Table of contents for Thanksgiving Videos

1. Popeye – Pilgrim Popeye (1951)

Vintage Thanksgiving Card

Popeye’s been feeding a turkey in his backyard; it’s Thanksgiving day, and his three nephews are all set to turn the turkey into the main course. But Popeye can’t bring himself to do the deed, so he tells them a story about the time he was a pilgrim and a turkey saved his life.

Popeye is hunting the turkey, which keeps outsmarting him; he finally corners the bird, which gives him a sob story about being too scrawny to eat.

Popeye gives him some spinach, but before the bird can eat it, Popeye is captured by Indians. They tie him to a stake. The turkey, watching, remembers the spinach, which turns the turkey into an eagle. He swoops down, carries off the first batch of Indians and throws them into a mountain; he turns another batch into a totem pole.

Popeye finishes his story and sees the boys missing; dinner time! They prepare to serve the turkey his big plate of spinach.

FREE Vintage Thanksgiving Desktop Wallpapers

Visit us for free vintage Thanksgiving desktop wallpapers and some very beautiful Autumn nature wallpapers. They are our gift to you!

Wallpapers page 1

Wallpapers  page 2

Visit Operation Letters To Santa’s Thanksgiving Section for family activities, recipes and much more!

Lake Tahoe Pinecones - Santa's Favorite Pine Cone Company

This is the time of year that we all go on the hunt for the perfect pine cones to decorate homes and offices with.  No one understand design as well as  Mother Nature so it makes perfect sense to bring natural beauty into our homes during the holiday season. One of our favorite places for pine cones is  Lake Tahoe Pine Cones.

These natural pine cones are  picked in and around Lake Tahoe and the Sierra Nevada region. This company cares deeply about the environment and gather only pine cones that have fallen naturally.  They are then put through a natural drying process which creates a beautiful, high quality, great smelling and long lasting product.

How to Decorate With Pine Cones

One of our favorite Christmas decorations is simple and beautiful. We order our perfect pine cones from Lake Tahoe Pine Cones and then place them in a large basket on the hearth. By adding an arrangement of evergreen branches from the branches cut from the bottom of the Christmas tree and possibly a few glowing red Christmas ornaments we have a lovely and timeless focal piece that we absolutely hate to dismantle at the end of the season.

You can also create a quick and easy centerpiece for your dining room table using pine cones and pine needle branches. Simply add a few pine cones to the center of a clear or colored glass bowl.  Surround the pine cones with fragrant pine needle branches until you create a pleasing arrangement. You can also add nuts, cinnamon sticks, flowers or berries to achieve the look you want.

Christmas Crafts For Kids

Scented Pine Cones

Pine Cone Tree

Holiday Simmering Potpourri

Reindeer Food

Please visit us at Operation Letters To Santa!

Table of contents for Halloween Videos

1. Bewitched – Halloween Special, 1967
2. Garfield’s Halloween Adventure
3. Halloween With the Addams Family
4. Scrappy’s Ghost Story, Columbia Cartoons – 1935
5. Popeye’s Halloween, 1954
6. The Skeleton Dance – Disney 1929
7. Lonesome Ghosts – Walt Disney, 1937
8. Betty Boop’s Halloween Party, 1933
9. The Mad Doctor, Disney 1933
10. Donald Duck Trick or Treat, 1952
11. It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!
12. Casper The Friendly Ghost (Vintage)
13. This is Halloween (Video)
14. Scary Skeleton Dance, 1929 (Video)

Spooky scary skeletons dance Halloween night away!

This black and white Silly Symphony by Disney was relased in August, 1929 in which a nightmarish graveyard provides the background for a quartet of dancing bones.

Enjoy!

Table of contents for Halloween Videos

1. Bewitched – Halloween Special, 1967
2. Garfield’s Halloween Adventure
3. Halloween With the Addams Family
4. Scrappy’s Ghost Story, Columbia Cartoons – 1935
5. Popeye’s Halloween, 1954
6. The Skeleton Dance – Disney 1929
7. Lonesome Ghosts – Walt Disney, 1937
8. Betty Boop’s Halloween Party, 1933
9. The Mad Doctor, Disney 1933
10. Donald Duck Trick or Treat, 1952
11. It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!
12. Casper The Friendly Ghost (Vintage)
13. This is Halloween (Video)
14. Scary Skeleton Dance, 1929 (Video)

This is Halloween

“Halloween Town” is a dream world filled with citizens such as deformed monsters, ghosts, ghouls, goblins, vampires, werewolfs and witches. Jack Skellington, “king of the pumpkin patch”, is a respected entertainer amongst the citizens and grows tired of the repetitive yearly celebration of Halloween. He wanders in the wilderness, where he accidentally opens a portal to “Christmas Town”. Impressed by the feeling and style of Christmas, Jack presents the culture to the citizens of Halloween Town of his slightly inaccurate impressions. While Jack may slightly understand Christmas, the townspeople fail to do so and compare everything Jack says to their ideas of Halloween. Nonetheless the townspeople agree to celebrate Christmas and take over the holiday.

