I wasn't gonna show you this....

But since my brother Kevin already mentioned (in the comments of the previous post) that my family was white trash, I figured the cat was out of the bag. And because I love videos so much, I thought WHAT THE HECK. Let me preview it by saying that out of ALL the Christmas music we play in our home, "the Hippopotamus song" by Gayla Peevy is BY FAR the favorite (it's the last song on my music list to the right.) Whenever it's on, no matter where we are in the house, we run to the living room/kitchen area and dance away. We have it on CD (obviously) but surprisingly, it's always on the radio too.. who knew. Anyway, next time I will be sure to video the boys busting a move (you can hear them laughing in the background.) But for now, all you get is Zack spitting-- and blowing snot bubbles from his nose. Thank goodness for short video clips, eh? Without 'em we would never really know how silly The ZIG can be.

Do you want to marry my underwear?

Videos are my favorite. I could talk about how homeless my kids always look, but it's so much better to capture it on film. This one is about three minutes, but it's very accurate of our life at home.. at least the days that we decide that doing our traditional 1000 piece Christmas puzzle is more important that anything else.

Honestly, it was a perfect day. Pajamas, non-stop Christmas music, non-stop hot chocolate, no television, no shoes, no makeup, no bras, no blogging or emailing, leftovers for lunch and Ramen for dinner. Isn't this what the Holidays are all about?

oh, and I have to mention that Luke is a very skilled puzzler. There is NO WAY I could have finished this puzzle in one day without him... Zack is not exactly a "helper", but he's free entertainment and that's all I can ask for at this point.

Chocolate Cream Pie

I should have posted this recipe before Thanksgiving... because Thanksgiving is the season for pies, but you never really NEED an excuse (or holiday, for that matter) to make a scrumptious pie, says I.

This recipe comes from my husband's BFF's wife. Yes, my husband has a best friend, namely Del Post. Del is Aaron's long lost soul mate and luckily they were put together as mission companions in Spain. I love how much they love each other. Nicole, Del's wife, would be my BFF if we lived closer. We both have 3 boys the same ages. We both supported our husbands through law school together while living only 2 short hours away. When graduation came, we moved to Vegas and they stayed put... and we really miss them! Eventually (when the Posts decided to move down south) Aaron and Del will be business partners and Nicole and I will sit together on porches, drinking lemonade in our rocking chairs... It only the Posts understood how important it is for them to move away from the cold northwest. Nobody in their right mind wants to live in Montana, anyway.

Back to the chocolate cream pie recipe... I don't have permission to share it with the blogging world, so I hope it's not a secret 50 generation family recipe. It should be, though because it's THAT GooooooD (and easy.)

Pie Crust:
1 1/4 C. Shortening
3 C. Flour
1 tsp. salt
*Cut flour and salt into shortening until mixture is crumbly.
Combine:
1 egg (well beaten)
1 Tbs. vinegar
5 Tbs. water
*Mix egg mixture into flour mixture until pie dough forms. This makes four single crusts or two double crusts. So divide into four and roll out. For cream pies, bake pie crust at 400 degress for ~10 minutes or until lightly golden browned.


Chocolate Cream Pie Filling:

Using a heavy saucepan:
*Combine and wisk together in the saucepan (I like to use the flat bottom kind to keept the cream filling from burning... Nicole's words, not mine. But I agree with everything she says :)

1/4 c. flour
1 c. sugar
2 Tbs. cornstarch
6 Tbs. cocoa
1/4 tsp. salt


In a separate bowl combine:

3 c. milk
3 egg yolks

mix really well together so eggs don't burn.


Slowly add milk/yolk mixture to saucepan and turn on med/high heat. Using wisk, stir constantly, keeping the wisk on the bottom of the pan to keep the milk from scalding. Stir until mixture becomes thick and starts to boil. Boil for 1 minute, remove from heat.



Add:

1/2 cube butter
2 tsp. vanilla

stir until butter is melted and mixed in.



