A New Year to Celebrate

Yeah, I know I'm behind. But now that I'm up and running with this blog again, I am determined to get caught up.

On New Year's Eve, our friends the Gravens, came over to hang out with us. Nothing fancy, we just ate, played on the Wii, and watched the kids play games. Leonard had to work :( but kept calling regularly, so we felt like he was part of the party. We had a fun night especially since we don't see them very often.

And I have a recipe to share!
SPINACH ARTICHOKE DIP
I'm sorry this is already half eaten, but I only make it for parties so I don't eat the entire thing myself. I figured I had better take a photo of it anyway since I may not be making it again for a while. It is SO good! I love this dip. I got the recipe from allrecipes.com.

Hot Artichoke and Spinach Dip II

• 1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese, softened
• 1/4 cup mayonnaise
• 1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
• 1/4 cup grated Romano cheese
• 1 clove garlic, peeled and minced
• 1/2 teaspoon dried basil
• 1/4 teaspoon garlic salt
• salt and pepper to taste
• 1 (14 ounce) can artichoke hearts, drained and chopped
• 1/2 cup frozen chopped spinach, thawed and drained
• 1/4 cup shredded mozzarella cheese

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Mix everything together then gently stir in spinach and artichokes (I usually use a whole pkg. of spinach). I mix in the mozzarella instead of putting it on top because I read in the comments that it makes a crusty cheese shell on top. I couldn't find Romano cheese, so I just added extra mozzarella. I have also used an Italian blend of cheeses before, but I prefer freshly grated cheese over pre-grated because it melts better. Transfer to a baking dish and bake for 25 minutes or until hot and bubbly and slightly browned.

On New Years day we slept in, then packed to head to David's brother Scott and his wife Heidi's house. Noah and Evan went to a sledding birthday party with friends while we got everything cooked and ready to go.

As we showed up at their house, they had old home videos playing on the TV and we got a good laugh over our 1991 wedding, and Brent and Karen's. Wow, what hair we had! Logan made a very wise comment to me the next day. He said, "Adults are always talking about how they wish they could look like they did when they were younger, and as soon as they see themselves, they laugh at how funny they looked." Very true.

Stauney with Grandma Hansen and cousins.

Soon, almost the entire Hansen family had made their way there for the party. Scott and Heidi were brave souls to invite all 41 of the family to sleep over at their house - 34 came! After everyone showed up and some returned from skiing, we had dinner, then a talent show. The kids were asked to do a talent, and the adults were supposed to do highlights of their year. Here's the poem that David and I compiled together (I read the 1st line and he read the 2nd):

We can't believe that now another year's gone by,
Our kids have grown, we've gotten older, boy, how time does fly.

In March David went to Moab on a motorcycle trip,
I came home with cuts and bruises on my legs and arms and hip.

In May Noah and Evan played baseball in their cleats,
They had a lot of fun as long as there were treats.

Then Evan graduated from good old Kiddie Kollege,
He went on trips, had fun and got lots of preschool knowledge.

In July we joined the Hansen's for our annual camping fun,
But we deserve the most cookies since I'm the favorite son. (family joke)

Our thanks to Grandma & Grandpa for watching over our clan,
While we flew off to Hawaii to work upon our tan.

In August all our kids were in the Davis County Fair,
They got belt buckles, ribbons, and lots of money there.

Then September took them to the fair for Utah State,
Their goats looked really awesome and the kids did really great.

Then off to school the kids did go for knowledge there to gain,
They're learning much and doing well, but carpooling's a pain.

Now in band and choir and acting, our kids really do shine,
But with all these performances, Mom and Dad have little time.

Two cows, two goats, four chickens, our little farm does make,
But now the cows are gone, so soon we'll have great steak.

Another year gone by, another year to start,
Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and now we will depart!

Yeah, I know it's cheesey, but we were the only ones with a poem! I think we raised the bar for next year.

