{So.. I had planned for this post to go up on Wednesday, but it's going up today, because my whole computer is on the fritz. I want to get this up before I loose all this work. I am taking my computer in to be fixed tomorrow. I am typing this in blogger which I never do. I always use a program called Live Writer which is not working, and I use a host for my photos; so lets just hope they look sharp and crisp. If they don't you know why? Oh, Computer, computer; you makin me mad. Anyways... here is Wednesday's post today. I also posted about these adorable Christmas sacks today. Check that out here; if you missed it.}
The ten pound effect/That's what January is for:
The ten pound effect/That's what January is for:
I always say
that I won’t gain weight over the holidays, but…
we have this
silly tradition of making treats together.
Our kids look
forward to it every year.
We spend a few
evenings making several delicious treats.
Then we spend an
evening packaging them all up.
…And then we
spend an evening delivering them to family and friends.
Sometimes we
even package them up and mail them to family and friends that are far away.
Yes!! this may
seem like a lot of work. It
is!!
…But, it is the
kind of work I want to do.
It’s teaching my
kids so many valuable lessons. They are learning to cook. They are
learning to clean up.
They are
learning to organize. They are learning to give.
They have an
opportunity to give to others. The best part is that they are learning
that homemade gifts can mean so much. We don’t always have to give what
we buy at a store.
…and we are
spending time together, having fun while we do it.
This year, we
put together 97 boxes of candy. This is our most yet!
I thought it
would be fun to share some of the different candies that we make and a link to
the recipe; just in case your family would like to try to make one of these.
…and because I
wish I could bring treats to all of you; this is my way of sharing them.
These are all
kid friendly recipes, and I assure that my kids had a hand in making all of
them.
Our family
favorite is a recipe that I make every year. They are called
Christmas Caramels
Christmas Caramels
I have been
making them every year. This year Stella made them. She is 11, and
she handled the whole process. She was even able to determine when it got
to the soft ball stage.
This is our
recipe:
1 C. butter
2 1/4 Cups Brown
Sugar
1 C. light corn
syrup
1 14 oz. can
sweetened condensed milk
dash of salt
Combine
ingredients into a heavy sauce pan. Cook over medium heat, stirring
constantly with wooden spoon. Keep at a rolling boil and cook till soft
ball forms in a cold bowl of water(this takes between 10-15 minutes of rolling
boil.) It will begin to get thick. When it does, spoon a small amount
into your bowl of really cold water. Touch with your hand and see if you
can roll it into a soft ball. If it becomes really hard, you have let it
boil to long, so check it consistently. Once it hits soft ball, pour it
into buttered 9x13 pan. Cool, and then cut. Makes about 75 pieces.
We also tried a
new recipe that we added our caramel recipe too:
Christmas
Turtles
We followed this
recipe and idea, but used our
own family caramel recipe; taking it to soft ball stage again.
The little kids
had the job of laying out the pecans, while Stella made the caramel.
Another family
fav, is molded mints:
Molded
Christmas Mints
I got this recipe
from my friend Krysta.
It’s super
simple. Melt a whole bar of almond bark. You can do this in a
double broiler, or slowly in the microwave. Once it’s melted, add food
coloring of choice, and a peppermint flavoring. I buy mine at our local
cooking store. It’s not the regular peppermint that you buy at the
grocery store. It has more of a butter mint taste. Then you will
need some Christmas molds. I also bought these at the local cooking store.
Lay out your
molds and spoon the chocolate into the mold. Then place the molds in the
freezer. Once they have hardened, pop them out. The kids are big helpers
when I am making these. They love to pop them out, and help me rotate
them through the freezer. When we make these, we like to make 2 colors.
We must really
love mints, because we also like to make:
Cream
Cheese Mints
You can find a
link for those here.
This year we tried
a new treat:
The kids enjoyed
breaking up all the goodies that went in the bark.
Then they
enjoyed breaking it into pieces when it had hardened.
When we were
done with the Cookie Bark, we used the left over Oreos and made:
Chocolate
Dipped Oreos
This is so
simple. You use what’s left of your white chocolate from your almond
bark, and dip your leftover Oreos in it. Then sprinkle on some pretty
sprinkles. This is certainly a kids job.
My kids favorite
treat to make are:
This is something
that the kids can do completely on their own. It does require the use of
an oven so it would be hard for smaller children when it gets to that
step. Stella is 11, and made these with the kids when I wasn’t home.
We also tried
out these yummy:
this year!!
Yummy in my tummy!
Isaac even made
the cream cheese frosting all on his own.
We normally just
make Ginger Snaps, but we tried them with frosting this year. I thought
they were yummo!! The kids are used to the traditional gingersnap and they want
me to go back to that next year. Some traditions just stick, making
change hard.
Then we made
some:
Christmas
Bar Cookies
We just like to
use our favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe, but then we spice it up.
The kids love
dumping in m&ms, and toffee bits, and chocolate chips, and our secret
ingredient?
Carmel
bits. Yep!! they are little bits of Carmel for melting. We use them
when we make Carmel apples.
We love how they
taste in the cookies.
A few sugar
crystals on the top of the cookies, and they look very festive.
The last and
easiest cookie we made were:
Red
Velvet Peppermint Cookies
Isaac mixed
these cookies all on his own.
It’s so simple,
he dumped these 3 ingredients into the mixer:
A red velvet
cake mix
2 eggs
1/2 cup of oil
Then he mixed that
up.
We then scooped
out cookie size portions with our cookie scoop.
We baked them at
350 for about 8-10 minutes; just until they crack.
We let them cool
some, and then we stuck that peppermint kiss right in the middle. They
are delicious! These would also be so good with white chocolate chips.
Happy Baking
friends.
WARNING: Christmas
baking has the ten pound effect.
If you make
these recipes, you may put on ten pounds during the holidays!!
Want to know
what I say about that?
That’s what
January 2nd is for.
1 comments:
Oh wow, all of these treats look amazing! I'd love to be one of your neighbors =) This is such a sweet tradition and lesson you are showing your children! Merry Christmas to you and your sweet family! -Jen
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