Gift Wrapping Ideas

• Store bows and ribbons in a plastic bag and hang from the hanger with a clothespin or just put the handles of the bag over the hanger hook.

• Cut leftover or old Christmas fabric into strips to make ribbons.

• Use tulle or shredded color paper (recycled of course) to stuff in gift bags.

• Buy white butcher’s paper or brown paper (found at home improvement stores, called "contractor’s paper") to wrap gifts with; simply add a colorful ribbon, twine and or decorations such as pine cones, leaves, silk flowers, small toys, candy or cookies. Tie small jingle bells on packages for a festive ring!
  
  

• If you can’t find butcher’s paper, use the backside of ugly Christmas paper. You can often find some very cheap at garage sales. Use the back side of ugly Christmas paper to wrap birthday presents.

• To wrap extra large presents like bikes, use a  plastic tablecloth. You can  find one for about $1 at Dollar tree or at a garage sale for .50.

• Make the wrapping material part of the gift. You can use a blanket, photo storage box, scarf, basket, jewelry box, coffee mug, vase, watering can, terra cotta pot etc.

• Wind ribbon around old wrapping paper tubes or toilet paper tubes to save for next year.

• Use Christmas material bought on clearance to wrap gifts. Sometimes it’s cheaper than paper.
  
  
• Cut Christmas pictures out of magazines. Paste on bags or the outside of packages.

• Save Christmas cards and use to decorate packages. Cut out with pinking shears for a lace effect.
• Use Christmas cards as gift tags. Cut out a section on the card that is blank on the back. Punch a hole in the top to tie on the package. Use the back to write "To:" and "From:".

• To freshen wrinkled Christmas bows, put in the dryer with a damp washcloth. Put the machine on the delicate cycle for two minutes. The bows will look like new.

• Don’t forget to look in your kitchen cupboard when you need boxes for wrapping – Oatmeal boxes, cereal boxes and such work great.

• Save crumpled gift wrap and use it for packing to mail packages.

• Place a little drop of scented oil, a scented pine cone, handful of strong smelling peppermints etc. inside a package you are sending so the minute they open the box they get a smell of Christmas.

Photo By: meddygarnet

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Tips:

• If you are having a potluck or buffet, be sure to place the silverware, napkins and drinks at the end of the food table so your guests don’t have to juggle them while filling their plates.
• If you need a punch bowl, check out your covered cake dish. Many of them are designed so you can turn the base upside down and turn the bowl upside down to make a punch bowl out of them. If you are in a real bind, just use a pretty large bowl.
• Don’t have a dipper? Set a fancy cup (not your husband’s football mug) on a saucer next to the punch bowl.
• Don’t have a gravy boat? Serve your gravy and sauces in small heat proof pitchers. I have seen some really cute pitchers and gravy boats at the dollar stores. This is one item that would be worth buying. Not only can you use it for gravy, but it is a nice way to serve chocolate syrup, caramel syrup, pancake syrup, melted butter, etc.

Menu:

Sausage Stroganoff*
Tossed Salad
M&M Marshmallow Bars*

Recipes:

Today’s main dish recipe is a quick and easy one dish meal for these hectic days. Just mix it up, toss it in the oven and by the time you have your salad made and table set it will be ready. It’s also a great dish to make to use leftover potatoes and peas.

*Sausage Stroganoff

1 lb. bulk pork sausage
1 cup onion, chopped
2 1/2 oz. jar sliced mushrooms, undrained
2 Tbsp. flour
1 1/2 cups milk
1 1/2 cups potatoes, cooked, cubed
1 cup sour cream
10 oz. can buttermilk biscuits
1 cup peas, cooked

Heat oven to 375°. In a 10 inch oven proof skillet, brown sausage and onion, drain. Add mushrooms and flour. Over low heat, slowly add milk, stirring constantly. Add potatoes and heat till bubbly. Stir in sour cream. Arrange the 10 biscuits around the outer edge of the skillet and spoon the peas into the center. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until biscuits are golden. Serves 5-6.

