“There are many things from which I might have derived good, by which I have not profited, I dare say,’ returned the nephew. ‘Christmas among the rest. But I am sure I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round—apart from the veneration due to its sacred name and origin, if anything belonging to it can be apart from that—as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys. And therefore, uncle, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe that it has done me good, and willdo me good; and I say, God bless it!” ― Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol
“Christmas waves a magic wand over this world, and behold, everything is softer and more beautiful.”-Norman Vincent Peale
“Pets, like their owners, tend to expand a little over the Christmas period.”-Frances Wright
“The nutcracker sits under the holiday tree, a guardian of childhood stories. Feed him walnuts and he will crack open a tale…” ― Vera Nazarian, The Perpetual Calendar of Inspiration
I’m a little behind on my cookie notes! It has been a busy couple of months and I’m still getting back into the swing of blogging. I thought you might be interested in seeing some more of the recipes though. In case you forgot, these were the cookies I made before the party. I’ll share our party treats in another post. I officially made all 25 treats, but some of them didn’t get photographed. Everyone was quite amazed. I ended up making about 2 batches of cookies every couple of days, sometimes three doughs, if they needed to chill.
These cookies are Chocolate Orange Pecan, Ginger Sugar cookies- hearts, and Norwegian Spice Cookies-snowflakes.
I thought the ginger sugar cookies didn’t have enough ginger. I was very into spices and unusual cookies this year. The Norwegian Spice cookies reminded me of apple pie and were one of the hits at the office. The Chocolate Pecan Orange cookies were also delicious, although I found that the chocolate cookies didn’t hold well and got kind of weird and dry. I would make a smaller batch of the chocolate cookies next time and wouldn’t bother making the ginger cookies. The spice cookies I would make again.
The chocolate cookies were from the Better Homes and Gardens Cookie magazine from 2019. The Ginger Sugar Cookies were from the Food Network December issue from 2016. The Norwegian Spice Cookies were from this website: https://roamingrosie.com/tag/norwegian-spice-cookies/
These Lemon Poppyseed cookies are from the Food Network December 2016 issue too.
The cookies were not super sweet and I accidentally left the poppyseeds out of the dough. As you can see, I just added them to the glaze. They almost started an office war between the Office Manager and another therapist who was trying to steal the tin. 🙂 Oh, and another therapist hip checked me away from my own cookies! It was a shocking, but hilarious display of cookie rage. 🙂 There was one other kind of cookie involved in this particular cookie mob and were also delicious. I found I tended to use the same magazine for a couple of different recipes- this one is also from FN Dec ’16.
Peanut Butter Crinkles with mini chocolate chips. I would make both of these cookies again. They both held well too.
The next one up was hotly contested and may have caused a not very Christmasy disagreement between the Husband and myself. These Cookies and Cream Drops from the Better Homes and Gardens magazine were either the favorite, or very much disliked. I was in the middle, but wouldn’t make them again.
They had frosting made from melting the middles of Oreos. It was weird and I didn’t like that part. They were either supposed to taste under-baked or I accidentally under-baked them. I baked them at the correct temperature for longer than it called for and they still tasted that way. They were also not sweet, which was really weird considering how much sugar there was in the recipe. I think they were supposed to be soft and cakey. The Husband had one bite, spit it out, and loudly declared them to be “an embarrassment to your reputation” and refused to take them into work! According to him, they were inedible. 🙁 However, at least a couple people at my work liked them, so they did mostly get eaten. As you can imagine, I will not be making them again.
Sadly for the Husband’s office, I declined to send many more cookies after that little incident. I was much offended. The Husband has since apologized and I have forgiven him his ridiculous statements… well, mostly…
I also made Malted Milk Brownies, Tahini Blossoms, and Dulce de Leche Thumbprints, all from the BHG magazine. The Thumbprints were too plain for me. They were a recipe that you made a large quantity of basic dough and then added to it. The second batch of them had cinnamon and other spices added to the dough and it still didn’t taste good to me. I won’t be making that dough again.
