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Holiday 2012

Vol. 5 No. 6

Holiday Features

Holiday Outdoors 26 Creating Wedowee’s Gingerbread House: Creativity and Teamwork Inspire 30 Safety is Key When it Comes to Outdoor Lights: Safety Tips from TREC 34 Enhancing Your Front Entrance: How to Door Décor 36 Turning Trash into Christmas Treasure: Reclaiming Wood for the Holidays

Holiday Entertaining 16 Embrace the Outdoors When Decorating: Harvest Tablescape 20 Thanksgiving Feats: Harvest Recipes for Thanksgiving

40 Preparing for the Main Event: Christmas Eve Menu 46 Planning a Party in 8 Simple Steps: Holiday Party Tips 50 Tips a Caterer Won’t Tell You...Until Now: Catering Your Holiday Party 56 Get Creative When Decorating the Holiday Table: Holiday Table Settings 58 Southern Like Pecan Pie on Christmas Day: Christmas Day Menu 68 Decorations for 3 Holidays: Holiday Tablescapes

70 Bonding Over A Few Wild Grapes: Making Homemade Jelly

Holiday Traditions 14 I am Thankful: Words From Our Fans 32 Magic Elf Returns to Bring Holiday Fun: Elf Magic 38 Tips for Wonderful Holiday Photos: Photo Tips and Contest

Back Issues available at SouthernHolidayLife.com

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79 26

32 40

In Every Issue

10 Letter from the Editor 12 At a Glance 18 Simply Fabulous 62 Charley’s Treasures 72 Creative Crafting

44 Countdown to the 25th: Advent Calendar

54 Don’t Forget the Deeper Meaning of Christmas: 64 Holiday Traditions Carry on from One Generation to the Next 79 A Disney Magical Holiday: Road Trip

82 Marine Crops Christmas: A Family Staying Connected 74 DIY Christmas Crafts Reclaimed Christmas Tree Holiday Owl Wreath Ribbon Tabletop Tree Merry & Bright Canvas Wall Art Christmas Ball Ornaments

Kelly

Leisel

Our Annual Glass Family Smackdown on Christmas Eve Eve. Caldwells are in it to win it!

Playing “Hush Kitty” with all my cousins and my Great Aunt Rebeye on Christmas Eve

Our yearly trips to pick out a Christmas tree at the Farmer’s Market and the crazy rides home.

At my Grandmother Burson’s house, the whole extended family is there. All of us spend the night, and Santa Claus still manages to find us.

My favorite Holiday was my daughters first Christmas.

My daughter's first Christmas.

Charley Norton Chris McEwen

Amanda Causey Lavoy Caldwell Kelly Caldwell Leisel Caldwell

Placing the angel on the top of the tree was my magical childhood Christmas tradition.

As a child, one year we got a phone call from Santa. Our excitement was priceless!

Jessica Maher Julie Shirley

My favorite childhood holiday memory is my whole family piling in our van heading to my grandparents.

The year I got my con-vertible Barbie car. Santa was so excited he came at midnight that year.

Keesha McEwen Peggy Burke

When all the family

would gather in on

Christmas Eve.

The whole family to-gether cooking in the kitchen is my favorite holiday memory.

Darlene Bailey Dwight Burke

We asked our contributors to share with us one of their favorite Holiday Memories .

Our son had just turned 2 & I was preg-nant with our daugh-ter. We awoke to find a blanket of snow.

Making ornaments, wrapping presents, and baking goodies with my mom.

Drinking hot cocoa and singing Christmas songs while putting up our Christmas decorations.

Sitting around the tree every year with my grandmother wrapping present after present.

Amanda Boykin Candice Helton

My favorite memory is mealtime with my fam-ily at Grandma & Granddaddy's house.

We always spent holi-days @my grandmother's in Wedowee. we still go to Mama Rosa 's every Christmas.

Emily Beaird Roach Holly McKenzie

Veronica Hawkins Whitney Baugh

We asked our contributors to share with us one of their favorite Holiday Memories .

I love unusual things. I always have had a knack for turning someone’s trash into a work of art. I never really planned on that love becoming what I did for a living. But as of late, the phrase “Love what you do, and Do what you love” has become a major inspira-tion in my professional life. I have begun to build furniture out of trash.

Within the last 3 years I have stumbled upon an art form that I can do well and that I find inter-esting, it’s called upcycling. I call it an art form, but maybe its just a hobby. It is mainly reliant on wood reclaiming. Every board foot of wood that I save from the trash has its own history. Some of the wood I get is from pallets, a vast treasure trove of wood in it-

self. When I build things from wood, I like to utilize the natural beauty of the wood. Every detail of the individual pieces of wood create a woven pattern of beauty that comes together to form the final piece of artwork.

Not every board is cut perfect from the mill. There are some flaws to every board which is used to create character. There is a small degree of satisfaction when you can reuse some old nasty wood and clean and reshape it into a functioning piece of furni-ture or décor. There are websites devoted to this on the internet. Usually people send me a picture of what they would like their fur-niture piece to look like and I try my best to incorporate the picture, their ideas and the wood’s “flaws”

into it. You can never get store bought

wood to come with any history. Each reclaimed piece of wood I use has tons of history. Sometimes you will run into a nice straight piece of wood but it will be stained or dyed from some paint in it’s previous life, but that’s also just part of the wood’s personal history.

