about 1 exit from my house. But THAT's ANOTHER story...hehehehehehehehe
Sunday saw even MORE holiday funJ As it was our day to pick out the CHRISTMAS TREE!!! Wohoooo! And of course, that called for an EXTRA special "Sunday Morning breakfast"...
What says 'go get a CHRISTMAS tree' more then chocolate & cinnamon, right?? And I just knew I wanted to make a Chocolate Babka to 'celebrate'..
OK, OK...so mine didn't even make REMOTELY discernible "swirls" like the recipe's picture...but WHO CARES??? A mess of chocolate & cinnamon was A-OK with us...
We're saving the rest for dessert...can't wait to have a slice tonightJ
After that, it was off to gather the goods...
Scott says it should only take 10 minutes to pick out a tree...and this year, I had to agree with him. Last year I tried to 'buck the system' and wanted to check out 'just a few more trees' before we secured the first one we loved. And what happened? We ended up wandering around for over an hour and COULDN'T find that first tree that we both loved & all the others paled in comparison.
Soooo...this year, in 10 minutes: We came...
...we 'saw'...
...we conquered!
Now just to magically levitate all of the ornaments right onto those branchesJ hahahahaha...
And we had a cozy little dinner to round out our day...
After a nearly SIX MONTH reprieve....chicken is SLOWLY making its return to our kitchen. I still can't eat it grilled or roasted...butttttt shredded & mixed with this savory onion-y sauce from the Chicken & Leeks pie? That, I can handleJ
(ps-I used some of the leeks that I had cleaned & frozen and they worked like a charm!)
For our side, I made some roasted potatoes. I let these babies crisp up for about an hour in a 400 degree oven...
When the potatoes had about 5 minutes left to cook, I heated up a small pan with a little olive oil & tossed in about 7 cloves of thinly sliced garlic and let them cook on LOWWW...
I let the garlic slowly toast...making sure NOT to burn the garlic. Garlic turns SUPER bitter when burned...
Once the potatoes were out of the oven & the garlic was toasty brown, I tossed em with all of that yummy garlic & now garlic scented oil...
This made for CRUNCHY on the outside/soft on the inside potatoes coated in all of that glorious garlic. Is there ANYTHING to complain about??J
So that about wraps up my CHRISTMAS weekend of holiday fun! Not a bad way to start of December, if I do say so myselfJ
And since it's Monday, here's my workout schedule from this week:
Monday: Weight Loss Yoga-Level 1 & 3 (with 8 pound weights)
Tuesday: 40 minute Bethenny Yoga
Friday: 2 hour CHRISTMAS yoga
Not an awesome schedule...and unlike the week before, last week I have NO excuse...other than laziness and THIS:
The culprit of so many "eehhh...do I feel like working out, or do I feel like kicking my feet up and reading??" Can NOT put this book down...and thankfully, I'm almost done! It is FASCINATING, although definitely the most ANTI-Christmas thing I've done this week. Not much could be more Anti-Christmas than reading about North Korean hard labor camps. Horrifying.
ANYWAYSSSS...on THAT note, you've heard enough from me! Hope you guys enjoyed your weekend & have a good MondayJ
1 comment:
Oh gosh, That gingerbread cupcake looked so amazing! Everything that happened to you is just fantastic and your Christmas tree is cute!
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