Cookie Marathon

At the Ruch house, we've been baking cookies for the past 7 hours. Since we got such a late start today (4:00) we had to table 2 varieties until tomorrow. This year we made cut out sugar cookies, pecan crescents, peanut butter blossoms, corn flake wreaths, cranberry cookies, snickerdoodles, thumbprint cookies, creme de menthe balls, chocolate crinkles, and strawberry sandwich cookies. I also baked 12 dozen cookies for my mother-n-law. She tends to make well done cookies :) so she asked me if I'd bake them for her...sure :) Each year along with the traditional favorites (cut out cookies, corn flake wreaths, peanut butter blossoms, and pecan crescents) I try out a few new recipes. This year I made chocolate crinkles (a favorite recipe of mine from the 1970 BH&G cookbook!) The pages of this cookbook are very yellow, but the cookies are still yummy! I make thumbprints and snickerdoodles that are "new" old favorites. I tried 3 totally new recipes this year. I tried the cranberry cookies, the creme de menthe balls and the strawberry sandwich cookies. The cranberry cookies will definitely return next year as they are T-A-S-T-Y! The creme de menthe cookies found themselves in the trash can. This was a no bake recipe and it was awful! I cannot describe what it looked like and tasted even worse! The strawberry sandwich cookies won't be assembled until tomorrow-- so the vote is still out on those.

Cookie baking was so much easier this year with my two helpers...They did most of the rolling and all of the cutting. When it came time to do the intricate cutting, Mom was called in for reinforcement! Stephanie said...I think you better do those...These cookies are the strawberry sandwich cookies. You make one cookie for the bottom, layer strawberry jam, and then put the other cookie with the cut out on top, so the jam shows through...pretty! (I hope they taste as good as they look!)

With all this help, I had a few minutes to relax between batches which was nice! Tomorrow is decorating day...the day all the frosting is made, cookies are frosted, decorated, assembled, and of course tasted! My brothers are the happy recipients of most of the cookies along with my Christmas guests. I started this tradition when I couldn't afford Christmas gifts. My brothers used to bring their tins back empty in hope they would get filled again the next year :) So...I keep filling 'em. It just wouldn't be Christmas otherwise. I wanted to mention why we were so late starting the cookies....Well, first I "slept in" until 8:00 which felt remarkable, then I had to finish shopping. I had the hardest time finding what my son wanted for Christmas (he had 28 things on his list by the way). I just didn't think it'd be that hard! Target finally saved the day. They had I think almost all of the items on his list. (Obviously wish I had gone there first about a week ago!) Anyway, I am finally done, and that is a big relief. Tomorrow, I'm up @ 6 -- to finish baking the cookies. Then baby girl comes over at 7:00. My MIL is coming to help me clean, we will be going to church, and then I have Zoe and Jason coming over to decorate their gingerbread trees. Be on the lookout for super cute pics on the ole' blog tomorrow!

Finally, what does it mean when the popular Christmas gift of 5 years ago suddenly comes back to life? Stephanie's furby has lived in her closet since losing interest in this toy a few years ago. If you are familiar with these toys, you know they sneeze, sleep, talk, yawn, giggle, cry and a myriad of other things. When my girls both had these we had to put them in the linen closet at night to get them to shut up so we could all sleep. Well, the other day I was waking Stephanie up and I sure heard a familiar sound that I just couldn't put my finger on. I pondered...what is that? "Steph, who is talking?" "Oh, my furby just started talking again the other day!" Craziest thing ever! I think Steph has a video of the crazy thing on her blog...It sure brought back memories of past Christmases and the hunt for the seasons "have to have" toy. I distinctly remember driving out to Kaybee toys for this guy, after calling all the toy stores in town and finding out they just got in a shipment! I wish I wasn't still playing those games, but after Christmas, I'll divulge the "have to have" toy of this season, and how it came to be...Until then...