Christmas Cookie Baking

This weekend I started baking cookies. Only two different kinds were completed. I will work on 2 other today or tomorrow after work. Every year this is a tradition for me...no matter how busy or how tired I am....or I'll tell myself, "I'm not doing it this year"...something happens and I end up doing them. Only because I LOVE my peanut blossoms. So does my family. Peanut Blossoms are peanut butter cookies with a Chocolate kiss stuck in the middle. My mom made these cookies as I grew up and they were my favorite then. It's definitely a Christmas tradition in our house to have these around during the holidays.

This year I documented preparing them. I couldn't help myself! Only because I love my camera and I wanted to share with all of you.

So....here we go.

First off I had to unwrap what felt like a Bi-jillion Chocolate kisses. This year I tripled the recipe and wanted to insure I had enough of these unwrapped. Turned out, I was only 4 unwrapped kisses short. Not bad for a guess.



Next putting all the ingredients together to mix up. This step included, white sugar, brown sugar, eggs, milk, shortening, vanilla and of course PEANUT BUTTER!!!



Then add the flour, baking soda and salt and mix all together!



Once mixed and all of the ingredients are blended together, roll them up into balls, roll in sugar, place on baking sheet.



Bake for 8 minutes, pull out of oven and strategically place a single chocolate candy kiss in the middle. This part is fun as it defines the cookie!



Bake for an additional 6 - 7 minutes and WHA-LA....yummy cookies! And the house smelled great too!



HAVE A YUMMY CHRISTMAS!!!

FINALLY - the Tree is up!

For some reason, I was having a heck of a time getting into the Christmas spirit this year. It may have something to do with starting a new job on December 1, which involves developing a new company image, company mission, new pipeline.......or maybe I was in denial that it was already Christmas. But late yesterday afternoon it finally hit me. I was going to get my tree up no matter what. And guess what? Once I got that dang tree up, the Christmas spirit finally came to me. There is something to be said about twinkling lights and putting up ornaments that come out once a year that bring back some great memories. Over the years I've saved the ornaments that the kids have made throughout preschool and school. Other ornaments have special meaning too. Actually every single one of them do. And every year I make an effort to buy a new ornament with special meaning to develop new memories.

Here are a few of my favorites....although, it's hard to pick favorites, because as I am sitting here typing this, I am thinking of others tucked away that didn't make the tree. Believe me I have boxes of this stuff!

Kevin made this in elementary school. Unfortunately this does not have a year on it, but I'm guessing it's early elementary school. ;-)



I remember buying this one at the Robinson's Christmas store in the mall. It's a little known fact that my husband likes carousel horses and I put this on a present as decoration for him. I had the words, "I love you" put on the back side of the horse.



This ornament was given to my oldest Son Michael in 1994 from his Daycare providor "Weezie". "Weezie" who's real name is Louise took care of Michael full-time while I was off overseas in Desert Storm.



I remember picking this ornament up 5 years ago at the Hallmark shop in the mall when Roxy was a puppy. I love this little guy!



John's mom made this ornament along with 3 others. 1 for each member of our family. She made these even before she moved out here to California. In fact the one pictured below was for Kevin when he was a baby.

Quote of the Day - Dec 3, 2009

Action is the foundational key to all success.

- Pablo Picasso

Quote of the Day - Dec 2, 2009

It may be hard for an egg to turn into a bird: it would be a jolly sight harder for it to learn to fly while remaining an egg. We are like eggs at present. And you cannot go on indefinitely being just an ordinary, decent egg. We must be hatched or go bad.

- C. S. Lewis