How to Host a Family Olympics in 3 Easy Steps... Kinda.

I've wanted to have a family olympics for a long time, for no reason other than it looks fun. My family sportingly let themselves be subjected to my plans this year at Thanksgiving. I gathered a lot of knowledge which I will gladly pass along.

STEP 1: GATHER FAMILY
The most important part of a family olympics is FAMILY. Shocker, I know. And in this day and age, most families are pretty spread out. Getting everyone together isn't always easy. If your family already has a reunion, perfect, but if not, make one. Our family doesn't have a reunion and I hadn't seen some of my cousins in over ten years. (Isn't that sad?) A large group of our family gathers for Thanksgiving every year, so it seemed a logical time for the olympics. I basically emailed the rest of the family threatening to beg if they didn't agree to come. Luckily it didn't take much convincing and before long I had our entire family planning to attend Thanksgiving and therefore attending the family olympics. Step One complete. :)
Since this deserves a picture, here's part of my family, including the cousins that I hadn't seen in a decade and their children I'd never met:

That is one good looking family. (I'm still trying to figure out how to steal the littlest one in there. He's just so precious.)

STEP TWO: ORGANIZE GAMES
An Olympics requires games, obviously, but the games should be chosen after some serious thought. Know your competitors. For example, I know my family isn't very athletic, so a race would be out of the question. I know I planned on having the olympics immediately following Thanksgiving dinner, so that game where you spin around a bat and then try to hit a ball would only result in a projectile vomiting competition.
I chose 5 games for 5 rounds of competition.
A Puzzle Building Round

A Pumpkin Support Building Round

A Nail Hammering Round (to keep the dads involved)

A Pumpkin Bocce Round (which sadly there are no decent picture of...)
And A Candy Corn Dropping Round

I researched on the internet for weeks to find the perfect games. There were dozens out there to choose from, so it would be easy to tailor the games to your crowd.

STEP 3: HAVE FUN!
My mom knows how much effort I put into the Olympics and was so concerned that I'd be upset of it didn't go EXACTLY as I'd planned, but I just keep reassuring her that my goal was for everyone to have fun with it.
Since our Olympics followed Thanksgiving dinner, I designed the games around a Thanksgiving theme. All the team colors were fall colors, the games involved pumpkins and candy corns, and even the trophy was a oversized acorn on a pedestal. Building the even around the Thanksgiving theme helped to give me a direction while planning it and I believe helped the family get excited. Everyone had a really great time and it stopped us all from gorging on turkey and sleeping all afternoon.

Every olympics needs a scoreboard and our family's would have been incomplete without glitter. Before the games started, I made each team create their own nametag. I gave them their team colors and decorations, but they had to come up with a team name and decorate their nametag.
Each team also got their own bandanas in team colors. What's a team without a uniform?

My family, the Autobots, won. No bias whatsoever. I promise. My brother is so proud of the trophy.

The green team, the Plymouth Rockers, got second place.

The Martinators came in third, but not for a lack of team spirit or intimidation.

The last place team, the Proud Mamas, put up a good fight, but unfortunately the wee one from that team needed to rest, so the team ended up disbanding before team pictures were taken. But we still love them.

My little cousins helped keep score and they're still learning to write their numbers, the little dears.

And if all that olympic fun wasn't enough, here's a beautiful picture I took on a walk the day before Thanksgiving with my mom:

If you ever host your own family olympics, I'd love to hear about it. :)

I hope you all had a wonderful Thankgiving and a VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS!

My Kind of Christmas Wreath

A few years back when Starbucks displayed their yarn ball wreaths at Christmas, I fell in love.

Christmas and yarn? My perfect combination.
So this year, I decided to make my own.

Luckily, I had a ton of reds, greens and creams in my yarn stash that were just waiting for this project. I bought a bunch of little styrofoam balls in 1 1/2", 2" and 2 1/2". I've read you could also just ball up tin foil or paper towels or something similar.

I used a needle to poke the yarn down into the ball to hold it in place.

And then I wrapped the ball until the styrofoam was completely covered.

Each ball took less than 5 minutes. So fast and easy.

I made a ton of balls in every shade of red and green I had.

I chose a 12" wreath form... It just seemed like a good size.

I did a couple of practice layouts before I started attaching the balls to the wreath.

I tied the largest balls to the wreath frame with more yarn, but the smaller ones I hot-glued so I could get them exactly where I wanted and hold everything in place. (Wearing my pink pajamas helps the creative process... I swear.)

I hung it over my television and added a big knitted bow. I'm so ready for Christmas now. :)

Watson's Trunk

Like most of the female world, I have recently become obsessed with Pinterest.com and when I saw this picture on there, I knew I had my new project for Watson.

