The Solstice is here! It is a time to celebrate the first day of winter, the longest night of the year and the rebirth of the Sun. For the next 6 months, daylight will get longer and gradually it will become warmer invoking the spring flowers and leaves the bud and bloom!
With the Solstice comes other celebrations such as Christmas and New Years. 
This weekend, Aiden and I spent hours trying our hand at one the most traditional ways to celebrate the season...Christmas cookies. Now, let me just say up front, I am not the greatest baker. This was quite an undertaking for me, but I really wanted to give it a shot. Besides, it's something Aiden can help doing (sort of ).
This weekend, Aiden and I spent hours trying our hand at one the most traditional ways to celebrate the season...Christmas cookies. Now, let me just say up front, I am not the greatest baker. This was quite an undertaking for me, but I really wanted to give it a shot. Besides, it's something Aiden can help doing (sort of ).6 hours of baking cookies is a long time! To be honest, I had no idea what I was getting myself into. I really didn't expect to be baking for 6 hours. Am I truly that naive to the world of baking? I picked 4 recipes that I wanted to try out of the Better Homes and Gardens Christmas Cookie magazine. I stuck to the ones that looked fairly easy, ones which made me think 'okay, I could do this one with a toddler in the house'. First, espresso balls-prep time 25mins, bake time 15mins. This is one is a piece of cake, right! According to the recipe, I could pump out 54 espresso balls in about an hour (provided I was baking about 3 batches). An hour a half later I ended up with 24 balls. Okay, so they taste great...but lets get real here. I think the recipes should post prep times for beginners. And 54 balls? The recipe calls for making 1 inch balls and I have to tell you, I think I was pretty close.
3 more to go... Next on the list was strawberry shortbread cookies, then peanutty peanut butter cookie sandwiches and lastly, sugar cookies with icing. Once again, I found the prep times to be a lie and the expected output to be completely exaggerated!
According to Better Homes and Gardens I should have been able to make 180 cookies in about 4 hours. Not even close...*And, as a side note, it certainly wasn't Aiden's fault that it took so long...he was bored after about an hour decided to play with toys instead.
According to Better Homes and Gardens I should have been able to make 180 cookies in about 4 hours. Not even close...*And, as a side note, it certainly wasn't Aiden's fault that it took so long...he was bored after about an hour decided to play with toys instead.But, with all that aside, it was still fun and Aiden did enjoy licking all the spoons and decorating the cookies (more like eating the icing and sprinkles!) His favorite treat wasn't the cookies that took so long make, but acutally the pretzels sticks dipped in white chocolate. That took about 10mins...go figure!
Happy Holidays to all!
The cold and dark of winter are as necessary to life as the heat and light of summer.--Kate West
2 comments:
LOL yes...the people that write the cookbooks...LIE! the recipies never yeild what they should and always take way longer. sounds like you had fun though :-)
you are my 1st "blog" experience!
I do think you could bring it up again in case he might remember saying that? you never know. or...how re: a book from the library re: the issue and see how he reacts--as you say, it may have been nothing more than the little boy was "monkeying" around.
also, give yourself a break on the "worst mother" thing--some moms don't care enough to even think re: such things. you'll have many more oppportunities to have him hopefully be the open minded person you are. we all do the best we can at the time--sure, we can all look back and feel we could've handled a situation differently--that doesn't stop by the way!:)
anyhow, that's enough blogging-if you want to talk more in person, have at it!lh
Post a Comment