Happy Christmas . . .

. . . from my home to yours.



Wishing you and your loved ones all the peace, joy and love of the season. xo

Wrapping Presents

Right now I'm wishing I had several hours I could pull out of my back pocket. How about you?

I have a lot of last minute things to do today for Christmas--mostly food preparations, tidying the house before guests arrive and wrapping presents.

Doing my best to do it all merrily!

Speaking of wrapping presents... check out this adorable video on How to Wrap a Cat for Christmas.




Merry Christmas Eve!  ^_^

Library Loot XLV

Library Loot is a weekly event co-hosted by Claire from The Captive Reader and Marg from The Adventures of an Intrepid Reader that encourages bloggers to share the books they’ve checked out from the library. If you’d like to participate, just write up your post-feel free to steal the button-and link it using the Mr. Linky any time during the week. And of course check out what other participants are getting from their libraries! This week's Library Loot is at Claire's. 


I thought last week's library loot post was going to be my last one of the year, but I was wrong! Hey, it happens sometimes! My youngest is reading Indigo's Star by Hilary McKay in school and discovered the author has written several books about Indigo's siblings, as well, so of course it became extremely urgent to get her hands on all of them at once. Thankfully, our library had all of them except one. We'll have to hunt that one down at another library at some point. Since we were there on a Saturday afternoon, it gave me the opportunity to browse the shelves at a leisurely pace instead of my usual rush in, grab books, rush out. It was nice.




His Mistress by Christmas by Victoria Alexander

A new Christmas Historical Romance.

I may not get to this one in time for this holiday season, but I couldn't resist taking it home just in case!

My Father's Daughter by Gwyneth Paltrow
I saw this cookbook on the new release shelf for non fiction and the only reason I picked it up was because it won the 2011 Goodreads Readers Choice Awards in the Food & Cooking category. I like Gwyneth Paltrow, but I did not vote for her cookbook. [I voted for Jeni's Splendid Ice Creams At Home by Jeni Britton Bauer, in case you were wondering.] I usually pass over cookbooks by celebrities on the principle that the only reason their cookbook is in bookstores selling copies is because they are celebrities, NOT because they are exceptionally original or talented in the kitchen. In fact, I think those are largely same reasons why this cookbook even won the Readers Choice Awards--because people know and recognize Gwyneth Paltrow. Not because they have read or cooked from her cookbook.

So out of curiosity, just this once, I brought home a celebrity cookbook from the library. It's a nice cookbook that uses simple, fresh ingredients in basic, familiar recipes that are healthful--which is how I strive to cook for my family. The food in the cookbook looks good, but not exceptionally noteworthy, but perhaps that's just because I already cook similarly to Ms. Paltrow. However, I am going to try her recipe for American Rotisserie Chicken tomorrow for dinner, so maybe I will be surprised and it will be the most exceptional roast chicken I've ever made! I'll let you know..

What's your take on celebrity cookbooks?

I borrowed some music by Maroon 5, Britney Spears and Pussy Cat Dolls. Don't judge.

I bought some Christmas novels on the 'books for sale' shelf to add to my collection. This coincided with my decision to collect little hardcover Christmas novels.


 

 

The Christmas Hope Donna VanLiere
Our Simple Gifts by Owen Parry
A Cedar Cove Christmas by Debbie Macomber
The Perfect Christmas by Debbie Macomber



Is there a particular sort of book you like to collect from used book sales or stores?

About Rainshadow Road {A video from Lisa Kleypas!}

I'm so excited to share this new video with you from Lisa Kleypas. In this short video, author Lisa Kleypas shares her thoughts about her upcoming new novel, Rainshadow Road, the first book in her  Friday Harbor trilogy.  Look for Rainshadow Road in bookstores in February 2012.




I posted this video for my readers as part of "Lisa's Divas" - a group of select fans who share info & content related to Lisa's novels and get sneak peeks & swag in return. But please feel free to grab the link, post the video and basically spread the word about Lisa's upcoming Friday Harbor series to your friends, too!

