November 2020 – The Writer of Letters

Mug review and my favorite hot cocoa recipe! cue the Christmas tunes and posts

Hello! How are you doing today? I hope your doing amazing, and guys: guess what?! It’s officially socially acceptable to start celebrating Christmas!! I may or may not have been celebrating Christmas since the beginning of November, I’ll let you decide what to believe 😉 In my opinion, Christmas only comes once a year and its the best holiday so why not go all out?

Today I’m back with a super fun and exciting post, and it’s also special because its my first Christmas post of 2020! I know your reader is probably full of Christmas posts so if you’re reading this, thank you very much, I appreciate it ❤

The wonderful Shellea from shelleaandscout over on Etsy kindly agreed to send me a mug in exchange for a blog post and man am I excited for this post! I chose a Christmas mug with this post in mind and the mug Shellea sent me was PERFECT! She sent me the Merry Christmas mug, which is one of my favorites from her shop. Check it out here!

The mug is the perfect size in my opinion and is so fun to drink hot cocoa out of. It’s this really festive red color and says Merry Christmas with some cute little stars around it. The design is made of permanent vinyl so it is completely dishwasher safe although Shellea recommends hand washing so it holds up longer. My mug was put in the dishwasher (unknown to me) on the top rack and held up wonderfully, without any of the vinyl starting to peel or anything!

Next, let’s move on to the cocoa recipe! This cocoa recipe is my family favorite, with it being passed around from one of my cousins and now its a family tradition to make for Christmas movie nights! This recipe originally comes from a Taste of Home magazine, published in 2008 but it’s been altered a little by my family and cousins 🙂

1/2 cup sugar
1/3 cup baking cocoa
1/8 tsp salt
4 cups milk
1/3 cup water
2 tsp vanilla extract
12 tsp almond extract
marshmallows and whipped cream (optional)

The recipe:

1/2 cup sugar
1/3 cup baking cocoa
1/8 tsp salt
4 cups milk
1/3 cup water
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp almond extract
marshmallows and whipped cream (optional)

Heat milk, water, and vanilla and almond extracts in a medium sized pot. Add in other ingredients, mix it up, and let warm until your desired heat! Top with whipped cream and marshmallows and enjoy!

Next, I poured my hot cocoa into my lovely mug and I took some adorable Christmas photos that I’m quite happy with 🥰 Here are my favorites!

*These photos are edited with a filter so this is not the true color of the mug, the actual color is brighter. You can see the true color in Shelleas picture on her shop.

Ahhh I love those photos! So Christmas-y and they definitely help me get into the spirit ❤ Overall, I give this mug a 10/10. I don’t have any complaints and I adore it for drinking my cocoa out of! It also works really well for taking super cute Christmas photos! A huge thank you to Shellea for sending me this mug, I appreciate it so much! Make sure to check out her shop, her mugs are priced super reasonably and I highly recommend.

Thats all for today! I hope you enjoyed this post, I sure enjoyed writing it for y’all! How are you preparing for Christmas if you celebrate it? If you don’t celebrate Christmas what are some fun things happening in your life soon? Do you call it hot cocoa or hot chocolate? Do you have a Christmas mug? I recommend buying one from Shellea if you don’t 😉

xx, Jasmin

Mug Haul dances around excitedly

Hello! How are you doing today?

Today I’m back with a weird-ish post. I don’t know how weird I personally am, although one of my life mottos is “If you’re going to be weird, be confident about it.” And I feel like that is a good motto. I’m pretty confident about my weirdness but I’ve never put it out onto the internet before. So please don’t hate 😂

Anyways, onto the actual post and it’s content! I’m obsessed with mugs, coffee cups or whatever you would like to call them. I went shopping the other day at some stores like Marshall’s, TJmaxx and Burlington Co. and all these stores has great selections of mugs at really good prices, like $5 for a mug! And some of them are the cutest things ever 😍 So of course, I couldn’t pass up the opportunity. I had to buy some. Plus who doesn’t need some nice mugs to sip coffee and hot cocoa and cider from?!

Now let me introduce to you, my new mugs 🙂

** photos edited with Lightroom and taken on a mirror because I was tryna be all fancy, hopefully you enjoy them 😉

This here cup reads “ I run on coffee and Jesus” and boyyyy is it accurate! I’m obsessed with coffee and my usual intake is 1-2 cups per day. And of course, Jesus. My intake of Him through His word (the Bible) is less than it should be, but I’m working on it. My mom is ordering me an advent Bible study so I hope I enjoy that and I’m excited to do it! But anyways, this cup is amazing. I love the quote on the front, and I also love the shape of the mug. I call it a campfire mug because the shape of it reminds me of camping and using metal cups like these.

THIS. ONE. 😍😍😍 I absolutely adore this mug, it’s the cutest thing and the giraffe just makes me happy. It’s the perfect mug to sip your tea or coffee out of on a crisp day, and ahhhh isn’t it the cutest thing?! It’s the “Rae Dunn” style, where it’s not all perfectly even so the top isn’t a perfect circle but I love it all the same. Also I’m kinda impressed with how my pictures turned out, I think they’re cute 🙂

Next, this adorable Christmas-y mug. This is just a simple mug, with a J for Jasmin obviously. I wanted to get a Christmas mug to drink hot cocoa out of for next month when I’m gonna be vibing with my Christmas jams. Can’t wait!! I’m so excited for Christmas and blogmas and all that cheer 🎄

This cup isn’t mine, but I picked it out and my sister is gonna give it to her tutor as a Christmas gift! I love the Bible verse, it’s one that’s really relevant in the times we’re in right now, you just have to know God is in control.

I got this super cute mug for a secret Santa present and it’s super simple but still adorable, don’t you agree? I love the clay bottom on it and how it contrasts with the black. The only downside is that it isn’t dishwasher safe, so you have to hand wash it and I’m lazy. But I’m not keeping it anyways so 😛

Last but not least, this mug is another Christmas gift but it is so cute! It really reminds me of the person we’re giving it too so I hope she loves it and I think she will. It also has a cute verse on the inside of the cup which I think it really cool and is perfect for you to see when your sipping your coffee!

And that’s my haul of mugs! I love them all and I’ve been enjoying drinking coffee, tea and hot cocoa from them! I hope you enjoyed this post, and please don’t leave even though I’m weird xD

Which mug is your favorite? Do you have a collection of mugs? How weird am I? Be nice lol 😂 Did you like my “mug shots ;)) I’m so funnyyy xD Anyways, talk to me in the comments, I’d love to chat! Have a wonderful day!

xx, Jasmin

Happy Blogiversary to TheWriterofLetters!!!

Hello my friends!! Welcome or welcome back to my blog, TheWriterofLetters! I hope your all having a lovely week and today I’m just popping in to say, happy blogiversary to me and my blog! I started blogging last year on this exact day. What a young little kid I was ahah. I didn’t know how many sweet people I would “meet” in the blogosphere or how this blog would help me grow and vent and learn to write better.It’s helped with expressing myself too. I never knew how far this blog would come and I would have NEVER dreamed of having 300+ followers, that is still crazyyy to comprehend! I just want to say the typical but sincere thank you guys all so much for your support, it means the world and I can’t believe it. I’m so grateful and amazed at how sweet y’all are and yeah, you’re the best. Thank you so so so much! And here’s to another fabulous year for TheWriterofLetters!!

also, just for funsies, if you want to cringe and see how my blogging voice has changed in a year, here is a link to my very first blog post!! Enjoy it xD

Thank you guys so so much for your support, it truly is so appreciated! Peace out and have a great day 💓💕

xx, Jasmin