Thanksgiving Preview . . and Some Crristmas

 know, I know . . . I have Thanksgiving listed first, but it is going to be second. I MUST show you the rattle I made yesterday to go with the Gingerbread hat I am giving Miss Elizabeth for Christmas.

Here's the hat.

Here's the rattle. I used white thread for the buttons because I had no black . . . looks like they were put on with the icing that circles his head . . . right?  LOLOL

I think he is the "Demon Gingerbread Man" with this smile.  HE HE HE

Now that I see him "blown up in all his glory," I think he looks more like a "Chipmunk-Squirrel-Gingerbread Man."  LOLOL

I want to make "Yuck, and Gorsh" sounds like Goofy when I look at him.!

He really was easy to make, but I hate the fact that the stuffing always shows through the dark yarn. So, I end up taking a long piece of yarn and weave it over and under the sc's and, normally, it will hid the stuffing but it doesn't look out of place. (The flash made more stuffing show up, but in normal light, with normal eyes, it isn't that obvious.)

I tried to make the "icing" drip like it does on the hat. But, with the smaller head, it didn't work as well. But, here is the "halo" shot of the "icing."

And now, on to Thanksgiving Prep!

Moi is the Queen of Pumpkin Pie using pumpkin puree from pie pumpkins. I always find it so funny that I never make a pie where you open the can and pour the filling in the shell and bake. Oh, n-o-o-o-o-o-o-o, I have to scoop innards out, roast the pumpkin and then mash the pulp into "pumpkin glop."

We divided the "glop," and yes it was a we . . . the husband is so funny, he can not leave me alone when I am doing anything food-y in the kitchen. He hovers like a helicopter . . I think I will start calling him "helicopter husband."  LOLOL

I put two pie shells in a 9" x 13" dish . . . (I just put them in, trying to get the sides somewhat even. The Helicopter came in and had to smooth the join and top some dough off the overlying crust and added it to the corners he thought needed more crust. Shoot, I was just going to poor the glop into the dish and cook it, but he wanted "pie" so crusted it shall be.)

This is the amount of  "pumpkin glop" filling I had. Now you can see why I needed that larger dish. Even if I had used a deep-dish pie pan, I would h ave had a several custard cups with glop in them . . . but, now that I think of it, that wouldn't have been too bad either.

Look at how it up the dish->

When I checked to see if it was done, I inserted a knife and it came out SO CLEAN . . . and the recipe said it still had a minimum of 5 minutes left. I guess that by spreading the glop out over 13" it cooked quicker.

I know, I know, the crust got a little dark . . . but the glop looks beautifully golden in person.

The recipe can be found here.

Next came peeling oranges . . . well, orange since it was so big we didn't need two. The Helicopter hubby was grinding up cranberries so I did the orange to get the cranberry relish made quicker.

Have you tried using Domino Light Sugar made with Sugar and Stevia? The Helicopter and I LOVE it. You use half as much as the recipe calls for and it tastes SO GOOD ! ! ! !!  The husband added 1/2C to the cranberry/orange mixture . . . tasted better than normal with sugar.

So, two things down, bread is drying for stuffing (whatever we don't use for that will become bread pudding . . yumm-o), I think the sweet potatoes are in the oven. So we are really ahead of the game.

All I need to do is clean up the dining room so we have a table for our meal.

Later gators!