Take Two of the 12 Days of Cookies!!

The windows in my kitchen are all fogged over. That could only mean one thing. Well, it could actually mean quite a few things, but since it is December and there is also the distinct smell of Andes Mints, it definitely means that my oven is working overtime baking Christmas cookies. Last year I posted my 12 Days of Cookies and this year I have a few new ones to add. Since it is already December 5th, I had better get posting!

Day 1 : Raspberry Linzer Cookies

These would be so sweet with little Christmas trees in the center.

Day 2: Brown Sugar Praline Cookies

Day 3: Peanut Butter Milk Dud Cookies

Day 4: Orange Slice Cookies

These are amazing. I think that these would be fantastic with gumdrops substituted for the orange slices. Red and green gumdrops would look perfect. This recipe makes about 8 dozen cookies (Courtney!!) so they would be fantastic for a Christmas Cookie exchange.

Day 5: The Ultimate Peanut Butter Cookie

I wouldn't freeze the Orange Slice Cookie Dough, but the other 4 would be perfect for freezing. All that you need to do is complete the cookie up to the point where you roll them into balls (or just wrap all of the dough in Saran Wrap and put in a Ziploc bag for the Linzer Cookies) and then freeze individually on a plate in the freezer. Once they are frozen, transfer to a Ziploc bag and leave in the freezer for up to 3 months. The night before you are ready to bake, put the frozen dough in the refrigerator. They will be ready when you are. It's a great way to take off some of the pressure of holiday baking.

What are you baking this year?

Christmas Cards

It's that time of year again! Time for me to make Christmas cards and then send them to absolutely no one. I am so not a Christmas card kind of gal. My mom, on the other hand, mailed out her cards the day after Thanksgiving. No joke. She rocks out the Christmas cards.

I made these cards using my December Mosh Posh kit. I loved all of the fun October Afternoon patterned papers and the embellishments were just perfect for lots of fun cards!

I just love using up all of my scraps of paper to create pictures on my layouts or cards.

I hand cut circles from the patterned papers and then cut them in half to create the shingles for this little cottage. The sparkly tree is made from sticks that I covered in glitter and sequins.

This is my favorite card. I just love everything and anything about Christmas trees.

I drew a Christmas tree onto a piece of white cardstock and cut it out. I then attached all of the folded pieces of patterned paper. The final step was to trim the paper from around the cardstock. I thought it would be a cleaner shape that way.

The October Afternoon Very Merry Wild Cards were perfect for the sentiment that I wanted to portray on this card.

I hand cut the petals and leaves for the poinsettia. I layered the green rick rack on top of the leaves and stapled it all together. I just love the layering.

And those are my Christmas cards! This will be my very last Mosh Posh kit. It was a very difficult decision, but I decided not to try out for the design team this term. I have been with Mosh Posh for 2 years now and I am grateful to Kristen for giving me the opportunity to be a part of her team. Mosh Posh was my very first design team. I will miss working with Brooke, Jenny and Frances!! You guys are the best!! MUAH!

You know I wouldn't leave you without a giveaway!! Just leave me a comment telling me about what you have been doing to get in the holiday spirit and I will draw one winner who will receive a little package from me!! (There will be lots of red, white and green embellishments + a little chocolate, YUM!)

You have until Monday to leave me a comment! Happy Thursday!

The Aftermath

I think that Santa spent as much money on batteries this year as he did on the toys, or rather, the salary for the elves. Breuklyn thinks that the elves get paid in candy canes, though, so I suppose that the point is moot.

Paizlee opened one present this year. One. Yes, that is correct. She opened the baby doll stroller that Breuklyn had picked out for her and that was it. Breuklyn and Maddux were more than willing to help out with the rest.

Maddux picked out a Soccer Coach Barbie for Breuklyn's Christmas present. Breuklyn gave Maddux a huge hug. Maddux then replied, "I love you, Breuklyn. You are my best friend." Such sweetness in such little packages.

One Barbie House, one ridiculously large dinosaur (that Brad says is the best.thing.ever), one Little People town, one really loud airport and about a gazillion other little toys later... Christmas is over.

To say that I am sad in an understatement. I miss the excitement. In protest, I am refusing to take down the Christmas tree. I can practically see through the tree at this point, but I need to have a few more nights of twinkly lights before I take it down. It was just such a perfect December.

How was your Christmas?

Merry Christmas!

Santa is almost here!! Let's review our past few days, shall we?

1. Eat cookies. Lots of cookies.

2. Unwrap new Christmas pajamas and try to take a picture. Try again. And again.

3. Successfully take a Christmas pajama picture. Sigh contentedly.

4. Camp out in the living room. Stay up until past 1:00AM and giggle a lot.

5. Spent Christmas Eve with the in-laws. Collapse from the sheer exhaustion of it all.

6. Leave cookies and milk for Santa. Don't forget the carrots for the reindeer!

7. Help Santa unload the gifts. Try to sleep. Must sleep. Need to sleep. Too excited to sleep.

My family and I wish you a very Merry Christmas. With much, much love from our home to yours!

21 Sticks of Butter Later...

The baking is done! Well, for now. There will be more baking for Christmas Eve. I know that you are shocked, don't lie. Santa will need fresh cookies, right?

We spent the day delivering cookies to people that we love (and a neighbor that we don't). Brad took cookies to his employees and returned home with empty platters, which is a very good sign. 13 different kinds of cookies. 21 sticks of butter. 15.5 hours of baking. 780 cookies. 5 minutes for the Shipping and Receiving Department to empty two huge platters. 364 more days until Baking Day 2009!

Maddux is counting down the days as well.

