Christmas Wrap-up

Oh Christmas.  We have so much fun together, but by the time you actually get here, I am glad to see you leave.  I don't usually stress over holidays, but with moving and dealing with a 1 1/2 year old who has an early case of the terrible two's, I'm ready to get things back to normal around here.

Nonetheless, we had a lovely holiday.

I made a promise to myself that I would take it easy this year and not make any gifts, but as usual, I did not listen to my words of wisdom.  I completely blame Rae and her Lickety Split Bag Pattern.  I even got an email from her that included lots of evil laughter.  Darn you Rae and your awesome patterns!

I wish I had the means to shower everyone in my life with elaborate Christmas presents, but alas, living on the salary of a second year resident and a stay at home mom doesn't allow one to be very flashy.  So this year it was chocolate to the rescue!  More specifically Chocolate-Orange Hazelnut Bark.   I whipped up nine batches of this baby and packaged them all up for gifts. 

Please forgive my massacred orange pic above.  I actually ran out of oranges at the end and had to resort to clementines, which don't skin nearly as well.  Lots of pith scraping....

This is my absolute favorite bark recipe (any other chocolate and orange fans out there?), and I follow Martha's directions pretty closely.  My only changes include mixing in some good, dark chocolate along with the semi-sweet, roasting the hazelnuts beforehand, and generously sprinkling the entire thing with fleur-de-sel.  I love me some sweet and salty. 

I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday!  Anyone get anything super exciting?