“In My Kitchen” January 2019

Welcome, 2019, and New Year Greetings to all!

Apparently, we were very good this year.  We got lots of homemade kitchen gifts and many other good foodie items under the tree and in our stockings.   

 

My side of the family only allows homemade gifts.  Here’s the made-with-love kitchen gifts this year.

Curried Pickled Green Beans, Malt Vinegar, Chive Vinegar, Green Tomato Jam and Seedless Raspberry Jam—all made by my sister.

More handcrafted items from Sis:  paper bowl (made from my favorite catalog pages) and a rope bowl and coasters.  She used a lot of Modge Podge on these items.  I love the colors!

Don’t you love this serving platter that the BiL and nephews designed and made with a laser?

We have a running gag involving tidy whiteys (hence the underwear design).  This will be a lovely dish for hors d’oeuvres, don’t you think?

Santa put the following items in our stockings:

Wine vinegar gift pack

“Finishing Sauce” and wing rub

Whiskey Pecans and the ubiquitous “smash orange”

Bourbon cherries and orange bitters for the perfect Old Fashion (upcoming)

USPS delivered some items from far away relatives:

Moose poop and trout eggs

The nieces send their uncle this pack of goodies every year.  The trout eggs are sour cherry candies and the moose poop (originally packaged in a real pet poop bag) is an array of “highly yummy” chocolates.  🙂

Harry and David

The BiL and SiL and their family send us a Harry and David package every year.  I love the pears and the chocolate cherries.  We had already eaten the Moose Munch (not to be confused with the Moose Poop) before I took the picture.

From a friend (who knows me well):

Notice it holds 14 oz.!

I wasn’t very good this year about posting our own homemade gifts that we were giving out.  Here’s a list of things that ended up around or in our relatives’ kitchens.

Spice mixes

This spice set included Wild Willy’s Number One-derful Rub, Rosemary and Thyme Spicy Herb Salt, Kitchen Pepper, and Cocoa-Chili Rub.   This gift went the the BiL who loves to smoke and grill.  He also got some Thai Dipping Sauce, Mango-Lime Jam, and Grape Spice Jam.

For my mom and Sis, I scanned and copied a majority of our family photos into Google Photos.  While I was doing that, I decided to make coasters/trivets with some of these memories.

I just used cheap ceramic tiles, photo copied the photos and poured a resin product on top.  I like how they turned out.  I ended up making four sets—one for mom, one for Sis, one for my dad and one for my best friend.

The Hubs made this beautiful exotic wood inlaid floral frog (similar to the ceramic one I got for my birthday).  He gave it to my sister who made this beautiful arrangement in it.

Handmade wooden floral frog.

I really wish you could see the inlaid design better.  It’s exquisite!

These  probably won’t end up in a kitchen, but I was pretty proud of my handiwork.

I am not really proud of my photos, but these art projects turned out pretty good (IMHO).

If you want the tutorial, click here.

Finally, I made two batches of Dog Biscuits for the two dog nephews.  These things were like doggy crack.  Seriously!

These aren’t homemade but I know how our host, Sherry, loves kitchen towels so I had to post these two hilarious ones that I bought for gifts.   This one I gave to my bestie since high school.

I gave all of my old work friends (old as in my former work place) who I miss terribly these hilarious ones. We were like a small gang—all five of us.

Finally, these are in my kitchen right now and they’re from The Hubs.   Our anniversary is right after Christmas. (Don’t you know I saved a lot on flowers because the church was already decorated to the hilt with greens and all things Christmas?)

Isn’t he the best???

I truly hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season and wish you and yours peace and happiness in 2019!

“In My Kitchen” is hosted by Sherry at Sherry’s Pickings.

For all my IMK posts from last year, click here.

24 comments to “In My Kitchen” January 2019

  • Mae

    Your family’s tradition of only home-made gifts is a lovely one! I don’t think our family could do that — we are mostly not crafty! Overall, your Christmas looks great. Have a wonderful New Year.

    best… mae at maefood.blogspot.com

    • We have so much fun planning although The Hubs sometimes waits until the last possible second to pull his off. 🙂 Happy New Year to you and yours as well!

  • Those homemade gifts from your sister are the BEST! Happy New Year, Deb!

  • Liz

    Wow! You raked in a lot of fabulous gifts! What a talented family! The frog made by your hubby is amazing! Happy New Year!!! xo

  • My but you are going to have a very tasty new year with all those wonderful homemade gifts. Wishing you all the best for this new year.

  • I especially loved all the handmade gifts. A good idea to adopt for Christmas.

    • We adopted it b/c we all had too much “stuff” and didn’t need more gadgets, especially for the kitchen. I think the straw that broke the camel’s back was when a relative got me a huge bread maker. Didn’t really see the need for that. 🙂

  • Happy New Year Eliot!!! It looks like you had a wonderful Christmas. The gifts are fabulous! Love the idea of only homemade presents. Your family is very talented!

  • shaheen

    Firstly Happy Anniversary to you and yours, secondly Happy New Year!Your kitchen is buzzing this month with so many wonderful handmade gifts from family and friends – each one is unique and wonderful. I wish my family had a similar appreciation for homemade gifts, but whenever I present someone with a homemade jam, chutney ..I usually get a snug nose – oh well..its a shame we live in a world of consumerism, but it so uplifting to see there are families across the world that relish in homemade gifts. Its hard to choose which I like the most, but it has to be your sisters paper bowls – you have one very creative family.

  • Love the idea of homemade gifts, and all of yours seem so creative and clever and would be lovely to receive. Hope you have a lovely 2019!

  • i love those tea towels debra. my collection is huge but i do use them all:-) great idea to have home made gifts at xmas time. yes i get what shaheen is saying tho – some people think a gift has to be big and shiny and cost heaps to be worth anything. i was pondering on buying that brumate wine tumbler over xmas but i didn’t buy it due to the high postage to be paid in getting it sent to australia. your sister’s paper bowl is very clever. Terry’s choc orange – wow that brings back the memories. hope your xmas break was blissful and thanks for joining in this month. cheers sherry

  • I’ve been trying to move people away from gifts and if they must, home made. Some success but not as much as I’d like. Well done to your family. It’s coincidental about the paper bowls as I have just started rolling some paper tubes for the same thing. I think I said it last time that the wooden frog is such a clever idea – no breaking! Happy New Year.

    My late addition: http://www.tiffinbitesized.com.au/2019/01/07/in-my-kitchen-january-2019/

  • Debra, your Christmas presents given and received made me smile — what a marvelous variety of homemade/hand-made gifts — not to mention humorous. Cool coasters, too! If my family ever anticipated or expected getting a DIY gift from me, they’d be waiting ’til 2029 or beyond. 🙂 Sounds like a whole lotta LOVE happened in your kitchen during the holidays, including your anniversary. Congratulations and Happy New Year! xo

  • Love homemade gifts always very thoughtful presents. The coaster are lovely too, great memories. Happy New Year.

  • What an amazing collection! May 2019 hold all that you need. I am so going to buy orange bitters when we are in France. And I would love to know how to make the Malt Vinegar. Happy belated anniversary 🙂

    • Funny story. My sister makes it and had run out of malt beer (which her husband had made). She went on the search to buy more and came home from the liquor store with malt liquor instead of beer. This is an interesting experiment. 🙂 It is a totally different color from what she previously made with the beer but she persevered.

  • wow those home made presents are so impressive. So much impressive food. I love the paper bowl and the lasered serving dish, the mouse poop is fun and so are your tea towels! happy new year!