Our first real Christmas tree

I've met quite a few Christmas tree growers through my job, but I've never set up a real Christmas tree in our house.  This year, I decided to convince my husband to help me pick out our first real Christmas tree.  It turned out, he didn't need much convincing.  His family never had a real Christmas tree when he was growing up, so he was all for the idea.  He suggested that we drive to a nearby grocery store and pick out a tree. But I insisted that we visit a local Christmas tree farm.

There aren't many Christmas tree farms left in Iowa.  It's a tough business to get into.  First, you need the land.  With today's high corn prices, you're likely to make more money planting corn than planting Christmas trees.  Plus, operating a Christmas tree farm is a lot harder than it looks.  You need to tend to the trees throughout the year, trimming and weeding and spraying for insects when necessary.  You also have to keep the deer from eating all your trees.  And did I mention that it takes seven years before a Christmas tree is large enough to sell?  You better have a lot of patience if you're a Christmas tree grower.

My husband and I traveled to the Kidman tree farm near Polk City to buy our tree.  We chose a White pine, because I love the "Teddy bear" soft needles.

I'm leaving the tag on the tree as an "ornament."

We bought the tree stand at the farm, as well, for only $25.  It's a very sturdy tree stand, and very simple to use.  (Sorry, I forgot to take a picture before we put the tree up. But I'll post one sometime.)  The best part of buying straight from the farm? They had the tree all wrapped and placed in the back of our pick-up by the time we left the gift shop.  We were in and out in 15 minutes, which made my impatient hubby very happy.

So far, the tree has been very easy to care for.  It's like an indoor gardening project.  I water the tree twice a day, since it sucks up quite a bit of water.  We've had only a few needles to clean up from the carpet.  I put down a layer of garbage bags to protect the carpet from water, but so far, there hasn't been any water spilled, another benefit of a good tree stand.

I wrapped the tree in the homemade tree skirt my mother-in-law made for us.  It's such a beautiful addition to our holiday decorations.

You may have noticed that I don't have any ornaments on the tree.  Too be honest, I'm not really a fan of ornaments.  I hate packing and unpacking them each year.  I might make time to put a few ornaments up, but I'm happy with just the lights.  My philosophy with Christmas lights:  the more colorful, the better!

So does your family prefer a real tree to an artificial tree?  Do you prefer white lights over colored lights?  Or do you skip the tree all together?  I'm usually not big on decorating the house for the holidays, but I was excited about getting a real tree for the first time.

Thanksgiving successes & messes

 Hello everyone! Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving, with plenty of pie!

Once again this year, my hubby and I enjoyed Thanksgiving together at home.  It's quite a marathon to put together an entire Thanksgiving meal, even when it's just for two.  This year, I made all the classics: cranberry sauce, pumpkin pie, green bean casserole, marshmallow-topped sweet potatoes.  My husband is an expert at making gravy, so I let him take over that task.

Can't believe I ate this whole plate of food! On the plate: stuffing, cranberry-apple sauce, sweet potato casserole, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, dinner rolls and, of course, turkey.

Thought I'd share a few of my successes and messes from Thanksgiving meal prep.  I'm hoping I'll look back at a few of these later on for a good laugh:

Success:  We decided to roast the turkey the night before to save time the next day.
Mess:  I dropped the turkey on the floor!  No kidding!  I pulled the turkey out of the oven and set it on top of the stove to check the temp.  When I turned around to grab the food thermometer, I heard a loud clatter and saw the turkey and roast pan drop to the floor!  Thankfully, I cooked the turkey in a Reynolds bag.  So my husband just picked the turkey bag up, plopped it back in the roasting pan and put it back in the oven to finish cooking. Some of the liquid spilled onto the floor. But otherwise, the bag protected the turkey!  We're still laughing about this one today!

Success:  I finished preparing the entire Thanksgiving meal before noon!
Mess:  I ended up leaving the pumpkin pie in the oven a little too long, and the crust got way too brown -- almost black on the edges.

Success:  I woke up early to burn a few extra calories at a 7 a.m. Spin class.
Mess:  I didn't have time to take a shower until 1 p.m.!

