Light of the World

First Presbyterian Church Christmas Eve worship service.

Our new family Christmas Eve tradition is going to our church’s candlelight worship service. This tradition is only a few years old for us but it has legs for many years to come. It’s one of my most favorite things to do.

I was always a Campbellite, but I haven’t always been a Presbyterian. This new tradition is helping me feel more like a Presbyterian in general and not just a member of a Presbyterian church. Two things during our worship service make it so very special. One is the music from Jeff, Honi and Ladd. These three people have truly been blessed with the gift of music. They are bluegrass musicians, have beautiful voices and can play any instrument with strings. Tonight Jeff played the mandolin, Ladd played the guitar and Honi played the piano and stand-up bass. The music brought tears to my eyes.

The second thing that makes our worship service so special is the candlelight part of the service. The lights in the sanctuary are turned off, then a flame is passed from person to person until everyone in the audience has a lit candle, which represents Jesus as the light of the world.

It’s a new tradition that I am embracing and truly enjoying and looking forward to many more candlelit Christmas Eves.

Jdubs with his candle.

Over the River and Through the Woods…

…to Grandma’s house we go

One of our family traditions is literally that song. Every year we head “down to the river” for our family Christmas gathering with my mother’s people. I live in rural Texas, and this is an hour out into the bush from where I live. It’s remote, really remote. Your cell phone won’t work and you had better have plenty of gas in your car in case you get caught down there when the river rises during a storm because you will have to take “the back way” out, which adds an extra hour to the trip.

“The River” is in Shackelford** County on the Brazos River. We drive until the pavement ends, then keep driving and driving and driving. This area is very much a part of the Frontier History of Texas. Some of the land was once a Comanche Indian reservation. It also had a civil war era medical station on it. We’ve seen all manner of skittish wildlife like mountain lions and bald eagles.

Sometimes it’s hard to imagine that most of Texas and the western U.S. were like this. You really are in the middle of nowhere.

We actually go through the woods before we cross the river.
Over the river ... This is Daws Crossing on the Brazos.
Comanche Indian Reserve.
This is Grandma's house.
No rare beasts today, just cattle and deer.
Beautiful sunset. Thank you handy iPhone camera.

Package Delivery

Tonight was all about wrapping presents. Jdubs was a wild man, as usual. He delivered packages on his Spider-man bicycle and his scooter. He was also very handy in the gift wrapping too.

Ready for action.
And we're off on our first delivery run.
Beep, beep! Coming through.
Had to change vehicles ... this package is for Emmi.
A 4 year old's wrapping. I really like the pink bow.
Gift tags, pre-K style.

 

Happy wrapping, y’all.

Chicken Pot Pie

This is a classic recipe for a cold day and left over chicken. It’s hearty and flavorful and downright yummy. It seems like a lot of ingredients, but you can omit something if you don’t have it on hand.

Chicken Pot Pie Ingredients:

3 sticks celery, chopped

1 med. onion, chopped

2-3 carrots, chopped

3 cloves garlic, minced or pressed

1 red bell pepper

3-6 baby bella or button mushrooms

½ C. frozen green peas

2 C. cooked chicken

2 tbs. butter

¼ C. flour

Chicken stock

¼ C. cream

Tarragon (fresh or dried)

Salt & pepper

Olive oil

1 egg (for the egg wash)

Preheat oven to 400

Heat a large sauté pan with olive oil and add onion and season with salt. Let the onion sweat for a few minutes, then add the celery, carrots, garlic and bell pepper. Add about ½ C. chicken stock and let it cook for about 5 minutes until the vegetables are soft. Add the mushroom and continue to sauté. Add more liquid if it starts to get a little dry.

When the veggies are soft, pour into a bowl and set aside. In the same sauté pan add two tablespoons of butter and melt until bubbly. Pour ½ of chicken stock into a cup and add 2 tablespoons of flour. Stir well with a small whisk or fork. When the butter is bubbly pour the flour mixture in to create a roux. Whisk vigorously to cook the flour. When the mixture starts to thicken, add chicken stock, whisking the whole time. It may be a little lumpy at first, but keep whisking and it will become satin smooth.

Season with salt and pepper. Add the cream and bring it to a simmer. Then add the chicken. (I use leftover roast chicken.) Add the veggies back into the mix. And very last add the peas.

Add tarragon and salt and pepper. Get it all hot and bubbly. Then add to the crust/pot.

Cover with the top crust and brush with egg wash to make it GBD. Stick it in the oven at 400 degrees for 45 min or until the crust is golden brown delicious.

Now for the Crust ….

This is an old-school crust and not as easy to work with as the Never Fail Pie Crust. But this makes for a delicious, flaky and savory crust.

Pie crust ingredients:

2/3 C. Crisco

2 C. AP flour

1 Tsp salt

3-6 Tbs cold water

Cut the shortening into the flour and salt until it makes a crumbly pastry. Then add the water a tablespoon at a time until it just comes together.