Cool pudding in sink of ice water (still in pan) and cover directly on top with saran wrap. (be sure not to run water on your pudding) After about 15-20 minutes, pour into pie shell, cover, and refrigerate for three hours.

Top with whipped cream before serving and if you want to make it look really fancy, add chocolate shavings on top. Marie Calendar... move over.

If it sounds too complicated, let me assure you, it's not. I love recipes where you have EVERYTHING on hand. This is totally doable and OH! so yummy!

Happy baking.

oh, the things they say.....

Ben (thinking seriously while eating dinner)

"So, I've got an important question...

When you work at a restaurant do you get to eat their food for free or do you have to pay for it?"

After we talked about it for a while, he let out a big sigh and said, "That's really good to know."
As IF he's about to fill out job applications next week or something.

Luke: (who's hoping to get hired by Laffy Taffy soon...)

"What is a Tree's favorite thing to drink?

*answering his own joke without giving you any time to think*

ROOT BEER! Get it? So he drinks from his roots. But trees don't drink beer because they don't want to get drunk. They either drink milk or juice or water. Yeah. probably just water. or root beer."


Zack: who was trying to wake me up over the Thanksgiving break... (we were all sleeping in the same room.) He got really close to me and said, "Mom, if you don't wake up, I am going to spit you in the face!"

When I opened my eyes, he smiled and said, "Hi Mom! I never spit you in the face. I only hug you in the face! See? I am hugging you in the face." and my face was never happier- or more grateful.

• Yesterday he asked me to help him put on a pair of black gloves. He got really serious and whispered, "When I wear these gloves, I turn into.... [long pause]..... HARRY POTTER!" I laughed because who knows how long it's been since Harry has been mentioned at our house.
  

• After dinner last night, we were getting ready to eat a delicious chocolate cream pie that I made... the one that I should have made when the in-laws were here, but there were already an insane amount of pies in my kitchen. Before we sat at the table, I heard Zack saying over and over and over, "MMmmm. I love this pie." When I turned around, I found him like so:

Nicknaming him "The Animal" was completely appropriate. It was so natural for me to say, "Who let the Animal on the table??" I wonder HOW many times I have said things like that over the past two (I mean three) years. He's been getting into trouble ever since he could move.

And when he does something wrong, he gives me this face.. It's new and I love it.


He's always a mess. I can't help but like him anyway.

A pie eating video entitled: Santa's fat, but nice.

I will post the chocolate cream pie recipe mañana.

ThanksVegasMas

Is it really December already? I can't believe it. Our Thanksgiving holiday was fab, delish, sweet, gnarly and all that. We spent a few days with our favorite Shumways.

The whole fam damily was here in Vegas and we had a good time... We had a homemade meal on Thursday and then opened Christmas presents on Friday (hence the weekend holiday being named ThanksVegasMas) All of Aaron's siblings are married and two of the sisters are expecting (yay for cousins.. FINALLY!) Our house was packed with people and we loved every minute of it.

The highlights of the weekend were-- Aaron's turkey, the Thanksgiving toast= "To our rich lawyer brother!", John's natural charisma with our boys (and the "Grandmother LIED to you" remark), the hoochies on the strip, the flying balloons in the front "yard" and getting a few of them caught on our neighbor's roofs, the electronic hot potato, staying up WAY past our bedtimes, PIE pie and more PIE, Karate-chopping Styrofoam, seeing Hugh Jackman's fineness on the big screen in Australia, and playing a charades game invented by my friend Rachel.. I would explain it-- but she needs to get it patented before I spill the beans. Just imagine all the men in the room trying to act out "A flower getting chocked by weeds" or "an octopus squirting ink at it's enemy"... there is a short video clip below, but it doesn't do justice.

Hope everyone had a happy Thanksgiving. I have a thousand more pictures to post, but I'm not gonna. My kids are pacing around waiting to make a countdown to Christmas chain. HELLOOOOOOOOOOOOOO December!!