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0:00 and even my therapist has said I prescribe to you line dancing for the rest of your life you must never [Music] stop well friends as always the 16t table is overloaded with a whole lot of food and it's a whole lot of junk food and Christmas party food and weekend sanity quick food now let me say this week I have done I think I've done four of our farm raised locally sourced chickens also I've done two grass-fed roast and homegrown potatoes from a friend's Garden but that's not what I'm showing you tonight tonight we got all
0:47 kinds of projects going down so let's have a look and as you also see we got one of two Christmas trees up this week I am proud of us with all the things going on in life I've kind of taken a week off of YouTube not that I've been sitting here with my feet up the whole time but I've just been take I took a little filming break so as you can see this past week we've got one of two Christmas trees up we are Christmas ready and just showing for inspo they'll look all all kinds of different but so many years in one of our local home school groups I would be the mom that I made like the 100 graham cracker gingerbread houses and then in recent years hold on here for smaller undertakings like for my family and maybe two or three others at my house I would also do these poptart houses now this is just the Great Value frosted
1:35 Cherry toaster pastries but it takes about six individual I just got I will have to call them poptarts okay six individual poptarts to make one house so each box of 12 makes two houses so that's why you're about to see a lot of houses we are going to host oh yes we are a fun Christmas party I actually don't have all my official numbers yet it should probably be between 20 or 30ish or so and I plan that we will make at least 20 of these Pop-Tart houses I'm not going to do the gram cracker ones this year last year we didn't even do any so I got a variety of candy with hosting this party in mind all the Pop-Tarts that I'm going to show you so much candy so we're going to have
2:20 tablecloths out on this table I'm asking each family that comes to just bring a random like finger food type thing kind of like a church par luck we don't know what we're going to get I'm providing the houses and a lot of candy and I did buy a lot of just great value icing but I have quite a bit of powdered sugar whenever I make these houses here I like to put them together with royal icing cuz it's like a glue but I will also make some more homemade icing I mean I'm telling myself I'm making homemade icing but I also know reality is when Monday comes I just might only at that point be able to open these little Great Value
3:06 icings so I thought ahead so we have icing we'll use it for something I will have to make the homemade anyway to do actually glue the houses together and I'm hoping to have the capacity on Monday at some point to do the homemade icing now these houses I need to do 2 days before it just really to 24 to 48 hours before for is whenever I would do the graham cracker ones and even the poptart ones for other families and my kids at home for the homemade icing I got egg whites also big variety of candy here and so I keep holding up this one also T the season with the cold I mean it's been 26° at some point so we've got a variety of sweatshirts and jackets
3:52 that are just going to be hanging around the table to go out the door quickly but anyway this is a candy Carnival bag Sugar Babies glow pops sugar daddies all kinds peanut free and glutenfree yay so we will have bowls of these candies all down the table I don't police them the kids have fun also a lot is eaten but these houses that stay for several weeks are also super decorated with candy and what I got for the houses themselves I got 24 of these plates I actually I got 48 I got two other ones I was thinking what's left we will use for like maybe Christmas Day buffet type
4:39 foods around here but at least these when we make the houses in 2 days they will set up on these and that'll be good I keep trying to tell you about the candy and then I keep talking to you about all the other little party things I got two bags so heavy says 3 lb 4 oz two two bags of gummy bears and then two bags of gummy bears and gummy worms I can taste them just looking at them I shall not eat them but they will be fun uh looks like so I ordered this is a nonsensical thing it's totally fine I got winter green candy canes I ordered peppermint so we'll have green and white striped I got six boxes of these candy canes and it looks like I must this must
5:26 have been a replacement too so I had ordered the mini red and white strip candy canes and I got these Christmas peppermint candies I can picture you know these Bean sidewalks for the houses or Windows or whatever so that's fine two big bags of Skittles very popular also two of these bags of like funsize random candies so that should be good I feel like we need more as I look at this Sour Patch little sour patch things too so I'm just looking maybe I need to ask each family to like bring one random bag of candy and one random finger food not sure so anyway here is all the
6:13 candy that I got I was just thinking you know other things I need is like to get out the sprinkles and such this is enough for today look at me several days ahead and that was why part of why I did this order I don't think I'm going to be able to like go to Costco or anything before this we got some fun stuff happening this weekend so hey look prepping also so when we used to do this for like with a 100 kids we would ask each family to bring like an icing per kid and one bag of candy so anyway for the actual houses we can use this kind of icing or as I said if I'm able to do some homemade icing we will do it we have powdered sugar for that then okay so just some little gluten-free folk fill in
