Christmas Moments

It seems like the Christmas season comes so quickly even though we have 365 days to prepare. I typically will put up our Christmas decorations the week of Thanksgiving depending upon where we will spending the holiday. This is our first Christmas at this house so it was alot of fun preparing and decorating the house for family and friends. We will be celebrating Christmas Eve with my husband's family and then my family will be coming in for the weekend. I totally enjoy the Christmas season because of Jesus birth, family, friends and traditions that we make.

A tradition that I grew up with was going to my Grandma's and then onto my aunts as the family became larger on Christmas Eve. That tradition still holds and I miss it when I'm not there but we would gather for a time of eating and fellowship. After everyone would be stuffed my grandma would bring out our booklets that were full of Christmas carols and tunes, and my uncle would start strumming on the guitar and someone would break out into song. My grandparents are both gone now but the family tradition still stays.

This past weekend Caleb and I attended the Nutcracker production at the Kentucky Center for the Arts and we had a great time. He learned to love the Nutcracker several years ago when we had taken him to performance, since that first performance he gets a new Nutcracker every year to add to his collection.

Caleb and I made cookies and truffles this week. We had chocolate chip (all time favorite), sugar cookies decorated in snowman, trees, stars and covered with sprinkles. The truffles were a new experience but Caleb had a great time melting the chocolate and dipping my chocolate balls as well as dipping pretzels.

If you'd like a easy recipe to make truffles here it is:
20 Chocolate squares (Baker's semi-sweet)
1- 8oz. package cream cheese, softened

Melt 8 chocolate squares, beat cream cheese with mixer until creamy, still in melted chocolate. Refrigerate until firm. Shape into 36 balls. Place on wax paper. Melt remaining chocolate and dip chocolate balls and decorate with sprinkles, peanuts, powdered sugar or cocoa powder. Place in small foil cups.

This recipe came from Kraft foods but I only used the 8 squares of Baker's chocolate and dipped the balls in 1 package of chocolate bark. This is absolutely yummy!