Holiday Traditions

December 1, 2019

This post has been sponsored by Tyson® Foods, Inc. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Ever since our boys were younger, we have celebrated the holidays by giving back. We always adopt families that need a little holiday spirit, we practice random acts of holiday kindness, and we share our home with our friends and family. One of our favorite family activities, though, is spending time together watching holiday movies. We pick at least one weekend day during November and December and curl up on the couch to watch movies while we enjoy a delicious brunch. And, the last few years, we have snuck over to one of our neighbors’ houses to drop off a brunch and movie basket, it’s one of our favorite holiday traditions.

Christmas Gifts

Gift giving doesn’t need to be expensive. It really just needs to come from the heart. One of my boys mows lawns around the neighborhood, and truly knows no strangers. So, we send him on reconnaissance missions to find a family to surprise each year.

A quick trip to our local Walmart store was all we needed to be ready to start gifting! We bought everything we needed to surprise our neighbors with a sweet brunch basket. Our Walmart cart was filled with a soft blanket, plates and napkins, a holiday movie, and ingredients for French Toast, and Jimmy Dean® Premium Regular Pork Sausage Rolls and boxes of Jimmy Dean® Fully Cooked Turkey Sausage Patties. I love being able to one stop shop, and Walmart makes it really easy for this busy mom. What’s even better is their online grocery where you can place orders for delivery or pick-up! And, don’t miss out on this rebate offer!

This year, he wants to surprise two neighbors. They are elderly with no close family, so he has adopted them as extra grandparents. Of course, we can’t tell him no. So, with help from the boys, we made Scrambled Eggs with Jimmy Dean® Pork Sausage, Jimmy Dean® Turkey Sausage Patties, Wright® Brand Hickory Smoked Bacon, and French Toast. The boys were extremely helpful, and very excited to play an active role in our gifting.

Holiday Gift Idea

While we love the idea of gifting our neighbors sweet treats and food, we really wanted to share some of our holiday traditions with them. It was important to pick out a soft blanket and holiday movie to include in the baskets.

Each basket was filled with freshly cooked bacon, and Jimmy Dean® Turkey Sausage patties, fresh French Toast, and our family’s favorite scrambled egg recipe. We usually whisk a dozen eggs with 1/4 cup of milk, and 1/2 cup of cooked and crumbled Jimmy Dean® Pork Sausage. Then we cook the egg mix in a pat of butter over medium heat until nearly fully cooked. Just before the eggs are fully cooked, we sprinkle a 1/3-1/2 a cup of shredded cheese over the eggs.

Packaging Christmas Gifts

Each part of brunch was packaged in food safe cello bags with cute holiday tags attached. {You can find the tags in the shop here, use code NEIGHBORGIFT to download them FREE} We decided to place the eggs in a small bowl. Then, we placed the bowl in a cello bag.

We placed the blanket on the bottom of the basket. Then, we added disposable plates and napkins and a holiday movie. Finally, we added the food to the basket. Each basket had a Happy Holidays tag tied to it as well.

Once the baskets were ready, we snuck over to our neighbors’ houses, dropped off the baskets. Then, we rang the doorbell and ran before they opened their door.