December is here already! I swear, the last three months have gone by in a blink of an eye. When it was time to turn the calendar to November, I kept catching myself thinking it was the beginning of October again. Well, you know what they say… time flies while having fun.
Last weekend was my 5th annual gingerbread house making contest. There were 18 people there (I think) and 14 houses built. Boy, were there some amazing structures this year! The winner was a crazy spiral tower. I’m not so brave when building my gingerbread houses. I really go for the standard “Hansel and Gretel” type cottage each year. Click on the picture above to view the houses individually. Special note, my 9 month old nephew “made” his very own entry, the one that my brother said looks like the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man threw up on. There was a castle with draw bridge, made by Alyssa and Wes, that had my vote. And my brother made an Edward Scissorhands themed scene, complete with animal trimmed hedges (animal crackers covered in frosting and green sugar).
The weekend before last was the Celebrity Scoop Benefit for my friend Nikki, downtown Naperville. We had a great time, and I even got to meet long time online friend Katie. She is such a sweat-heart for coming out to the event and bringing her super adorable son. It wasn’t until after she left that it even occurred to me that I should have introduced her to my friends and the star of the evening, Nikki. Doh, sorry Katie. We ate lots of yummy goodies and bought plenty delicious gourmet popcorn to take home. I’m actually pretty excited to have found a nearby location with such great popcorn. Did I mention I’m going through a popcorn phase. 2010 will probably be remembered as the year of popcorn. We bought several LARGE bags, jalapeno, cheddar, and caramel. I’ve been mixing the caramel and cheddar, mmmmm. Matt ate his entire bag of jalapeno in 2 days. TWO DAYS. This bag was probably 8 inches wide, and knee high or taller! Oh, and it wasn’t until after I bought the cheddar and caramel to mix together later at home, that I found they also carry a caramel cheddar popcorn. It’s not just caramel and cheddar popcorns mixed together, it’s caramel popcorn that is covered in cheddar. drool. Had to buy a small bag of that and it was gone in a heartbeat. Here is the popcorn place if you’d like to check them out, did I mention that it’s also a Haagen Dazs as well? It was amazingly kind of them to host the event and donate a portion of sales to Nikki’s mounting medical bills. And here is Nikki’s Caring Bridges page once again, where she posted about the event.
ha! i bought a big bag of kettle corn with the intention of sharing it with my coworkers. then I ate the whole thing monday morning. :) i’ve been thinking about going back and getting some to bring in to work or bring to holiday parties, it was really good popcorn!
After seeing your gingerbread post, I was inspired to post my family’s gingerbread session a few weeks ago. I’ve linked it to your blog as well.
http://fabricfascination.blogspot.com/2010/12/gingerbread-village.html