Double Time

Just a few days left and I'm working at double time pace. We leave to go to my sister's this Saturday and we are so excited! Meanwhile, I have a few things left to make and shop for. Here's what we've accomplished this week:

Christmas cookies! My fav cookie of all time. I made these as a kid growing up every year. We don't know where the recipe came from, but these aren't sugar cookies, but a rolled vanilla cookie that is worth making the homemade from scratch kind! See recipe below!
Mmmmmm after working hard at decorating cookies, we had one for ourselves and a big glass of milk.

Micah means serious business when it comes to cookie eating (he's known as the cookie monster in this part of town...lol)
Here are the plates for the neighbors. Cookies, choc dipped pretzels and cheater's fudge.
We made our yearly ornaments a couple of weeks ago, but I finally put ribbons on them to hang on the tree. Maressa's is still missing as I need to paint her little hand to print on her lavendar heart.
Here's a sampling of gifty that I've done. Peppermint sugar scrub, snowflake soap and dino surprise soap. See how to's at the bottom of the post.
And I whipped up this little diddy for Maressa. I had this extra patchwork fabric from a dress I made K a few years ago and added some ruffles and used a blank tee I found in my sewing room. It's a little big and the picture really doesn't do it justice as tshirt dresses are hard to picture unless on as they always appear wide and one dimensional. The nice thing is I cuff up the sleeve on Maressa and it comes to her ankles, but next year it will be precious over some ruffle jeans for the holidays.

Here are the recipes and how to's as promised:

VANILLA ROLLED COOKIES

3C flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1 C shortnening

1 C sugar

2 eggs

1 1/2 tsp vanilla

Sift dry ingredients in bowl. In large bowl, cream shortening. Add sugar gradually and continue to beat til light. Add well beaten eggs and blend thoroughly. Add vanilla. Add dry mixture and mix. Chill for hour or more. Roll on lightly floured board and cut out with cookie cutters. Bake 400F 6-10 mins

Hint: This recipe is forgiving with extra flour used when cutting out cookies. I like to pat my dough down then sprinkle with flour and place plastic wrap over top and roll on top of that for no sticking. Then I dip my spatula in flour each time I scrape up a cookie shape.

I use royal icing on top. To make icing that hardens (so cookies can be stacked) get some meringue powder at your local baking shop. Recipe is on the container.

CHEATER'S FUDGE
I got this from a message board, but don't remember where.

1 1/2 C choc chips

1 can frosting

Put in glass bowl and microwave 30 secs and stir. Repeat twice more and pour in pan. Refridgerate for hour. I personally have done the pbutter chips with milk choc frosting. Does come out like fudge and tasty too. I also sprinkled M&M's on top.

PEPPERMINT SUGAR SCRUB

1 C granulated sugar

1/3 C olive oil

Peppermint ess oil

Mix well and put in jars for gifts. This stuff is wonderful for soft feet.

DINO SURPRISE SOAP

I have tons of soap molds and the like, but for this I used my SILICONE mini loaf pan. If you use baking pans for molds, I suggest using silicone as it is easy to push the soap out when it hardens.

For this fun kid soap I used a package of mini dinos like you find in the party supply aisle. I melted down clear gylcerin soap (found in hobby store) in the microwave. Pour about half an inch in pan/mold and let harden. Then place toy on top and pour rest of soap over the toy. I used blue and yellow (to make murky green) coloring found in the soap aisle and green apple fragrance. You could also use those cute little plastic frogs you can get in the party aisle and just use a simple aluminum muffin cup liner as your mold. It's fun for kids to use and get the 'surprise' when the soap is all gone.

Happy Holiday everyone!