Christmas Cheer

I keep forgetting to update this thing. I know it's been a while. It always feels as if I've been so much busier than normal. I've come to the realization that busier than expected IS normal. *sigh*

It's that time of year again, when the kids channels are inundated with horrible toy commercials, people go around humming carols under their breath rather than curses, and neighbors compete to see who can put up the best Christmas lights. Yes, I know this, even in my apartment. But the neighbors only tease me a little about my 2 strings of badly put up lights and tiny lit up tree, because they know my time is much better spent baking. I've started baking earlier this year, baking and freezing cookies ahead of time so I won't be dashing around for a day or two trying to make three different kinds of breads and sweets and deliver them before the goods aren't fresh. And I've started baking cookies this year rather than all sweet breads, but I'll still bake my Pumpkin-Glazed Walnut bread. I'll try to include a recipe or two at the end of this.

We bought our first Christmas tree this year, a pre-lit fake one from Wal-Mart. Natalee seems to be enjoying it. She's been pointing to to it a lot, saying 'Wha'z'at?!' The tree we had prior to this was the little two footer that's now on the porch. There aren't a lot of ornaments on it, but it leaves room for the ones Natalee'll hopefully make herself one day in Primary or kindergarten, and the ones we receive as gifts. We have about two dozen ornaments on the tree, and all but maybe three have been gifts from family and friends celebrating Matt's and my first Christmas together, our engagement, our first Christmas as parents, and several celebrating Natalee's first Christmas, along with gifted Aggie ornaments. It doesn't seem right to just buy a box full of balls without any sentimental value behind them. It's been really nice to see the tree glowing in the living room, feeling like we're starting our own memories as a family. Plus now we actually have a place to tuck our gifts.

Things haven't all been rosy lately with Matt's surgery coming up. It shouldn't be too bad since it's outpatient surgery. But it's a little nerve-wracking since he'll have to stay overnight for observation regardless, in case his airways get blocked. But Jennifer's supposed to be coming to take care of Natalee for us and help around the apartment for a day or two. And Matt's parents are coming for moral support. That's been a big relief to us. We won't have to deal with this by ourselves, with a child to take care of and a scary experience ahead of us. It felt like that when I had Natalee, since there wasn't anybody here to help us and give support till the day after. (That couldn't be helped though, since she came almost four weeks early.) But it'll be nice to have some of our family here. If we just think about our family visiting and Christmas coming up and avoid the surgery stuff, we can pretend that it's an early holiday celebration.

Natalee has been growing so much! Suddenly since she turned two, she's shot up and lost a lot of weight. She used to have chubby little legs that were short below her torso. In the last week or two they've stretched out and thinned out. No more chubby little legs for sure. And her little pot belly is gone. Her ribs are visible most of the time now. I hate that - I loved her little belly, but it's natural. I'll just have to repress my urges to constantly feed her cheese and milkshakes. She likes to sing "Jingle Bells" and "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town" and "Once There Was a Snowman." She doesn't know all the words but definitely has the tunes down. And she loves to be picked up and held and hugged and kissed and give kisses and play hide-and-seek. She's a lot of fun right now, unless she's throwing one of her fits. Matt and I've gotten to be old hands at that in some ways. We've learned to just tune her out. Unless she decides to slap you in the face and bite you a few times. Which she did at the ENT's office last week. Good times...

I'm happy that Christmas is almost here, enjoying the excitement of getting all the shopping done and the anticipation of visiting loved ones and receiving gifts. But it's always a bit sad this time of year too. I like having Christmas and New Year's to look forward to. Once they're over, it's kind of bleak and cold and broke for weeks after. But Christmas seems to be extra special this year, experiencing it with my sweet little girl. And I'm definitely enjoying making my Christmas goodies in my big, powerful stand mixer. Eat your heart out, Tim the Toolman Taylor. I got a real machine in my kitchen this year! I can make 13 dozen cookies at a time in this baby. Which is why I'm making cookies. *gloat-gloat-gloat*

Here's one of the recipes I'm using. The ones I've made so far are really good. The texture reminds me of pecan sandies. Just make sure you grease your cookie sheet well enough, or the cookies will explode when you try to pull them off.

Swirled Holiday Snowball Cookies

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups (3 sticks) butter, softened
3/4 cup powdered sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 2/3 cups (10-oz. pkg.) NESTLÉ® TOLL HOUSE® SWIRLED™ Holiday Morsels
1/2 cup finely chopped nuts
Powdered sugar

Directions: PREHEAT oven to 375° F. BEAT butter, 3/4 cup sugar, vanilla extract and salt in large mixer bowl until creamy. Gradually beat in flour. Stir in morsels and nuts. Shape level tablespoons of dough into 1 1/4-inch balls. Place on ungreased baking sheets. BAKE for 10 to 12 minutes or until cookies are set and lightly browned. Remove from oven. Sift powdered sugar over hot cookies on baking sheets. Cool on baking sheets for 10 minutes; remove to wire racks to cool completely. Sprinkle with additional powdered sugar, if desired. Store in airtight containers.

Estimated Times: Preparation - 15 min Cooking - 10 min Cooling Time - 10 min cooling Yields - 54 cookies (4 1/2 dozen)

I got this recipe off of Nestle's website, http://www.verybestbaking.com/. It's also available on the back of the packages of the swirled holiday morsels. They're really easy to make, it's pretty much just powdered sugar, butter, swirled morsels, and nuts. Just watch them so they don't crisp up - they bake pretty fast. Hope they turn out as well for you as they did for me.