Use red and green M&M’s on these bars to make a fun and different Christmas cookie. I haven’t tried it yet but in a pinch you could probably replace the first four ingredients with a brownie mix and just top with the marshmallows, M&M’s and peanuts.

*M&M Marshmallow Bars

1 (18 1/4 oz.) pkg. devil’s food cake mix
1/4 cup butter or margarine, melted
1/4 cup water
1 egg
3 cups miniature marshmallows
1 cup plain M&M’s
1/2 cup peanuts

Combine dry cake mix, butter, water and egg and mix well. Press into a greased 13×9 pan. Bake at 375° for 20-22 minutes until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Sprinkle marshmallows, M&M’s, and peanuts on top. Bake 2-3 minutes until marshmallows melt. Cool before cutting.

Extra Holiday Recipe

In the following recipe, you can add red or green food coloring to tint for Christmas or add another food coloring to tint for any other holiday you want. You can also add 1/4 tsp. of peppermint extract if you like chocolate and peppermint flavors together.

Cookies While You Sleep

2 egg whites
Pinch of salt
1/4 tsp. cream of tartar
2/3 cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
1 cup chopped pecans
3/4 cup chocolate chips (optional)

Preheat oven to 350°. Beat egg whites until foamy; add salt and cream of tartar and beat until stiff. Very gradually add sugar, then vanilla and peppermint (if you are using it). Peaks should be shiny and stiff. Fold in nuts and chocolate chips. Drop by teaspoons on greased cookie sheet. Place in oven, turn off heat and leave oven closed until morning. NO PEEKING! or you will lose oven heat. Store in airtight containers.

It might be fun to experiment with these cookies and replace the chocolate chips with peppermint, butterscotch chips, chopped maraschino cherries or different types of crushed candy.

Make the meatballs from this next recipe and freeze them in a plastic bag. Lay the bag flat in the freezer to help make them freeze individually. They will keep for up to 3 months. They are so handy to keep on hand to take to a last minute activity, whether it is tailgating, a Christmas or New Year’s get together or as an appetizer for unexpected company.

Christmas Meatballs

2 lbs. ground beef
1 pkg. Stove Top stuffing for chicken
1 cup water
2 eggs
1 bottle barbecue sauce
1 (16 oz.) can cranberry sauce

Line 2 – 15 x 10 x 1 pans with foil and spray with cooking spray. Mix first 4 ingredients. Shape into balls the size of walnuts and place on pans. Bake at 400° for 15-20 minutes until done. While they are baking, mix barbecue sauce and cranberry sauce in a large saucepan and bring to a boil, stirring occasionally. Add meatballs to sauce and coat evenly.

Photo By: André di Lucca

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I love Christmas Trees! The worst part of Christmas is taking down the tree. It’s great to sit and watch the tree lights twinkling at night all through December. There’s just something about Christmas lights in the evening that is so soothing! I love it so much that I turn my Christmas tree lights on in the morning and leave them all day. About 9 years ago, I came up with the idea to keep a small three foot tree up all year. Then I would make or collect ornaments for it and change it each month depending on the holiday or season. Of course about 2 years after I came up with it, someone else did too and now you can find mini ornaments in every store.

Here are a couple of pictures of my tree at different times. 

This one is for fall. I think I spent about $7.00 on all of it. The tree was $2 at an after Christmas clearance sale and then I collected the decorations at after Halloween sales and at yard sales.

For September, it has leaves and mini pumpkins on it for ornaments.

In October, I put little ghosts, Jack O’ Lanterns and bats. Then I put some garland or black and orange ribbon around it.

After Christmas one year I bought all snowman stuff for my January tree. I spent about $3 on everything. I used leftover fake snow to put around the base too.

The first year for my Valentine’s tree I made all red and white hearts out of construction paper. Then one year I found heart ornaments on clearance at Hobby Lobby.

I keep a tree up each month: Easter, St. Patrick’s Day, and of course for spring I bring out my favorite collection of gnomes!  For each tree I’ve spent less than $5 and it’s always so nice to have something festive all year. 

