As usual I thought I was going to have much more to blog about this past month than I actually did. I tried to pack the calendar with all sorts of activities (parades, tree farms ,etc) for the kids in an attempt to make the most of the season. I started to realize pretty early on in the month that Claudia is just not at the age yet to enjoy most of the things that I had planned. So, I dialed back my expectations a bunch and have just been enjoying my days with the girls and my family. We did get to drive around looking at lights (which Claudia surprisingly loves), we met Santa a few times (Claudia is not a fan haha) and we even got to see a Christmas movie at a theatre for Maddie's pre-school party. It was the first time for both of the girls and they really enjoyed it. In the wake of the horrible, unimaginable tragedy that occurred in Newtown, I have been finding myself counting my blessings every day and trying to spend less time focusing on how stressful motherhood can be at times and just really trying to be "in the moment" with my kids as much as possible. To just hug them and stare at them and get down on the floor and play with them. They are at such a precious age and it goes by so fast. This picture reminds me of what my house has looked like for the majority of our December...
I decided this would be the year that I would try my hand with baking cookies and the girls and I have been loving it! Maddie has a special Santa apron that she wears while we're making cookies and we blast Christmas music in the kitchen (it helps the cookies taste better I think.)
I was really excited to finally learn how to make my grandmother's recipe for cherry butter cookies. Maddie enjoyed putting the cherries on and when they were done baking we dipped some in chocolate and some in raspberry jam and sprinkles. We can NOT stop eating them!
Claudia and Maddie really like to write down recipes in little notepads...just like Barefoot Contessa does.
Sometimes baking with kids can be more of a mess than a help, but I can actually say that Maddie was really helpful. She unwrapped all of these hershey's kisses for our peanut butter blossoms and cherry kiss cookies.
Sometimes all this baking can make you really tired and you just fall asleep on the kitchen floor.
Besides my Grandmother's cherry butter cookie recipe and my mother's chocolate raspberry truffle recipe I used only recipes that I found online that I thought would be fairly simple.
So if you haven't already started baking, and you need some simple yet delicious recipes those are my recommendations.
We even made some "cookies" for our bird friends too!
I hope that you are all enjoying the holiday season as much as we are. Merry Christmas from my family to yours!
Gorgeous photos!! Have a wonderful Christmas:)
ReplyDelete~Anne xx