If you think you'd like to be one of Lisa's Divas, there may be room for a few more fans in the Lisa's Divas community. Visit this site for more information and how to sign up.

Spritz Cookies!

Baking an assortment of homemade Christmas cookies has been a tradition in my family for at least three generations now. My maternal grandmother immigrated to the United States from Germany as a teenager, following her sweetheart from her hometown, already skilled in cooking and baking, including traditional German recipes for a variety of holiday breads and cookies such as stollen, lebkuchen, linzer cookies, and spritz cookies. My mother continued the tradition of baking tins full of Christmas cookies for the holidays--some of my grandmother's traditional recipes and some new ones she found here and there in her own cookbooks or passed to her from friends. We would eat more than our share of cookies the week between Christmas, but my mother would also package several cookies of each variety into decorative tins to give to friends and family during the holidays. I have joyfully continued this Christmas cookie tradition in my own home, establishing a repertoire of Christmas cookies I bake every year. My husband even has two cookies he makes every Christmastime, too. *loves*

I have baked a lot of different Christmas cookie recipes over the years,  recipes I found primarily in cooking magazines that I have accrued over the years--many of the magazines special issues dedicated entirely to Christmas cookies. I also own Joy of Cooking Christmas Cookies by Irma S. Rombauer, Marion Rombauer Becker and Ethan Becker, which is a must for anyone who loves classic, tried and true Christmas cookie recipes.

Every year I'm on the lookout for new Christmas cookie recipes to try, because you never know what's destined to be the next family favorite. Favorites may come and go over the years, but one cookie that has a permanent spot on the family favorites list--and one I enjoyed from my grandmother's and my mother's kitchens is Spritz cookies! My daughters especially have come to love and expect spritz cookies every year at Christmas and I'd like to share my recipe with you.

Spritz cookies are a traditional German butter cookie also known as Spritzgebäck, that are made from a very basic butter cookie dough that is pressed or 'squirted' [spritzen is the German verb for squirt!] through a cylindrical cookie press that is fitted at the opened end with discs with patterned holes that form special shapes. So technically you will need a cookie press to make traditional spritz cookies. They are inexpensive and fairly easy to find at specialty food shops, department stores and possibly even grocery stores during the holiday season.

What if you don't have a cookie press or don't want to invest in one just to make Spritz cookies?

Do not despair! You can still make spritz cookies using a pastry bag fitted with an open star tip. Simply fill the pastry bag with the cookie dough and pipe the cookie dough directly onto cookie sheets. You can pipe the dough into 2" sticks,  circles for wreaths or shape the piped dough into hearts.

Spritz Cookies


1 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup sugar
1 large egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/8 teaspoon salt

1. Preheat oven to 375 F.

2. Place butter and sugar in a large mixing bowl and cream together on medium-high speed until light and fluffy. This will take about 5 minutes. Set your kitchen timer for 5 minutes because these cookies really do turn out best when you beat the butter and sugar for the full 5 minutes.

3. Add the egg and vanilla and beat until well blended.

4. Add the flour in three additions, adding the salt with the first addition, mixing well with each addition.

5. Assemble and fill your cookie press according to the manufacturer's instructions.

6. Press cookies onto ungreased, cool cookie sheets. If you are reusing the same cookie sheet for separate batches, make sure the cookie sheet cool completely before using again.

7. Decorate with colored sprinkles, if desired. This is a must in my house. :)

8. Bake for 6-9 minutes or until the cookies are just lightly brown at the edges. Watch carefully to avoid over baking. They tend to go from perfectly baked to burned in just a few seconds.

9. Cook the cookies on the cookie sheet for a few minutes before transferring to a cooling rack or large platter.

Enjoy!

Yield: 4-5 dozen.

