Archive for the ‘make it’ Category

Making my home smell wonderful is so important to me this time of year.  The smells of the evergreen, cinnamon, orange and spice all mean the Holidays are here.

A stove top potpourri mix is an easy inexpensive way to make your home smell wonderful.  Packaging the mix in a Holiday bag makes a wonderful gift for friends, neighbors, teachers and co-workers.

Here’s how I make my concoction:

Holiday Stove Top Potpourri Mix

• one whole orange or just the orange peel
  
• 1/2 cup cranberries
• 1 Tbsp. whole cloves
• 3 sticks of cinnamon or a small handful of small pieces of cinnamon
• a bit of grated nutmeg if desired

Quarter the orange.  Put all the ingredients into a saucepan.  Fill pan with water.  Place on the stove on the smallest burner, on the lowest setting.  Refill water as needed.

It’s just that easy.

I love to use an orange that is starting to get old… or just use the peel of an orange.

Another important tip is don’t allow the water to completely evaporate. I always refill the water when I turn it on.  One mix stays good for weeks.  With heating the mix does turn brown, but continues to smell wonderful, so I usually make only batch in a season.

It’s not the Holidays without the delicious scent… it makes me think of cranberry sauce or wassail.  Yum.

A stove top potpourri mix makes a perfect easy gift this season.  It is inexpensive, homemade and useful.

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P. S.  If you are interested in a few ways to package stove top potpourri as a gift, I blogged about it here.  I even included a PDF you can download with the instructions for use.

Last week Janean, a dear friend of my mother’s, dropped by my mom’s while we were baking together.  She had read on my Holiday Calender that our family would be making gingerbread houses this weekend.

She brought us a delightful surprise.  Her husband, who owns a cabinet making company, had made Candy Cottage Kits to give as gifts.  I think they are simply brilliant.

He made them out of a wood composite, which can be decorated for the season, gently cleaned and saved until next year… or even used for another holiday.  No need to make gingerbread… or buy a gingerbread kit… or get burned putting it together like I’ve done in the past.  Once decorated, you would never know it’s not a cookie house.  The darling gingerbread houses above are the ones she made with her grandchildren.

Over the weekend, the kids were able to each decorate their own cottages.

Pure Delight.  That’s what it was.  We had so much fun decorating our gingerbread houses.

Here’s what the kit looked like out of the package.

Here’s what it looked like put together.  Isn’t it fun?

Janean even provided us with some wonderful candies… to which I added a few of our favorites.  I love seeing all those candies together.

We all had a sugar buzz when we were done.  And we all loved the results.