Guest Post-Holiday Traditions and a Recipe for Monkey Bread

With the holidays coming up a lot of us are running around trying to make everything perfect. I am one of those people that tries to make everything just right for my kids. Holiday traditions are very important to me and I try to carry on the memory of my mother through cooking the recipes that she used to make for me growing-up. I love holiday cooking and these traditions are one way that I can teach my kids about their grandmother. On the subject of cooking and holiday traditions today's post is another great guest post. This guest post is by Single Mom in the South. I love that she includes a recipe for monkey bread, it is so yummy! Enjoy and make sure to check out her blog and links when your done reading her great guest post.

One of the things that was hardest for me to come to terms with when my marriage ended was the loss of family holidays and traditions... all those years of growing up with mom and dad and family and special routines... it felt like my children weren't going to get that... it would be different every other year... there would be no consistency for them.

It took a few years, but I realized a few things.  

1.  That heartbreak was mine, not theirs.  They were too young to remember their dad and I together, so this was their normal.  It hurt ME that their childhood Christmases wouldn't be like mine, but they didn't know the difference!

2.  They would make their own traditions and they have.  Without realizing the significance of what they've done, my children have their own rituals that they demand regardless of where they are on Christmas...Things like the Elves leaving pajamas on their pillow on Christmas Eve, getting 3 presents from Santa and making Monkey Bread Boy Howdy, don't think they'll let either their dad or I forget!

 
*****

We started eating Monkey Bread on Christmas morning when we first got married.  We'd been given a copy of the recipe from one of my former sisters-in law after hearing one of the nieces go on about it and thinking that is sounded good. It turned into an annual Christmas morning tradition.

When the kids were born, we continued making it.  That first year, when we had just split, I made it because I was determined to not to lose all of the things we'd intended to be traditions just because we weren't together.  He must have made it for them too, when they were with him, because one year, I tried to do something different.  I tried to make an egg casserole and cinnamon rolls and the kids freaked as I assembled everything the day before!  "Where they Monkey Bread?" they asked.  I ended up sending my dad out to get the ingredients while we headed to my cousins' after church on Christmas Eve.  

On the years they spend Christmas with their father one of them undoubtedly asks on the phone in the says leading up to their visit if he's gotten the 'stuff to make the Monkey Bread?"

*****

I can relax.  Maybe their childhood didn't turn out like I thought it would... maybe it's not like mine ~ which, while traditional and good, had it's own warts *winks*~ but they have done their own thing, without a conscious thought. As the only living reminders of a union and family unit that no longer exists, they have made their own little unit... one that is just for them and comes with it's own traditions.

I couldn't be more proud and I probably love them even harder for it!

I hope your holiday is filled with love, laughter, and family traditions.

Monkey Bread

4 pkgs Original Pillbury Biscuits (in the blue four-pack)

1 1/2 cup sugar

1 1/2 sticks butter

4 T cinnamon

nuts (optional)

Mix 3/4 cup sugar with 2 T cinnamon in a bowl.  Take 2 cans of biscuits and cut into quarters.  Roll them in sugar mixture and stack in a Bundt pan.  Melt 3/4 sticks butter, mix with leftover sugar mixture in bowl and pour over the biscuits.  Repeat with remaining sugar, cinnamon, biscuits and butter.  Bake at 375* for 30 minutes.  When done turn onto a plate and allow butter to drip down.

I've tried to make this less sinful by cutting some of the butter and sugar. Don't...it's a once a year thing... just make it as is and enjoy!

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