Weekend Cooking, a weekly blog event hosted by Beth Fish Reads. Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food related post to share--a food related book review (fiction or nonfiction), cookbook review, movie review, a recipe, random thoughts, gadgets, food quotations, photographs, etc. Please visit Beth's blog for more information and join the fun!

Library Loot XLIV

Library Loot is a weekly event co-hosted by Claire from The Captive Reader and Marg from The Adventures of an Intrepid Reader that encourages bloggers to share the books they’ve checked out from the library. If you’d like to participate, just write up your post-feel free to steal the button-and link it using the Mr. Linky any time during the week. And of course check out what other participants are getting from their libraries! This week's Library Loot is at Claire's. 


These two books will be the last few I plan on reading in 2011. I have a specific list of books I want to read by the end of the year in order to meet a couple of Reading Challenges. I'm going to be cutting it close, but I think I can do it! Among the last few books I hope to read in 2011 are these two books I recently borrowed from the library:

After the Quake by Haruki Murakami
Translated by Jay Rubin

After the Quake is a collection of six fictional short stories set in Japan after the devastating Kobe earthquake in 1995. Reading this book will meet the challenge to read one of Murakami's works in 2011 as per the Haruki Marakami Reading Challenge I joined back in February. After much internal debate, I had finally decided to read Sputnik Sweetheart--partly based on the story premise, partly on the length of the book and partly on which book was currently available at the the library! As I was about to reach for Sputnik Sweetheart on the shelf, I spied this little book right next to it and decided straight away that it was an even better choice for me. A collection of short stories in under 180 pages would give me a sampling of Murakami's style without the commitment to read one of his longer, more involved novels. I understand 1Q84 comes in at 925 pages! I'm looking forward to reading After the Quake and am curious to find out if I'll enjoy Murakami's writing.

Macbeth : The Graphic Novel by William Shakespeare
Plain Text version

Script Adaptation: John McDonald
Character Designs & Original Artwork: Jon Haward
Coloring & Lettering: Nigel Dobbyn
Inking Assistant: Gary Erskine
et. al.

My 16 year old is reading Shakespeare's Macbeth right now in Honors Brit Lit and while I recall having read it myself when I was in high school, I remember very little of the play. Reading the Classical Comics' graphic novel version of Macbeth will be a quick and fun way to refresh my memory of the play and invoke some Shakespearean discussion with my daughter.

Other Classical Comics graphic novels I read in 2011 include Jane Eyre and Frankenstein.

A 500th Post Holiday Giveaway

It took me almost exactly four years [my blogging birthday is December 29, 2007], but I've finally reached my 500th blog post and this is it! That's an average of 125 posts a year, 10.4 posts a month or about one post every 3-4 days. That sounds about right.

What started out as a place to share my thoughts on books with an emphasis on romance novels has expanded and transformed into pretty much a personal blog. I still post regularly about bookish things, but also about fitness, food, family and other assorted adventures. All are topics I'm passionate about and enjoy sharing with my readers here on the happily ever after... I hope you all enjoy the mix, too. :)

To celebrate this 500th post milestone and the upcoming holiday season and to thank all of you who visit the happily ever after... and keep me company on this blogging adventure, I'm giving away a holiday ebook prize to one lucky winner. Below is a list of holiday novellas, most of which are new releases, from which one lucky reader will win up to three stories of their choice.

I'm afraid I don't know a lot about the restrictions of purchasing ebooks for recipients overseas, but I will look into that between now and the closing of the entries and see what I can do. In the meantime, assume that you will at least need to have one of the following to qualify for the prize: A kindle or kindle app on your reading device OR an iPod touch, iPad, or iPhone with either iBooks or the Kindle app installed, depending on the book below.

Winner will choose from the following list of fantastic holiday ebooks:
  Click on titles to see the book on goodreads.

   

Newly Fallen by Megan Hart [kindle only]
A steamy contemporary Hanukkah romance!

