Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
Things I’m thankful for:
- God – for all that He has given me.
- My husband – who supports me and my adventures.
- A roof over my head and a husband who has a stable job.
- My family for being there for me. My dad especially has spent so much time, energy, and money, helping us out. He makes the two hour drive to help us haul things and take lawn “trash” to the local compost heap.
- Creativity – from myself, D, and other bloggers. How would we get our house redecorated without creativity? There are so many inspirational people out there.
- Music – it gets me through the day and makes for some fun moments with D.
- Independent contracting – the mystery shopping, auditing, merchandising companies I do jobs for, writing this blog, and online auctions.
- Our 2 dogs and 3 cats for providing countless hours of entertainment (good or bad) and teaching us valuable lessons.
If you’re on here taking a break from cooking the turkey, don’t throw the turkey juice out! Use it to make delicious and easy homemade gravy.
1 part butter (melt in a pot)
1 part flour (when butter’s melted, stir in)
8 parts turkey broth (when butter/flour gets thick, stir in a small amount of broth until thickened, repeat until all broth is used)
If you need concrete numbers instead of a ratio:
- 1/4 cup butter
- 1/4 cup flour
- 2 cups broth (I got about 2.5 cups from a 14 pound turkey)
Jill moved in two houses away from my parents when I was in fifth grade. She has a daughter who I used to babysit and tutor and our families spent a lot of time together doing fun things. Jill is creative, a go-getter, and an awesome chef! If I remember right, she used to have her own catering business.
I don’t have a super special story to go with this recipe. I had finished babysitting for the day and my younger sister came over to play. Jill pulled out a bowl of chip dip and said, “Try this. Can you guess the flavor?” 
What was it?! It was so familiar, but I couldn’t put my finger on it! “It’s olives!” she said. During this stage in my life, I was “baking” about every other day, so I ran home to make this recipe myself. I can’t remember how it ended up on the holiday menu, but it did, and now it’s a Thanksgiving tradition. My grandpa mistakes it for a salad every year and eats it as-is!
If you’re interested in printing this off, I’ve created a PDF version for you.
Olive chip dip - yum!
Ms. Jill’s Olive Chip Dip
Ingredients:
1 large tub of cream cheese at room temp
5.75 oz. jar green Spanish olives – chop or slice
½ C sour cream
½ C real mayonnaise – do not use Miracle Whip or similar!
½ C chopped pecans
2 tsp olive juice
Directions:
Put cream cheese into bowl and then mix in all other ingredients. It’s useful to use a blender. Refrigerate for a few hours to allow for the blending of flavors.
This recipe goes well with:
- Crackers – Ritz and Triscuits especially!
- A slice of bread
If you’re interested in more recipes you can check out my food and recipes pages. If you want to know what I’ve been up to this week, visit my front page!
I’m also participating in the following carnivals today! You can find many more recipes here:
Hi all! I just got an email (newsletter) from Martha Stewart.com! The Martha crew is doing a 6-week workshop to help you prep for the holiday season.
The topics will include…
- Martha’s best holiday tips
- Handmade gifts, stockings, and ornaments
- Treats, menus, and party ideas
- Expert tree-trimming and wreath-making techniques
- Hostess how-tos and a magnificent holiday menu
- Time saving strategies
- A gingerbread-house contest and photo contests
- And many more ideas!
According to the email, more than 100,000 people have already joined, including me. I’m a fan of Martha Stewart and can’t wait to see what wonderful tips and projects she has in store for us all.
The fun begins November 16. Please visit the signup page to get in on the action!
Many many years ago my paternal grandma gave my mom a very special recipe. There are quite a few similar recipes out there that call for added cinnamon, sugar, and food coloring, but I think this recipe is just perfect. My mom began the tradition and has been making this recipe every Christmas for as long as I can remember. The tradition has been passed down and now I make it every year. Since there’s only D and me, I usually make smaller loaves and give them out to extended family who have come to love the recipe as well.
Although the recipe is called “bread” it is more like a cake in a loaf form. Don’t let the pistachio scare you away, the dominant taste is the yellow cake mix and the cinnamon-sugar topping which becomes delightfully crispy while baking. I’m not a cherry fan, but the maraschino’s are really good in this recipe. This recipe freezes nicely for a long time, but you sacrifice the crispy crust. I’ve personally frozen a recipe for 10 months and I know D’s mom has frozen it for a long time too.
