The beginning of the holiday season

Our holidays have started off very well.  Thanksgiving was stress free, lots of food and plenty of catching up with stories.  Tables were beautifully set and ready for out of town family to arrive.  All the typical Thanksgiving fare was served and today after eating on the leftover for a few days at Judge's parents home we brought everything to our house.  They were tired of eating turkey and they knew with 4 growing kids it wouldn't last very long here.  I think I need to make some more sweet potato casserole though (that's my favorite) and one the first to be finished off too!

Now I am getting ready to start about Christmas and which boxes that need to come upstairs first to begin sorting.  I don't want to overdo it.  The kids are cleaning rooms this afternoon and straightening up the basement that has been neglected for the past month.  While I catch up on reading and learning spanish.  I already know some conversational spanish but this program DuoLingo is kind of showing me I really didn't know as much as I thought I did!  It is really fun and to me it feels like a learning game.  You can attach it with your facebook and compete against friends I suppose.  I did this but only invited my children to come learn with me.

Yesterday, Emily helped me finish up the lesson plans for the week. The only one that isn't on the board is Elizabeth's plan as its already on the computer.  Its really nice having Jacob and Emily in the same grade as their assignments are quite even except for the math part.  Jacob is taking Advanced Geometry while Emily is working on Algebra I.  We are desperately in need of another laptop in our house.  Too many people needing to be on the computer at the same time.

A lot of my friends are gluten free and I found a list of pantry items that are in the Pampered Chef catalog.  She is a fellow consultant and she has this list on her blog HERE.  Thanks Erin!

I was thinking of making either Large Meatballs tomorrow for dinner or a homemade BBQ.  I have the meat for either one but really can't decide.  The Large Meatballs would help and be good hand therapy for me as I roll them into balls.  I was thinking of making them like small meatloafs (but circular) and putting them in my muffin stone.  But if I make the BBQ, I do have a nice sized pork loin I can slice up and put in the large oval baker and then get to use my salad choppers (which is also good OT for my hands).  I think we have eaten a lot of buffalo chicken dip and we are burned out on that one. So I need to change things up a bit.  Either recipe I decide to do I bought a sauce that I can use for the marinade.
And remember with tomorrow being Cyber Monday, orders over $75 not only get a free serving spatula but they also get FREE SHIPPING!  This can save a lot especially depending where you are!  I do have an open party right now and you are more than welcome to take advantage of the free shipping tomorrow if the order is large enough to close tomorrow.  Otherwise individual orders are always welcomed!  Come visit my Pampered Chef site!