Jack’s obsession with Christmas leads him to usurp the role of Santa Claus. Every resident is assigned a task, while Sally, a rag doll-type resident, begins a romantic attraction towards Jack. However, she alone fears that his plans will become disastrous. Jack then assigns Lock, Shock, and Barrel, a trio of mischievous children to transport Santa Claus to Halloween Town. Against Jack’s wishes and largely for their amusement, the trio deliver Santa to the lair of Oogie Boogie, a gambling-addict bogeyman who plots to play a game with Santa’s life as the stake.

Christmas Eve arrives and Sally attempts to stop Jack, but he embarks into the sky on a coffin-like sled pulled by skeletal reindeer, hoping to deliver presents to children around the world. As Jack begins delivering gifts, children are horrified by their monstrous, which include shrunken heads, man-eating wreaths, vampiric teddy bears, 30-foot snakes, and pull-string ducks dotted with bloody bullet holes. Their parents believe Jack to be an imposter attempting to imitate Santa, and the military is commissioned to shoot Jack out of the sky. He is presumed dead by the Halloween citizens, but eventually is shown to be alive. Although he is initially depressed by the destruction he had caused, he realizes he is still the ruler of Halloween Town and can bring joy to the world in his own way.

Sally attempts to free Santa, only to be captured by Oogie Boogie. With the climax ensuing, Jack rescues Sally and Santa and defeats Oogie Boogie. Santa reprimands Jack before setting off to save Jack’s Christmas mistakes. Santa flies over Halloween Town and gives it snow as a gift to the town, signifying that there be no hard feelings between him and Jack. The townspeople are confused at first, but start to play in the snow. The film ends with Jack and Sally sharing a kiss on a spiral hill over the cemetery.

Table of contents for Halloween Videos

1. Bewitched – Halloween Special, 1967
2. Garfield’s Halloween Adventure
3. Halloween With the Addams Family
4. Scrappy’s Ghost Story, Columbia Cartoons – 1935
5. Popeye’s Halloween, 1954
6. The Skeleton Dance – Disney 1929
7. Lonesome Ghosts – Walt Disney, 1937
8. Betty Boop’s Halloween Party, 1933
9. The Mad Doctor, Disney 1933
10. Donald Duck Trick or Treat, 1952
11. It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!
12. Casper The Friendly Ghost (Vintage)
13. This is Halloween (Video)
14. Scary Skeleton Dance, 1929 (Video)

Casper the Friendly Ghost

Casper the Friendly Ghost is the protagonist of the Famous Studios theatrical animated cartoon series of the same name. As his name indicates, he is a ghost, but is quite personable. According to the 1995 feature film Casper, his family name is McFadden, making his “full” name Casper McFadden.

Casper was created in the late 1930’s by Seymour Reit and Joe Oriolo, with Mr. Reit devising the idea for the character and Mr. Oriolo drawing the illustrations.

The Friendly Ghost, the first Noveltoon to feature Casper, was released by Paramount in 1945 with a few differences from the book. In the cartoon adaptation, Casper is a cute ghost-child with a New York accent, who prefers making friends with people instead of scaring them (Casper used to scare people but got tired of it all). He runs away from home and goes out to make friends. However, the animals he meets (a rooster, a mole, a cat, a mouse resembling Herman and Katnip, and a group of hens) take one horrified look at him and run off in the other direction. Distraught, Casper unsuccessfully attempts to commit suicide by laying himself down on a railway track before an oncoming train (apparently forgetting that he’s already dead) before he meets two little children named Bonnie and Johnny who become his friends. The children’s mother at first is frightened of Casper, but later welcomes him into the family and sends him off with her children to town wearing clothes after he wards off a greedy landlord.

This short had the NTA logo at the beginning and end of the cartoon, it shows Famous Studios at the beginning and end.

Santa loves this video!

Table of contents for Halloween Recipes

1. Halloween Jack-o-Lantern Cheese Ball
2. Halloween Pumpkin Popcorn Balls
3. Black Cat Halloween Cookies
4. Halloween Wormy Burgers
5. Halloween Butterscotch Haystacks

Happy Halloween from Operation Letters to Santa http://www.operationlettertosanta.com

Halloween Butterscotch Haystacks Recipe

Ingredients

2 (11 ounce) bags butterscotch chips

1 (5 ounce) can chow mein noodles

1 ½ cups peanuts

Wax paper

Instructions

1. Place chow mein noodles in a ziplock baggie and crush into smaller pieces.
2. Place butterscotch chips in a microwavable bowl and microwave for 1 minute, 10 seconds.
3. Remove and stir.
4. Add chow mein noodles and peanuts.
5. Working fast, place a heaping teaspoon of the mixture onto wax paper.
6. Let cool until hard and store in airtight container.

