Friday, December 21, 2012

Christmas Baking: Chocolate Chip Tea Cakes


Can you believe Christmas is only 4 days away!? I sure can't, it feels like last Christmas was just a few months ago.

I hope you've been enjoying the recipes I've been sharing with you over the last few days. Today I have the 4th and final recipe, Chocolate Chip Tea Cakes. These cookies are my mom's favorite. There aren't any eggs in the dough so you can snack on the dough without any fears. That's always a plus!




Be sure to let me know if you decided to make any of the cookies I've shared with you. I'd love to hear how they've turned out for you. Also if you have any favorite Christmas cookies yourself I'm always looking for new recipes and I'd love if you'd share them with me. You can either e-mail me or leave the recipe in the comments.

Tonight I'm headed to dinner with my girlfriends. It's a tradition we have been doing for about 4 or so years now. Instead of giving each other gifts we get dressed up and go out to dinner. It's always a lot of fun. Then after dinner I'm headed over to Nick's parent's house, because his dad's side of the family will be over there. So tonight is going to be quite busy, but busy in a good way.

I hope you all have a very Blessed Christmas! Be safe if your traveling. Enjoy celebrating our Savior's birth!

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Thursday, December 20, 2012

Christmas Baking: Scandinavian Almond Cookies


Welcome back! I hope you're ready for the third recipe I have to share with you guys. This recipe for Scandinavian Almond Cookies came from my mom's good friend Lorie. We've only been making them for the last 5 years or so, but they quickly became one of my favorites.

Without further ado, here's the recipe!




As you can probably tell from the picture we didn't use sliced almonds. My mom had just regular raw almonds so we just ground them up a bit and it seemed to work out just fine. These cookies are really good with a cup a coffee. I'd even eat them at breakfast!

Tomorrow I'll have the last recipe for you, just in time for Christmas! I hope you all are doing well & staying warm!
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Wednesday, December 19, 2012

Christmas Baking: Spritz Cookies


I'm back for day number 2 of my favorite Christmas cookies! Today I'm going to share with you the recipe for the Spritz Cookies my mom has made every year since I was little. She's probably made them even longer then that.

This recipe for Spritz Cookies comes from the old Betty Crocker cookbook my mom has. (I blogged about that cookbook here) You're going to need a cookie press like this one from Pampered Chef.
Here's the recipe!




These cookies always look nice and festive if you color the dough. Otherwise if you'd like to add sprinkles just do so before you bake the cookies so that they stick.

Come back tomorrow for another delicious cookie recipe!

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Tuesday, December 18, 2012

Christmas Baking : Chocolate Ball Cookies



Today I went over to my mom's house and we baked all morning. Since neither her nor I need many cookies this year we baked everything together and just split it up. That made the process go much faster.

I thought I'd spend the next few days posting my favorite cookies recipes. I figure, what's a better way to get in the Christmas spirit?

Today I'm going to share with you our Chocolate Ball Cookies. They are one of my favorites and resemble a truffle, but with a cookie consistency. They are super easy to make, which is always a plus.



Hope you like them! Tomorrow I'll share with you another recipe. Until then I hope you have a wonderful rest of the day!

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Thursday, December 13, 2012

Finally Done Decorating!

So I thought I had been done decorating my house for Christmas for at least a week or so. At least the main living part of the house seemed to be done. Soon though I began thinking that I would like to change up what my dining room table looked liked. I was growing tired of the same table cloth and candle combo (picture just below) that I have had for the last 3 years.


So what's a girl to do when she needs a little decorating help? Go to Target of course!

I ended up spending much more then I intended to, but I'm really very happy with the final result. Also everything I bought (minus the votive holders) was on sale. So obviously that justifiably makes it better. The table now goes much better with my kitchen decorations then the silver decorations did.

I'm going to make the bold statement that I'm now completely done buying Christmas decorations for this year. Until after Christmas sales that is!

This seems to happen to me every year. I think there is no possible way that I need more decorations, but every year I end up buying more. Maybe next year will be the year when I won't have the urge to buy anything new. I'm doubting it, but oh well!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend! We've got another busy weekend in store. It's looking like they'll all be that way until after the first weekend in January, then we'll finally get to rest.






