Look scrumptious? Oh, it is. Trust me. I am no expert cook, so for me to say this recipe was easy-peasy means this recipe was seriously easy. First, set your oven to 400 and line a cookie sheet with tin foil. You take a sleeve of saltine crackers and line them on top of the tin foil. In a medium size sauce pan, you boil 2 and a half sticks of butter and 1 and a half cups of brown sugar for three minutes. It will get foamy looking almost. Make sure you are constantly stirring. My husband warned me that this stuff can burn easily. In all seriousness, I timed three minutes on my iPhone just so I wouldn't mess this up. After the three minutes is up, you poor it on top of the crackers and put it in the oven for seven minutes. Once you take it out, you sprinkle it with Heath bar bits and chocolate chips. Let it cool completely and then break it into pieces. It's not going to break into perfect cracker pieces. It's hard- just like toffee, and man is it delicious. Just by me writing this post I had to sneak in the kitchen and grab a piece. Yummmmy.
Anyhow, we ended up making this hillbilly toffee, peanut butter rice crispie treats dipped in chocolate, white chocolate pretzel, rice crispie, and nut balls, peppermint puppy chow (another idiot proof recipe), frozen bananas dipped in chocolate, buckeyes, oreo truffles dipped in white chocolate, white chocolate holiday popcorn mix, ritz crackers and peanut butter dipped in chocolate, and haystacks (Chinese noodle, butterscotch candy).
Seriously. We made enough candy to fuel Santa's elves for the next ten Christmases.
We laughed and reminisced on past Christmases. I love this candy making tradition. Each year we start out strong, but by three hours in our peanut butter balls go from being the size of a ping pong ball to the size of a softball. Lol. After the third hour of double boiling almond bark we become tired and... then come on the belly aches.
The "I ate to much chocolate, licked to many spoons, tested to many peanut butter balls" belly ache. Oh, and man, this year it was full force. Lol.
I could have starred in a Pepto-Bismol commercial.
Heartburn, nausea, indigestion, upset stomach, diarrhea! Yay, Pepto Bismol!
The night (or early morning for that matter) came to an end at two o'clock in the morning. Dustin and I dragged our chocolate stained faces into the guest bedroom which was decorated a few of my childhood memories. The full size bed is that of which I slept on growing up. In the corner of the room was the life size Tiger that my daddy won for me at Vision Land.
Let's stop there so I can explain that one- Long story, short.. I was about ten years old and we visited one of the new theme parks that opened a few hours from our home. We kept passing a small carnival game that featured a HUGE tiger from Winnie the Pooh. He was gigantic and I wanted him more than I wanted anything else in the world. The game was rigged, as most carnival games are. You had to be able to get a ball into a cup. Sounds easy, right? Not so much. In all reality, the ball is bigger than the cup so the odds of the ball fitting into the cup are slim to none. Not when your home team consist of God and Daddy. My dad paid the five dollars for his three chances. First chance. Fail. Second chance. Fail. Third chance? I prayed harder than I ever had, and believe it or not- and I have the Tiger to prove it- that ball went over the cup, bounced off the wall, and landed right into that tiny cup. WINNER. And who says God doesn't answer prayers? There ya' go folks. Sounds silly, but that's where my testimony of prayer blossomed. It works, folks. He listens. He provides. He is the All Mighty.
Anywho, we strategically got comfortable on the full size bed and were out like a light. I woke up earlier than everyone else in the house, and I just sat in the living room crying.. A happy cry, none the less. I am so blessed to have such a wonderful family, and I was given such a wonderful childhood of blessings, traditions, and fun. Yeah, it had it's ups and it's downs but the down's taught me something new every time. My parents taught me right from wrong. They taught me manners. They taught me how to be strong, how to stand up for what I believe in, and most of all to never give up on myself or my family. I had a great childhood, and though I am twenty-two now and have been out on my own for four years, I still feel the love from my parents.
I want to give a broken child a childhood that I had. I want to show a child what love, family, hope, and God is all about. I want to show a child what it feels like to be loved by many. I feel like I have this awesome family, willing to welcome in a stranger and love them like a grandchild.. I am just ready to share memories like these with a foster child. Yes, I want children of my own, but I specifically want to help a child that wasn't as fortunate as me. I want to share these experiences with them. I want to show them my four foot Tiger and teach them that anything is possible through Christ. I want to show them how silly my Dad is and how loving my Mom is. I want them to have a belly ache- not because it's empty because they have been neglected food- but because they ate so much chocolate on Christmas Eve that they are miserable yet so, so, so loved.
After everyone woke up and had their fair share of coffee, we headed to my grandmothers house for breakfast. I was devastated to find out there was no breakfast. Not because I was starving but because it was a Christmas tradition. I don't like quiche, but every year I would stomach eating sausage quiche just because my Mom had slaved over it for two hours. We would sit around the table, thank God for our many blessings, and tear into some biscuits and gravy. Afterwards we would pass out gifts and share more laughter and stories. This time there was no breakfast. No quiche.
