Life At Korthuis Manor

Life At Korthuis Manor
Captain Randy and his First Mate!

Monday, December 29, 2008

Christmas and Family Galore

We spent the weekend with my family. My brother Dave and his family came up and stayed with us, and then Sat. night we had all the Brim's for Soup and rolls. What a crowd - we counted about 45!!!
Here are four of my brothers, a sister in law and a niece. Just to total it all up for you, I have................ my mom,5 brothers (and sister in laws), 18 nephews and nieces, and 14 great nephews and nieces!!


We sat and chatted, ate, and then ended the night with Mad Gab and Catch a Phrase. It was so fun! I am so blessed with a wonderful family - I love them all!!

At one point I walked back to the laundry room, and was struck by how many shoes were there (which equals a lot of people belonging to those shoes!!). These are not all the shoes as a lot of people left their shoes in the garage!

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend!!

Friday, December 26, 2008

A White Christmas!


I'm dreaming of a White Christmas.........................

Randy and I went for a 4-wheeler ride in the beautiful snow and sunshine. He had me take a picture from the back side of our house - isn't that beautiful? I think I see a Christmas card for next year!! The best part is - you can't tell that we have absolutely NO landscaping.......just beautiful snow!

On Christmas Eve I mixed up the dough for Orange Bowknots and shaped them and set them in the garage overnight (because my 2 fridges were too full :-) and then I took them out about 6:30am and popped them in the oven at 8:30 and by 9:00 we had nummy, fresh rolls (with scrambled eggs and maple bacon! These are so good! If I get enough cries for the recipe, I'll post it. It's my friend Sally's recipe and they're a tradition at her house - and at ours now too!

My brother and his family arrived safely from Florida on Christmas Eve, so we went over for coffee at my mom's Christmas morning. This is me and my brother Steve, we're only 1 1/2 years apart so we grew up fighting like cats and dogs, but now I kinda' like the ol'guy! :-)


We are having my family all over on Sat. so the whole gang will be together then, as my brother and his family from Corvallis are coming up today! I'm so glad we'll all be together - this is the first time since my dad died (just over 6 months - can you believe?) that we'll all be here. That will be so nice - especially for my mom!

Even tho' none of us looked our best I had my brother take a picture of us by mom's tree. I don't have a picture of all of us together since last December - that is so sad!!

Monday, December 22, 2008

Cookies with the kids.........................

I love traditions!! Today, was one of my favorites.........cookies with my Scheib kids! These are my "nieces and nephew" by friendship :-) and we have been making cookies every Christmas for at least 6 years - maybe more (I'm sure Tanya knows).

Here are a few of the samples - we love sprinkles!

Brenna went first....................
.............then Alyssa....................
...................and Ethan was very "manlike" about it..............slap that cutter down, and................. "get 'er done"!!
Tomorrow I get to babysit Randy's nephew, he's 5 months old, and oh so cute! Randy's mom usually watches him on Tuesdays, but dad ended up in the hospital today. They've ruled out stroke and heart attack, so we wait for more tests and hopefully some conclusive results.

Baking and sampling!!


I love being snowed in! Well - I realize we're not technically "snowed in", but since I don't like driving in ANY snow, I consider myself "officially snowed in". The best part is, 1)my gifts are all done, even the handmade ones, and that means no last minute crunch, 2) the Christmas baking is actually getting done, 3) I'm making progress on the afghan I started 2 years ago for Nathan (since he's 6'4" I think I'll be crocheting forever!), 4) I've gotten to watch a couple of my most favorite Christmas movies,5) and last but not least, I have eaten, and eaten, and eaten!!!

Here are the almond sticks wrapped and ready to hand out!

Brandon reminded me yesterday that we hadn't made donuts yet!! It's our family tradition to make donuts (mom makes them) when it snows! So yesterday I whipped out these babies! They're called "Crispy and Creamy Donuts" and they are yummy!

Here's what was left after we had our friends over last night!

And here's MAX enjoying the fireplace and just "chillin" - is that the craziest way for a dog to sit or what?!? It cracks me up everytime.


Tomorrow I will post more of the Christmas goodies!

Thursday, December 18, 2008

All snowed in......................and lovin' it!!!

Today was the kind of day I love..........it started with SLEEPING IN!!! I love going to bed knowing school is canceled and we have no schedule!! I got home about 2pm yesterday and had visions of finishing gifts, doing Christmas baking, and some checkbook work! All that got done (besides laying in front of the fire reading and watching TV) was dinner! Isn't that pitiful???? But I did finish a good book!! Here's a dark picture of our house in the snow tonight - I will get one tomorrow in the daylight!