Tawra

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Transporting Food In The Car

One of our readers, Margaret, wrote in and told of an accident she had with the holiday dishes she was transporting. I thought I would post my answer to her to help some of you avoid disaster when transporting your holiday food.

When transporting food items, here are a couple of things you can do to make it easier. Margaret recommended having someone hold the dish when possible, which I highly recommend. If you can’t, try this: I set my dish (hot or cold) in the center of a large flour sack towel, bring up the two opposite corners and tie. Then I bring up the other 2 corners and tie.

This helps keep the lid from moving. If the food is hot, the knot you made on the top gives you a handle to help hold it by. If it is very hot, you can place a hot pan holder in the center of the towel before setting the dish down. The towel it is wrapped in helps soak up some of the spills if you happen to have any spills. The towel also insulates the food, helping keep it warm.

I have used this technique for years to transport food, but in recent years, I have a new all time favorite. Now I wrap the dish in the towel and then set it all inside a cardboard box that is deeper then the dish. The boxes don’t seem to slide as much, they absorb the spills really well, the cardboard insulates the food, and the box helps make it easier when carrying a hot dish. 

-Jill

Photo By: thebittenword.com

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Holiday Centerpieces

Most of us love having beautiful centerpieces for our tables, especially during the holidays but sometimes they can be in the way when we need to use our tables for other things. 

One way to make things easier is to arrange your centerpieces on a silver tray, Christmas tray or some other sort of tray. That way when you need to use the table you can lift the whole thing up in one swoop and remove it.

This is also handy if you happen to need a temporary centerpiece or decoration for someplace else. You can just pick up the tray and use it where you need it.

      -Jill

Photo By: Dennis AB

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Holiday Cooking Tips

Clean your pantry, freezer and refrigerator.

Get your refrigerator, freezer and pantry cleaned and ready to stock up on the food you will need for your holiday cooking as soon as they come on sale. Then they’ll be ready for the store bought items and the things you will be cooking.

Fill Canisters

I use canisters to store my flour, sugar and other staple items because the canisters help keep out bugs and humidity and it is less messy to scoop things like flour or sugar out of a large canister than a bag. Get the canisters filled up and ready for your upcoming cooking and baking marathons.

I also fill up my spice containers at this time. I usually buy my spices in bulk and some of the containers they come in are large and are not easy to measure from. I keep smaller spice containers and then just fill them from the bulk packages.

Keep A Trash Can Handy

When doing a lot of baking or cooking be sure to keep the trash can or a brown paper sack near you so it’s easy to throw away trash. I often make 5-6 trips to the trash can so this simplifies the process. It also motivates you to clean as you go along. You might also keep a large bowl on the counter to dump your trash into as you work. Then, when you are done, you can take it all at once to the trash.

Graham Cracker Crumbs

It seems like half the desserts I find call for graham crackers of some sort. To make things easier, crush a whole box or more of graham crackers and store them in an air tight container. Keep a measuring scoop in the container and the next time you have a recipe that calls for graham cracker crumbs, you’ll have no mess or fuss and one less step to do.

Twisted oatmeal cookies

Use pumpkin pie spice or apple pie spice in place of cinnamon in your oatmeal cookies.

Sliding cutting board

You will probably have that cutting board out all the time during the holiday cooking. To help keep it from sliding around, glue a small piece of waffle rubber shelf liner  to the corners.

Margarine, butter???

Sometimes it gets confusing trying to decide what kind of margarine or butter to use in baking. Always use margarine which has at least 80% fat. If you don’t, your baked goods can stick badly to the pan or spread too much and they often turn out too dry. Oils to stay away from in baking (unless otherwise stated in recipe) are vegetable oil, low fat margarine and tub margarine.

Easy Pancakes for a crowd

With out of town guests coming or when you’re preparing holiday brunches, it can mean you’ll be making lots of pancakes. To make things go faster, using about 3 cups of pancake mix to make your batter, pour the pancake batter into a greased 15×10 inch jelly roll pan and bake at 375 degrees for 10-12 minutes until puffy and brown. Then just cut the "pancakes" into squares with a pizza cutter.