7:00 again some rice cak some Annie's gluten-free chewy granola bars some more of those Amy's chili Max again not all of the Amy's food items in the freezer section are gluten-free but these are nice cuz obviously when we have busy weekends and because I'm out of freezer meals how I would like to have them in a perfect world I fill in with Walmart and Costco freezer meals and again we've had five nights of grass-fed Meats so there's a lot of give and take in this life we're having a fun weekend mama is not going to have the time or capacity to think too much about food and that's okay thank you Great Value then some more of these um skinny pop gluten-free little individual popcorn bags and then
7:45 so for tomorrow night big event big evening so it's going to be a pizza night this is cheaper than ordering pizza order pizza $200 or get a stack of Great Value pizzas not $50 so there's that so we've got six two pepperoni two cheese and two three meat pizzas chocolate milk for the weekend already gone also I just thought I I have okay I have one bag one big bag of Costco meatballs and I think that's 6 lb so for our Christmas party on Monday I can dump meatballs in the slow cooker but I also thought okay for the weekend it might be good to also have
8:31 like either some barbecue or marinara meatballs in the slow cooker as a food option for my home that operates like a buffet sometimes so I got these thinking these will either this would be 8 lbs for our gathering and then I can use a six lb bag this weekend this is some ice cream that is also gluten-free and loved by my gluten-free folks because for my other Army of people that look like me it's just a little variety pack for the weekend I got two of them and yeah happy happy ice cream have a little ice cream after dinner yay let's see here and then so for so Pizza is Friday thoughts and
9:17 these can go either way you know it could be corn dogs on Saturday night nuggets on Sunday Sunday afternoon I'm going with some family folks running a Christmas 5K so again something easy for people at home for a mom who does not have freezer meals and then we also needed to refill our daily paper plates we still run both dishwashers at least once a day sometimes twice but paper plates also help us make it through then I got some backup I don't know when I'm going to need emergency chimmy chongas for my household but they will be in the freezer look at me I'm meal prepping I'm thinking ahead also so for the Christmas
10:04 party I got five boxes I thought it was five I see four okay it looks like we got four boxes of the Cherry unless I left that box somewhere we got five boxes of the frosted cookies and cream I thought some of them would like those and then it looks like we got six boxes of strawberry so that will be fun then fruit wise because we have let's see so over here hey look you can see some Christmas decorations we have our bowl of bananas and we have our very active and entertaining Nativity everybody's taking a nap now they're good let them be we have bananas some are green anyway other fruit two bags of Granny Smith apples two bags of red delicious 4 lbs
10:51 of strawberries I mean these these are like this is 24 hours and then four packs of these blueberries cuz I have people that still think blueberries are amazing and then I have people that are scared of them so there's some fruit and then again hey look we're prepping for a party I got these little paper fans that we'll decorate with I got the they only had one of these but it just looked cute this just a little like Pioneer Woman cookies for Santa napkins maybe I will put one of these with each of the houses that we make cuz there's only 24 I just got this this little Merry Christmas sign why not these are disposable tablecloths but I thought we could put
11:37 them on the table for doing the houses and then I did not realize this plate was so little but hey that's cute and festive so we have a variety we got some three packs of snowflake plates two packs of Christmas tree plates I guess one little fa la la la la plate and then a little variety of napkins and then because I had to get into my camping plastic wear for my last event I got another fresh thing of plastic utensils then I have a kiddo who has really fallen in love with their new glue gun it is being used all day every day it's a lower heat glue gun so anyway got them refilled so they can make it through all of their projects we needed some glue
12:25 stick reinforcements and then like I said I was thinking I would have some of these left for our actual Christmas week here well friends I'm breaking into this video for a few minutes with you here I want to let you know and maybe you remember do you remember in April when I needed a thing to look forward to and I went to The Vision Christian writers conference in Mount Herman it's right outside the Santa Cruz mountains I signed up for it January 2024 when my friend Trisha goyer was going out there and I needed I needed something to look forward to in my future that involved living and progressing forward right okay and that thing became the Vision Christian riters Conference in Mount Herman I'm going again in April 2025 I'm speaking there as well I'm also going to
13:11 fill my soul and fill my cup those people poured into me it was a wonderful event I'm also inviting you to come with me to the Vision Christian writers conference in Mount Herman in April 2025 here's all the details I'm going to have the link for the conference in the description below and listen to this coupon code you can use code jam 15 for 15% off of your conference registration by the way this isn't a sponsored video by this event it's an event that I love and I'm going to be at and I figured some of you would like to come join me there too so your registration includes your room it includes 12 Meals and I showed the meals and where we ate I even showed where I stayed and such last year in my April video that I will also link below but the first link in the
