2013 Cookie party!

This is a stock photo of what the cookie cutters can make. The set is no longer made but you can  purchase it on E-bay. It is The Williams-Sonoma Holliday Storybook Cookie Cutters set. For reference, the trees are actually about 4-5" tall



This is my post for my 2013 cookie party! I have started a tradition for family and friends that every year I throw a cookie party. This year will be 3D Christmas scene involving sleigh, reindeer, trees and snowman. I will add to this post as the event evolves. I am making the sleigh and reindeer out of gingerbread cookies and the trees and snowman out of sugar cookie dough. I will pre-color the tree dough green.

This is the gingerbread recipe that I am using. It is included in the cookie set.

Gingerbread cookies

(This recipe states it's lighter than those used for houses so suitable for small cookies. See my cookie party 2012 post for a gingerbread house recipe.

Have ingredients at room temperature before starting

Combine and sift together than set aside

5 c. flour
½ t. Baking soda
1T. Ground ginger
4t. Ground cinnamon
¾ t. ground cloves
1t. Nutmeg
1t. Allspice
1 ½ t. salt

In the bowl of an electric mixer, using flat beater, beat on medium-high speed until fluffy and pale yellow (4-6 minutes)

                2 sticks (1 cup) butter

Add and beat for 1 minute

                ½ c. firmly packed brown sugar
                ½ c. granulated sugar

Reduce speed to low and beat in, until well combined (about 1 minute)

                1 c. molasses

Add and beat until well combined

                1 egg

Add the flour mixture in 4 portions, beating in each addition before adding more. Stop and scrape down sides of bowl occasionally.

Turn dough out onto floured surface and with floured hands divide into 4 sections. Shape each section into a disc and wrap in plastic wrap, parchment paper or other material and refrigerate at least 2 hours or up to 2 days.

Preheat oven t o400ºF (200ºC)

Remove dough 1 disc at a time and let stand 10 minutes. Roll out to ¼ “- 3/8” thickness and cut.

Bake cookies until lightly browned on the bottom (4-5 minutes for smaller cookies 6-7 minutes for larger cookies). 

Let cookies cool on the sheet for 5 minutes before removing and placing on cooling rack. Trim cookies while warm as needed

12-22-13
Cookie party was a success (as it usually is). I found some silicone molds for $1.99 at our grocery store (Meijer's) so I melted Jolly rancher candies into them. the gingerbread men and snowflakes took 1 candy. and I used 3 for the presents to fill the bow space.

 And as for the cookies.... it was FUN! We had lots of candy to decorate with and a room full of creative people who have unique senses of humor is always a good thing.

 This one belonged to a friend of mine. Her and her husband love to do cookie stuff.

 This is my niece with her decked out tree

 

 Another friend has their sleigh running over some poor gummy bears!

 And my daughter made a full on cookie crime scene!

 

 For the candy decorations we had...

• colored sugar
• candy corn
• mints
• gummy bears
• gummy worms
• sour gummy worms
• chocolate covered raises
• spice drops
• pull and peel twizlers
• peppermint candies
• mini M&M's
• mini reses cups
• smarties
• candy pearls (in assorted colors and sizes)
• jelly beans
• icing
• buttercream frosting
• royal frosting

We may have had more, but that is what i can think of for now.

Cookie party 2012

I haven't posted in a while but I have been busy!

We just had our cookie party Saturday and it was a hit! This year we made gingerbread houses. we made up the dough and Anja cut out templates for the house parts. we collected lots of candy and edible decorations for the houses.

this was the gingerbread recipe

Heat to boiling point:
2/3 c brown sugar, packed
2/3 c molasses
1 tsp ginger
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp cloves

remove from heat, and add:
2 1/4 tsp baking soda

Pour this over 2/3 c margarine in a bowl. Stir until margarine melts.

Add and blend thoroughly:
1 egg
4 1/2 c sifted flour (approximate)

Knead lightly (10-15 strokes on floured board)
Divide into 4 pieces and form into flattened balls. Wrap in plastic and let cool a bit.
Roll out about 1/4-3/8” thick and cut out each set twice (dorky’s note, this is the house pieces). Note: Do not make the dough too thick.
Bake at 350; on greased baking sheet or parchment for 15 minutes.

*note - it originally called to let chill a couple hours but when I did that I couldn't roll it out for nothing and had to add water and butter my hands to stop it from crumbling. So we ended up mostly just cutting it straight after kneading.