Lessons learned this year was that I definitely needed to add up amounts of ingredients like butter, flour, and sugar before the start of baking season. I definitely wasn’t prepared for the need for brown sugar this year and had we not had extra flour, I would have run out. The butter stores were good. I ended with about 10 pounds left, so probably used around 12 pounds total, just for the cookies. We did run out of regular chocolate chips, so I had to make a small Costco run to find more in the middle of baking season.
It was helpful to list out the specialty ingredients and know which recipes I was going to make ahead of time. I spread those purchases over a couple of shopping trips too, so that was good.
Getting into a routine of “make this dough to chill, then make this recipe to bake right away” was another good organizational tool. I felt very organized with all my lists in the same spot too. My blog notebook is full of all the lists! I still have about half of the notebook left too, so room for many more. 🙂
I still have a bunch of recipes I want to try, so I’m sure you’ll see more cookies this year. Hopefully not everyone at the office is on diets!
Please bear with me as I catch up on blogging again! I’ll bribe you with cute Fancy pictures, if I have to! Here’s one, so you know I’m serious. 😉
With that done, please excuse me while I head to bed. I have to have rest to bake up more cookies! Have a sweet night!
A tray of interesting things, including gum rocks (I don’t know the correct name) from New Zealand! One of the Daddy Daughter tea dates! All the red ornamentsFancy’s party poseI made the Scrabble ornaments for my Mom for Christmas a few years ago and she put them on this cool wreath!Tea!These were mostly fundraiser ornaments for the Finnish dancers from Finlandia University.
“Christmas Eve was a night of song that wrapped itself about you like a shawl. But it warmed more than your body. It warmed your heart…filled it, too, with melody that would last forever.” – Bess Streeter Aldrich, Song of Years
Here I am! With puppers in tow, of course. She’s stealing my blankets and giving me sad eyes when I stop petting to type. Silly dog.
I have been a busy girl this month, but some of it, I can’t show you yet, as it’s super secret Christmas business. You’ll see it next month though. I have been focusing on presents and sewing warm things for our Christmas trip to the snowy North. Which, by the way, is next week already! Crazy talk!
This sweater was one that I was originally going to make for a gift, however, it turned out to be meant for someone who doesn’t lift (so not my brother’s lovely girlfriend,) so I kept it. Oh darn… I had to keep this lovely cardigan… The Husband claims I planned it that way, but don’t listen to him!
French Terry for the main body with lace lined front panels.
It’s a Cocoon Cardigan from Patterns from Pirates. I love this pattern and it looks pretty flattering on everyone, I think.
I made another one this month.
To be fair, this grey one only needed the band, but I was undecided on that and it got put away until it got cold out and I suddenly needed ALL THE SWEATERS! Don’t worry, I have some additional ones now, but I think I’m destined to be cold all winter again. It does seem to happen. Dad will say my blood thinned when I moved downstate, but I distinctly remember being super cold when I lived in the snowy North as well.
Speaking of warm clothes, I made a sweat suit, which is currently in the wash, as I wear it as much as possible. It’s not terribly glamorous and I don’t have pictures, but it’s a lovely warm blue sweatshirt material. The pants have grey flannel pockets and the top is made from the grey ribbed material of one of my other new sleep shirts.
These are the flannel pants that lead to using scraps for the sweatpants.
I used the Linen Lounger pattern and accidentally flared them. 🙂 I think they are cute though and the flannel is so soft!
I have two more flannel pants planned. I think they will have slimmed down cuffs with cotton lycra to make them stay on my ankles. My blue and grey ones slide up my legs and then I have terribly cold ankles. Fancy doesn’t always sleep on them like she should. 🙂
One of my pretty consistent goals is to use new patterns and I have made three dresses from the CKC Amy pattern, which is a knit dress with a v neck and a gathered skirt. I use pleats because gathering and I are not friends.
