The grand kids didn't have school today, but Daughter Dawn did and Son-in-law Todd had to work, so we were on our own most of the day. During the night it occurred to me that it would be a good day to start making Christmas cookies and then go shopping later in the afternoon after DT got home from school.
The kids were game, but wanted to make the ginger animal cookies that go with the Noah's Ark set I had gotten from Martha Stewart many years ago. So that's what we did. The set has a recipe for ginger cookies that is really very good -- it should be: it calls for a tablespoon of ginger, a tablespoon of cinnamon, a half tablespoon of cloves, a cup of molasses AND a teaspoon full of black pepper!
We spent most of the morning making the dough, chilling it, rolling out the dough, cutting out the animals, chilling it again, and then baking the cookies. We were going to start the royal icing, but neither Dawn, nor the neighbor, nor Auntie Violet, not the little Whiskey Hill Store next door had any powdered sugar!
While the girls and I were making cookies, Forry took GS Micah birding. Micah needed to do a project for Scouts. They had a pretty successful afternoon with Micah spotting and identifying fourteen different birds -- including eight blue herons!
Since we didn't have the powdered sugar to do the frosting, we took a break (badly needed on my part!) until Dawn came home a little after three. After she got here -- all bubbly and happy about the wonderful evaluation she got from her nursing instructor! -- we took the girls and went over to the Goodwill store to look for some new jeans for GD Kyra. She has been growing so tall, so quickly, that everything she owns is definitely "high water" pants! She lucked out and not only found several pair of jeans that fit, but a couple of skirts as well.
We met the guys at the Thai restaurant in Canby and had a quick, but very delicious dinner before we headed for the new show house. Grandpa made major brownie points by taking Micah to see Planet 21 while the rest of us went to see New Moon (the 2nd time for Dawn and Havela and the THIRD time for Kyra!). Great movie -- I can't wait until the next one comes out in June!
(And we did remember to stop at the store and buy powdered sugar on the way home...)
I also needed a special grocery run for powdered sugar for Beka's Girl Scout cookie exchange...just not something I keep on hand...
ReplyDeleteThe teaspoon of pepper in your cookies...very interesting! Sounds like you've got some good spice there :-)