As you all know, I decided to do what mattered most to me this Christmas. And, I have to say, I'm pretty excited about all the production that came out of my Christmas this year. 44 dozen cookies - which is 528 for those of you who would rather look at it that way. It was fun. Real good fun. I'm really not sure how I did it all, but I know that my new best kitchen friend, my Kitchen Aid mixer, made a lot of the work a whole lot easier. I would normally mix most of my cookies by hand. This awesome thing did all the work without any effort. It's the best thing I ever invested in for my kitchen, aside from my dishwasher!
Once I got rolling on my baking train, I started to realize all kinds of ways it was going to make everything easier. It also just does an awesome job of mixing and really cut down on the time needed to mix everything up! Almost everything that I made, I used this wonderful "beast"! I ended up making 9 varieties of cookies in all - Peanut Butter Blossoms (Hershey Kiss Cookies); Peanut Butter Temptations; Pinwheels; Sugar Cookies; Pecan Tarts; Mini Cherry Cheesecakes; Monster Cookies; Grandma's Raisin Filled Cookies, and Chocolate Gobs - half of them had cherry filling (yum!) and the other half with vanilla filling tinted green. Of course, you can't have Christmas cookies without Christmas candy (well, not in my house anyhow) so I made 6 varieties of candy - chocolate fudge, candied strawberries, peppermint patties, coconut balls, peanut clusters, and chocolate covered pretzels (with Christmas shaped pretzels that I found at Aldi!). I also made banana nut bread and cranberry nut bread - mostly in small loaves to share. It just felt so good to do all of this and made me feel like I really accomplished something at home, something that I haven't felt for a long time!
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| All the cookies and candies out on the table ready for distribution! |
Then, a few days before Christmas, I laid everything I had baked out on the table, and the kids and I started making trays - "Grandma" gifts, neighbor gifts, gifts for friends, and gifts for some relatives that are alone or having a hard time. I love that the kids wanted to join in on this, and they were great helpers.
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| Eliza and Eric adding a few of these and a few of those to their trays. It was too cute! |
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| Eliza adding a bow and a gift tag. |
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| Eric pretty pleased with his work. |
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| Finished product - off to Grandma's house! |
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| Gift for a friend. |
To say our house is over flowing with goodies is an understatement!! But it makes me so happy to have accomplished this and to be able to show my love to others by feeding them! Then, to finish it off, I made homemade donuts on Christmas Eve - and to really impress my husband, I filled some of them with homemade strawberry jam! He was in his glory - he loves donuts - and I love the fact that I can whip up about 4 dozen donuts for a fraction of the cost that it would be to buy ONE dozen donuts at the donut shop!
Another thing that warmed my heart this Christmas season is that both Eliza and Eric chose to MAKE homemade treats to take their classrooms for their Christmas parties from the options that I gave them. Eliza made a creation that I thought up - "snowmen" - oreos dipped in white chocolate with mini chocolate chip eyes and mouths and orange slice candy noses.
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| Eliza dipping her oreos in melted white chocolate. |
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| Eliza did all the work herself except cut the orange candies into the noses! |
Eric chose to make Rice Krispy Treat wreaths for his class. We dyed the Rice Krispy Treats green, then I shaped them into the wreath and he decorated with m&ms. I made the "bows" from strawberry fruit roll up.
It's such a joy to see my kids enjoy things that I enjoy.
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| Eric putting his candies on the wreaths. |
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| The finished product! I love them! |
If you are wondering what Easton does during all this activity, well, the results are varied! However, Craig and I have decided that I am either getting old or more mellow - or maybe a bit of both! He was constantly into something but it didn't bother me like it used to - as long as it kept him occupied. This is a glimpse of how he kept busy while I was baking. . .
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| Using the flour container to get up to snag a gob off the counter while they cooled. |
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| Found the "sprinkly" flour can. . .and had a blast! |
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| He had so much fun with that can of flour - there were little white footprints in the living room! |
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Licking the beater!!
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This is a big part of the way we prepare and celebrate Christmas at our house - making things and spreading love through food. May your hearts and bellies be full this year!
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