Sunday, December 27, 2009

" It Was A Wonderful Day "

We had a wonderful time Christmas with family! The food was the best I've ever cooked! I'm not exaggerating when I say this! I used four new recipes for the Corn Casserole, Sweet Potato Casserole, English Pea Salad and I used Marguerite @ Cajun Delights, Cajun Bourbon Glaze for the Ham! DIVINE! All were just Divine!
I got so many wonderful gifts this Christmas! Of course my favorite was the "Windsor Print" Hubby got me! It's good that I never made it to the framers, because I got four more prints that need framing also. This is one of them!









This is another. All 4 are very old Victorian prints. The 2 Christmas prints I'll hang next Christmas.
The next 2 will go in my dining room after I get them framed........

I love Victorian Art................

This picture is " Magnolia Mansion ", a Bed& Breakfast in the Garden District of New Orleans.
Here it is decorated for Christmas...........









This is a daytime picture of it. It just happens to be right across the street from Garden District Books, a favorite independent book store of mine. That is where we met Kathryn Stockett, the author of "The Help".............





Can you believe they have a " Gone With The Wind " suite ?







Well, Hubby and I got a Gift Certificate for a stay in it from his son David and his wife Shannon!!!!








We'll wait until it's warmer so we can stroll the Garden District again...........









Another favorite gift is this Covered Crystal Server Tray........










I LOVE it!










My TBR got additions also.............














I've already read the "Natchez Cemetery Legends" cover to cover and I'm at present reading;
" When The Ghost Screams"...............











Another fantastic gift is this Susan Boyle CD !! OMG ! This woman's voice is so incredible!!
All 12 songs are just fabulous!














I got a lot of wonderful gifts including 3 pairs of lounging PJ's and warm house shoes, my son Todd sent us a wonderful Harry & David Basket! I LOVED every gift and I'm and sooooo grateful for each one! I am really exhausted though and not looking forward to the "un-decorating" part.
HAVE A GREAT SUNDAY !!!!!1













32 comments:

RNSANE said...

Wonderful presents, indeed, but my favorite would have to be that stay in the Garden District mansion. Such fun. I rarely stay anywhere except with friends when I'm in New Orleans since I am a Charity RN and so many of my classmates live in the area. In fact, our 45th reunion is coming up in the fall. It hardly seems possible that it has been so many yeras!!

Betsy Banks Adams said...

Looks like Santa was VERY good to you, Carol. Of course, you were a good girl this year---so you deserved everything you got. Your dinner sounds yummy.. We had the traditional turkey and trimmings (which is our tradition at both Christmas and Thanksgiving).

I got the Susan Boyle CD also. Doesn't she have a marvelous voice???? Wow!!!! I also got the Mormon Tabernacle Choir's Christmas CD --which is fabulous also.

Love all of your prints and can't wait to see them framed. And getting to stay in the Gone with the Wind suite is FABULOUS.... I'm sure you'll blog about that when the time comes...

Have a great day--and get some rest in your new lounging PJ's.... Sorry about our Titans--but they did pretty well coming back from 0-6.... Now we'll just have to wait 'til next year.

Hugs,
Betsy

Pamela Terry and Edward said...

Ooh, Santa was certainly good to you this year!!
Happy Christmas!

Reader Wil said...

Great presents Carol! I love your Victorian pictures too! You are a good cook, I believe, and your family are very fortunate to have you around!

Marguerite said...

So glad that you liked the bourbon glaze and merci for the shout out, cher! Looks like you racked up on the gifts! Love the Victorian prints, but the stay at the Gone with the Wind suite is my favorite. That is really something to look forward to!

Rosaria Williams said...

Lovely! I saw the recipe at Marguerite's blog and saved it for my New Year's Party.

Good to know you had a lovely holiday and gifts to redeem in warmer months too.

Pat in east TN said...

What a wonderful holiday you had with wonderful presents, people and food!

My TBR pile has also grown, but on our colder days I'll try and play catch up with it.

NCmountainwoman said...

It was a wonderful day at our house as well. So great to be with family. I love each of the prints.

Vicki Lane said...

Your TBR pile looks so enticing -- but then so does mine . . . Aren't Christmas books wonderful?

Kat said...

I made that Cajun Burbon Glaze for my ham too and I cannot stop eating it!! It is the best ham I have ever made. Glad you got lots of nice gifts. That one to the Bed and Breakfast Inn sounds great, cannot wait to hear about that!

Jayme Goffin, The Coop Keeper said...

Sounds like a wonderful Christmas indeed! I made a corn pudding casserole and thought I'd died and gone to heaven! Love your victorian prints. I still marvel at how much you manage to read! I 'read' six books yesterday (skimmed), all 'how to books'...can't seem to break that cycle...:-)

I'm all undecorated! The mood hit today, and I went with it. It's a relief.

KB said...

Wow, you did have a great day! Great food, wonderful gifts, family - what more could you want?

I received almost only books - which was exactly what I wanted. I'm on a non-fiction kick, reading everything that I can find about the animals that live in my forest and also reading the lyrical descriptions of nature by wonderful authors.

I'm glad that you're so happy!

Elizabeth Spann Craig said...