I love them! It’s nice to have dresses that I can count on not to wrinkle and look adorable, if I do say so myself. This dress is made from Liverpool Fabric, which is textured on one side with a pebbly feel and is very smooth on the other. I think technically it’s a double knit, meaning two sides are knit together. It’s a very stable knit and makes excellent pencil skirts and lovely dresses. I bought the last three yards of this fabric because it needed to be a dress and I still have enough for at least one shirt too. 🙂
This Cotton Lycra version has pockets! It also makes me feel a bit gothy, especially when I wear black jewelry, a black cardi, leggings, and boots.
I wore it with my owl cardigan to work and every time I went into the lobby, someone new would compliment me on it. I must have not been wearing my hair up for people to see the owl, because I have worn it lots of times before and it hasn’t been that big of a thing. I was very careful with my pattern placement and think I lined things up pretty well. Both of these were heavier fabrics, but I have some planned with lighter weight fabrics too. I’m interested to see the differences between them.
This raglan was made out of some of the scraps from the red and a grey french terry material. The french terry isn’t as soft as some other of the same fabrics I have, but it’s still a cozy sweatshirt. Here’s a detail shot of the pattern and the cuffs.
Besides the grey cardigan, my UFO bin also got some love. I finished my tree skirt! My MIL finished her tree skirt too, but I don’t have a picture of it, as there were presents all over it! It is, of course, displayed with the flamingo side up. 🙂
My other UFO is a wall hanging that’s been sitting in the box for several years. I attempted to do some hand embroidery, but it looked terrible. I finally pulled the stitching and machine stitched around the middle.
It has watch gears on it, for a slightly steampunk vibe. The squares are the tiniest scraps from my box. I enjoy it a lot and might have to make some more tiny squares.
Another recent scrap buster project I discovered was these little gnomes or tomte that were presented in one of my sewing groups- So Sew English Craftalong on Facebook. These little guys (and the one beardless lady gnome) are made from only stash materials. They are made with scrap fabrics, stuffed with scrap fabrics, and I used stash yarn.
This one is a wizard!This is the lady gnome!
Aren’t they cute? I want to make some specifically Christmas ones for decor. Tomte are good luck, according to Scandinavian folklore, as long as you keep them supplied with porridge.
These ornaments are also made with stash things. I bought these glass balls last year, I think, or the year before on clearance and have started to love the mercury glass look. Since I now know how to make them, I kind of want to mercury glass everything!
Two of the Christmas presents I’ve made so far can be shared, as they were for the Husband’s sister and she has already seen them. She was happily wearing them today after making sure they fit. 🙂
The leggings are Peg Legs from Patterns for Pirates and the shirt is the Relaxed Raglan. Be warned, the shirt has some rude language on it, so don’t look too close if you might be offended.
The white fabric was originally intended to be leggings as well, but it wasn’t going to look good. She loved it as a shirt, so I’m happy with it too. I might actually make clothes for other people soon!
My goals for the month include making my own snow pants, assuming tje fabric comes in on time, a few more warm shirts, including some layering ones, and finishing my warm pants as well.
Obviously, in the next week, finishing my Christmas presents is a priority and making Fancy a nice sweater.
This post got super long, so I’ll post the food review in a few days. For now, I’ll leave you with this silly meme about buying fabric.
“I like to compare the holiday season with the way a child listens to a favorite story. The pleasure is in the familiar way the story begins, the anticipation of familiar turns it takes, the familiar moments of suspense, and the familiar climax and ending.” – Fred Rogers
“Books don’t only furnish a room: they also make the best holiday gifts.” – Michael Dirda
“Nothing says holidays, like a cheese log.” – Ellen DeGeneres
“If it’s not messy and it doesn’t drip over the sides, it’s not a holiday hot chocolate -it’s just an average hot chocolate.” – Alex Guarnaschelli