So how was your Thanksgiving this year?  Did you cook the turkey yourself, or do you get together for a big family gathering?  Hopefully, your turkey stayed off the floor!

I'm thankful for all you blog readers out there.  You really inspire me to try new things and not be afraid to fail every once and a while.

July 4th parade

This weekend, I traveled back home to northern Iowa to see my hometown's July 4 parade.  There aren't a lot of towns in central Iowa that still hold big Independence Day celebrations, so I'm glad that it's still a tradition in my hometown.

Here are a few of my favorite highlights from the parade.  Hope you and your family had a great July 4 holiday, as well!

Norwegian family recipe: Rommegrot

Hope you all don't mind, but I'm on a Norwegian food kick lately.  I'm always surprised by how many folks stumble onto my blog looking for kringla, rosette or lefse recipes.  So I'm adding another family-favorite Norwegian recipe to the mix.

Along with lefse and lutefisk every Christmas, my grandma always served rommegrot, a Norwegian cream pudding.  Goodness, it was such a treat!  It was always served warm, and we would top it with melted butter and a sprinkle of cinnamon and sugar.  Grandma would always serve it in fancy glass dessert bowls, which made it even more special.

Unfortunately, I don't have my grandmother's old recipe.  But I do have a church cookbook from back home that has two very similar recipes for rommegrot.  So I just picked the one with the easiest-to-follow directions.  I made this recipe on Christmas Eve night, as a surprise to my dad and sister, who drove in a snow storm to spend the holidays with me.  (My family is such a blessing!)

And guess what?  It turned out perfect, nearly as good as my grandmother's rommegrot.  The flavor totally took me back to my childhood days sitting at the little kids' table at grandma's house.

So as my gift to you, I'm sharing my recipe for our family favorite, rommegrot.  It's a great treat for a cold, winter day.

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Rommegrot
From Deer Creek Lutheran Church Cookbook; Carpenter, Iowa (my grandma's hometown)

• 1 C. butter, melted
• 3/4 C. flour (add to butter and whisk)

Boil for 1 minute.  Add:

• 8 C. whole milk

Keep stirring until thick and it boils a bit.  Add:

• 1/3 C. sugar
• 1/2 tsp. salt

Stir in well. Serve with melted butter, sugar and cinnamon. Yield: 12 servings.

Cookie Friday: Christmas cookie plate

One of my very favorite things to do is bake cookies.  I've been known to go a little crazy when it comes to Christmas cookie baking.

My record is baking more than 12 different kinds of cookies for Christmas.  I went on a month-long baking spree.  Every free night I had was spent mixing up cookie dough in the kitchen.

While I had a lot of fun trying new cookie recipes, it was seriously too much.  My family is fairly small, and we don't have big gatherings for Christmas.  We ended up with way too many leftover cookies in the freezer, which isn't ideal considering that's also the time of year when you're trying to work off those extra holiday calories.

So this year, I went simple.  I only made two types of cookies.  One batch was my favorite ginger creme cookies, the other was the lemon sandwich cookies that my husband requested.

I'll leave the sugar cookies to my sister this year.  She's a much better baker than I.

So, what's on your Christmas cookie plate this year?

Martha Mondays: Silk-dyed Easter eggs

Hello everyone!  I had the opportunity to pick this week's Martha Mondays project.  I thought it would be fun to try one of Martha's wonderful Easter egg creations featured on her Web site.  In particular, I've been wanting to try her famous silk-dyed Easter eggs.  I saw this project featured on her TV show last year, and it looked super easy.  Plus, you don't have to work with the messy dyes.

I cut up an old silk scarf that I never wear anymore.  I wrapped it around the egg, then wrapped a piece of an old white cotton sheet around the silk.  Then I boiled the eggs for 40 minutes, with a little vinegar added to the water.

When the eggs cooled, I unwrapped the silk.  I hoped for the best, but I'm afraid my eggs didn't quite turn out.  Maybe it was the scarf, or maybe I didn't let the eggs simmer long enough. 

I would like to try this project again next year with another silk scarf or tie to see if it would work better.  It's such a simple way to dye eggs.  Thanks to Martha and Me for letting me pick this project this week.