A few thoughts

• The key to moving past listening to only Christmas music is to switch immediately to show tunes. I recommend Mamma Mia or the Legally Blonde the Musical soundtrack or whatever your favorite happens to be.
• USA is showing a day long marathon of the movie "Elf" today. "You sit on a throne of lies" is probably one of my most favorite lines. If you need to smile today, go turn it on.
• I still haven't sent out my Christmas cards. I'm annoyed with myself but I can't figure out what sort of letter to include. I will mail them. I just don't know when.
• My holiday break has been very relaxing. I haven't shopped once. I've cleaned stuff that needed cleaning. I've watched a ton of DVDs. I've had lots of fun play time with friends. I'm working on my second jigsaw puzzle. I really really really don't want to go back to work on Friday.
• I've decided I am a low-brow baker, not a fancy baker. I can't do the ganache thing. Just give me a normal butter/powdered sugar/a little milk frosting and I'm happy.
• Speaking of that, does anyone have an idea what I can do with a bowl of chocolate ganache? I really hate to toss it after all of the work it took to make it.
• And still speaking of food, I really enjoy watching the Barefoot Contessa. She has that "Martha" vibe but I also think she'd be fun to hang out with. Rachael Ray? She just looks mean even with the "I'm so cute" grin. I really love the Food Network, by the way.
• My friends invited me out to dinner with them tonight: two married couples and me. For some reason, it just feels weird so I'm meeting up with them afterward for dessert and games. New Year's Eve is just such a "date" holiday to me -- not my favorite.
• Have I mentioned that I don't want to go back to work on Friday?

I'm no longer dreaming of a White Christmas

It snowed most of the day on Christmas Eve and again on Christmas Day. I can't believe we had an actual white Christmas. Here I am at my mom's house on Christmas Day.


It's beautiful but driving is a mess and now it's raining/sleeting. I'll be glad when I can pull into my parking lot without worrying about whether or not I'll get stuck.

Christmas was relaxing and fun. After the presents, we ate leftovers from our Christmas Eve family party, watched movies and I did a puzzle. Here are pics of me and a few of my favorite presents. My dear friend Kim got me this WAY cute Brighton purse. I can hardly wait for spring/summer to use it!

My sister gave me the gift card to CPK and my mom got me the new Guitar Hero. My cute niece Makenna had to slide into every picture she could (and she's the girl who used to only let her mom photograph her.)

Callie gave me this super fun game. It's kind of like Monopoly and Settlers of Catan all rolled up into one. Plus it's based in the Washington farmlands. I mean, how can you go wrong with that??? I want to play it again now.

I hope everyone had a great Christmas!

Have yourself a merry little Christmas

As a little gift to you, my lovely blog friends, I'm sharing my most favorite Santa picture ever. It's my nephew Jaxen (not quite 1) my sister Jaylene and my niece Makenna (2.) Let's hope you and yours are a little happier than Makenna when Santa arrives tonight:

With lots of love from snowy (yes it's snowing again -- another 3-4 inches just this morning!) Washington,

Jeanelle

I love Barry Manilow.

I'm not sure if I've admitted my deep, abiding love and affection for Barry Manilow on my blog but it's true. I totally love him. I heard his new Christmas song on the radio this morning and immediately downloaded it off of Amazon. It's so fun, cheery and happy. Yes, it will be on my 2009 Christmas Mix!

Here's part of the song when he was on Jimmy Kimmel recently. Watch this and go download it. You know you wanna!

Weekend Roundup

I braved the ice and snow on Friday and drove in to work. The only people in my office were my boss, another VP and me. My boss and I did my performance review - it went great. He let me leave early too which is always a bonus. I finished my shopping and picked up groceries, in anticipation of being snowed in at some point during the weekend.

After blogging on Saturday morning (I still can't believe I posted a pic of myself w/o makeup!), I went to brunch at Salty's with two very dear friends, Ida and Lily. We started this tradition last year as our Christmas gift to each other and it's such a treat. The food is amazing and the views of Seattle are incredible. The best part was when we left, our waiter said he was surprised we ate so little considering how long we stayed. Girls always like to be told we're dainty eaters. Here we are with one of the many nutrackers they have throughout the restaurant during the holidays:

It started snowing Saturday at about 3 PM and by the time I had to leave for tithing settlement and our ward's Christmas party, it was like a blizzard out there. I thought nobody would show up for the dinner and was amazed to find the entire gym filled even though there was about 4-5 inches of snow on the ground outside. (Snow is different in Western WA. Trust me.) We had a great time and nearly every college girl I love was there, which was wonderful. Including Callie:

Church was canceled today because of the snow. So I spent the day making fudge, another round of caramels (praying I didn't mess them up again!), more caramel chex mix, and Oreo truffles while watching movies on my laptop (love multi-tasking.) The fudge is perfect AND I made it without a candy thermometer, thank you very much. We truly live in a winter wonderland right now. See below:

And finally, all of the lights on my tree have been staying lit. I love it.

My favorite things of 2008 -- my bed

I heart my bed.

It's not the bed frame/headboard that I love because it's nothing special and a hand-me-down. My bedding is pink/white/khaki stripes from Crate & Barrel and it's very cute but the thing I love most is my memory foam mattress topper.

Sleeping on it is just my idea of heaven. When I went to Hawaii, my sister's bed had one so I had to buy one as soon as I got home. I found this one at Costco. (Well, Kim picked it up for me -- thank you again Kimberly.)

They have a funny foamy odor at first but that goes away pretty quickly. Mine came with a mattress pad-like thing you put over it so the topper stays in place and doesn't shift off of your mattress. It makes my bed even taller, which I like. And even when you wake up at 6:30 AM on a day when you could sleep in, you still wake up looking like this.

I really, really love my bed.

Treats galore

This is how I've spent the last 36 hours:

Making one batch of caramels. Verdict: I made these last year and they were perfect. This year's batch looked great until I went to cut them today and they were hard as a rock. I should have asked Santa for the Williams-Sonoma digital candy thermometer. I'm trying to decide if I want to make another attempt after having to re-melt and throw away the first round.

Making one batch of Chinese Noodle Cookies. Verdict: awesome as usual. They are haystack type things with melted butterscotch & chocolate chips, chow mein noodles, rice krispies, peanuts and marshmallows.

Making two batches of toffee. Verdict: good and great. I didn't cook the first batch long enough so it's a little too blonde. Second batch is perfect. Easiest recipe ever: sugar, butter and water. It's pretty much no-fail. Ignore the crumbs on the counter and the accidental Hoody product placement (not used in the toffee.)

Making one batch of The Pioneer Woman's Chocolate Candy Cane cookies. Verdict: Eh. I like the way they look but the cookie is a little bland for my taste. I don't know that I'd make them again.

Making one batch of Peppermint Meltaways. Verdict: YUM. Excellent texture plus they're good a few days later.

Making one batch of peanut butter topped ritz crackers dipped in chocolate almond bark (they need a name.) Verdict: these totally rock.

Making two batches of Caramel Chex Mix. Verdict: Perfection. My coworkers are getting this for Christmas.

And it's been snowing most of the day with more on the horizon. Hopefully I'll be able to deliver all of this stuff sooner rather than later. And surprisingly, I've not felt like snacking. Maybe it's like when you work at Krispy Kreme, you lose your craving for their donuts?