Christmas!

I've been crazy busy leading a life instead of wallowing so I haven't even thought about blogging and then I realized that it's almost the end of the year and I should blog one last time for 2006.
This season holiday has been filled with tons of firsts for me and I want to brag about them, because well that's what I do best.
So for the first time ever in ages my whole family spent Christmas together and did the whole Christmas thing. We had our first real Christmas tree. When I was a little kid we had that fake Christmas tree thing but we never got a real one. So this year we got one as a present for my mom. She kept going up to it and sniffing it and saying it smells good! I loved it. Then we had our first Christmas dinner. Well it was on Christmas Eve but hey it's close enough. We actually had over 17 ppl over for dinner which was way more then we expected but we set up the table for everyone. I was also the party host which was my first time being a host for a 'grown-up' party for that many ever.
My favorite firsts were the cooking firsts though. I cooked green beans for the first time ever. Really quick and easy recipe... caramelized onions (only way I'll eat them) with a splash of apple cider (my definition of a splash is about half a cup btw) and then add steamed green beans to that cook together for 5 min. so the green beans pick up the apple cider taste. Then I made my first apple pies... not exactly from scratch since Pilsbury did help me w/ the crust but I did peel and cut the apples and flavor them all by myself. Then this is when the crying and emergency phone calls started. I made my first turkey all by myself... everyone had left the house to tend to other Christmas errands and if I didn't make the turkey either A. no turkey for dinner or B. dinner would have started off really really late. It was really easy too... season turkey with the following salt, pepper and some garlic powder. Make sure it gets the seasoning on all sides. Then cut celery, carrots, onions (and/or any other good veggies into the dish) put veggies underneath turkey add some water. Cook 15 mins per lb or until button pops with an aluminum 'tent' on top of turkey. When done take 'tent' off leave in oven for another 10 minutes to get color onto turkey.
Thanks are given to the following ppl for a great Christmas...
First off to my family for co-operating with me to have a good Christmas with one another.
Next to Howell Strauss for opening his home to all of us to have this event... especially loved the toast where you welcomed the 'whole family' weather by birth, marriage or choice.
Never forget Kevin Strauss for helping me pull this off with helping of shopping and keeping me calm and help with recipe ideas.
Chef Dave Clouser for the apple pie recipe he gave us.
The Strauss-Benjamin-O'Glasser family for welcoming my family and me into their family.