I don't want to get into any complicated family drama on here, so I will make this short and sweet. I grew up in my grandparents house. I was blessed enough to have two wonderful parents and two wonderful grandparents. My grandpa was my best friend, and though he has been gone for over ten years, God has given me the gift to remember every memory of him just like it was last week. He was a wonderful man, and he and I shared a close relationship. I was devastated when he passed, confused almost. I was eleven years old, and maybe I didn't accept his passing as I should have, but, hey, I was young. I lost him, physically, but I had the memories of him and the material things he left behind to help me feel his lingering presence.
Within the past few years his house has changed. My uncle, whom lives with my grandmother, has changed so much around. And, it makes me so angry. I want everything to stay the same. I don't want anything to change. I want every piece of furniture left in the same spot just as if nothing had ever changed. Just as if, I could wake up and it'd be Saturday morning, the smell of pancakes cooking would be lingering in the air, and my Papa would be calling my name for breakfast..
I know that's never going to happen, but I didn't want to come to terms with it. When I was missing Papa and needed to fill that hurt in my heart, I would go to Grandma's house. I'd sit where his chair once sat, and take in the familiar sights, sounds, and smells of the house I once grew up in.
But, things changed.. The house is filled with unfamiliar furniture and trinkets. The kitchen resembles that of a green house- seriously? Ugh.
It wasn't until this Christmas that I realized I had been holding onto these things to fill a void that I've got to come to terms with. My papa has been gone for over a decade, and no matter how perfect and untouched his house stays, he isn't going to walk in the front door.
I was so angry that we weren't sitting down for breakfast on Christmas morning. It's another one of those things I wasn't willing to let go of. If we didn't have Christmas breakfast, if Papa's chair wasn't set at the head of the table, how would I feel his presence on Christmas morning?
We went straight into opening presents, and call me crazy but I knew my grandpa was in that front living room with us. I felt him, and I was finally able to let go of things I've tried to hold onto for 10+ years. I felt like a child trying to hold a handful of bright colored balloons in a hurricane. The balloons were slipping away one by one and I was crying out, begging God to bring the balloons back. But, the thing is, the balloons will always be in my heart. Those memories I have of my grandfather will always be with me no matter what furniture inhibits his house- no matter what traditions are broken- no matter how many plants my uncle crams into the kitchen.
So, I let the balloons go, and I feel relived. My uncle is free to decorate the house with leopard print couches if he pleases. My grandpa lives in my heart, not in that house on Hinkle Road. I can't believe it's taken me this long to realize this. Oh, well, better now than later.
My grandmother is an amazing woman also. She is a strong willed woman with an intense love for God. She has been a member of the LDS church since I can remember, and she is the closest thing on this Earth to perfect. Ever since she's had her stroke, her speech has weakened and she has lost a little bit of the light that once shown in her eyes. When she speaks, I listen (and normally take notes). Here are my notes from Christmas-
Grandma told me a personal story about a child that was bouncing on one of those bouncy balls with the rubber handle. She said the mother kept telling him to get off the bouncy ball, stop bouncing in the house, go outside and play with that, STOP IT I SAID! The little boy was reluctantly saying, "No! You cannot make me!" and after several of these disrespectful remarks the mother got up, went to the kitchen to get a butcher knife, and stabbed that bouncy ball several times until it was lifeless, lacking air. The little boy was terrified. The mother loved her son and had never hurt him physically or emotionally. She was a good mother. She had acted spontaneously and that small decision she made to pop that ball stuck with the child for years. He was terrified of balls and butcher knives! That's a small memory that little boy will hold onto forever.
She told me this to remind me how something simple, that maybe we, as adults, don't think is that big of a deal can have a huge impact on a child. Even if it wasn't directed towards a child, maybe they witnessed something or overheard something.
I have all of these amazing memories of my parents and my childhood. With taking on this fostering adventure, I am just hoping that when these children grow up that they can look back and have memories of fun times when they felt loved and happy. I hope that maybe they can take something they learned or experienced from our home and incorporate into their own lives as they grow up and have their own family. I hope they tell stories to their children about fun Christmases spent with their foster family.
The thought of them leaving my home with a bad memory plaguing their mind scares me to death. I struggle with the thought that some of these children will come to me not interested in school (because they were never taught to put forth effort in academics). What if I have to be the bad guy and enforce strict rules about school attendance, participation, and grades? Most of these kids lack discipline and it's our job as stand-in parents to teach them right from wrong, to show them proper discipline techniques, and to be their parents first, friend later. I've got to be tough but soft. I've got to understanding but firm. I've got to do an awesome job because it's my job to turn these child's lives around. Whew, what a concept.
In other news, I bought a pink bird cage. What should I put in it? Birds terrify me. But, pink bird cages are adorable. I am thinking, plant maybe? Hmm...
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