A Taste of Midnight by Lara Adrian [iBooks or kindle]
A Midnight Breed novella, book #9.5
Paranormal romance, not so Christmas-y

Once Upon a Winter's Eve by Tessa Dare [iBooks or kindle]
A Spindle Cove novella, book #1.5
Historical romance.

Or perhaps one or more of the following contemporary romance novellas from the Carina Press holiday anthology, Holiday Kisses:

 

Mistletoe and Margaritas by Shannon Stacey [iBooks or kindle]

It's Not Christmas Without You by HelenKay Dimon [iBooks or kindle]


 
A Rare Gift by Jaci Burton [iBooks or kindle]

This Time Next Year by Alison Kent [iBooks or kindle]


Romance not your thing? That's okay! We can still be friends and you can choose this "regular" Christmas book: ;)

The Christmas Shoes by Donna VanLiere [kindle only]







To enter the giveaway, simply leave a comment letting me know which THREE holiday novellas you would like to read.

All entries must be received by Friday, December 16, 2011 12 noon EST.

Be sure to leave an email address if it is not easily found in your profile.

Happy holidays! :)

REVIEW: The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente

If that title alone doesn't grab you, perhaps my review will... 

The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making is a charmingly whimsical, albeit at times dark fairy tale about a precocious twelve year old girl named September who longs for excitement and happiness when her life has become less than joyful after her father has left to fight a war overseas and her mother has gone to work as an airplane mechanic. Within the first pages of this story, September is visited by the Green Wind--a gentleman in a green jacket and green jodhpurs, who invites her on an adventure into Fairyland. In Fairyland, September meets a myriad of creatures and beings and specifically befriends a Wyvern and a boy named Saturday and soon becomes embroiled in a quest to the far reaches of Fairyland. September must rely on her quick wit and growing heart to stay alive and find her way through Fairyland. With sophisticated and poetic story telling, the reader is whisked away into Fairyland right along with September where countless insights into the hazards and joys of life provide the reader with much to ponder.

Many times while reading this story, I would find myself rereading passages for no other reason than that they invoked such vivid imagery for the senses. Such as this paragraph:

"And so I may tell you that the leaves began to turn red as September and her friends rushed through the suddenly cold air on their snorting, roaring highwheels, and you might believe me. But no red you have ever seen could touch the crimson bleed of the trees in that place. No oak gone gnarled and orange with October is half as bright as the boughs that bent over September's head, dropping their hard, sweet acorns into her spinning spokes. But you must try as hard as you can. Squeeze your eyes closed, as tight as you can, and think of all your favorite autumns, crisp and perfect, all bound up together like a stack of cards. That is what it is like, the awful, wonderful brightness of Fairy colors. Try to smell the hard, pale wood sending up sharp, green smoke into the afternoon. To feel the mellow, golden sun on your skin, more gentle and cozier and more golden than even the light of your favorite reading nook at the close of the day. " [p. 130]

The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making is an unforgettable fairy tale that would appeal to adults and children alike. In fact, it would make a wonderful read aloud book to be share with the child in your life. Even if you think the days of reading aloud are over in your house, capture them with this book if you can, because...

"As all mothers know, children travel faster than kisses." [p. 156]

The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making has a decisive conclusion and can certainly be read as a stand alone novel. However, I am compelled to tell you that never before has one short sentence near the end of a book made me gasp in bittersweet delight that a sequel would be on the horizon for September and her friends. Said sequel to this unforgettable and enchanted book is expected to be published in March 2012, and will be titled The Girl Who Fell Beneath Fairyland and Led the Revels There. I'll be reading it.

You can visit the author, Catherynne M. Valente at her website http://www.catherynnemvalente.com/.