This dough is stiff so don’t worry if it’s seems difficult to handle. divide the dough in half. Sandwich the first half between plastic wrap to roll out. This is one of the handiest tricks. By placing the dough between sheets of plastic wrap, you eliminate the need to add extra flour to the dough, which will make the dough tough. Also you can rotate the dough around to roll it out evenly. Plus, it’s super easy to clean up afterward.

To prepare the dough/pot, you need to prebake the shell for about 10 minutes. This keeps the dough from getting too soggy. The plastic wrap trick makes it easy to put your crust into the pot, with is very helpful since the dough is very crumbly. I use copper pennies as pie weights.

Bake the shell for about 10 minutes, take it out of the oven and fill with the veggie/chicken mixture. (see above for instructions)

Happy Eats, Y’all.

Beautiful Sky = Pretty Pictures

The sky was beautiful this afternoon. The clouds started to break up as the sun was setting. I took these photos around 5 p.m. today. The night sky was even more beautiful because it’s a new moon with cold high pressure air. That makes for a clear sky, perfect for seeing the Milky Way. Unfortunately my photography skills do not extend to nighttime panorama. But here are a few of my favorites from today.

Lego Reindeer

Jdubs has been fighting a cold/virus for a few days but now he’s feeling better. He started playing with his Legos today and built a Lego reindeer. And looking very angelic in the process.

Doppelganger. This kid is his daddy's boy, mischief and all.
Showing off his handy work.
This is the demonstration of the reindeer flying.

Momma loves you, Jdubs.

Playing Cat and Dog

I had no idea what I was going to write about tonight when I came home from work… then this post magically wrote itself. Jdubs and I were wrapping presents. This is what happens when a 4 year old who can recognize a few letters does for gift tags.

Momma, will you write letters for me?

Then we ditched the packages to play with the cat.

Ah, momma, Pussums wants to play with me.

Then the dog got in on the action, and we played cat and dog and kid for a while.

Ruby: "You wanna piece a me?" Pussums: "Bring it. I can't wait to slap you"

Here’s Ruby trying to be playful. (I wish that darn ornament wasn’t in the way, but you will see it in every frame.)

Pussums: "you are so gonna regret this!"

Pussums is definitely ready to take a swipe at Ruby. Fortunately, for Ruby, those paws are sans claws.

Puss is fired up. Ruby: "I double-dog dare you."

Puss is supremely pissed. If I could hear her kitty voice I think she would say: “oh no you didn’t. No way that’s going to fly up in here.”

Pussums slinks away to provide more "personal" space.

Here’s Ruby with two batteries on her shoulder saying: “I dare you to knock these off.” (very bad reference to a very old Duracell battery commercial.)

Too bad I didn't have the video going to capture the little dance before they both darted up the stairs.

The aftermath of Cat and Dog—the dog pounced at the cat, scooting the tree over 3-4 feet; the cat peeled out on the tree skirt and bolted up the stairs with the dog in hot pursuit. And Jdub’s package is left behind.

An Angel Among Us

Today was Jdub’s third [and last] Christmas program at his preschool. This year he graduated to being an “Angel” complete with a speaking part.

We’ve been practicing these lines constantly: Christmas is God’s love for people on Earth, the day we celebrate Jesus’ birth.

My little Angel did great today along with all his schoolmates. Bless Ms. Lori’s heart … it takes a lot of work to get a group of little children all working together to put on a program.

All the sweet little 2 year olds ... it's like hearding cats.
My sweet little angel.
No Room at the Inn ... the stage is set.

After it was all over I asked Jdubs how he did and he said: “I did amazing.” What a precious moment!

Jdubs said he got to be an actor today.

Random Awesomeness in Pictures

Sometimes things don’t quite come together. Tonight was one of those nights… I had plans for this blog post, but Jdubs is not cooperating so I had to redirect. But now maybe it’s going to be something more awesome than I had originally planned.

I looked through my random photographs and there are several I haven’t been able to use elsewhere. So I decided to write this post as random awesomeness in pictures.

A few days ago United Supermarkets had a sale on berries. I LOVE berries, and since it was cold, I made oatmeal and berry awesome in a bowl. And I have serious coffee every day. This is pressed coffee. The French version of Cowboy Coffee; it’s not for sissies.

French Press Coffee. Old fashioned oats, fresh berries, walnuts and a splash of cream.

Supper tonight. I made vegetable soup and chicken salad from a leftover roast chicken. The bread is the awesome country French bread we got at Central Market on Sunday. Oh and those are the little garden tomatoes I picked when they were still green, just before the killing frost. If you leave them out, they will ripen.

Soup and sandwich supper.

I almost peed my pants when I saw this (at Central Market on Sunday). You know how I love Scharffen Berger chocolate. Well here is a giant block of San Francisco chocolaty awesomeness!

OMG. I've died and gone to chocolate heaven.

The UPS man left a great big cat playhouse on the front porch. (That’s what I told the cat, anyway). Awesomeness in a cat toy.

This is awesome until the cat tries to play at 2 a.m., then not so awesome.

Who doesn’t love Sock Monkey? This hat is random awesomeness!

This Sock Monkey hat was a big hit at the supermarket tonight.