cookies! two more

If ever a day in Florida were made for baking, today was the day. Did you know we can have days in December with a windchill factor of 32 degrees? No? Well, I'm glad to see I'm not alone here. That kind of cold is typically reserved for our annual three-day-long "winter" in late January, and then we pack away our pants and closed-toe shoes and welcome summer. But not this year, apparently. This year, tonight, mid-December, we're going to be getting down into the TWENTIES. Did you know the baby doesn't even own a pair of feetie pajamas, and my older kids don't have any matching socks? So cranking up the oven was a welcome sight.

Today I only plowed through 2 of my recipes (both double batches), but the cookies were tasty! And I rarely have an excuse to dance around the kitchen, singing along to Christmas tunes (well, plod clumsily. And my singing is more like humming). My day was cut short by Hobie's twelve-month checkup - you mean we have to go outside in this weather? - and the ministrating of several sickies. I missed this evening's 4-H meeting but in this cold I'm not so sure I didn't get the better end of the deal.

Enough yammering. The first cookie I whipped up was the White Chocolate Cranberry Cookies. I omit a lot of the ingredients (coconut, apricots, macadamia nuts) but the white chocolate combined with my secret weapon (aka Craisins) is so good you don't need the extra confusion. I bet these would be wonderful with a little dark chocolate tossed in! Of course that probably holds true for most things.

I also trudged through the Turtle Cookies. I absolutely loathe making these cookies, I won't lie. The dough has to refrigerate, they have to be rolled, dipped in egg, dipped in pecans, flattened, baked, they stick to the pan, I always have to re-flatten the thumbprint while they're hot (a rubber baby spoon works great for this!), and then they have to be filled with caramel and finally drizzled with chocolate. And if you aren't drooling by now, there's something wrong with you. This is why I make them every year, even though they are a tremendous pain.

As I make my Christmas cookies, I take a photo of one of each variety on a white napkin, which makes it easy to drag into an editing program like Photoshop later on. Then it's a quick cutout and I can add tiny photos of my cookies to a cute little cookie card that I print out and attach to each gift tin or box we hand out. This was the card page ready for printing out, from a few years back. Cookie names are subject to change depending on my whims.

Stay tuned for more! And if you're looking for the recipes from yesterday's post, I went back and added the links for you.