We brought cookies to Nan and the caregivers at the Alzheimer's Facility. Nan was happy today. It was a very good day.

Lots of hugs. Lots of love.

Speaking of love... the kids got a box of Christmas gifts from my mom and dad today. Paizlee was the very happy recipient of a stuffed kitten. The perfect gift. She also got a tea set, so she has been feeding the cat tea.

That poor cat won't sleep a wink tonight.

It's almost Christmas, are you ready?

A Holiday Tradition at My House: Homemade Hard Candy

Making hard candy is a much loved tradition for my family. My grandmother used to make candy, my mom always makes it every year and now I make it. In fact, when I made it this year I was talking on the phone to my mom and sister who were also making it. Fun memories.

The ingredients are pretty basic. You will need: granulated sugar, light corn syrup, water, Lorann flavored oils, liquid food coloring and powdered sugar. Also, you absolutely must have a candy thermometer.
Usually, I order these flavor oils directly from the LorAnn website, but I found them at Wal*mart this year, which was even easier. I only did 5 flavors this year: Peppermint, Spearmint, Wintergreen, Cinnamon and Orange. When I was a teenager, I would convince my mom that we needed to make 15 different flavors. It would take all day, but it was so much fun.

In a large pot, mix together 2 cups of sugar, 2/3 cup of light Karo syrup and 3/4 cup of water. Mix together until the sugar has dissolved. I use a pastry brush lightly dipped in water to brush down any sugar crystals that remain on the side of the pot. You don't want any weird crystals in your hard candy.

Once the sugar has dissolved, attach the candy thermometer to the side of the pot, making sure that the thermometer is NOT touching the bottom of the pan, and leave it alone. No more stirring. No more fussing. Just walk away. Well, don't go too far because you need to watch the temperature. Closely. You can look, but don't touch. Hee Hee. Sorry, couldn't help myself.

While the sugar mixture is heating, butter your cookie sheets. If you are making just one kind of candy, you will only need one cookie sheet. Since I got overboard with about everything I attempt, I need to prepare lots of cookie sheets.

Once the temperature reaches 260 degrees Fahrenheit, you will need to add the food coloring. Since this batch is going to be cinnamon, obviously I will use red. Brad thought I should make it green just to confuse people. I would like to think that I was being sneaky when I colored the peppermint candy purple, but really it was just a "dusty rose" gone awry. **Do not stir** the food coloring. The boiling action will mix the color for you. Handy, right?

Make sure that your pans are ready to pour the hot sugar mixture into. You might want to grab some pot holders or towels, just in case. Once the sugar mixture reaches 300 degrees Fahrenheit, remove the mixture from the heat. Add the flavor of your choice, and stir. Let me warn you, if you are using the cinnamon, peppermint or clove flavors you will want to adjust the amount. You will not need the whole amount of flavor because it is really, really strong. Just ask Brad.

Pour the mixture into the buttered pan. I know it sounds weird that I buttered it, but trust me, it's my magical tip. The butter does not affect the flavor at all. It just allows the candy to slide right out with no issue, no drama. As you can see, it is hot. 300 degrees hot.

Repeat with any other flavors that you are going to make. Just a tip: the easiest way that I have found to clean the pot and utensils is to fill the pot with hot water and set it on the stove to boil. The boiling water will loosen the candy and it will melt into the water. Easy.

Once the candy has cooled completely, you can break it into pieces. There are molds out there that allow for uniform pieces and neat little shapes, but I like to break it into random pieces. It is how Nan always did it, and it's how I will do it.


If it is humid when you are making candy, your candy might be sticky. This is easily solved by dusting confectioners' sugar over the top of the candy. Even if it isn't sticky, I always use the confectioners' sugar because I like the way that it looks. Pretty, right?

I bought cute little cellophane snowman bags to package the candy in. They will be delivered along with all of my Christmas cookies. Baking Day is in 3 more days!! I had better start preheating my oven. :)

On the 3rd Day of Christmas...

We made snowman ornaments! I found the directions for this project HERE back in October and I knew that we just had to try them.

For this one, I used Pink Paislee Glitter Stix and Baker's twine along with the Crayola modeling clay. Obviously, the kids did their snowmen a little bit differently since I didn't want to be cleaning up glitter for the rest of my life.

We rolled the clay out flat and then wrapped it around the 2 inch Styrofoam ball. We then rolled the snowmen until they were smooth-ish.

It was a great way to use up some of the 10,000 scrapbooking supplies that I have accumulated. We used brads for the facial features and silver shaped paperclips to string the ribbon through so that we can hang them on the tree. We used Making Memories paint for the noses and Clinique blush in Sweetcheeks (appropriate, no?) for the cheeks.

Can you guess which one is mine? I know, it's tough to tell.

December Mosh Posh Layouts + A Few More Days of Christmas

This month we had lots and lots of Pink Paislee yummi-ness. I love using pink on Christmas layouts. Love it.

The kit this month was a lot of fun to work with. Kristen does an amazing job picking out lots of fun products that coordinate perfectly.

The design team had a challenge this month to scrap our favorite holiday recipes and I had so much fun making this layout. It has really inspired me to create a mini-album for all of my cookie recipes. I seem to have enough to make an album!!

Day 2 of the 12 Days of Christmas was to "Watch the Polar Express." We kind of cheated on this one because we had just watched the Polar Express a few weeks ago. The kids really didn't want to watch it again, so we watched Horton Hears a Who instead. It was hilarious!! As long as we got to spend a few hours snuggled together on the couch eating popcorn and M&Ms, it really doesn't matter what we watched.

Have a happy Monday!!