Anyone can do Upcycling, just sometimes it takes a little work and creativity. Having the proper tools and equipment doesn’t hurt either. I have seen Coke bottles being turned into a roof for a shed, a whole “house” made from pallets, or even fishing lures made from bottle caps. Its fun to me be-cause the limits are only what my imagination says they are.

Holiday Outdoors

by Chris McEwen

Turning Trash into Christmas Treasure

We asked on our social media sites “What are you Thankful for?” Here are some of our favorite responses:

Sandy Carol Smith: I am most thankful for my

Family, My precious lil Princess Macie! When I was

told that I might not ever get to have children, but

GOD had other plans for me at age 36 I was

blessed beyond words. She is my world GOD has

been sooooooo Good to me! I thank him everyday

for my Blessings!! Amy

Richardson: I am thankful for dirty dishes and

piles of clothes to wash. My children are growing

up so fast and even though washing dishes and

clothes seems like a never ending cycle, as long as I

have them...I have my kids (and husband <3).

Stephany Dedman: I'm thankful first for the blood

He shed for me. I'm thankful for my freedom and

Liberty. I'm thankful for my sweet husband and all

he does for me, and for our two beautiful girls

that's all I need. I am Blessed!

Heather Heard Huddleston: I am most thankful

for God's aboundless love and blessings for me. It

is because of Him that I have the opportunity to be

thankful for the many other wonderful things in

my life. He has blessed me with 3 smart and hand-

some boys, a wonderful husband, a very big fam-

ily, everything I need and most of my wants

Creative Crafting Christmas in Black & White

A picture tells a thousand words, captures a moment in time and gives generations some-thing to look back on. I enjoy seeing old pho-tographs in black and white. My love for pho-tography comes from my “Mama Liz” who is rarely pictured in photographs I have since

she was the photographer of the family. I wanted to find a way to display photos of

loved ones during the holiday times. This ba-sic evergreen wreath is decorated with ornate photo frames purchased at a local craft store. I used some scrap silver chiffon, cut them into

three inch strips, and loosely wove them through the limbs. Add in some small ele-

ments that go along with your frames and a hint of color if you desire.

By: Amanda Causey

Photo Gift Tags Using photocopies of old photo-

graphs as gift tags is a great

way to remember family mem-

bers and a creative way to iden-

tify gifts under the tree. Use

cardstock copies of photos and a

gift tag paper punch. Loop

twine/yarn through a hole

punched at then end. Attach to

the gift of the person photo-

graphed or make the tags part

of the gift itself.

With me being southern and all, I can’t let this holiday season pass by without sharing with you all a pecan pie recipe. It just wouldn’t be right. Some version of pecan pie can be seen at every house here in the South whether it is the good old fashion pecan pie, mini pies, pecan pie muffins or pecan pie bars. I would like to introduce you to the latest and greatest creation in the pecan pie series and that is a brownie pecan pie.

Combing two of my loves into one pie almost makes me weak at the knees. The best part about it is-Shhh! I don’t want to say this too

loud and risk the wrath of my southern grand-mother-the cake is basically semi-homemade- as in

the brownie layer comes from a box! Okay, seriously, no rolling your eyes. Even cooks with a passion for baking know when a box of brownie mix is called for over the homemade version. Sure you are

more than welcome to make the brownie layer from scratch- but why?

A crispy buttery crust, a decadent sugary sweet pecan topping and a moist chewy brownie center will have everyone begging for more- which could be a good and bad thing depending on how long you want your guests to stick around:)

Pumpkin French Toast Rounds 2 large eggs 1/3 cup canned pumpkin 1 tsp baking spice 1/8 tsp salt ¼ cup half and half 2 TBSP sugar ½ loaf of day old French bread,

cut into cubes In a large bowl mix together the

first 6 ingredients. Toss in the bread cubes and coat well. Allowing the bread to rest in the liquid for 10-15 minutes to soak up all the flavor. Place 2 heaping handfuls of the bread cubes into a greased muffin tin. Sprinkle with a dash of cinna-mon and bake at 350 for 15 minutes.

Arugula and fig winter salad For the Salad: 1 ½ cups fresh arugula ½ cup fresh basil leaves 6-8 ripe figs, quartered ¼ cup glazed walnuts ¼ cup goat cheese For the dressing: 1 tsp Dijon mustard 1 tsp salt ½ tsp pepper 4 TBSP extra virgin olive oil 1 tsp honey 1 shallot, minced Instructions: Whisk together the dressing

ingredients. Toss together the salad ingredients and serve with the dressing.

Holiday Entertaining

by Jessica Maher

Christmas Day Menu Pumpkin French Toast Rounds

Fruit Fondue Platter

Arugula and fig winter salad

Apple and Sage Roasted Chicken

Duck and sausage gumbo

Sautéed Green Beans, Edamame and Roasted Shallots

Southern Like Pecan Pie on Christmas Day

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