12 shrimps a-spooning

Merry Christmas Eve, everyone!!  This morning I awoke bright and early (cough 9am cough) and headed to the bank and grocery store.  It was pretty busy, but lots of people were cheerful!  When I got home, I went straight to tidying up the kitchen and finishing my cookies.  This was the first year I had my cake decorating tips, so I kinda went to town piping on the icing.  The royal icing I slapped on first was stiffer than I’d have liked, but I was too lazy to go back and thin it out (laziness is a theme on the ol’ blog, can’tcha tell?)

Here are all that I made:

See those dipped pretzel rods?  They’re leftovers from 2 weeks ago.  Don’t tell the neighbors.  I worked until about 2pm and was famished.  I had some smoked turkey with some kind of deli mustard and steamed broccoli + cauliflower with parmesan cheese.

After lunch and tidying up, I showered and we delivered cookies to the neighbors.  I’ve always done it just to be nice, but in the past few years, they’ve started giving us goodies as well.  We got 2 jars of amazing homemade pickles, a loaf of Panera’s holycrapamazing holiday bread, and I got some Christmas money from our dear next door neighbor. 

One tradition I’m really missing this year is our Christmas punch.  Every Christmas Eve we make a punch with ginger ale, cranberry juice, pineapple juice, almond extract, and sugar, but this year we settled for Sierra Mist Free Cranberry Splash with some almond extract mixed in.  It was a poor substitute for my beloved punch, but it was something special to sip on during the day.  It would’ve helped if we had busted out the punch bowl, but with space as limited as it is in this temporary kitchen, we poured straight from the bottle.  I did dig out my stemless red wine glasses, though!

Mom and Dad traditionally have boiled shrimp on Christmas Eve (I run hot and cold with shrimp…sometimes it weirds me out, so I don’t always have it), so I partook of some for my dinner.  I also made a green bean casserole, complete with cream of mushroom soup and fried onions…blehhhh.  Don’t get me wrong – it was amazing.  My heart and gallbladder are just probably slightly pissed at me.

I pre-portioned my dinner so I wouldn’t keep nibbling, and Mom made fun of me for being so OCD about my shrimp.  I truthfully didn’t mean to lay them out in such an orderly fashion – it just kinda happened!  And yeah, that’s way too much green bean casserole.  I’m dealing with it.

I’m currently on my 2nd viewing of A Christmas Story – a movie I cannot watch until Christmas Eve.  I watched it earlier in December last year and spoiled it for myself.  Like eating a crappy McDonald’s cheeseburger mere hours before dining on five-star restaurant fare, when the main event (TBS marathon) arrived on December 24th, it just wasn’t as special.  So this year, I abstained until 8pm Christmas Eve.  Every year when I see the beginning credits start to roll, I get choked up…that means it’s really officially Christmas!!

I’m off to get gussied up for our church candlelight service.  Though I’m not a church-goer, it’s a tradition to attend and then come home to read The Littlest Angel with my Mom.  I’m 25, but I’m certain we’ll keep doing this until I have to read it to her.

Merry Christmas, everyone!!