What a great Christmas! I'm very curious about the wonderful new recipes you used for your dinner. I'm usually too anxious to try out something new for a special occasion!

Gorgeous inn to stay in. And the Boyle CD sounds wonderful...

Elizabeth
Mystery Writing is Murder

NitWit1 said...

The food sounds divine and of course my favorite part. Since hubby and I are ill food has not tasted right, and we both have lost weight, but that won't last very long.

I always hated the UN-decorating. Have fun. It seems to have been a very merry Christmas at your home. And the henhouse seems to be in grand production, too.

Morning's Minion said...

Hope you got past the "undecorating" and can spend some quality time in the cozy pj's with a pile of books and a cup of tea. We didn't end up with "leftovers" this year, so the cycle of cooking has to start again tomorrow.
With our cold and snowy weather I think crock pot soup and home made bread will be just the thing---leaving some time for me to enjoy this week that the quilt shop is closed.
Happy New Year!

Pat @ Mille Fiori Favoriti said...

WOW! Carol you really had a bountiful Christmas! Enjoy it all and have a happy new year's eve ..cheers!

Elizabeth McCrindle said...

What a beautiful mansion absolutely stunning thanks for sharing :))

Nezzy (Cow Patty Surprise) said...

Sounds like ya'll made off with the kings ransom this year. You must have been very, very good.

The B&B look just magnificent! You lucky thing you. You're goin' to have a ball.

Have a great day and may God bless your New Year!!!

Deb Shucka said...

So glad it was such a rich and abundant Christmas with gifts that will keep on giving for months to come. Happy New Year!

Snowbrush said...

I'm from Brookhaven (spent 36 years there), but have lived in Oregon for the last 24. I miss the relatively sunny winters (here, it's rain and clouds almost everyday for months in winter followed by endless sunshine and drought in summer), and the very long (compared to here) amount of daylight you get in winter. I also miss the history and the subtropical plants, but I like it here better otherwise.

I used to write for "Mississippi Arts and Letters," which, I think, was out of Hattiesburg. That was in the early and mid '80s, so I guess it's long gone. It was a good magazine, but had trouble getting advertisers.

You have a lovely blog.

Anonymous said...

Those books looked so good I am here at the library now and I had to pull up your blog to get the titles.

The prints are beautiful too.

Elizabeth Bradley said...

Wow. You cleaned up girl.

Angie Muresan said...

I so agree on the undecorating part! Love Victorian art as well.

Anonymous said...

You are glowing! Nothing like the success of recipes that turn out so well :).

LOVE the prints! Just love them.

THANK you for the book!!! I will begin reading NYE, as I will be home for the night and family will all be out of town again. It lloks very encouraging and I am intrigued.

Oh, isn't Susan Boyle's CD just FAB? Wild Horses gets me every single time!

Happy New year!
xxMere

xinex said...

I am so glad you got some wonderful gifts, Carol. I need to read that Natchez Cemetery Legends. I have toured the cemetery lots of times but I can never remember all the stories. I hope you have a wonderful New year!...Christine

Snowbrush said...

I didn't notice the part about "Natchez Cemetery Legends" until I saw Xinex's response in my mailbox. May I recommend two more Natchez related books. One is "The Barber of Natchez" and the other is (if I recall correctly) "Mississippi as Seen by a Yankee." In any event, the former was written in the mid 1800s by a black man, and the latter in the 1830s by Joseph Holt Ingraham. He went on to become an Episcopal priest and served at Holly Springs until his death from an accidental gunshot wound just before the Civil War. He was also the most prolific writer of his era, although completely forgotten in our own except for a few Mississippiphiles.

Tess Kincaid said...

Mmm...your meal sounds delicious! Hope you and yours are enjoying the holidays. Warmest wishes for a delightful 2010, Carol. ~xx

Jen said...

Hello Carol!

It's been too long since I've rambled through your "door"! So glad to hear you had a marvelous Christmas! Ours was quiet and wonderful, just like we like it.

I hope you're doing well. Do you have anything planned for New Year's Eve? I like to keep that quiet too, but we'll probably go to a party some friends invited us to. Then it's cornbread and black eyed peas with my mom on New Year's Day!

Happy Tuesday!
Jen

crochet lady said...

So many wonderful things on your post!

Wonderful Victorian prints and that Gone With the Wind suite...wow!

I would love one of those Susan Boyle CD's, how enjoyable.

Anonymous said...

Carol, what beautiful shinys!! Yay for you!! Sounds great, and I've been in that mansion in the Garden District... lovely!!

Snowbrush said...

I pulled some ancient issues of "Mississippi Arts and Letters" to see what I could find out. It was indeed published in Hattiesburg by Persons Publishing. The editors were Alec and Gabi Clayton. One feature I did was on a McComb writer, Carroll Case. The Claytons treated me very well. They couldn't pay much, but they did pay promptly.

Do you know any of these people?

Alec Clayton said...

It's amazing that after more than 20 years a writer who once contributed an article to my short-lived literary mag, Mississippi Arts & Letters, found me up here in Washington state by posting something here. BTW, I got a kick out of seeing the photo of the old Hattiesburg library. It brought back fond memories.