Holiday Banana Nut Bread

Give your regular banana nut bread recipe a holiday flair by adding chocolate chips and maraschino cherries to it.

Ham Juices

Many of you will be baking hams for holiday dinners or parties. Often, we just throw away the ham juice but this year save it. Skim off the fat and then pour the juices into ice cube trays or small containers. The next time you make green beans, pea soup, boiled potatoes or green bean casserole, use a cube for flavoring.

Photo By: ccharmon

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Dying Easter Eggs – Easter Egg-stravaganza

OK, so the kids noticed on the calendar that Easter is approaching and they want to make a huge production of dying eggs. In the past, the little stickers you bought at the store sufficed, but now they want the real thing. Here are some old standards with a few new ideas for you.

One important note: When the kids get really excited about egg dying, don’t feel sorry for them and pour the left over egg dye in their bath water so they can have more fun (no matter how much they beg and plead! Especially if it’s food coloring). Someone might panic and declare a citywide medical quarantine if they see your kids dyed all sorts of strange colors in their Easter finery.

Before you decorate Easter eggs, cover the entire table with newspaper. Keep a huge roll of paper towels or rags handy for messes. Have each kid wear one of dad’s old (now disposable) tee shirts.

Making Easter Egg Stands

Cut toilet paper roll cores into one inch cylinders and use for egg stands. Decorate with stickers or paint.

Decorating Eggs

Traditional Method

Hard boil eggs. Fill several mugs with boiling water and add 1-2 tsp. vinegar. Place a few drops of desired food coloring in each mug. Place eggs in mugs for several minutes until eggs reach desired shades.

Remove with a spoon. Place on paper towel to dry. When dry, polish with a small amount of shortening on a paper towel. Buff until glossy.

You can draw or write on the eggs with a light colored or white crayon before dipping. The drawing will remain white after the egg is dipped.

To clean out mugs, put a little bleach water in the cups and soak for a few minutes.

Natural Easter Egg Dyes

If you would like to try dying eggs naturally, try the following:

• Yellow– yellow onion skins, turmeric (1/2 tsp. per cup water) celery leaves
• Orange–any yellow dye plus beet juice
• Red–beets, paprika, red onion skins
• Pink–cranberry juice
• Blue–blackberries, grape juice concentrate, red cabbage
• Brown–black tea, white oak, juniper berry, coffee, barberry
• Light purple–blackberries, grapes, violets
• Green–alfalfa, spinach, kale, violet blossom plus 1/4 tsp. baking soda, tansy, nettle, chervil, sorrel, parsley, carrot tops, beet tops or dip yellow egg in blue dye

Hard boil eggs with 1 tsp. vinegar in the water. Place dying ingredients in non-aluminum pans, cover with water and boil 5 minutes to 1 hour until desired color is achieved. Use enough material to make at least 1 cup dye. Crush ingredients as they boil to extract as much dye as possible. Strain the dye. Most dyes should be used hot. Let each egg sit in the dye until it reaches the desired color. Some dyes will take longer than others to make the desired colored on the egg. Remove the egg and let dry.

Glitter Eggs - Place 1 tablespoon each of glue and water in a cup. Stir the mixture and then paint the eggs with it. Sprinkle with glitter. This can also add sparkle to already dyed eggs!

Decoupaged Eggs – Tear small pieces of wrapping paper, napkins, stickers, or clip art. Mix equal amounts of glue and water. Paint egg with glue mixture. Place paper on top and then cover with more glue mixture. Let dry.

Spotted Eggs – Place 1 tsp. of cooking oil in dye. Dip the egg. The oil will cause the dye to make an irregular pattern on the egg.

Waxed Eggs – Dip a portion of the eggs in melted paraffin or candle wax. Then dip them in the dye. Remove from dye. Dry and peel off the wax. The egg will be white on one half and colored on the other half. You can also dip in dye before waxing to get two colors.

Hollow Eggs – Poke a hole in one end of an egg with a very small needle. Poke another slightly larger hole in the other end. Then blow on the small end and the egg will come out the other side. Decorate as desired.

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