I was getting ready to move and I knew the move would be easier on him if he had a bed of his own, as opposed to just a blanket on the couch. So it was kind of a miracle when, while I was out shopping with my friend Kendel up in North Georgia, I found the most perfect trunk to convert into Watson's bed. It was navy blue with old, dirty, silver hardware. We painted our dining room navy blue, so the color was just right. And the best part was that it was only $10! Thank goodness we wasted half the afternoon just trying to find the antique mall. It was time well spent.

Once I got it home, I tried to clean it up, but there really wasn't much I could do. Luckily it's beautiful just the way it is.

And the dog fits perfectly inside!

For the inside, I bought a fleece blanket from the Atlanta Junior League's thrift store for $2. I took some measurements of the trunk and drew out the pattern. As you can see, the first time I drew it out, I made some mistakes, but I swear by "measure twice, cut once" rule so I was able to correct it before I cut the blanket up, and the lines would be hidden on the back once it was done.

I cut it out to match the sides and bottom of the trunk.

I forgot to take a picture of this step, I guess, but I bought some batting from the fabric store, folded it over a few times to give it some extra plushness and lined the edges of the trunk, then I put a standard size pillow in the bottom.

I laid the fabric in it to test it out before sewing it up.

I sewed the corners up using a very basic zig-zag stitch.

The fabric needed to be removable so I could take it out and wash it because I knew the dog would jump in it dirty, or wet. So to attach the blanket, I found Velcro's Decor. It's a type of velcro where one side, the hook side, is sticky backed to attach to a hard surface and the other side, the loop side, isn't sticky backed so that it can be sewn onto a fabric. It was intended to be used for window treatments and bed skirts, but it worked great for me.

I sewed the soft loop velcro to the blanket and then blanket-stitched the edges to give it a finished look.

Watson LOVES his trunk. I think it really did help him deal with the chaos of the move. Whenever he'd start to get spazzy, he'd just go jump in the trunk and hide. He lives in it. He's in it as I'm typing this. It's always funny to see the silly positions he gets into. I was originally going to leave the inside of the top alone, but somehow he manages to use it like a shelf for his head sometimes, so I'm going to try to line the top with the leftover pieces from the blanket. Someday.

Pumpkin Pie: Paula Deen Style

HAPPY OCTOBER! [and happy Friday! :)]

I LOVE October. It's such a great month. It's the start of fall and fall is my favorite season. It just makes me feel so warm and cozy when I think of things like falling leaves and hot apple cider and pinecones and PUMPKIN PIE. I really, really love pumpkin pie. I look forward to it all year (and I was slightly disappointed when I realized you can buy frozen pumpkin pies any time you want from the grocery store. Lame.)
I've been wanting to make pumpkin pie from scratch for a few years but just haven't gotten around to it, so I decided that this year will be the year I perfect the pie.. I made a pumpkin pie at FSU a few years back and it was so awful we covered it in maple syrup to try to get it sweet enough. I must have left out the sugar? No idea. We'll just ignore that little cooking disaster.
This time I followed my dear Paula Deen's pie recipe. It's not the perfect pie recipe, it's a little more like pumpkin cheesecake, but it is darn delicious.

I bought a pumpkin (for $2, as you can see) from a little produce stand in North Georgia when I was up there flea-marketing. It's not a pie pumpkin, it's just a regular old pumpkin, so next time I think I'll try to get a true pie pumpkin.

And I hacked it all to pieces.

I cut it into 5 big pieces and then scooped out all the guts, making sure not to scoop out the pumpkin flesh. The seeds could be saved for cleaning and baking, but I wasn't feeling that much in the spirit yet and I just threw them away.

Then I put the pieces in a pan and roasted them for 45 minutes in a 350 degree oven.

They start to get mushy when they're done. They're kinda fun to play with at this point.

I scraped all the flesh away from the skin and into a bowl. It came off very easily. It got harder as the pumpkin cooled though.

And then I started to mash. (The masher is one of my great flea-market steals. I love it.)

I mashed for a very long time. Like a whole episode of Law & Order. I really wouldn't recommend it. The pumpkin was certainly mashed, but it was still kinda stringy, so having a food processor would have made it so much smoother. At this point I put the mashed pumpkin into a container and popped it in the fridge overnight, for no reason other than I was tired and wanted to finish cooking the next day.

So the next day, I gathered all my ingredients. Paula, of course, uses individual spices, but I use pumpkin pie spice because I'm not Paula.

I put a whole package of cream cheese in a bowl (probably why it tastes like pumpkin cheesecake..) and beat it and then added the mashed pumpkin and beat until blended.

Mmm. pumpkin cream cheese. (Don't actually eat this. It's not that good yet. TRUST ME.)

And then I added the rest of the ingredients in the order the recipe calls for.

I got my pie shells ready, prebaking them a little.. I didn't make those from scratch, obviously.

And I poured the filling into the shells. This recipe makes a LOT of filling.

I baked them for about 50 minutes on 350. The whole apartment smelled like heaven.