Today my mom and I had our annual almond stick baking day scheduled! I've really had the best end of the deal in this tradition, as my mom buys the supplies (which aren't cheap) and then she mixes up the dough and the filling the day before. Then she comes over and we assembly line the batch of 16 almond sticks. We've been doing this for years and it's a tradition I love!!! (Did I mention she only takes 4 sticks and leaves me with 12?) I keep teasing her that as long as I can get her wheelchair up to the counter she will be doing this with me!!! (no, she's not in a wheelchair yet - that's how many more years we have ahead of us :-) This is mom rolling out the dough - she's a pro at this!
...........then she passes it over to me and I fill them, seal the edges, prick them with a fork, brush them with egg white and stick them in the oven!!!

We taste test them as soon as they're cool enough to take a bite! I love the flaky pastry and the almond paste filling when it's warm - nummy!! (That's for you Debbie doo!)


Tonight Brandon has friends over to play rock band (for those of you who know what this means to the noise level in my house tonight - I appreciate your sympathy!!). I have sloppy joes simmering and hashbrown potatoes in the oven for them to swoop down and gobble up!

Maybe - and only maybe - I will get something productive done tonight! I have to admit that since I have the next few days at home with nothing pressing to be done, I just might have to put off productivity until tomorrow (after I sleep in that is - because.....school is canceled!!!)


Monday, December 15, 2008

Baby It's Cold Outside....................

I feel if it's going to be this cold, we'd better have a good ol' whatcom county snowstorm - drifts and all! What a great day today - it's cold and stormy - and I don't have to go anywhere!! I'm working on getting some handmade Christmas gifts done, I have a batch of bread in the pans rising, chicken thawing for a comfort food dinner, Christmas music playing, Max is napping in the sun, the dryer is going, and my oldest son, his friend, and my hubby were just all in for lunch! I love days like this!

Here are some more Christmas Decorations for you. I can't really show pictures of the gifts I'm making until I've given them to the receivers, because that would ruin the surprise!

This is the "Pottery Barn" bench and shelf my hubby built for me/us :-)! We ended up without a front coat closet because of some remodeling we had to do in the building process :-)! Isn't he talented? I just ripped the page out and handed it to him and here it is! I have to buy baskets yet, but it came in the house Friday just in time for our 10th annual Christmas Sing company.

Here is our nativity - I think it's a necessity when you're decorating for Christmas! You'll notice our angel's arm is broken off, and there are several others that have glued on pieces, but we've had it forever and I can't bear to replace it!

Kathi and I flew over to Idaho on Wed./Thur. to visit Judy McKay and we had a blast! This is dinner at PF Changs - can you say chicken lettuce wraps - nummy!!


Judy's daughter Hailey is learning to play the piano, and therefore, so is Judy!! We played a couple duets for the kids - what fun it was to sit next to my friend and play piano!

P.S. Judy - be thankful, this picture is better of you so I put this one in :-)!

Spencer is 15 and we used his car while we were there - I can't believe how big he's getting and how fast he's growing up!


Hailey is 6 and is reading and doing math and all that smart stuff. It was so fun to hear her play the piano - she's very talented!! Keep up the good work Hailey!

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Finally a Christmas card!

Here's the 3rd card from Stamp Club the end of Nov. It's a 3x3 card that uses the Season of Joy Stamp set. The background was done with the Versamark pad and I used bashful blue and chocolate chip CS. Isn't that a cutie?! :-)


Sorry I haven't been blogging lately, in the last 2 weeks we've been to Salem, OR, Spokane and Pullman, WA taking Brandon to tour colleges. He has chosen Whitworth in Spokane, which we are very happy about! Now it's time for all those fun financial aid and scholarship forms!!

Here are a couple shots of my laundry room - which - if you've been here you know this is what I look at when I'm sitting at the counter in my office! Nothing extraordinary, but I think the snowflakes and blue theme look adorable in my blue laundry room. I think this is my favorite paint color in the whole house!


Tomorrow Kathi and I are heading on a blitz trip to Idaho for not even 48 hours! We get to fly out of B'ham Wed. @ 5:40AM (YUK!) and get home Thur. @ 11:25PM! We are going to visit our good friend Judy (who left us 7 years ago!!!!!). It will be fast but fabulous! I will post again on Friday! Enjoy the rest of your week!