Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!  I hope you had a wonderful long weekend and if you are lucky, have this week off too. Me? I am back to work this week.  I know a lot of attorneys are out, but so are legal assistants, so this could be a cake week where I get a ton of stuff off my desk with no pressure, or it could be balls to the wall.  

I took about 200+ pictures over the long weekend.  Saturday Jacob worked all day and Hannah and I spent the day together and it was so much fun.  She makes me laugh so hard sometimes.  Um, turns out we spent nearly TWO HOURS at Hobby Lobby alone!

This was a tough Christmas for Jacob’s family, as it was the first Christmas without his grandma.  I totally know how that feels – losing a loved one a few weeks before Christmas when the sadness is still so present that you just want to wrap yourself in a blanket and go to sleep until you feel better.

We tried to keep as many traditions for Jacob’s grandma as we could – one of which is doing appetizers for Christmas Eve.   I made a charcuterie board – OMG, I am going to post the crack Ritz crackers tomorrow – Hannah could have eaten that with cheese spread and been a happy camper.  

Christmas brunch I made a charcuterie breakfast!  I made dropped biscuits with everything but the bagel seasoning, scrambled eggs, Hannah made sausage gravy, and we had sausage, peppered bacon and fresh fruit.

It was a weird day though – Jacob’s Mom got upset and left after brunch. Jacob’s Dad said he was coming, then he wasn’t.  Jacob’s brother decided not to come. His Mom eventually came back.  Me?  I just sipped on wine and went with flow!  And I made these potato stacks.  I could not get this picture to flip around, but basically you slice potatoes really thin (I used small white potatoes so I didn’t have to peel them) toss them in a butter and herb mixture, stack in a muffin tin and bake for 50 minutes.  I saw my Instagram friend Jane make them and they were delicious.  Um, I may have also added Cabot cheese on top before serving so the top was like scalloped potatoes.  The full recipe can be found at Southern Living Magazine here. 

Yum!!

Jacob’s grandpa used to be a butcher and provided the prime rib roast for dinner.  He seasoned it 48 hours before I cooked it yesterday.  I cooked it at 450 for the first 30 minutes, then brought the temp down to 325 and cooked it until it reached 125 degrees.  It only rest 45 minutes (I would have liked to let it rest another 15 minutes), and next time I think I’d only do the 450 for the first 15 minutes, but this was delicious.  And I am usually not a huge fan of prime rib.

Here’s a blurry picture of what it looked like out of the oven 😀

Hannah gave me a necklace – it is to hold some of Tony’s ashes.  The chain is a bit long, so we are going to get that fixed, but the charm fits right in between my boobs, which is where I think Tony would want to be anyway. 😀

So while there was some sadness this holiday, I was able to find moments to just laugh and live – such as going to the pet store and holding tiny dogs with Hannah on Saturday.  

I never posted the winner of my giveaway from last week yesterday!  The winner is . . .

“Molly

I went through a major career change/mid-life crisis/fun-employment this summer. I’m thankful I’m still able to financially take care of myself with WW and gym memberships. I’m thankful for the community provided to me with these memberships and the ability to make friends and connect with people all over the country. You included!”

Shoot me your email address and I’ll get it out to you this week.

It’s -5 degrees right now, but with the windchill feels like -14.  Gah.  Jealous of my sister who has this whole week off!

Happy Tuesday – make it a great day!