For the Royal Icing I use the Wilton recipe that uses meringue powder. it's really easy to make. Just be sure not to over beat it. Also allow the walls to harden and set before "gluing" on the roof. Royal icing get's rock hard and is a very effective (and tasty) glue

the decorations we used:
pull and peel twizlers
mini and regular m&m's
pretzel sticks
mini candy canes
mini Nilla wafers
cashews
holiday "drops"
jelly beans
sprinkles
gummy bears
fruity twizlers
Jolly ranchers
peppermints
powdered sugar for snow

we melted the jolly ranchers in a low, 250ºF oven in silicone ice cube trays (the type that have sort of a gem shape to the bottom) to make gems. Lots of the people used them to make windows. We also melted the jolly ranchers on silicone pan liners so that they would spread out flat which is what you see as the roof tiles on one house and "stepping stones" in front. We melted the peppermints as well on the silicone liners. the silicone kind of grabs the bottom of the mit and it melted in really neat ways as the candy ran.

Carl (our cat) has passed away

Not to long ago we aquired a stray cat that decided he was going to live at our house. I did a post when we "Got" him in the post We do(n't) have a new cat. Well Carl ended up getting sick as he was an indoor/outdoor cat (he made it clear it wasn't going to be any other way). We tried antibiotics and he got better but as soon as he was done with the antibiotics he got really bad really fast and was favoring his wounded leg again. He was a tough cat (or at least he thought he was). We (the kids and I) took him to the vet Sunday to see what was wrong.

Of course he didn't much enjoy the ride there.

After a blood test it came out that he had feline AIDS. We had to have him put down. He was a good cat for the short time we had him. The kids were there and got to pet him as he went. DD held him as they gave him the medicine to put him down.

He will be missed but we loved him while he was here. I'm glad the kids were able to be there when we let him go. The vet said we could bring him home but I figured he hated the ride there and wasn't going to get better so we thought it best to just make him stop hurting.

in memory of Carl the cat

Christmas cookie party

So this year I invited friends and family over again for cookie decorating. But instead of regular Christmas cookies I made a cookie tree for each family to decorate. This ment I had to make 7 trees! I have a cookie cutter set that is 10 star cutters in stepped sizes and you make 2 of each and stack them into a tree.

Now I will suggest if anyone is thinking of making these trees. Start with making the smallest stars 1st. that way if you run out of dough or energy you can stop and have a smaller tree but still in proportion. I made the bottoms and than tops so was committed to making all the cookies in between. And it took me 6 batches of dough to make 7 trees

before we got started

sorry for the laps in posts

I just got done painting Christmas cookies. I invited the family kids over and we had fun. I made 2 batches of cookies and a load of icing which we colored into many different colors.

My camera is currently MIA and i have so much I want to post and update for this blog. Hopefully I'll find my camera soon!

Family update

Last week I was called to Robert's (my middle child) school. He had an asthma attack but we didn't know he had asthma so nobody was prepared. I rode to the hospital with him in an ambulance where they kept him for several hours and still could not get his blood oxygen level to raise w/o him being on oxygen so they admitted him into the hospital and I stayed with him all Wed. night.

He is now doing great. They say it was intermittent asthma and was allergy induced. He's fine inside the house but has a rough go at it when he goes outside though he has been fine lately. I want to get him tested to see what it is he is allergic to. Michigan is a bad place to live if you have allergies. I have seasonal fall allergies and never had them till I moved to Arizona then came back to Michigan.

And then the other day Michael clogged our toilet (it's an old toilet and clogs easily). But he flushed and flushed and flushed till he jammed the valve into an open run. I was taking a nap before work and Anja came in saying it was raining in the basement... sure enough the whole bathroom, hall, entrance to the boys room and our bedroom was beginning to flood (or was well flooded already). The water was raining down through the floor into the basement! What a mess! Luckily it stayed on the side of the basement that didn't have the pool table but I had to shop vac the upstairs than shop vac the basement and everything is a sloppy mess!

WE have all hard wood floors which will need to be replaced and refinished as needed. But I don't intend to even think about that until the kidlets are older and out of the "oops I destroyed the house" stage. What would be worse than flooding our house is putting in new floors and THAN having it flooded.

So Now I'm cleaning the basement and everything that got wet. Well I have been putting it off for way to long so i guess this is my motivation.

Why does it seem we put things off and then it's 10x the hassle to clean when something happens?

We do(n't) have a new cat

So we have had this stray kitty on our porch. I was feeding it to keep it near as I posted a found add on Craigs List and also a "seeking a good home" add.

Well, DH felt sorry for it as it was storming and let it in. It is really friendly with the kids and lets them pet him and pick him up. I went and got a litter pan and small bag of food but it looks as though we have a kitty now! He doesn't have fleas and is litter trained. I will take him to the vet down the road to see if he has a microchip in him and if not, he's good as ours.

Robert has decided on his own that the cat's name is Cookie.

