How about we start off today’s blog with some good news. . . the winner of the Ninja Blender!   I loved reading each and every one of your Christmas stories!

True Random Number Generator:  Min: 1   Max: 100  Result:  64

Erin

Love ya, Biz. I think it would be hard to delete the DVR. Just one more thing that breaks my heart for you. My favorite Christmas memory is the last one I had with my maternal grandmother. She had been sick for a few years and that Christmas was the last time I saw her before she passed away. Fast forward to October and she slipped away before I could get up there. It’s the biggest regret I have in life, that I couldn’t get up there to see her before she died.

Erin – please send me your mailing address to mybizzykitchen@gmail.com.  Congrats!

So yesterday was a tough day.  I haven’t read all the comments to yesterdays post, mostly because I didn’t want to cry at my desk, but this weekend I will.  One of the things I’ve done is to just . . . keep busy.  It seems if I slow down and take a breath, the reality sets in that Tony’s not here.  So strange.  Over the weekend I met up with Hannah, her boyfriend and their friend (and mine!) Melody with her son Carver.  I decided to go to Pilot Pete’s because the restaurant is an a small municipal airport.  He didn’t seem too interested in the planes when I brought out my tablet and he started to watch a Mickey Christmas!  Courtney, have you ever taken your boys there?

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The food was surprisingly really good!  We split the friend calamari, and Hannah and I both got the pulled pork bbq sandwich – it was so much food, I probably ate 1/3 of the pork sandwich.

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Mel’s son REALLY like his mac n cheese – I love this picture of him!

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Thanks Mel for the loot too – you didn’t have to give me anything, but I am loving the lipstick!

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And I brought out a few of my hundreds of snowmen.

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Sunday I spent the afternoon at my Mom’s for our Christmas with my sister and her family and Hannah and Jacob.  My Mom is going to be spending Christmas in Austin with my brother.  Sadly, I had charged my battery to the DSLR and promptly left it in the outlet at home, and my iPhone battery was about dead.  Dammit!  I brought all the meat and cheese!  The secret to my mac n cheese?  Shredded butter over the top before baking – it gets a nice bread crumb crispy topping, but super creamy underneath.  And Hannah and I being goofy!

I also made this Christmas tree . . .ball appetizer!  I found it on pinterest – I’ll link to it later, but it’s basically homemade pizza dough, wrapped in mozzarella cheese, baked and then dipped into marinara sauce – really good!

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And Hannah and Jacob gave me the cutest bag!  I put this on Instagram and there was interest for people wanting one, but this is a one hit wonder and its all mine! Open-mouthed smile

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So my oven died on Friday and I went and bought one on Saturday and it was delivered last night.  It is so nice it makes my kitchen look even worse than it normally does!

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It’s a Frigidaire – it has a convection oven, an internal meat thermometer and a ceramic cook top.  I literally didn’t want to use it because it was so pretty, but I broke it in with . . . pizza!  Duh!  Hannah, Jacob and my Mom went in on a gift for me – something I’ve wanted for a while – a baking steel!   It’s super heavy and it needs to heat up to 500 degrees for 45 minutes, but it was worth the weight.  The crust was perfect!

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That picture doesn’t do the pizza justice, but it was delicious!  I haven’t been sleeping well lately, and I woke up late this morning.  I’ve literally got 10 minutes to get ready and out the door.  No problem!  Only 1 1/2 more work days this week – woop!  Make it a great day!