Table of contents for Holiday Cookie Recipes

1. Pumpkin Cookie Bars
2. Cereal Spice Bar Cookies
3. Butterscotch Bars

Butterscotch Cookie Bar Recipe

Ingredients

Happy Halloween from Operation Letters To Santa, http://operationlettertosanta.com

½ cup butter or margarine

2 cups packed brown sugar

¼ teaspoon salt

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 cup shredded coconut

1 cup chopped walnuts 

Baking Instructions 

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. In 2-quart saucepan melt butter or margarine over low heat.
3. Remove from heat; stir in brown sugar.
4. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.
5. Stir in vanilla.
6. Stir together flour, baking powder and salt.
7. Add to brown sugar mixture.
8. Add coconut and nuts. Mix well.
9. Spread in greased 15½x10½x1-inch baking pan.
10. Bake in 350 degree oven for approx. 25 minutes.
11. Cut into bars while still slightly warm; remove from pan after thoroughly cooled.

Yield: 36 bars

Table of contents for Holiday Cookie Recipes

1. Pumpkin Cookie Bars
2. Cereal Spice Bar Cookies
3. Butterscotch Bars

Cereal Spice Bar Cookie Recipe

Ingredients

1 package 2-layer spice cake mix

½ cup quick-cooking rolled oats

¼ cup wheat germ

½ cup shredded coconut

Powdered sugar

2 eggs

½ cup light molasses

¼ cup milk

¼ cup cooking oil

Baking Instructions 

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
2. Thoroughly mix together cake mix, rolled oats and wheat germ.
3. Beat 2 eggs: add molasses, milk and cooking oil. Mix well.
4. Add wet mixture to dry mixture; blend just until moistened.
5. Add coconut and stir until thoroughly mixed in.
6. Spread in lightly greased 15.5×10.5×1 inch baking pan.
7. Bake in 375 degree oven for 20 minutes.
8. Cool thoroughly and then sift powdered sugar over the pan. Cut into bars.

Yield: Makes 60 bars

Table of contents for Holiday Cookie Recipes

1. Pumpkin Cookie Bars
2. Cereal Spice Bar Cookies
3. Butterscotch Bars

Pumpkin Cookie Bar Recipes

 Holiday Cookie Bar Recipes — Pumpkin Cookies 

Ingredients

1 package 2 layer size spice cake mix

½ cup butter or margarine, melted

3 eggs

1 cup canned pumpkin (plain, not pie mix)

½ cup sugar

½ teaspoon grated orange peel

½ cup pecans or walnuts

 Baking Instructions 

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Reserve 2/3 cup dry cake mix and 2 eggs.
3. In large bowl combine remaining cake mix, butter and 1 of the eggs. Mix well.
4. Pat into well-greased 13×9x2 inch baking pan.
5. Bake in 350 degree oven for 15 minutes.
6. Combine reserved cake mix, pumpkin, 2 eggs, orange peel, and dash of salt.
7. Beat at medium speed of electric mixer for 1 to 2 minutes.
8. Pour over partially baked cookie layer. Top with chopped nuts.
9. Bake in 350 degree oven until set, 15 to 20 minutes.
10. Cook and cut into bars. Refrigerate in a tightly covered container.

Yield: Makes 32 bars

Holiday Cookie Recipes From Operation Letters To Santa

Bar cookies with their rich flavor and moist texture have long been popular as deserts and snacks. With the holidays coming soon we will be sharing some favorite cookies recipes here. Be sure to bookmark this site or signup for Santa’s FREE holiday newsletter to get updates each week.

TOFEE BARS 

Ingredients

½ cup butter or margarine, softened

½ cup sugar

½ teaspoon salt

1 cup all purpose flour

1 14 ounce can sweetened condensed milk

2 tablespoons butter or margarine

¼ teaspoons salt

2 teaspoons vanilla

Fudge frosting

 Baking Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Cream first three ingredients; stir in flour.
3. Pat mixture into ungreased 13×9x2 inch baking pan.
4. Bake at 350 degrees until lightly browned, approx. 15 minutes
5. In heavy saucepan stir condensed milk, 2 tablespoons butter, and ¼ teaspoon salt over low heat until butter melts.
6. Cook and stir for 5 minutes over medium heat. Mixture will thicken and become smooth.
7. Stir in vanilla.
8.  Spread mixture over baked cookie layer and bake at 350 degrees until golden, 12 – 15 minutes.
9. Spread warm cookies with Fudge frosting.
10. While warm, cut cookies into bars and remove from pan

Yield: 48 cookies