Logan told me he was going to play one of his hard songs on his trumpet. It was nice, but lasted about 30 seconds. He doesn't understand why I was upset. After all the money we pay for piano lessons and trumpet payments, you'd think he could allow me a little more proud mother time than 30 seconds! I barely had time to take this photo. This is the second time he has done this to me, so I told him next time I get to pick the song.

Stauney and Noah played a duet of 'Jolly Old St. Nicolas'. Then Stauney played Fur Elise and Noah played 'Silent Night' while Evan sang to it (no photo, I was helping).

Then after enjoying everyone's talents (except Brian's family who weren't there), we divided everyone up according to where they were going to sleep, and stayed up WAY too late for the second night in a row, talking, laughing and playing games.

Breakfast the next morning was so yummy. We made omlettes in a bag. In case you haven't had them here's the, uh, recipe?

OMLETTES IN A BAG

Break 2 eggs into a sandwich baggie.
Add some mix-ins: peppers, browned sausage, grated cheese, diced ham, olives, onions, salsa, tomatoes, salt and pepper, etc.
Close bag and squish to mix. Let out extra air. Write your name on it with a Sharpie pen and drop into a pot of boiling water. They take about 15 min. to cook completely. Squish to make sure the egg is all set.
They are great, and fun to make.

Then I headed outside to take photos of the kids sledding on the hill next to their house. Here are a few of my favorite photos:

David and Noah on the snowmobile.

Great shot of Kylie in mid-air. She is so fearless, she took more hard landings than most of the big kids.

I love Noah's expression as he flies off his sled.

Taylor's awesome snowboard jump off the ramp that Cory and Parker took so much time creating.

Stauney and Brooke. In almost every photo I had of Stauney she was screaming like this.

Logan and Evan enjoying the ride. It was actually raining on us for a while, so it was a little warmer than usual January weather. It turned to heavy snow later that night on our way home though.

And now my favorite. Every year for Christmas I give all the Hansen family a CD of all the photos I've taken of family outings for the year. This is sure to be a favorite of the whole family soon.

My SIL Sonja's awesome crash! One of my best action photos ever.

David and Brett donned showshoes and hiked up quite a way onto the mountain that you can see behind him. They had fun, but were very tired after.

Here's a photo David took on their hike looking back toward Scott and Heidi's house. It's such a beautiful place with an amazing view of Ben Lomond peak out their back windows.

They were so gracious to host us all and we had a fabulous time.

Catching Up with Friends

We still haven't forgiven the Simmons family for moving away over 5 years ago. They lived next door to us, and we've known each other since we each only had 2 kids. Scott was David's home-teaching partner, and then his 1st Counselor in the Bishopric. Their kids are all the same gender and ages as our kids, and best friends. Our kids would pretty much decide which Mom's meal they preferred and they ate at each others houses often. We shared plants, tools, movies, food, pools, swingsets, and trampolines. We celebrated many birthdays together, carpooling, sleepovers, barbecues and campouts. We had somewhere to leave our kids when we had to go somewhere (or sometimes just left the baby monitors with each other while a child slept).

It was perfect.

Then Scott got a job transfer and they moved away. It left a big hole in our lives that hasn't been filled since. We've tried to keep in touch, but it's just not the same. Two years ago we went to Disneyland together on vacation and had a blast. But since then we've only seen each other about once a year, so we haven't been doing very good at keeping in touch. So we were determined to get together for the Christmas break.

On December 29th we met Kim and the kids at Discovery Gateway in SLC. We had never been there before. It was so sad at first to see the kids all so shy with each other because they hadn't seen each other very often, but it didn't take long for them to get reacquainted. Kim, David and I stayed with the 4 younger boys while Logan and Tyler, and Stauney and Kierra went off on their own.

This is Evan on the rock wall. This was a great place for the boys.

Ryan (on horse) with Travis and Noah waiting for their turns to pose for me.


We found the 'big boys' building upstairs. They were really good sports for being there -the place was packed with tons of little kids. I do think they found enough to have fun with though. I know they spent a lot of time in the water area after this.

