Cajun Christmas Gifts, pt. 2

Continuing the Cajun Christmas Gifts...I decided to do 2 separate posts because #1: I was getting tired of all that typing and #2: separate posts make for easier reading...(you're welcome!)

Day 7: Seven Fleur De Lis...How hard is it to find THESE in Louisiana? So this is what I sent my sister to help her keep her wine glasses or water goblets from getting confused!

Day 8: Eight crabs a brewin' .... oh boy. What am I gonna give her now? Can't send her eight crabs now can I? I go back to Ebay and do a search and "to what do my wonderin' eyes do appear?" This beautiful bracelet for my sister to wear!

Day 9: Nine oysters stewin'....Well, now HERE'S a dilemma! I search and google all over for SOMETHING but I keep drawin' a blank. Finally, I find an oyster platter but it only has 6 wells for 6 oysters. I need a 9 well. Do they make those? Well, yeah, but not for cheap! In fact, after googling and ebaying, and finding everything from a 6 well to a 24 well plate, I decided that if it can't be found....then it can be made. I sent hubs out again with the chainsaw to cut a plate size piece of wood in which he can rout out 9 wells. This task turned out to be not so easy. In the end, he purchased a wood cutting board and did the routing on that. It wasn't as pretty as I would've liked but it was much less $$ than the $2000.00 I kept seeing for antique platters. In the end, I guess I could've found a 9 inch oyster!? Also, wouldn't cha know.....This is the one gift I didn't get a picture of!!! So you'll just have to picture it in your mind. Sorry! :(

Day 10: Ten pirogue paddles. Hubby easily solved this one for me. My dad has been building his house next door and doing much of the finishing and trimming work with cedar. Dad gave hubs a plank of cedar just big enough to cut some small, ornament sized, pirogue paddles out of. Then I tied a pc of red ribbon to it and stuck ten of them in a box for sister. I figured she could hang them in her closets now that she has that house full of smelly kids! (Her new hubs brought 5 children (ages 7 - 17) with him into their blended family!) This picture is of the first one. It was damaged so hubs had to start all over but you get the idea.

Day 11: Eleven duck decoys. After searching Ebay, I found some duck decoys, I but wasn't happy with sending her eleven of them. I mean, she's already picking up after seven children now....did she want to keep up with eleven duck decoys? I just couldn't do that to her. I finally ran across this beautiful print featuring a pair of children feeding a mother duck and her ten ducklings. Then I purchased a Walmart frame to put it in. I figured my sister could hang it in her bathroom or something.

Day 12: Twelve shotgun shells. Okay, well, all I could come up with here was this. I made twelve of these and sent them off to her. I'm sure there are some other really cool crafty things to do with shotgun shells, but I was at the end of my rope....not to mention DEADLINE! I needed to get this stuff packed up and shipped off to Olive Branch, MS!! This picture came from the http://www.shotgunsanta.com/ website. I didn't make mine exactly like this but it was pretty close.

So, there you are. The Cajun 12 gifts of Christmas. I did this for my sister because just love her sooooo much!!! Sadly, I can only do this for one family member at a time, so hopefully, my other sisters can be patient and know that they will get their turn eventually. Although, I'll have to change up the gifts a bit to keep the element of surprise!!!

Cajun Christmas Gifts, pt. 1

In honor of my little sister's (I have 3 little sisters) new family and her celebrating their first Christmas together, I decided I would gift them with the 12 gifts of the Cajun 12 Days of Christmas.

Day 1: A Crawfish in a fig tree.....minus the crawfish.

So, I send my sister and her new hubby a fig tree. When it arrived, my sister didn't know exactly what it was she was looking at. She called me up and asked in this accusatory tone, "You love me so much that you sent me some poison ivy? What's this about?" I just responded, "Sis, it's a FIG TREE!" Still sounding puzzled, she says, "A fig tree? What am I gonna do with a fig tree?" To which I answered the obvious, "Plant it!" Then I went on to explain that I couldn't find a crawfish to send with it (As a matter of fact, I found a crawfish TODAY at Hobby Lobby!!!) and would she just accept the little fig tree and plant the thing in her back yard. It took her a minute before she exclaimed in my ear....."Ooooooh I get it!!!" I swear, some people are just sooooo slooooow!




