Category Archives: holiday

saturday upsides: reunited with my fam!

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Happy Saturday, everyone! I am currently writing this late on Friday night from Mike’s parents’ house in the Chicago suburbs, but by the time you read this I will likely be in an airplane en route to Burbank, California, to be reunited with my family for the holidays!

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I am SO excited to see them. I feel like my child-self on Christmas Eve, unable to fall asleep. I do love my life at Purdue, but it can be hard being so far away from my family. We have always been extremely close and though I do talk to them every day, as our time apart grows I find myself missing their physical presence more and more — I crave a hug from my mom; I want to see my brother’s mischievous-eyed smile; I really want to hear my dad’s laugh. I absolutely cannot wait to hug all of them in a matter of hours!

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So my Saturday Upsides today, of course, is that I get to see my family. Their love and support is such a blessing in my life!

I was thinking today, as I scurried around town trying to get done what felt like the hundreds of little errands and tasks to complete in preparation for my trip, that traveling is like a lot of things in life: you have to put in a bunch of work to get to the reward. It made me think of one of my favorite quotes by John Wooden: “The journey is better than the inn.” Now, I’m not saying that waiting in line at the Post Office is better than the moment I step out into baggage claim and see my family’s smiling faces. But instead of letting stress get the best of me, I tried to appreciate the rituals of errands and packing and preparing for my trip back home as part of the journey itself. Switching up my mindset made my hectic day a whole lot more enjoyable!

What are the upsides of your lovely Saturday? Anyone else have de-stressing pre-travel tips to share?

-Dallas

holiday white chocolate pretzels

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How is your week going? Mine is flying by. It’s the last week of school before I head home to California for the holidays, and I am a mix of productive “aaack-so-much-to-get-done!” and lazy “it’s-December-and-I-just-want-to-bake-cookies-and-watch-Love-Actually.” Tonight I channeled both of these inclinations and baked festive white chocolate pretzel goodies to give to some of my friends and colleagues as Christmas gifts.

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I came across this recipe on one of my favorite blogs, Peanut Butter Fingers, and I tweaked it slightly because I couldn’t find the white chocolate wafer candies that Julie’s recipe called for. I just used plain chocolate and they turned out great!

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Here’s all that you need:

  • pretzels
  • green and red M&Ms
  • small chocolate pieces {I broke apart these Andes peppermint white chocolate pieces}

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Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. If desired, line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.

2. Spread a layer of pretzels over the cookie sheet.

3. Break chocolate apart into small pieces and place one piece in the center of each pretzel.

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4. Bake for 3-4 minutes, until chocolate begins to melt.

5. Gently press a red or green M&M, writing-side down, into the chocolate.

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6. Transfer pretzels to a plate and allow to cool.

7. When chocolate has hardened, store the pretzel treats in a tin or air-tight container.

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I packed mine up in these cute tins I found at Target in the dollar section:

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This is such an easy and inexpensive holiday baking recipe. These white chocolate pretzels are a special, home-made treat that your friends and loved ones will gobble up! {Or make a big batch for yourself — I won’t tell!} 🙂

Have a wonderful day,
-Dallas

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-Time spent: 20 mins
-Cost: $6.00

*This post is linked up at I’m an Organizing Junkie as part of Menu-Plan Monday!

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Here are the other posts in my “Make Your Holiday Season a Masterpiece” series:
– homemade festive decorative chain
– little oases of rest in a hectic, busy season

 

homemade festive christmas chain

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Good morning! Hope your transition from the long holiday weekend back into your regular routine wasn’t too painful yesterday. I had a nice time seeing my students again and hearing about their Thanksgiving breaks. I can’t believe we only have two more weeks left of the semester!

Christmas is in full swing here in my little apartment. Today I’m excited to share an easy, super inexpensive, and wonderfully festive holiday craft with you.

Remember those colorful paper chains you used to make in elementary school to decorate the classroom or count down to holidays or special events? In my family we used to make them as count-downs until Christmas or our birthdays and tear off one strip each day … it was so exciting to watch the chain gradually get smaller and smaller as the big day approached!

We also used to make chains with red and green construction paper to decorate our stair bannisters. The only problem with using paper is it isn’t very durable. We would make them again and again year after year, which was fun in its own way {especially as kids} but it isn’t very environmentally friendly or time-friendly — there are so many other craft and decorating projects I want to try rather than doing the same one year after year!

After some brainstorming, I came up with an idea: what about using using green and red felt instead of construction paper?

TA-DA! A homemade festive Christmas chain that will last from year to year. The best part? It costs less than $3.00 to make!

Here are the supplies you’ll need:

  • scissors
  • stapler & staples
  • red & green felt — I used 5 sheets of each color {got them at Michael’s for $0.29 each}

Directions:

1. Cut the felt into strips about 1 inch wide.

2. Bring one strip of felt together into a loop and staple the ends to each other.

3. Take a strip of the alternate color and loop it through, stapling its ends together to make another loop.

4. Continue the process until your chain reaches your desired length.

Then display them around your house! These are great hung around the walls and draped over a mantel. I don’t have a mantel in my apartment, so I draped mine over the top of my bookcase where my stockings are hanging.

And that’s it! Hope you enjoy this festive Christmas craft.

Have a great day!
-Dallas