13:57 description will be I have to read their their website is VCW comp C nf.com so I'll put that URL here for you on the screen it'll also be the first link in the description and again jam 15 is 15% off your registration so that includes again your room 12 Meals I've got to look at my notes cuz I I got I got a lot in my head right major morning tracks afternoon workshops evening worship and speakers Sunday service there's also night owls event unlimited appointments with literary agents industry expert experts Acquisitions editors and Publishers last year I took some of that opportunity to brainstorm with Experts of course I bunked with one of my good friends Trisha goyer who's only written I say 87 books it might be 94 now I think she only came out with five or six new books
14:44 in 2024 so she's a prolific writer I've always wanted to be a writer when I grow up I think now maybe by 50 I will be life goal published by 50 I've had a lot of opportunities over the years and writing is why I started blogging about 15 years ago now because everything back then was you got to have a Blog you got to have a Blog to be a writer and I wanted to reach moms and so I started blogging about homeschooling dance around the barn with me right anyway so they say there's only 30 spots available at that rate and so the Vision Christian writers conference it's all inclusive and it's set again at Mount Herman and that's those beautiful coastal redwoods and remember last spring I went ziplining in the Redwoods I mean who even are we so some of us will probably
15:31 go zip lineing again this year I'm not organizing it but know that there's all kinds of additional opportunities that's not part of your registration that's extra fun and excitement so there's over 50 tracks and workshops and there's teaching options for non-fiction and fiction the business of writing and everything from beginners and professional level so I'm going to be there surprise surprise speaking about the YouTube but there will be many other professionals there educating on all the things so in addition to speaking I will be enjoying many of the workshops so again just use my code jam 15 on your registration and I'll see you at Mount [Music]
16:24 Herman so as I mentioned all kinds of fun events this weekend I don't know if I have mentioned this detail or not but I guess it's time you know this about me I've been line dancing for over a year and it has been so good for me and even my therapist has said I prescribe to you line dancing for the rest of your life you must never stop there's this whole thing about bilateral stimulation and my walking does it and line dancing does it and also horseback riding does it and a great many other activities so tomorrow night is my big line dancing event for December it'll be so much fun and then Saturday night I'm going with my line dancing group and I'm going to be in a parade in the city line dance in doesn't that just sound like why not sounds good
17:12 okay doing that Saturday so that's why tomorrow night while I'm at my big once or twice a month line dancing event it's pizza night here so they'll be having pizza Saturday night while I go and do the parade they'll have some corn dogs don't worry there's all kinds of activities that all of us do all the time I just mainly chitchat with you about some of the stuff that I personally am doing and these are some things that are good for my mama soul that I'm excited about for this coming weekend so next up let's get all of these houses made for our Christmas party that we're going to have in just a few days all righty friends so it's pretty serious this afternoon just got done with the run and because Virginia never knows what it's doing weatherwise you know it's freezing yesterday today
17:57 it's like 62 too got to run in a t-shirt that's good so I'm going to do my royal icing and this royal icing is for the Pop-Tart Christmas houses because we are having that party tomorrow these will these fit in this one okay you know I've had a couple different mixers over the years so I got to watch where my beers come from and that was left on that was fun I do think those are the beers for my other mixer but that's okay so look at us we're doing it don't mind me I'm actually we've got a dinner event this evening so we will be pulling it together that's why I sto my run a
18:43 little short to get these houses done and I've got some meatballs in the slow cooker that we were taking with us this evening and then tomorrow for our Christmas Cy house decorating party here they will do another batch of Meatballs cuz I can do that I can dump some meatballs in a slow cooker like nobody's business Expert level at that and hey look I'm making homemade royal icing who are we what else am I doing oh I'm going to have one of my teens do like four dozen deviled eggs for our party tomorrow and we have fruit and I I could get inspired for something else but that's all I'm you know the times when I say I'm not not that inspired I'm not
19:29 cooking too much it'll be okay that's probably when the creativity will kick in and I'll want to do something but that's all okay last night I had my ly dancing group I going said in the fair in the uh Christmas parade so that was fun and the night before I had a big monthly line dance event out which is also lots of fun and some of my family folks have come to those with me before and it's just always a nice time so busy weekend tired mom we're still doing it aren't we and because I haven't been doing a ton of cooking in here recently my stuff
