The last few years since we moved to Florida has been hard for me because the cookies are not quite as appreciated with this side of the family so we've been trying to do the "gift buying" thing, which gets expensive and is harder each year. The first year we did cookies, taking over my father's kitchen for days to do so. This year though we have our own kitchen and for the first time in four years I feel like Christmas is really here, and everything feels just about right. I got my niece and nephew involved in the cookies this first day, which was SO VERY long! Wife and I napped after the first batch of cookies stuff and then woke up to do the crayons. Today marks day two of the cookie making, so there's lots of pictures!
First things first. I picked up my niece and nephew after shopping all morning and grabbing a 3 and a half hour nap. I couldn't get the wife up at all, she was out cold, so I picked them up on my own and brought them back to the house. While they wandered around I got wife up and then me and the kids cleaned off the dining room table, placing plastic table cloths over the table to protect it from the insanity I was sure to follow. I'm SO glad I did that, because there was powdered sugar, cookie dough and flour everywhere by the end of things.
We pulled out the cook book and got started. Gene (nephew) would read off what was needed, Alicia (niece) would measure out, and I'd put things in the bowl to mix up. Then, since Gene is interested in being a chef and I didn't think Alicia had spent much time making bakery type things, I'd mix, and explain how you did the steps, what things felt like, looked like and all of that. I would hand the bowl to each child and let them give a swipe, get a feel for everything. Then Gene would read the next part, Alicia would measure, and we'd go from there. We got a whole batch of sugar cookies ready to put in the fridge while the Wife began her coco roll adventure.
Let me explain the Chocolate Roll thing. My grandmother, bless her and her insanity, makes this FANTASTIC chocolate roll that is my father's favorite desert type thing. She learned how to make it from her Husbands mother, getting her cook book and everything with the recipe knowledge. It's the type of thing that has been passed on for generations, only it skipped my father and my sister and I would like to learn how to make it, but really Omi (grandmother) just doesn't want to tell us how it's done, she insists on "showing" us how to do it. This wouldn't be an issue except that she's cranky all the time, and generally makes being around uncomfortable and such. My sister has tried to learn the recipe from her in the past, but it never happened, and my Wife is the type of person who could totally master a recipe that includes the instructions, "Add sugar until it glazes" or something like that, but I need a measuring cup or amount. Adding a "dash" of something is a BAD instruction for me. So my father pilfered his mothers cook book and gave us a copy of the recipe so the Wife can try to figure out what it is Omi does to make the roll. So she spent a while tearing a roll apart and such in order to try to figure it out. We think that we might have a general idea of it taste wise, so we'll be giving those out as presents to our families. It's exciting, but mostly because we want to know how close to the actual thing they turned out.
SO! Wife was doing that while I put the dough in the fridge and me and the kids got started on the thumb print cookies. They loved the nut chopper and argued over who got to use it first. Once the batter was done the Wife realized we had only ONE cookie pan and she and I decided that had to be changed. She asked the kids who wanted to go with her and who wanted to stay with me and finish up the thumbprints. Alicia and Gene were both easy on this decision. Alicia wanted to go, and Gene wanted to stay. So they left and I took Gene to the table, whipping up the egg white and rolling the balls of thumb prints in it and passing them off to him to roll in the nuts, place on the pan and put his thumbprint in it. We got those all done, and then in the oven. Then the girls came back, we had more cookie sheets and it was about time to pull out the batter.
I rolled out the dough and let the kids cut out their shapes. Each of them had their own sheet to place cookies on and decorate. It seemed like it took forever to get the dough cut and shaped and decorated (it does EVERY year!) and then finally we had those cooked. While the kids were in the other room taking a break, I cleaned up a bit and then Wife and I started the dough for the tea cookies. These are a favorite for everyone, not in the cookie book, but my mother found the recipe *waves at mom* and placed it in the back of our cookie book. My sister loves these the most, and everyone in the house does as well, really they're fantastic.
By the time we got that in the fridge to cool it was nearly ten and we'd had the kids for 4 hours, how had that happened?? So off they went back home and when I got back I realized I'd meant to take pictures and had forgotten. I'm not used to having a camera so I don't think of these things, but afterwards I picked it up and started snapping. So of course, the first bit is all the mess and clean up that was the first thing we did.
The stove with its two cookie sheets. Somehow it doesn't seem so dirty just looking at it, but wow, there was a lot of sugar sprinkles!
The sink, the dishes already washed, the tree and the computer that dutifully was playing Christmas music the whole time we were working. Ra was home (you can see her in the background) from work and just about as exhausted as we were. She was having some fun, playing Fable 2!
We have these terrible tiny ants, so we got ourselves a nice big plastic box thing to put our cookies into. This is so they will not only have to get through the plastic bags, but also get through the box. We are hoping it works. You can see the sugar cookies and the thumbprints. Unfortunately Gene's cookies got too hot and got a bit on the burnt side but they taste alright, just smell burnt.
Tea cookies!! <3 The second batch of batter was thawing on the cookie sheet and the first one was all rolled up and ready to go. You can see a bit of the mess the table was in, and at this point it was pretty clean!
That was the table cloth. Now apparently, it is part of the dog's snuggle bed on the ground. The white blanket is her's completely and totally, the green one peaking out is *mine* and the gold thing used to be a more or less clean table cloth. Sakura pulled it down from the mushroom and made a nest. *sigh* Oh well, she's so cute it's hard to be angry with her.
Ra! The cat is Shadow, the oldest cat we have, and the uncontested Queen of the household. She's crotchety, mean, and has it out for me, but of course I love her. Actually, for a time I hated her, but she's old, and much sweeter in her old age. Shadow loves that arm of the recliner, and therefore whomever ends up on it gets a cat, whether or not they wanted one. Ra is patient and loves Shadow, so it's all good stuff.
The second batch of tea cookies. I was supposed to cut them into about the same sized pieces and roll them up. I was. *I* was. Wife was mean. :P I'm no good with even and such. Cutting straight lines or cutting things into halves is not my forte.
Cloud cat is Shadow's first litter. There was no one else in the litter, just him. He is a yowler and has taken to meowing in front of that door just because he wants us to run the water in the sink for him to drink out of. No kidding. I was elbow deep in cookie dough though, and not about to go do that.
The new nest, and isn't she cute?
The finished tea cookies. First you cook them, then when they're warm you roll them in powdered sugar. Once they're cool you roll them again in powdered sugar and this is what you get. Aren't they pretty??
The mess... OH the mess.
I lied! It's all clean!
This is the finished pan. As you can see the pieces are up higher than the shapes, that's because they bake down to fill in all the spaces.
When you do this, sometimes the crayons don't completely melt. That's fine, just take a toothpick and press them down into the mix, they'll melt some more and will be inside the shape, so no problems!
I have close up pics of each one of the crayons in my photobucket: Christmas Crayons If you want to see more pics feel free to browse!
I was so tired when we were done, but we managed to get everything cleaned up and put away before we crashed again. Yay for us!!
*passing out now*
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