After a while we all retired to the craft room to play with Play-doh while we waited for Scott to get off work.

Then we all headed for the food court to eat. We didn't realize that a Jazz game was going on that night also, so everywhere was packed. We thought we hit the jackpot when we found a big table where all 12 of us could all sit together to eat. Thank you to the guy who pointed out that someone had just thrown up under it. I guess we weren't so lucky, but we managed to maneuver around it.

Then we walked over to Temple Square to see the lights. The kids were cursing me for making them dress so warm. It was a really warm night and Logan carried his coat most of the time. That really was lucky. I don't remember ever seeing the lights on Temple Square before and being warm.

The blue-eyed brunette and the brown-eyed blonde. Kierra and Stauney are both getting so grown-up! They started their friendship at age 4 and their birthdays are just a couple of weeks apart. Even though they don't see each other often, Stauney still calls Kierra her best friend.

All the mirrored lights were beautiful in the reflection pond.



Our families.

The lights were beautiful, as always. While we were listening to the nativity, Evan was on David's shoulders and yelled out very loudly, "Guys, we already know this story!"

I felt very lucky to get this picture of the Christus without any people in it. It was SO crowded there that we didn't stay for the presentation because we could hardly move.

We sat to rest for a while around the paintings area. I had a nice chat with some sister missionaries, one from Canada and one from an island I had never heard of so I don't remember where it was. The second also has three brothers and is the only girl like Stauney and Kierra.

And of course, the beautiful temple. I love the colors that showed on it from the reflection pool.

We hopped on Trax for one stop while we headed back to our cars at the Gateway. It was also the first time we had ridden Trax. The kids loved it so I'm sad it was such a short ride. Just as we got into the car we heard that the Jazz game was ending and saw people start pouring out of Energy Solutions arena. I yelled to David, "Get out of town quick!" We beat the traffic.

It was great to spend time with the Simmons' and we vowed that every two months this year we would take turns meeting at each other's houses where we would leave the kids and the adults would head to dinner. Plus there needs to be a campout in there somewhere. They are great friends and we feel blessed to know them. Travis has started calling us their cousins, and that's how we feel - like family.

Stauney and Kierra were trying to do some serious newscasts, but their brothers weren't helping any. Here's my attempt at posting a video. I was standing at a distant TV screen so they didn't know that I was recording them, that's why there's no sound except for background noise and me laughing.

Christmas Eats, Treats and Feats

You know the line in It's Beginning to Look a lot Like Christmas where it says, "...and Mom and Dad can hardly wait for school to start again..."? Stauney asked me if that was true and I told her we'd have to wait and see. It's true. All these new toys and new snow on the ground and a new sled and yet everyone keeps complaining to me that they are bored! I'm at a point in my life where I'm thrilled when I'm bored because it means I don't really have anything I have to do right then (although I always have something I should be doing). So to my children I say - be happy to be bored occasionally because it doesn't happen much as you get older.

I remember complaining to my Dad as a child about how time dragged by and he told me, "The older you get, the faster it goes." He was so right. Time passes by so quickly. This whole season I could hardly believe it was Christmas time already, and now it's over. So here are just a few things from our Christmas season which passed by so quickly I didn't get photos of some of it.

Evan drew this cute picture of me and him and we had to get a photo of it before it got erased. It's so cute it warms my heart to look at it!

Hooray for new snow to get the boys out of the house! They attempted to build an igloo, but kept getting distracted with snowball fights. They're sitting in what they got built and our dog Chloe is jumping on Noah's friend Kelson. Chloe loved having them out there too so she could kiss anyone who fell on the ground. I think they like going outside more as an excuse to come in and drink more cocoa.

New recipe: CAKE BALLS

While the boys were outside playing Stauney and I were busy inside making food and treats for some neighbors and the family party the next day. This was a recipe I found on allrecipes.com that looked really good and sounded really easy. You bake a cake mix, crumble it into a bowl while warm, and mix in a can of frosting. You can mix any flavors you want to, we wanted to do red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting, but couldn't find a red velvet mix, so this is a photo of the mix of cherry chip and cream cheese frosting.

