A Gift with Heart

This was not an easy Christmas for my family. After losing mom in January, I dreaded the holidays. She made Christmas SOOO unbelievable with her parties, cooking and gifting. She never left anyone out!
I decided in November that this would not be a Christmas of tears because that would be contrary to everything that my mom was about. So my focus turned to my kids and family. It actually made the holidays easy to get through. I have lots of distractions with 5 year old twins and a 2 year old that finally understood the concept of Santa. Who could be sad surrounded by so much love?
Then I received a special gift from my LONG time friend, Jenni Hunstad. She gave me a book of mom's recipes. Most pages had pictures of mom and recipes in her handwriting. How special and what a surprise! The tears did come but they didn't last long. There were memories of meals we had with these recipes and that brought smiles. I can't thank Jenni enough. It must have taken a lot of time for her to gather the photos and recipes behind my back, organize them and then have the book published. Thanks!


This is her lasagna recipe. It was always what I chose for my birthday dinner!
Check out the hair!

This photo is of mom in Hawaii. She really LOVED the sun! Funny thing is...this recipe is mine. I guess she wrote it down when I gave it to her. It is for cucumber salad that was almost like Grandma Torlina's.

Thanks, Jenni, for always being one of my strongest supporters and shoulder to cry on! I love you!