Ingredients
- 1 yellow cake mix
- a 4 serving package pistachio pudding
- 4 eggs
- 1/4 cup oil
- 1 cup sour cream
- 1/2 cup chopped walnuts (Mom makes the recipe with them, I make it without them)
- 2 tablespoons water
- 3/4 cup maraschino cherries – chopped
- 1/4 cup cinnamon-sugar mix
Instructions
1 – Heat oven to 350 degrees F
No, it's not lunch time, it's baking time. (aka: Half past midnight) That's how much I love you guys (and baking)!
2 – Combine and mix all ingredients except for the cinnamon-sugar
3 – Pour into two 8×4 loaf pans or one 8×4 and two or three mini loaf pans or all mini loaf pans to give as gifts
4 – Sprinkle cinnamon-sugar on top of loaves
5 – Bake for 45 minutes
6 – After it has thoroughly cooled… enjoy! I think this is one of those recipes that tastes much better the second day anyway. (If it’s still to warm, it will also start to fall apart when you cut into it.)
If you’re interested in more recipes you can check out my food and recipes pages. If you want to know what I’ve been up to this week, visit my front page!
I’m also participating in the following carnivals today! You can find many more recipes here:
It’s that time of year again! The Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals are gradually getting posted as we eagerly wait to see how good or bad the discounts are this year. For those who may not know, Black Friday is the day after Thanksgiving. It’s a day when many businesses make a profit and are in the black. It’s also a day when greed takes over many people and bad things can happen. Cyber Monday is the online version of Black Friday happening the Monday after Thanksgiving when people go back to work and apparently spend the day shopping online…
Going from personal experience, when the economy is good, there are a lot of freebies and awesome discounts. When the economy isn’t great, the deals aren’t great either. However, this year many businesses are taking part in online pre-Black Friday sales and not waiting until Thanksgiving weekend. I’ve looked through some of the deals and so far there isn’t anything that has sparked my interest. I’d love a new digital SLR camera, but the deals I’ve seen for both the pre-sales and Black Friday aren’t good enough to warrant a purchase. See the below links for posted Black Friday ads and the pre-Black Friday sales that are happening right now!
Do you have a favorite Black Friday site you go to? Mine is GottaDeal which shows bargains all year long on a forum, but also has a Black Friday site that lists the Black Friday ads as they come out. The following ads are currently listed:
- Gander Mountain
- Gymboree
- Half Price Books
- Harbor Freight
- Kmart
- Lowe’s
- Old Navy
- Sears
- Tanger Outlets
“Become” also has a Black Friday deals area. One thing I like about their site is that you can click on a general item you’re interested in purchasing, such as digital cameras, and they’ll show you every store that has that item on Black Friday.
Many of the following stores have been in the news because of their early deals, so I’ll summarize what they’re offering for you here.
- Power Hour pricing on November 6 and 7 (this Friday and Saturday). There will be many deals and stores will be open until midnight.
- Redeem Kohl’s Cash and Pick-Your-Day savings.
- Save 20% on toys already marked 10-40% off.
- Every Friday at 5pm through Saturday morning – “Black Friday Now” features weekly deals through Christmas.
- Every Saturday 7am-12noon – doorbuster deals
- Offering a credit for any November-release book you have purchased through Amazon.com, Target.com, or Walmart.com. Use the credit on a purchase over $45 at Sears.com.
- 50% off 2010 calendars, holiday Cards and many holiday products
- Free shipping on orders over $50
- Up to 50% off custom photo gifts
- 100 toys for $10 each through the holiday season.
- Popular books will be selling for $8.98.
- 2 for $30 specials on Nintendo Wii games.
- Saturday (11/7/2009) – pre-Black Friday sale. Hot deals include a Sharp 42″ LCD HDTV for $498 and an Xbox 360 System with free $100 Gift Card for $199.
- Walmart.com has also started a “Deal of the Day” where they will be selling one item each day at a Black Friday-level price. Today’s deal is a 32″ LCD HDTV for just $298 with free in-store pickup.
Do you participate in Black Friday? Why or why not? What’s the best deal you’ve found? Is there anything you have your eye on this year?