Pack the mix tightly into a scoop then roll it lightly between your hands an place the balls on a tray. We used a 1" scoop. We also did a devils food cake with milk chocolate frosting. Each cake mix made about 70 cake balls. Then refrigerate (or freeze) them to harden the balls.

Then you melt almond bark or candy coating and dip the balls in them. We did some of each kind of cake in each coating. I got a little lazy on the drizzling, so they look messy, but we were ready to be done. This was an easy recipe, but it took hours to dip them all. They turned out pretty though, and were a big hit at the family party.

Here's a photo of all the Moon grandchildren. And thanks to the magic of Photoshop they are all in it and (mostly) smiling. Aimee had just gotten home from New Jersey that morning, yeah! We had a fun party, playing games, eating and visiting and more eating, and some really silly games, and even more eating.

Christmas eve cookies for Santa. The kids all in their new jammies and Christmas socks. This is by the kids' tree where they decorated underneath it with the Lego train and a Lego village they built on the train table. They decorated the tree without help this year and it's very unique!

And one final recipe.
Whenever I do something the kids really like it has to become a new tradition whether I want to keep doing it or not. I made the french toast Christmas trees about 6 years ago for the first time an have been doing it ever since. Last year I told the kids it took too much time and I didn't want to spend that much time in the kitchen on Christmas morning so I made a breakfast casserole instead. It did not go over well. They didn't like, didn't eat it and kept reminding me how much they love the french toast Christmas trees. I got the hint. They were back this year, and will stay from now on, with their sausage trunks and orange slice suns too.

So here's the recipe: not for the french toast, but for the Lil' Smokies we used this year for trunks. We usually heat them in grape jelly, which is really good. But, Christmas morning we discovered we had no grape jelly - and we are so glad!!! We started searching for a substitute and decided to try cranberry jelly instead with a little orange juice. It was so good! We will now make that a tradition and look forward to trying them for other occasions as well.

We also enjoyed the kids in their Christmas concerts. Logan played his trumpet in the band concert, Evan sang with the kindergarten in the school assembly and Stauney and Noah performed in the school choirs three times. We are proud of them all and the hard work they put into their practices. They all did a wonderful job.

We had a fun Christmas morning and Santa must have decided the kids were good. They got books, clothes (Evan was not happy about getting underwear for Christmas), new Wii games, new Webkinz, and plenty of toys. Evan said, "I think I got everything I had on my list!" Noah was so excited that Santa came through with the hard-to-find Bakugan game that he asked for. Logan and Stauney were immediatley immersed in their new books that they were dying to read, Makeover (Stauney), and books 4 and 5 of The Ranger's Apprentice (Logan).
Their new Wii games are My Sims Kingdom, De Blob and Wii Music. If you have a Wii, you have to get Wii Music! It is so much fun and we laughed so hard at the music videos we made. They were all really fun games and we spent 2 days in our jammies just playing and watching new videos. On Christmas day we cooked a turkey with all the trimmings but felt so weird sitting down to eat such a nice meal in our pajamas.

We are now looking forward to the new year and our party with the Hansens. We'll keep you posted on that soon.

Fun with Snow and Photoshop

I hope everyone had a wonderful and safe Christmas like we did. It's been a tradition to take a photo of our Christmas lights outside every year. But when my husband reminded me of it tonight I was thinking of skipping it due to the new foot of snow we got that hasn't been cleared. I'm so glad I didn't because I got some really neat snowy photos and hopefully my camera (and fingers) will recover from the cold. I had to come in and download my camera to see what I got, and of course I had to mess with a few in Photoshop Elements. So here are the results!

I liked this one with the colored lights making a rainbow of colors underneath the snow on our spruce tree. I did a dry brush filter on it.


I didn't do anything to this photo. It's of a snowflake light decoration hanging on our house.

