Christmas Carol Game - Answers

Here's the answers to the Christmas Carol Game I posted yesterday.  We played it at our meeting and it elicited the appropriate laughter, moans and groans so I'm going to consider it a success.

Answers:

1.  Hoping not to visit the dentist during the holidays.

ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS IS MY TWO FRONT TEETH

2.  Spanish Christmas Classic 

FELIZ NAVIDAD

3.  Shut up when it’s dark outside. 

SILENT NIGHT

4.  A water horse is on my wish list. 

I WANT A HIPPOPOTAMUS FOR CHRISTMAS

5.  Small city in the Middle East. 

O LITTLE TOWN OF BETHLEHEM

6.  Tiny male percussionist. 

LITTLE DRUMMER BOY

7.  Wife is witnessed cheating on husband with Christmas icon. 

I SAW MOMMY KISSING SANTA CLAUS

8.  Nureyev namesake quadruped with a fortuitous birth defect. 

RUDOLPH THE RED-NOSED REINDEER

9.  Excuse me?  What was that sound? 

DO YOU HEAR WHAT I HEAR?

10. The opposite of Black Easter. 

WHITE CHRISTMAS

11. Royal trio from the Far East we be! 

WE THREE KINGS OF ORIENT ARE

12. Ms. Channing or Ms. Burnett of the chimes. 

CAROL OF THE BELLS

13. Pealing clappers. 

JINGLE BELLS

14. Also a song by Three Dog Night.

JOY TO THE WORLD

15. German coniferous yuletide symbol. 

O TANNENBAUM  (OH CHRISTMAS TREE)

16. December 14^th to December 25^th. 

THE 12 DAYS OF CHRISTMAS

17. Decorating passageways with the floor of a ship. 

DECK THE HALLS

18. The color of Elvis Presley’s shoes on December 25^th. 

BLUE CHRISTMAS

19. Chilly balls of frozen precipitation wearing a top hat. 

FROSTY THE SNOWMAN

20. Family matriarch in tragic accident on Christmas Eve. 

GRANDMA GOT RUN OVER BY A REINDEER

21. The expected vision of the season is starting to happen. 

IT’S BEGINNING TO LOOK A LOT LIKE CHRISTMAS

22. It looks like there will be nary an item for me in my stocking or under the tree. 

I’M GETTING’ NUTTIN’ FOR CHRISTMAS

23. Stonehenge surrounding the pine scented Christmas symbol. 

ROCKING AROUND THE CHRISTMAS TREE

24. Steeple noisemakers – not golden. 

SILVER BELLS

25. St. Nick will be arriving in your habitat. 

SANTA CLAUS IS COMING TO TOWN

In Other Words ... A Christmas Game

Wanna be my "Christmas game idea" focus group?

I’ve mentioned before that I am the group leader of a local TOPS chapter, so for the last several weeks we’ve been discussing how to survive holiday functions and the monumental amounts of food that are involved with any sort of celebration.  Tonight is our last meeting of 2015 so I thought it would be fun to have a games night complete with prizes.  Yes, yes … we are a small group of adults … but who doesn’t like to go home with a little something?

I saw a game online quite some time ago that I thought would be fun to play but of course when I went to look for it again I couldn't find the website (memo to self: Bookmark!).  So I decided to make up my own version ... I'm calling it "In Other Words" ... simply, well known Christmas carol titles explain in "other words".

So back to being my Christmas game guinea pigs focus group … and if you tell me the whole idea really sucks … then my group will have to fall back on word scrambles and bingo.

IN OTHER WORDS – THE GAME 

Can you figure out these 25 well known Christmas Carols when they are described in other words?

For example:

"Evidence of moth munching after sundown"

would translate into ...

O HOLY NIGHT

Get it?

Don’t worry, there are no obscure carols such as “Six White Boomers” – although come to think of it – THAT would have made an awesome bonus question!

DISCLAIMER:

SORRY … there are no prizes for the guinea pigs focus group.

Wanna play?