Day 2: Two voodoo dolls. So I sent them these in honor of their new marriage. My new brother in law phoned to say he'd never rec'd a voodoo doll from a Baptist before! LOL

Day 3: T'ree stuffed shrimp. Well, now, here I drew a blank. I had no clue what to do for 3 stuffed shrimp. I toyed with the idea of phoning a restaurant in her area and just having 3 stuffed shrimp delivered to her office for lunch. Then she went and took 10 days off from work so she could decorate her house. So much for having lunch delivered to her office....and I couldn't have it delivered to her house because I had no idea whether or not she'd even be there. Then her cat would end up eating the shrimp. Oh, yeah, she has a CAT!!....so I purchased 3 little pkgs of Meow Mix, Ocean Explosion, for my sisters kitty. I later rec'd a text that said, "You're a nut!" followed shortly after by another text telling me that she treated kitty with one of the little morsels and he was going crazy looking for the rest of them. Awww, sweet puddy tat!

Day 4: Four pousse cafe'. For this one, I had to do some internet research. I didn't even know what a pousse cafe' was! I learned that it is a sweet, striped drink made from a series of liqueurs poured in succession so that they float upon each other. It's a "chaser" to enjoy after dinner and after your last cup of coffee. I also learned that bartenders absolutely HATE to make this drink as it requires a bit of tenacity and patience. Since it's layered, the alcohol must be poured with care, the heaviest liquor first, then lighter liquors poured over the back of a spoon so it doesn't mix with the previously poured layers. The end result is a lovely looking layered cordial. Personally, I think it's too pretty to drink....not that I would or anything. However, my daughter tells me that it will knock your socks off! She also says that when she ordered an 11 layer pousse cafe, the look on the bartender's face was absolutely priceless! Anyway, the fourth gift my sister received was pousse cafe cordial glasses I found on Ebay for $10! Woo Hoo!

Day 5: Five poules d'eau....a.k.a. American Coot. Another gift I had to do some research on. This little bird looks like a cross between a chicken and a duck. It has a white, duck like bill but not webbed feet like a duck. It can also be found in stews and other southern Louisiana cuisine. On Ebay again, I found a collector's plate (Only $5!) with 5 of these critters on it. I bought it and sent it on to mah sister.....since I didn't know how else I would fulfill this particular gift.


Day 6: Six cypress knees. Now here's a little story. First of all, I don't know if there's a law against this or not, but I sent hubby out to cut the tops off some tiny cypress knees. I needed them to be about 4 to 5 inches in heighth. I wasn't sure at first what I was going to do with them. I'm not a wood carver or even a very good painter so I debated whether or not to deface these beautiful pieces of wood. Anyway, I finally decided that they'd be the perfect heighth to make unique Louisiana Christmas ornaments for her tree. I started out by boiling the cut knees in order to peel the bark off. This is my first time ever crafting with cypress knees so this entire craft was quite an experiment. To my surprise, the bark just slid right off the wood, leaving a perfectly smooth surface eliminating the need for sanding to paint or polyurethane. I sat them out in the sun for a couple of days to get good and dried out before I sealed them. Then I sat them up on my kitchen counter and..... Do you see what I see?

I see the nativity. Now the really cool thing about this is that these knees were just randomly picked and cut by my hubby down in the woods behind my house. I imagine when he was looking at them all covered in mud and bark, he didn't see the nativity. It was only after they were cleaned that the nativity was revealed. My sister thinks this is the coolest of the 12 gifts so far and instead of hanging them on her tree, she opted to set them up like in the picture.

See Cajun Christmas Gifts, pt. 2 for the rest.