The railing up to our front porch has a garland and white lights on it. And now a foot of snow too! I did a soft white blending mode on a duplicate layer and I think a slight paint daubs filter.

Soft white and poster edges for our house light.

Didn't do anything to this one either. So glad it focused on the icicle for me.

Frosty fake poinsettias in the planter on the porch. Soft white and water paper filter.

This one I took Monday. They're not partridges, but they are blackbirds in our pear tree.
Soft white and poster edges (I think).

Merry Christmas!

We hope you are all having a great holiday season. Ours is very busy which is why I haven't been blogging. Just wanted to take a moment though to post this and wish you all a

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from David, Kristyn and kids!

Some 5* Perfected Recipes

Wow, this month really went by fast and the holidays are upon us. But these photos don't go with December, so here's my final fall post.

I like chili, but I didn't love it until I tried this recipe. I have tried making a few chili recipes over the years, but this is now a favorite that we make often. I'll officially call it Aunt Donna's chili since David's mom got it from her sister, but we call it Grandma Hansen's chili. Funny how recipes get re-named after the person who gives it to you. I add 2 more cans of chili beans when I make it so that it goes further for my family, and I like having leftovers. I have never remembered to buy bay leaves, so I haven't ever put those in, I usually use dried diced onions if I don't have fresh, and I add more chili powder.

Aunt Donna's Chili

1 1/2 to 2 lbs. ground beef
1 onion, chopped

Brown, then add:
1 can chili beans
1 can diced tomaotes
2 small cans tomato sauce plus 2 cans water
1 pkg. spaghetti sauce mix
1 tsp. sugar
1 tsp. chili powder
2 bay leaves
Cook slowly until thickened, usually about 1/2 hour, uncovered. Stir often. Remove bay leaves.

Somewhere in our move 4 1/2 years ago, I lost my favorite sugar cookie recipe. I had tried others with limited success (especially the batch David helped Stauney make where they added powdered sugar in place of the flour and wondered why it wouldn't thicken.) So in a search last Christmas for a great sugar cookie recipe I found this one on Allrecipes. I love that site because I love to read the ratings and see how people liked it and what they would change. I recently made these to take visiting teaching in November. I will post my favorite icing recipes also. These are iced with royal icing that I outlined and flood-filled, but I have a favorite soft frosting recipe also from Allrecipes. These cookies are crispy on the outside, but soft and melt-in-your mouth on the inside. And they are really easy! The royal icing hardens up just enough to place them on a plate without the cookies sticking together, but stays soft inside. The green ones in the photo are still wet and that's why they are shiny.
My Grandma Lindsay's sugar cookies will always have a place in my heart, my recipe binder, and my stomach, but these are my favorite sugar cookies for decorating. Try them and enjoy!

The Best Rolled Sugar Cookies
allrecipes.com

1 1/2 cups butter, softened
2 cups white sugar (can add up to 1 more cup for a sweeter cookie if you don't plan to frost them)
4 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla extract
5 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt

Cream butter and sugar until smooth. Beat in eggs and vanilla. Stir in the flour, baking powder, and salt. Cover and chill dough for 1 hour in the fridge or overnight. (I throw it in the freezer for 1/2 hour).
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Roll out dough on floured surface 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick. Cut into shapes with any cookie cutter. Place on ungreased cookie sheet 1 inch apart.
Bake 6-8 minutes in preheated oven. Cool completely. (I bake mine up to 10 min. depending on the thickness. Bake until the edges start to turn brown.)
Makes about 4-5 dozen depending on size.

Royal Icing

8 tsp. merengue powder + 8 Tbsp. water = 4 egg whites (I've always used the powder for food safety)
5 cups powdered sugar (plus more for thickening)
1/2 to 1 tsp. lemon extract
food coloring to tint
Whisk the merengue powder and water until smooth and bubbly. Add powdered sugar and extract. Separate some into another bowl to thicken for outlining. Add more powdered sugar until it will hold a peak on your spoon. The flooding frosting may need to be thickened some more also so it will run together, but not be too runny. Place in decorating bags with a small round tips. (The lemon extract makes this fabulous, so don't go without! The only real trick to this is to get the icing the right consistency for outlining and filling. Outline and let dry before filling.)