I think some are easier than others but in no order of difficulty …

1.  Hoping not to visit the dentist during the holidays.

2.  Spanish Christmas Classic

3.  Shut up when it’s dark outside.

4.  A water horse is on my wish list.

5.  Small city in the Middle East.

6.  Tiny male percussionist.

7.  Wife is witnessed cheating on husband with Christmas icon.

8.  Nureyev namesake quadruped with a fortuitous birth defect.

9.  Excuse me?  What was that sound?

10. The opposite of Black Easter.

11. Royal trio from the Far East we be!

12. Ms. Channing or Ms. Burnett of the chimes.

13. Pealing clappers.

14. Also a song by Three Dog Night.

15. German coniferous yuletide symbol.

16. December 14^th to December 25^th.

17. The floor of a ship used to decorate passageways.

18. The color of Elvis Presley’s shoes on December 25^th.

19. Chilly balls of frozen precipitation wearing a top hat.

20. Family matriarch in tragic accident on Christmas Eve.

21. The expected vision of the season is starting to happen.

22. It looks like there will be nary an item for me in my stocking or under the tree.

23. Stonehenge surrounding the pine scented Christmas symbol.

24. Steeple noisemakers – not golden.

25. St. Nick will be arriving in your habitat.

 I know what you are all thinking ...

 If anyone is interested I’ll post the answers tomorrow.

Sunday Christmas Baking - Round DONE!

All that's left now is to make the cake for dessert at Christmas dinner.  I'm always the "dessert bringer".  Secretly, I think it's because it is so much easier to bring veggies, a salad, or a side dish than dessert.  You see, I'm still trying to figure out how this works?  When one of my daughters is hosting the holiday dinner the "host" does the turkey and the rest becomes pot-luck. When it's my turn to host I get to prepare everything and they show up with empty tupperware for leftovers.  (Oh yes, I imposed that rule a long time ago ... you want to take leftovers home?  Bring your own containers 'cause I've had to replenish my supply too often).

So this Sunday the task was Cinnamon Palmiers, Pistachio Pinwheels, Monkey Bars (nothing to do with Christmas but they were a special request) and my Chocolate Baklava.  I found the Baklava recipe quite some time ago and it has definitely become a family fave at Christmas and Easter.

I managed to package everything all up (sorry for the blurry pic ... I really need to remember to put my glasses on when use the camera).  I couldn't resist - I had to put "Naughty" and "Nice" stickers on the containers.

All that's left now is the delivering ...

The munching ...

And, hopefully - no cookie regrets or hangovers!

Sunday Christmas Baking - Round 3

Well, you've got to be tired of hearing it (feel free to tell me to stop whining in the comments), but I'm behind again in my posts.  There are these silly folks around that actually expect me to do social things around Christmas time ... go figure?

Anyway - since I started these baking posts I figured I might as well continue on with the latest batch of baking.

This Sunday it included "Chocolate Peanut Butter (filled) Snowballs".  I don't know what happened but I ran out of filling before I ran out of dough so the few cookies on the bottom are simply "Left-over Dough Butter Cookies" with a few sprinkles on top ... they must have been all right because they disappeared quickly enough.

Then, for the first time I attempted "Cherry Chocolate Rugalah".  They turned out well, but I had to get the hang of rolling them properly and the first batch turned out too big.  No worries, they'll go on the dessert table instead of into the gift packages.

My son-in-law loves "Pineapple Kipfel".  They are a kinda-sorta butter dough filled with pineapple.  His Oma used to make them for him every Christmas (as did my mother when I was growing up).  When his Oma passed away I took over making them for him so he wouldn't miss out.  It was a bit of a challenge since I didn't have a recipe to go by.  Consequently there were a few hit and miss years until I finally figured it out to get the taste and texture right.  This year's batch looks like the best ones and it's the recipe I'll stick to from now on.

I live in a little house and although the kitchen is a fair size it has VERY LIMITED counter space, so since it was a disaster zone anyway and I had some bananas that were a couple of hours away from being zombie bananas I decided to make some "Banana Pistachio Muffins" (okay - they are supposed to be Banana Walnut Muffins but I ran out of walnuts and had some pistachios left over so I improvised).

And lest you think I was kidding about the kitchen being a disaster zone ...

BUT ... I did clean up!!

AND ... I managed to get the tree up.

Saturday I am going to make two small batches of cookies that do not freeze well (so cannot be made too far in advance) and on Sunday I am going to make my Chocolate Baklava.  It is the costliest thing on my list of home made gifts and only a select few (by request) get a small container - the rest is for the dessert table at our family and friends Christmas dinner.

Then they'll all get packaged up ready for delivery throughout the week.  No doubt next year I'll again decide that it's too much work ... and probably do it all over again anyway!

Christmas Traditions ... True or False?

I saw this on a FaceBook thread.  Now, I didn't fact check, but I sure like the idea of getting a book for Christmas and the chocolate part!

True or false?