Merry Christmas, Y'all!

'Twas the day after Christmas, and on the internet...just kidding, I went shopping today after having a very enjoyable Christmas Eve and Christmas.  I was so hungry, that I legitimately forgot to take pictures.  In addition, it'd be strange to do with my surrogate grandfather and uncle there.  So I took some selfies and a picture of my gifts.

Shirt: Azul, Skirt: Silence & Noise

Look at me, I did my makeup.  You can't tell though because bangs. Collar: American Eagle

Top Row: Sweater, Free People; Sweatshirt, Abercrombie & Fitch; bath & body stuff; pants, Free People (navy); sweat pants, Abercrombie & Fitch (red)
Middle Row: ASUS laptop; pumps
Bottom Row: slippers, Macy's; sweater, Anthropologie; polka dot shirt, BDG; blazer, H&M

I love all the gifts I received, but my favorite has to be the computer.  It is so beautifully efficient and I am actually a big fan of Windows 8.  I am typing on it right now!  Part of the package I wanted to give myself was an updated iPod, with songs I never listen to deleted and new music downloaded.  It is just the way I want it and I could not be happier.

For food, I eat the same dishes for Christmas every year.  In Polish tradition, fish is eaten for dinner on Christmas Eve, Wigilia, when most of the immediate family gather.  We had four different types of herring, a broiled lake fish, barszcz, pierogi, vegetarian bigos, eel, and smoked salmon.  In some houses, they make as many as 12 different fish dishes, but we don't have the space or means to.  I got to enjoy some South African white wine with my eel, bigos, and fish; the meal was delicious and gluten-free.  The whole pescatarian Christmas feast stems from Catholic religious tradition, where eating meat is undesirable on the eve's of major holidays.  In my family, we always offer coffee and tea with the desserts platter.  For me, there was my mother's flourless cheesecake and we also bought chocolate mousse cake from Eataly, this Italian masterpiece of a grocery store.

Then Christmas day, my aunt came over for some roast ham, potatoes, South African red wine, meat bigos, and leftover smoked salmon.  It was a pretty relaxed day.  I hope you guys had relaxing Christmases/holidays as well!

Keep it yummy,
Jo

Cupcake Bouquet

Sorry about being a butt and not posting on Sunday!  I'm feeling somewhat better, but I'm really just using my blog as stress.

Anyway, I saw this post on Tumblr and was absolutely inspired.  I really wanted to do this one day, but did not have the resources.  On the day celebrating our first month together, Matt and I decided that we wanted to get crafty.  So we went to A.C. Moore, and later Wegmans, to acquire supplies with which to make a Cupcake Bouquet.  I also really wanted to make cupcakes anyway, but he took it the extra step.

Gluten-free chocolate cake mix.  More on this later.

Milk, eggs, butter, and cake mix.

Matt adding the mix to the dry ingredients.

No blog entry is complete without a picture of me eating something.  H&M beanie, AE blue tank top, pink ring that I got from Tobi

Cupcakes, cupcakes, CUPCAKES.

The cupcakes were delightful.  The cake mix had the prefect consistently.  Though, I will be honest, baking non-vegan was different for me.  I hadn't done it in a while, but thank God that this mix was so easy to use, because I would not have been able to figure out how to use eggs.  Then again, that was Matt's problem, since he was doing most of the baking.

We also bought a fancy pastry bag with tips in order to the frosting on artfully.  Matt is pretty boss at frosting, but unfortunately, we were completely winging the recipe and it got really runny and, after adding more confectioner's sugar, super tough.  You can't have all the nice things, can you?

Here we have the Matt in his natural habitat of frosting.

Close enough.  But the wrappers are cute.

Finished product and I look so happy.

Unfortunately, I got a phone call from Wegman's indicating soy lecithin in the cake mix that was not previously listed as an ingredient.  Excuse me while we bury yet another fantastic product on the long list of things I can't eat.  Lovely.

Keep it yummy,
Jo