To all my pals in blogland that I call my friends-Merry Christmas. I have made some newer blog pals that I have enjoyed getting to know. I think back on my second grade teacher who taught use this little song in round-‘make new friends and keep the old, one is silver and the other is gold’.

Here are my cookies for this Christmas-

7 layers cookies, Russian Tea cakes, Sour Cream Drops, Sugar cookies, Rum Raisin squares, Mini Reese’s cup cookies and peanut brittle.

And one of my favorite gifts from Brian-

Adorable little mushroom salt and pepper shakers from Anthropologie! I thought they were just mushrooms for my collection. : )

I also got a GPS for the van-which will be great if I get into going antiquing in unknown parts along with some books and music CDs. I highly recommend Sarah Brightman’s Christmas CD-it’s beautiful!

Brian and Sean got new watches-Bri a Ford Mustang one and Sean a new Penn State one. Sean got almost everything off his Amazon wishlist-a cool big book on the history of Penn State Football with removable ‘artifacts’ like old banners, etc. He looked at it for a long time.

It was nice to have my mom here this year. We took her to midnight mass at a church in Delaware. We sat off to the side instead of in the middle pews and it took away from hearing the choir as well. I saw her singing quite a few times.

We had shrimp and chicken carbonara last night:

It was good-very rich with maybe a wee bit too much garlic. The recipe wasn’t written well and I skimped on the sauce-but in retrospect, I didn’t use all the milk product it called for. I think I would do a breaded chicken next time and not put the shrimp in with the sauce as it was hard to peel.

Tonight we had ‘Surf and Turf’! I cooked the sirloins from BJ Wholesale and cut them in half as they were huge. I bought two lobster tails and cut them in chunks so we all got some. Also made the green bean casserole with fried onions in the can; Potatoes and sweet potato au gratin and asparagus. It was a great dinner and everyone enjoyed it.

The fellows took Brian’s dad some dinner and his gifts, so mom and I are hanging out relaxing.

Hope everyone had a great day!
The entire song from above:

Make new friends,
but keep the old.
One is silver,
the other is gold.

A circle is round,
it has no end.
That’s how long,
I will be your friend.

A fire burns bright,
it warms the heart.
We’ve been friends,
from the very start.

You have one hand,
I have the other.
Put them together,
We have each other.

Silver is precious,
Gold is too.
I am precious,
and so are you.

You help me,
and I’ll help you
and together
we will see it through.

The sky is blue
The Earth is green
I can help
to keep it clean

Across the land
Across the sea
Friends forever
We will always be