20:16 isn't is even less organized than normal but that's a teaspoon going do two teaspoons tter okay got that and I am using this to be the the glue that'll hold our houses together and then along with that you know we have the store bought icing and sorry I haven't done filming much this week so I'm kind of like how do I film again now I've got to get back get my filming muscles back okay was just planning with another good friend of mine and and she and her kids are going to come over to our house
21:03 at some point after Christmas between Christmas and New Year's we're going to have a campfire party day which will be a lot of fun and her kids are coming over and we're going to get this campfire fire pick going and do hot dogs and s'mores cuz we can do that too I like to lean into the things that we can do okay so should be pretty good here and if I have any icing left we can add some food coloring to it do it for the party and if I don't I could make more tomorrow or Great Value did it [Music]
22:06 in [Music]
23:48 okay friends happy new day happy new day I definitely got off of my egg white math switching from just doing egg whites out of the egg versus egg whites from the carton so I had to add some more powdered sugar to cover a multitude of sins to help my eyes SE stick Like Glue I don't know tired mom brain going to take a nap today and rest up a bit before we get party ready I was up late doing these houses last night but we got them done and they will be covered with candy the good time with friends the seed evening and they all worked out it was kind of a fun little assembly line I would get one built and I would send it
24:36 over to dry and then once in a while we would have a collapse and then I had a teen that was up with me helping and and they would help rebuild it and the big test was everything stayed up overnight so I love that the icing looks like snow dripping you know it's great now you can see can see our little earthquake damage that would happen but again again we're doing it [Music]
25:49 so moms in hard life situations if you're number one if you can't do Pop-Tart houses this year don't worry about it I could not do them last year but this year I'm doing them and boy are they imperfect such as life but also I just can't say enough we're doing it we're doing the thing folks are going to have a house full of friends tonight they're going to decorate these and I mean they they they seem they seem sturdy they seem solid it's going to be a lot of fun even though we got a broken mama here making it we are making it aren't we and so it's just all the beauty of life right look look at this this one look look look at that that fun situation and you still got no makeup Mama today on
26:34 this Monday but we have about 12 kids that are coming in addition to my own I don't even know how many kids I have in this anyway in addition to my own kids there's about 12 other kids plus their parents coming so we're probably having about 20 to 22 folks in addition to my household of 10 so you yay look at us I am going to put in a Walmart order this afternoon of the last minute things like I didn't get I was looking back through old pictures okay sorry 6 hours sleep and with all I'm going through in life I don't function well when I'm on low sleep it's rare that it happens but again let's just talk about my needed
27:20 nap and how I'm going to get that here shortly I had an 8:30 appointment this morning and I'm like okay this is where I kick myself I'm up till almost 1:00 a.m. getting these houses was done and I have an 8:30 appointment but look at us we did it and I have my timer set for 1 hour and I'm going to do all I can do Mama stuff I need to do then I'm going to take a nap and then I'll wake up with a it's like a whole new brain I get a nap and I get a new brain it's amazing so and then we'll bustle around some more this afternoon but anyway I was looking through pictures of all the other years and all the other houses that we've done cuz I've been doing H these houses now in different forms since The Farmhouse so I mean at least a decade of homemade royal icing and gram cracker houses and then in the last
28:07 maybe four years we've added in the Pop-Tart house variation never made no homemade gingerbread but that's okay we are doing we do Christmas candy houses so anyway looking for more ideas of things we need to make them I usually get hold on brains coming online pretzel rods and like mini Mar marshmallows and a few Oddities like that so in my Walmart order I'm going to throw a few more things I think we're good though like candy wise we're probably good it'll be fun mama will get a nap and prepping and getting ready and having friends over it is a whole family event again you only see me and hear my busy Mama narrative but I got folks in
28:52 different areas doing different things and together we will pull this party for 30 us together y all righty happy afternoon happy another WalMart delivery how we make it through so I thought we would do like a cheese and cracker tray so let me just bring those down here hey look we got some cheese and it's already cut to Cracker sizes and we got some entertainment crackers and some buttery smooth crackers also I got some pepperoni and some salami we we could do a whole cracker and cheese and meat board what we have shrimp I saw this fantastic idea why I laid down and rested about making your own ice bowl for shrimp with like lemon slices in it