Sugar Cookie Frosting
allrecipes.com

4 cups powdered sugar
1/2 cup shortening
5 Tbsp. milk
1 tsp. vanilla extract
food coloring
Cream together sugar and shortening until smooth. Gradually add milk and vanilla and mix with an electric mixer until smooth and stiff, about 5 minutes.

Sorry, but I forgot to take a photo of the next recipe, but I'm sure you know what a pumpkin roll looks like.

For the Stake Presidency/visiting speakers dinner after Stake conference last Sunday I was assigned a dessert to make. My last food assignment had problems and was a flop (only to me I'm sure), so I was determined to show the other wives that I could cook. I searched allrecipes.com again for a 5* pumpkin roll recipe and found one that looked promising. Actually I found 2, but used the ingredients from one (Granny Kat's) and the directions from the other(Pumpkin Roll II). I made this recipe 4 TIMES last Saturday before I finally felt like I had it perfected and good enough to present. So I took the best 2 to the dinner and took the other 2 to Thanksgiving to share with my family, who could care less what they looked like. Turns out, once you slice them, they look pretty, and they taste so good, who cares what they look like! But I feel like I redeemed myself. I dusted powdered sugar on the plates, put a slice of pumpkin roll, some chocolate shavings, and a scoop of Dryers Vanilla Bean ice cream. Oh boy it's good!
So here's the combination of recipes, and my instructions so we'll call it:

The Perfected Pumpkin Roll

1 cup white sugar
3 eggs
1 tsp. lemon juice
1 cup pumpkin puree
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. pumpkin pie spice
(1 tsp. pumpkin pie spice = 1/2 tsp. cinnamon, 1/4 tsp. ginger, 1/8 tsp. nutmeg, 1/8 tsp. cloves)
powdered sugar for dusting

Filling:
1 (8 oz.) package cream cheese, softened
1/4 cup butter
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 cup powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line a 10"x15" jelly-roll pan with parchment paper. Grease and flour the paper completely.
Cream eggs and sugar about 2 minutes until fluffy. Blend in lemon juice, pumpkin, spices and baking soda. Slowly add flour and blend just until mixed. Pour the mixture into prepared pan and spread evenly.
Bake for 15 minutes. (Here's where I had problems with my first 2. Bake until the top starts to brown slightly and springs back to the touch. I didn't bake the first ones long enough and they stuck to the towel. I baked my perfect one about 21 minutes, but it depends on your oven.)
Lay a linen towel on the counter and sprinkle it generously with powdered sugar (not lightly like they tell you). Turn the cake onto the towel. Carefully roll the towel up with the cake in it. (Lengthwise if you want a small roll, widthwise if you want a big one). Place the cake-in-towel on a cooling rack and let cool completely (no peeking, that's where I messed up #3, it cracked. Mine took about 40 minutes).
Make the icing in a bowl with a mixer.
When the cake has cooled, carefully unroll it, spread the icing on it, and re-roll it without the towel. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate before serving (or it squashes) or you can freeze it for up to 2 weeks in foil. (I froze mine and let them thaw on the plates while we ate.) Cut the cake in slices, thick or thin. Serves about 10-15.


I hope you try and enjoy my recipes! I also made Apple Carmel Sundae Tart from kraftfoods.com for our friends' Pie Preview the night before Thanksgiving. Everyone brings pie and we sit around and chat and eat WAY too much pie, but oh, how we look forward to it every year! Anyway, this pie is very simple and quick to make, very tasty and will be added to my favorites. The Cherry Danish Dessert is also a 5* favorite of our family.

I'm thankful for good food, but mostly for my wonderful family and friends I have to share it with. You're the reason I enjoy baking.