This pie is good. It's not perfect, but it is very, very good. I think I'll try a Martha recipe next time....

Paula Deen's Pumpkin Pie Recipe

1 (8-ounce) package cream cheese, softened

2 cups canned pumpkin, mashed (I used the homemade stuff)

1 cup sugar

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 egg plus 2 egg yolks, slightly beaten

1 cup half-and-half

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) melted butter

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon (instead of this and the ginger, I used about a teaspoon of pumpkin pie spice)

1/4 teaspoon ground ginger, optional

2 pre-made pie shells

Whipped cream, for topping

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F and prepare the pie shells according to their directions.

In a large mixing bowl, beat the cream cheese with a hand mixer. Add the pumpkin and beat until combined. Add the sugar and salt, and beat until combined. Add the eggs mixed with the yolks, half-and-half, and melted butter, and beat until combined. Finally, add the vanilla, cinnamon, and ginger, if using, and beat until incorporated.

Pour the filling into the warm prepared pie crust and bake for 50 minutes, or until the center is set. Place the pie on a wire rack and cool to room temperature. Cut into slices and top each piece with a generous amount of whipped cream.

I like how Paula calls for a generous amount of whipped cream. Who's surprised?

And now for a little bonus.. yay.

I knitted a sweater vest for a family friend's baby shower this week and made a fatal error. I was in a hurry to make it and didn't pay close attention to the pattern. I was supposed to start on size 4 needles and switch to size 7 after a few rows... and I never switched. I didn't realize what I'd done wrong until I finished the whole back and thought it looked a little slender. Babies aren't slender. So I had to reknit the entire back again. Luckily I caught it before I knitted the front too or I might have just killed myself.

To show you the difference between the two:

The one on the left is slightly more baby-shaped, don't you think?

 

And for the finished piece, which I'm absurdly proud of:

 

How stinking cute is that?! That will be one stylish baby.
The pattern is available here for free on Ravelry.

Chana Bhatura.. or something similar

Chana Batura is an Indian tomato and chickpea stew served with a big puffy bread-like item. It's one of the most delicious things I've ever eaten. My old boss was from India and when we would have meetings around lunchtime, we would stop at this little Indian restaurant just north of Atlanta and we'd have lunch. Every time I went I got a different meal because I just couldn't find anything I wanted to try twice.. until I tried Chana Batura. I started a new job this week and will miss my Indian lunches very much, so of course the only logical thing to do was learn to make it myself. I looked at a lot of recipes (and had to translate a few of them) and finally just decided to mush them all together and wing it... as usual.

I started off by browning some onions. In hindsight, I could've used a LOT more onions. I love onions. I let them brown up for a minute and then added a little minced ginger and garlic.

The spices were the hard part for me. I don't generally keep jars of coriander or cumin or really any spices used in Indian cooking. Luckily, spice companies know about people like me and sell Garam Masala, a mixture of various ground spices. It can include peppercorns, cloves, cumin, cinnamon, cardamom, nutmeg, star anise and coriander. I would have had only the peppercorns and the cinnamon. So I bought a jar. It may not be the exact proportions the recipe called for, but it'll be closer than if I had nothing.

So that's a lot of garam masala on the left mixed with some tumeric and cayenne pepper. I don't remember the exact amounts because I added some extra while it was cooking because I felt like it. Luckily cooking isn't as exact as baking.

I added the spices to the oil/onion/ginger/garlic mixture and let the spices toast a little.

Then I added a can of diced tomatoes. I'm not a big fan of chunks of tomatoes, so I probably would've been happier with a can of smaller diced tomatoes or just tomato sauce. Just kidding.. maybe.

I let the tomatoes cook for a while until the liquid thickened up a little and then added the drained chickpeas. I kept getting confused because every recipe I was finding was telling me to cook the chickpeas in a pressure cooker and that seemed odd. Then I finally stumbled across a recipe that explained that cans of chickpeas (I didn't realize they came any other way) are already cooked, but a typical Indian family would probably have bags of uncooked chickpeas. Since I didn't have uncooked chickpeas or a pressure cooker and I DID have a can of precooked chickpeas, it worked out perfectly.

This mixture just simmers for about 10 minutes or until the stew has thickened up. I wish I'd let mine thicken a little more. I don't even want to call it a stew because it's supposed to be a fairly dry meal.

Then serve it hot with bread. Bhatura is apparently the typical choice, but it's not something I'm willing to try making when a pita will suffice. (I'm sure there's an Indian chef rolling in his grave at that.) Bhatura is a flour and potato dough that's rolled out and fried. It puffs up and is served hot. When you puncture it, the steam inside escapes and it collapses in on itself. It's really very cool. But truly, a pita does taste delicious with it.
Although, served without Bhatura, I believe the name is Chana Masala? I'm clearly not an expert.

I might venture back up to that restaurant from time to time to eat the real stuff, but this version is so flavorful and easy to make that I think I'll survive.