Great Wolf Lodge

So we took the Girl Scouts up north to Traverse City MI and stayed the night at Great Wolf Lodge (they have locations around the US). We had a blast! GWL is a massive indoor water park and they have pools, play areas, lazy river and 5 water slides. so much to do there. Just had to share. This photo was taken of the fort in the middle of GWL the bucket at the top dumps 1000 gallons of water every 5 minutes and this is the big dump. It really comes at a huge force and knocked some PPL down who weren't expecting it.

DD's b-day cakewiches!

So we are having DD's party today and we just finished the cakewiches. one is ham & cheese on "rye" and the other is yet another pb&j. The ham & cheese one is butter creme frosting for the "mayo" and marshmallow fondant for the ham and cheese it is a yummy fondant recipe! easy to follow and make. for the ham I used brown Wilton frosting coloring and a touch of orange. the cheese is just orange. I colored the ham frosting before putting it on so it would be more marbled but the cheese was done as it was being made to make it more uniform. The fondant frosting is a marshmallow fondant which is really quite good and easy to follow.

I"m going to dust the white spots w/cocoa powder to help hide them.

A small town celebration

I went to my Grandma's town yesterday and they had their 4th of July parade on the 3rd. I took some photos. She lives in a small town. My uncles were in visiting and after the parade we took the kids to the ice cream shop around the corner. I like small town stuff like this.

Here's my youngest with his bag of candy he collected.


And what parade would not be complete without the hot dog eating camp!

Zebra's new sweater

So, Robert (my middle child) came to me and asked me if I would make zebra a sweater because he was cold. I asked him what color zebra's sweater needed to be and he said he zebra wants a gray one.

So I whipped up this little sweater for zebra and I think he's quite happy ;)

Some assembly required...

MY ASS!!!!

My parents got the boys a play kitchen for Christmas. Robert was so excited that as soon as he unwrapped it he suddenly wanted to go home and didn't want the rest of his presents. He even started to shove the box towards the door.

So I got it home and opened it up. There couldn't possibly be more assembly required. All the pieces were connected together with runners. So just to start putting it together I had to cut it all apart!

But needless to say at least 2 hours and 1 beer later It was done and is well loved! So all the effort was worth it. The boys really love their kitchen and playing with food (which they have a TON of!)

And lets not forget the best part.... THE BOX!

And all that turned into this.... And the final product!

Painting sugar cookies

So we painted sugar cookies on Christmas eve. This is a fun thing for the kids (and adults)! It takes more time than other methods of decorating cookies but it's quite fun. You start with your favoriate rolled sugar cookie recipe and make a bunch of cookies! And for the "paint" I don't really have a recipe exactly but I take a medium bowl and fill it with powdered sugar. Add about 1-2 tsp vanilla extract and I like it to be a bit buttery so I add 1-2 tsp Whilton imitation butter flavoring. Gradually add milk and whisk to the desired consistency (paint). divide into small bowls and color the icing. get some cheap plastic craft paint brushes and let everyone have fun!

Here is the sugar cookie recipe I used:

Rolled sugar cookies

Recipe By :
Serving Size : 0 Preparation Time :0:00
Categories : Cookies Deserts
Holiday recipes

Amount Measure Ingredient -- Preparation Method
-------- ------------ --------------------------------
1 1/2 cups butter -- softened
2 cups sugar
4 whole eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
5 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt

1. In large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until smooth. Beat in
eggs and vanilla. Stir in the flour, baking powder and salt. Cover and
chill dough for at least one hour (or over night).

2. Preheat oven to 400ºF (200ºC). Roll out dough on floured surface 1/4
to 1/2 inch thick. Cut into shapes with any cookie cutter.

3. Place cookies 1 inch apart on ungreased cookie sheets. Bake 6-8
minutes. Cool completely.

(click on any image to enlarge it)

The last of the tree trimmings!

I have received what i think are the last of the decorations to add to the tree this year. for our Holiday Craft Exchange on the HGTV knitting and crochet message boards I received this really cute Christmas doll and the large colorful ornament stars on the tree which are made of yarn. and this year my youngest sons class made ornaments. The teacher took photos of the kids at one of their field trips and some how had them printed on clear plastic. then she cut them and tucked them inside clear glass globes and the kids added glitter. It's so pretty! It's hard to see the picture inside due to it being in the globe and clear it self but I did get it to show up.






I have recieved what i think are the last of the decorations to add to the tree this year. for our Holiday Craft Exchange on hte HGTV message boards I recieved this really cute christmas doll and the large colorful ornament stars on the tree which are made of yarn. and this year my youngest sons class made ornaments. The teacher took photos of the kids at one of their field trips and some how had them printed on clear plastic. then she cut them and tucked them inside clear glass globes and the kids added glitter. It's so pretty! It's hard to see the picture inside due to it being in the globe and clear it self but I did get it to show up.