It’s giveaway time! It’s a massive one guys and I’m pretty excited! For the past week or so I’ve been featuring recipes using Staub, Shun, Cuttingboard.com, Finex, and Kitchen Aid and now’s the time to finally bundle everything up and give it all away. Well, not literally, because you’re actually going to win new items, so there’s no real bundling, just figurative bundling.
win this staub!
I hope you’ve been following along – so far I’ve made Slow Braised Japanese Chashu Pork, Mini Puff Pastry Roses, Caramel Corn and Rice Krispie Mix, and Mint Snowman Marshmallows, but with these giveaway items you can make pretty much anything, which is perfect for the holiday season.
win this shun knife and cuttingboard.com boo’s block!
I love food – as I’m sure you know – and one of my favorite Christmas memories is of me, my brother, and Christmas chocolates. As little kids, come the first of December, we would get chocolate advent calendars. I still see them around now: those thin cardboard drugstore boxes featuring a Christmas picture with tiny numbered windows and chocolates hiding behind them. My brother and I lived for that moment at the end of the day when we got to pry open the cardboard for our long awaited treat. Our eager fingers would melt the chocolate ever so slightly as we tried to eat our chocolates as slowly as possible.
win this finex cast iron pan!
One year, we got it in our heads that we didn’t want to wait. We snuck our calendars down to the basement – it was cold and dark down there and I didn’t like it but my brother convinced me it was the best place to hide – and ate every single chocolate. We ate the entire month of December. And the thing is, we did it in a gentle, artful way where we could close back the windows so that at a casual glance, you couldn’t tell that the calendar was ravaged.
win this kitchen aid!
Maybe it was the sugar-high making us crazy, but we totally thought we got away with it. That is, until it was time for our nightly ritual with our parents. Needless to say, there was no chocolate treat that night. Or the next night, or the next. But, it was okay, because come Christmas morning, there were still presents under the tree. Apparently, our chocolate binge didn’t leave us on Santa’s naughty list, which was a huge relief, because, presents.
These days I’m more into giving than receiving so I couldn’t resist putting together this giveaway for you! I wish I could send everyone a Christmas present but since I can’t, I thought I’d do the next best thing and giveaway some of my favorite things. So, let me know your favorite holiday memory and maybe you’ll be the lucky reader who wins! Good luck!
Giveaway: I’ve teamed up with some of my favorite brands to do a massive giveaway. One lucky reader will win:
Staub 4 Quart Round Cocotte
Shun 6-inch Dual Core Utility Knife
Cuttingboard.com Boos Block Walnut 20×15 Cutting Board
Finex 10-inch Cast Iron Pan
Kitchen Aid Artisan Design Series 5-Quart Stand Mixer w/Glass Bowl in Pearl Silver
To enter: Leave a comment on the blog with your favorite winter holiday memory. I want to hear ALL the details! I’ll randomly choose a winner and notify them through email. Open to US residents only. (Sorry international friends, only American companies agreed to this one!) If you’d like some extra entries use the widget below to follow me on Instagram, Twitter, and Pinterest. Contest ends December 21st at 12pm PST. Good luck!
The giveaway is closed! I’ll be announcing the winner in the next week or so after reading through all of the comments. Thank you everyone who entered! There are some beautiful memories here!
Update: Congrats Chelsea, you won! Look for an email from me shortly!
That time I got a present from my father. We always got presents from both my parents but this one was special because it was just from him. It was a Jenga and it caused a lot of yelling (and fun times) over the years.
My favorite holiday memory is the first time we started doing Secret Santa. Our family is huge (6 people) and we had gotten old enough to buy presents for each other with our own money. One year, my sister asked if we could start doing Secret Santa so that we could concentrate on one person and give them great gifts instead of spreading ourselves thin for five people. We all loved the idea and come Christmas morning, it was the best feeling ever as we all took turns giving out Santa Babies their present! It was heartwarming and sweet to see how well everyone knew each other, my younger brother especially since I didn’t think he ever took mental notes of peoples likes and dislikes. It really felt like everyone was enjoying giving rather than receiving that year ??
We (family and friends) would all gather at a friend’s home where we had the most delicious peanut butter balls, gingerbread men/women (the best ones had red hots as buttons), ham biscuits, and a regional favorite, Hot Virginia Dip. Merry Christmas!!!
I have lots of favorite holiday memories some involve a gift I received and some involved something I gave someone…my favorite memory is from a very long time ago when I was just a little girl. We lived in a metropolitan suburb and made the trip many times to my grandparents farm just a few hours away…”are we there yet?” and what town is this?” drove my parents crazy….they answered our persistent questions and listened as we giggled about the town named Sleepy Eye. Once we arrived at the farm, we couldn’t wait to play in the snow with our cousins…hours outdoors were always rewarded with grandmas homemade hot chocolate topped with marshmallows. If the weather outside was bad, grandma always had dish towels ready for our amateur attempts at embroidery or we played chopsticks on the old piano. At night we would crawl into the bed under a pile of five or six blankets because the only source of heat was through floor grate. That same floor grate was the perfect place to spy on the adults playing cards after we were sent to bed. In the morning we would hurry downstairs and lay in front of the heat register to warm our toes. Every holiday meant grandma brought out the family favorites. There was always ham and scalloped potatoes, homemade rolls and lefse, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes with marshmallows, corn (plain and scalloped), carrots/celery/black olives/green olives and of course, grandmas dill and sweet pickles. Dinner was always finished with pie and freshly whipped cream. Years later I now understand that the greatest gift I received from my parents was the gift of time with my family. Many of the traditions my grandma shared with me, I now share with my children and grandchildren.
My favorite holiday memory is also of me and my brother. It was a few days before Christmas. It was becoming dark out. It was snowing. We went into the park that was beyond our backyard, and we made snow angels. And I remember laying down, looking up at the sky and just watching the snow fall. And it was kind of hypnotizing. And I didn’t have a care in the world.
Merry Christmas!!
My favorite holiday memory is when my brother and I made snow angels in the park behind our house. And I remember looking up at the sky, watching the snow coming down. And i didn’t have a care in the world!
Merry Christmas!
My favorite wintery memory has to be my junior year of college. My family was never into imbibing, but I figured I would let them see what college was about. We ended up playing family beerpong for HOURS with my grandparents, who had a BLAST. This was not long after my parents divorced, and the joy we had been lacking really came through that night! They now request to play every Christmas!
My favorite Christmas memory is definitely making cookies with my mother. She started baking the day after Thanksgiving and filled our freezer!
She was an artist with the spritz cookies, and my brothers and I got to decorate them. Lots of trees, lots of wreaths. But the most fun were the little dogs, which looked like our Sampson Todo.
My favorite memory is laying under the Christmas tree in a dark room watching the lights blink on and off while listening to the sound the old fashioned lights used to make (1960’s).
My favorite winter holiday memory is having my huge family (brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles and cousins) close to 50 people gather under one roof for a huge Christmas family potluck dinner. We eat great food, play a ton of games, laugh till our bellies ache, and then eat some more! We usually gather around 1 pm and don’t go home until well after midnight! Family is the most important thing in life. I treasure them all dearly! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!