Our Thankful Turkey

This time of year, it seems like the kids are gearing up for Christmas and the “I wants” start taking over our conversations.  So each year in November, our family makes a Thankful Turkey. 

We cut out a bunch of feathers, write what we are thankful for on them, and attach them to the naked turkey. 

We let the kids write whatever they want.  Some of the things are serious, and some are not. 

By the time we are done, the turkey tail is huge, and we all feel a little more gratitude for the things that we have, and seem to focus a little less on the things that we want.

Chocolate-Covered Caramel Apples!

I’ve been wanting to do some chocolate-covered caramel apples for awhile, now, but kept talking myself out of it.  It sounds stupid, but the thing that was holding me back was unwrapping all of those dang caramels.  I hate that part so very much.  To avoid the unwrapping in the past, I’ve tried to do make caramel from scratch or have tried bottled caramel with little success.  So I was back to the unwrapping. 

Then I remembered that I have kids.

Turns out, my children quite enjoy unwrapping caramels, and the caramel collateral damage wasn’t too bad.

So we prepped the apples, melted the caramel, and then came another hurdle.  Keeping the caramel on the apple.  If you set it right down after dipping, most of the caramel falls right off, so we opened a window and slowly turned the apples rotisserie-style until the caramel had set up enough that it wouldn’t puddle at the bottom when we set it down.

However, this took FOREVER.

Again, I grabbed the kids to do the manual labor, and after some training, they did a pretty good job.  After they had turned them for a while, we put them in the fridge to continue to set.

After the caramel had set came the fun part.

We melted milk chocolate chips, white chocolate chips and peanut butter chips and dipped the caramel apples, then rolled them in mini chocolate chips or toffee bits, and returned them to the fridge to set.

They turned out so yummy and most of them were pretty, too, which was awesome.

Making caramel apples was pretty labor intensive and messy, and after finally finishing them I vowed that I would never make them again. 

Until next year.

November VT Message {Conference Preserves}

What a great General Conference we had in October!  I loved every minute and drew such strength from each of the speakers.  I preserved a few of my favorite thoughts and quotes to share with my Visiting Teaching sisters, and you are welcome to use them, too.

To make some Conference Preserves to share with your sisters, you will need 3 sheets of paper—I used a regular weight paper with a cute print on one side and white on the back.  I printed on the white side.

   Click here, here, and here for the quotes.

Next I cut them along the dotted lines, folded them, and put them in a quart jar with some extra treats.

To make the tag, click on the link below to print, then cut around or use a punch to cut them out.

The tag is large enough to put on your lid if you are using a wide-mouth jar, or, you can tie it around the neck of the jar with some ribbon.

Click here for the tag.

I hope that you had a great conference, too!

Happy Visiting Teaching!

P.S.  If you are in the North Utah County area and would rather purchase some Conference Preserves to share with your sisters this month, there are limited quantities available at The Country Loft {288 E. Main Street} in Lehi.