Be sure to check out Cat's page of free reads, including The Girl Who Ruled Fairyland--For a Little While, a prequel story to The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making, who are, by the way, two different girls. ; )

RECIPE: Roasted Root Vegetable Soup

This simple roasted root vegetable soup is works well with just about any combination of root vegetables such as turnips, celeraic, potatoes, carrots, rutabagas or parsnips. I'm not a huge fan of turnips or celeraic, so when we got both of these in our co-op share one week, I decided making soup would be the best way to use them up. Since turnips and celeraic have a strong flavor, potatoes would mellow the flavor and onions and garlic would sweeten it up a bit. I happened to have two lonely carrots left, and decided to use them in the soup too. Finally, I opted to roast the vegetables instead of boiling them so that the soup would have a more carmelized flavor.

I hope you give this recipe a try--it's really easy and very tasty!

Roasted Root Vegetable Soup

1 celearic [celery root]

2 turnips

4 potatoes [I used two red and two yellow]

2 carrots

1 onion

4 garlic cloves

salt and pepper

sprigs of fresh thyme [or 2 teaspoons of dried thyme]

1. Peel vegetables, cut into similar sized chunks and place in a large bowl. Toss with olive oil, kosher salt, freshly ground black pepper and dried thyme, if using, until vegetables are evenly coated.

2. Place vegetables on cookie sheets in a single layer and top each cookie sheet with a few sprigs of the fresh thyme. Don't over-crowd the vegetables. It's better to use additional cookie sheets.

3. Roast vegetables in a 375 F oven for 45 minutes to an hour or until vegetables pierce easily with a fork, tossing every 20 minutes or so. Remove from oven and let cool.

4. Working in batches, place roasted vegetables in food processor, scraping any olive oil and roasted bits of vegetables from the cookie sheets--there's a lot of flavor there! Add about 3 cups of water for every 4-5 cups of vegetables. Purée until smooth and pour into a large sauce pan.

5. When all of the vegetables are puréed, cook over medium-low heat until heated through, adding additional water if necessary until soup is desired consistency. Taste for salt and pepper, and add accordingly. Keep in mind that this soup is prepared with water and not broth, so don't be alarmed by how much salt you may need to add.

6. Serve warm, garnish with fresh thyme leaves, if desired. Chopped chives would work, too.

Enjoy!

This post is my contribution to Weekend Cooking, a weekly blog event hosted by Beth Fish Reads. Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food related post to share--a food related book review (fiction or nonfiction), cookbook review, movie review, a recipe, random thoughts, gadgets, food quotations, photographs, etc. Please visit Beth's blog for more information and join the fun! 

Holiday Reading Challenge 2011

December is here! Along a huge list of other things, December means there's only a few weeks left to try to finish all those reading challenges YOU I joined this year. At this point, I've completed some, others were a total fail and there are yet a few that I admit I'm going to scramble to finish by December 31. Either way, I'm not stressing over it much, but I really, really would like to meet my goal of reading 100 books in 2011 and I'm SO close, too. And still, here I am joining one more challenge! This one is a Holiday Reading Challenge hosted by Book Lovers Inc. and I just couldn't resist. I have a few Christmas themed books I wanted to read this time of year anyway, so why not?

Holiday Reading Challenge 2011
Hosted by Book Lovers Inc.
November 10-December 31, 2011.

There are three levels from which to choose:
Santa's Helper: 1-3 holiday themed books
Serial Mistletoe-er: 4-6 holiday themed books
Candy Cane-aholic: 7 or more holiday themed books

The books may be any adult or young adult holiday related book and any format is acceptable--paper books, ebooks, audiobooks, short stories, novellas, etc. Children's books do not count towards the challenge.

I am going for Serial Mistletoe-er because HEY! It's mistletoe, people! And where there's mistletoe, there's kissing and who doesn't love kissing??!!

I have several holiday themed books on my shelves here at home and a few new ones on my wish list, so I certainly won't be lacking for reading material! You can see my selection on my goodreads holiday shelf.

What Christmas or winter holiday themed books are on your list?


Any favorites that you'd recommend?