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Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Our Christmas Tree

Somehow even through the craziness of Thanksgiving weekend we managed to at least get our Christmas tree up. (The rest of the decorations stayed in boxes all over my living room for almost 2 weeks after that.)


Last year Evelyn was much too little to even begin to help put up the tree. This year she wasn't much help, more of a menace, but she sure did like looking at all the pretty lights and ornaments. At one point she even ran off with the star tree topper to get a better look.


Since our cats like to knock out tree over we decided that instead of putting the tree in our bedroom, like we did last year, we're just going to lock them in the basement whenever we leave the house. So far it's worked out pretty well. I'm not too sure the cats appreciate it, but it means far less of a headache for us.


So far Evelyn really only disrupted a few of the ornaments. There are a couple that are right at her height and easy for her to pick off the tree. She always brings them right to me like she's giving me some sort of gift. Next year hopefully we'll have less of an issue, because she'll be able to communicate better.


Now for a little baby #2 update. I had an appointment today and everything was perfect. My first 2 weeks of blood sugar readings we're so good that I now only have to test twice a day instead of 4. The little jelly bean's heart rate was in the upper 140's. My next appointment is in about 4 weeks and it's the big ultrasound to find our the baby's gender! I'm pretty excited to for that one.

I hope you all are doing well and staying warm! It's been pretty cold around here lately, but still no snow :( I'm pretty bummed about that. I'm still hoping for a good layer of fresh snow for Christmas!

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Thursday, December 6, 2012

End of October Till Now (Plus An Announcement)

Well friends I took a much longer break than anticipated  It was prompted by a little bit of writers block and a huge bit of life being hectic. I'm hoping to be back more regularly, but with Christmas coming up soon I may still be in and out over the next month.

I thought I'd just give a quick overview of what has been going on around these parts. Then I'll reveal the big announcement that I hinted at in my post over a month ago.

Since I pretty much stopped blogging right after Halloween I never had a chance to show off Evelyn's adorable costume. She was the cutest little duck around! We made a stop at each of the grandparents' houses to show her off and then made a quick stop at our friend's house.





On the 18th of November we had Evelyn dedicated at church. She had the prettiest little dress and was well behaved through the dedication. Thankfully they do it at the beginning of service so that she could go to the nursery during the sermon. I don't think she would have been as well behaved if she had to sit through the whole thing.


For Thanksgiving we had quite a busy day. We had lunch with my parents, sister, brother-in-law and niece and then had dinner with Nick's parents. Even though it was too big meals I managed to not over eat which is amazing, because I'm a big fan of Thanksgiving food!

A few days after Thanksgiving on the 24th my sister gave birth to her second child. Her name is London and she was only 5 lb. 6 oz. She's a tiny little thing even though she was only a week early. Her big sister Drew thinks she's pretty cool.

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Now for the announcement. The big reason why I've been M.I.A. from the blogging world for the last couple of months is because I'm pregnant again!



This time around I was feeling pretty sick during the first trimester. I actually got put on some anti nausea pills, because I was finding it hard to eat since I was so nauseous 24/7. They worked like a dream, but nothing helped with exhaustion and that's why I took a break from the blog. Chasing around a toddler and being pregnant is a lot harder than I thought it was going to be.

I'm due on May 31st. They were a little iffy on my actual due date since I got pregnant while I was nursing, so we got two ultrasounds in 2 weeks to just confirm everything. The first time there wasn't much of anything to see, but the second time there was a strong heartbeat and a little jellybean.

Unfortunately I have gestational diabetes again. They did the test around 12 weeks this time since I had it with Evelyn. So now I'm testing my blood sugar after every meal and right when I get up in the morning. I'm hoping that my numbers are good enough that I can go down to just testing after one meal and in the morning like last time. So while you're all enjoying your sugary treats this Christmas, I won't be. That's the only part I'm bummed about.

Just one day shy of 15 weeks.
Well there you have it. That's what I've been up to. I hope all of you are doing well. I'm hoping to blog about setting up our Christmas tree either this weekend or next week sometime.

Have a wonderful weekend!

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