29:38 I loved everything about it but hey I got shrimp got cocktail sauce um here's the pretzel sticks for houses also got some pretzel twist variety of marshmallows and then added some more candy we got the mints going on here I did have some folks help themselves that was their payment for organizing my grocery haul and let's see here we got some different Hershey cases too some more mayonnaise cuz we're doing several dozen doubled eggs and we are we are doing it we are doing this thing [Music]
30:28 oh [Music] h [Music]
31:25 [Applause] [Music] and I don't think I've even fully introduced the whole wide internet into my Hobart Mixer and that whole experience there's hopes and dreams here I did film the whole process over in my private membership community at large.com Community they got some pictures and some exclusive videos and stuff but all that to say hopes and dreams for the new
32:12 year folks straight from Facebook Marketplace cuz you know I Broke My Kitchen Aid mixer and I got a replacement one I did we got we got yes that's the lighting we need all the time I got a replacement Kitchen Aid mixer at Costco and Bing Bang Boom one of my friends was so kind enough she has a Hobart Mixer so she searched my local Facebook Marketplace from several states away and she's like this one this is the deal get this contacted the guy that day I'm like hey my friend said I need this she does a lot of big batch sourdough and all kinds of baking and I need this in my life and he brought it to me that day and I didn't get I didn't get un alived wasn't that great so you know
32:58 okay so here's what's important I got some stickers for it and I'm cleaning getting ready for this party and so even though you are just now meeting my mixer you got to help me name it it's a whole thing but I'm not quite there yet I am making it through the holidays I am hosting a Christmas party for I think 30 people now tonight and juggling multiple Walmart orders and you know fighting evil in all of its shapes and forms so we're doing pretty good and we're going to put these hopeful these CH magnets and this is an actual sticker we're going to put this on this mixer that you are meeting now okay and then we're going to scrub countertops and get going I got a whole other thrift store outfit I'm wearing this evening it's a white sweater but I'm not going to clean in
33:44 that but I also like this one you all were with me we got a Goodwill okay so we have you belong amongst the wild flowers okay we have a sunflower and then we have this it's just how many appropriate things can I have in my life I think all the things that are appropriate are what's required so it says when life gives you lemons make lemonade okay so let's apply these cuz it's just what's needed right now before we clean so here is the mixer and the whole setup my goodness I haven't filmed in like 2 weeks you all don't even know I got this magnetic strip on Amazon put it together hung it up it it holds our stuff and look at the biggest whisk in the universe I mean look at this Bly whisk
34:29 okay A Paddle like that's you know like bigger than my head then we have our Kitchen Aid mixer from Costco I bought this before I I knew that this was even inserted into my life but I love these life in insert here right we can mix all the things in this while also mixing some stuff in that does a mom of a household of 10 to 30ish some days need two mixers maybe maybe so okay so h i I don't know we would cover up the Hobart that's okay that's okay I mean we we can move these around isn't this nice this could this could like be so many things now this
35:15 one this is more serious maybe just for now I'm just going to set it there to signify that I will be finding a permanent home for that one but there we go also removed the ice maker cuz I was like you know what I I have to make life decisions I choose two mixers okay that's what I choose [Music]
36:27 all right right friends so here we go so far we we hung the little things we got the little paper tablecloths out right amazing the island also equally amazing is clear I feel like if I could have made it to Hobby Lobby I'd have even more Christmas Gall going on but that's okay we've got our tea station coffee check we have look we put Walmart already done cookies on a plate and had a lovely teen make meat cheese cracker platters we put some mandarins in a bowl we put some blueberries in a bowl we have two big deviled egg platters that'll be out here shortly we have shrimp I need to put on a platter here
37:12 and then we have all our houses and our meatballs hanging out over here for the moment I'll be so proud I figured out what to put in this Christmas Bowl I put the shrimp in there and some I we got some cocktail sauce back there awaiting and we took some of these houses and lined them up like the centerpiece that still gives people room to eat around then we got our big mountain of you know lots of lots of candy [Music]
37:57 a [Music] so Operation Christmas decorating party Christmas candy house party whatever we're going to call this success and we have three kiddos that could not come so we have packed them a bag there's a lot of candy at the bottom of this bag down
38:42 here we have some more of the the house excitement that's staying at our house I individually wrapped the houses that have left the building but here's some of our creation this is the the first year that my toddler did one of these cuz he was two last year and I did not do these houses last year so this is his first creation he was so excited we have some beautiful colors I can smell colors lots of candy reactions going on in the house right now because of all the candy consumption right we've got some beautiful Creations here got a nice little ladder going in
39:28 beautiful roof that's a reindeer at the front isn't that great love it love it modern although that's slipping a little I might have bumped that and lots of fun [Music]
