Such a Busy Holiday!!!

Oh my goodness our holiday has been so full! I’ve been busy cooking and cleaning and visiting it has FLOWN by! But I wanted to share some highpoints here on the blog, because – it’s what I do! And I can’t get on with blogging until I do! πŸ˜‰ So here goes!

Christmas Eve saw the delivery of a new stove and glass cooktop! You may or may not remember, but Hubby and I (mostly Hubby) re-did our kitchen 2.5 years ago, but didn’t replace the appliances if they were working. The fridge and dishwasher have since been replaced, but the oven and cooktop were still working – until Thanksgiving! Now, the oven didn’t totally die that day, but it did somehow get into cleaning locked mode in the middle of us cooking a 24 pound turkey, YIKES! We had to shut off the breaker twice in order to get it re-set, but that was scary! So, we ordered a new ovenΒ and the cooktop made to be installed over it for our Christmas present. It was supposed to be delivered on the 17th, but that was not to be, instead they were delievered at 2 PM on Christmas Eve. It took hubby a couple of hours to get it all installed (there was a fair amount of fussy cutting away at cabinets and the countertop to get the cooktop to fit right), but installed and working it was!!! Of course, Stirling was a big help:

It wouldn’t be Christmas time without power tools!

A video posted by Candy Glendening (@candiedfabrics) on

Andrew cooked us a delicious Cioppino for Christmas Eve dinner and a splendid roast on Christmas Day!

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No, this isn’t an induction top, but ooh la la, no knobs to clean around!!!!

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Yes! The handles on the oven match our refrigerator! Woooot!

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We were able to have our traditional watching of A Christmas Story that night, and thankfully the boys are old enough that we all slept in until 8 the next morning! πŸ™‚

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Stirling absolutely LOVES the opening of the presents, he’s bonkers about it! Here he is opening one of his stocking presents:

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His excitement continued throughout the day! Here’s the best pic I got of the boys in front of the tree:

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Here’s Liam laughing after he got ANOTHER gift card to one of his favorite places to go out to each in Nashville – that’s where his spending money goes, so I told his aunts and grandma what he would really enjoy at school next semester – he is now SET! πŸ™‚

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Logan is happy to discover the drone he’s been asking for:

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When you go to school in a place that has Winter, you get warm clothes as gifts!

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Here’s Logan being cool using his acoustic bass guitar he’s been asking and asking for for months:

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And yes, here’s Stirling at the end of all the wrapping, still as excited as he was with the first present!

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On the 27th, my cousin Jess, along with her hubby Jim and the darling Miss Lucy came out for tamales!

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They brought the boys a new game called “Outbreak”, it’s a game where you try to beat the game together…the four of them had a great time playing it while hubby and I were cooking.

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Of course, there had to be pie, the first made in the new oven! Andrew had found some lovely rhubarb fresh just before Thanksgiving, there was enough for 2 pies, so I froze one batch then so we could have this:

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On the 30th we made 2 trips to 2 different airports! The first one was at noon to LAX to pick up Liam’s girlfriend Celia. (Note: to those of you travelling to So Cal, there are MANY airports in the area, LAX sucks, try to go to a different one!) Because the second trip, to pick up my Mom and Step-Dad wasn’t until 9 pm, in Long Beach, not LAX thank goodness, we had time to stop for lunch at a great place in Santa Monica:

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Celia usually looks LOVELY in photos, unless she WANTS to look silly – and when she wants to look silly, she excels at it! πŸ˜‰

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After the late airport run we all slept well, and then were happy to spend New Year’s Eve cooking in the kitchen! I made some most excellent Hazelnut Gelato, here’s Logan making sure the cylinder is cleaned out of every last bit:

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And then we made a lot of dim sum to go along with Peking Duck, which is becoming our traditional New Year’s Eve dish. Liam and Celia did a great job filling crab rangoon and wontons:

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And here’s the duck de resistance! πŸ™‚

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It was delicious, and we actually made it to midnight! Stirling was wondering why we were up so late:

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But it was indeed a happy New Year’s Eve!

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After a peaceful enough New Year’s day, we all went into LA with some Montreal Smoked Meat! (Hubby likes to smoke and cure meat, Montreal Smoked Meat is like pastrami, but awesomer!) Mom and I stayed to visit with the baby while Andrew, Logan and Step-dad David went to the car museum, while Liam and Celia went to LACMA across the street from the cars. I didn’t get a picture where Mom and Lucy were both smiling at the same time, so here’s two, in each one, one of them is looking good! πŸ™‚

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Can you tell Lucy’s parents love her very much? Look at those happy smiles!!!

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After everyone returned, we sat down for some smoked meat sandwiches:

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And then, the installing of the curtains! If you remember, I made a bunch of quilts etc…for Lucy when she was born, all in a purple and yellow color palette Jess and Jim chose. They looked and looked for curtains to match and couldn’t find any, so I told them duh, of course I’d make a set! So 4 yards of hand dyed linen and some really heavy blackout liner and the curtains were ready to help keep Lucy’s room dark. Hubby installed the curtain rail, with Jim assissting:

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I was only able to shoot a quick pick of the final result on my phone, folks were raring to go. Jess and Jim are really happy, because Lucy’s been sleeping in her room for the past month with black trash bags pinned to the window to make it dark!

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They happen to live 3 blocks from a fabulous ice cream shop, so of course we had to stop there on the way home:

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Phew! Celia headed back to her boarding high school yesterday, and Mom and David drove the 3 hours to my Step-sister’s apartment, they’ll be there until Wednesday, then back here for a couple more days of visiting. Thank goodness classes at the UoR (or Vanderbilt for that matter) don’t start until next Monday, because this holiday keeps on happening!

I hope you had a great holiday week, even if it hasn’t been as full as mine!