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Monday, December 19, 2011

Cookies and Cousins

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Pumpkin Pecan Cookies with Brown Sugar Butter Frosting These are always favorites for fall

Well my parents annual Christmas party has come and gone and it was fantastic as usual.

I posted pictures of my parents house last year, you must stop and see their awesome backyard.

Last years cookie table featured 16 different kinds of cookies and I was determined to cut down this year.

Picnik collage

My efforts were thwarted by special requests and more specifically my mother...
who declared half the cookies I was eliminating her "favorite".

This year she took on quite a few cookies herself and we ended up with
21 different types of homemade cookies.

23 if you take into consideration different flavor variations.

Picnik collage

Here we have...
Almond Window Cookies with Raspberry Jam or Apricot Jelly
I detest making window cookies so my mom did those this year.  It was awesome.

White Chocolate Cherry Shortbread, dipped in white chocolate and sprinkles
Spicy Gingerbread Snowflakes- Peanut loved these.  He's a weird kid.
My mom made them and I decorated them and I really love that system of doing things :)


Picnik collage

Going clockwise in the collage and clockwise on the plate
Repeats of the window cookies and shortbread with 
Salted Butterscotch Shortbread Bars (one of my personal favorites)

Peanut Butter Kisses & Lemon Bars
Oatmeal Chocolate Chip & Pumpkin Whoopie pies made by my sister Sherri
I think she needs to get on here and share this recipe with you- I expect this every year.
Thanks Sherri- here we go with the recipe!

Cranberry Orange Chews, Sugar Cookies and Revel Bars (another crowd favorite)

Picnik collage

Sugar Cookies, Peanut Butter Kisses and Cherry Winks

Someday I'll learn to decorate sugar cookies with fancy frosting.
The thing is I need them to be stackable and I feel like a whole sugar cookie covered with royal icing might break your teeth.  Thoughts?

That and the fact that I'm lazy.
I made my sister help me decorate these which just means painting them with corn syrup and dipping them in sprinkles.

Picnik collage

My mom also buys danish butter cookies along with 
See's Candy because we just don't have enough sweets.

On the back side of the plate are Almond Orange Bites.

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Not pictured (along with the rest of the party and all of the guests)
and 2 different kinds of my mom's fudge.

Am I missing some?  I can't remember.

Then people started showing up and I couldn't find my camera,
I spent several hours following kids from one room to another,
back and forth, all night long.
Most the time I was running after Peanut but occasionally it was someone else's child.

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I almost missed this family shot but my mom let me know my camera was in the garage 
(of course, why wouldn't it be?)
and I was able to sneak it in.

This is at the very end of the night before all the kids got into their pjs.

Next year I vow to get pictures of everyone.
I have approximately 5 pictures of B, Peanut and I and 
almost none of both my parents with him.

I didn't even get a picture of him in his cute little argyle sweater.

I am so happy I got this shot!!

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Afterwards all the cousins got cozy in their pajamas
and played around the Christmas tree.

Everyone had a great time and we can't wait until next years!

8 comments:

  1. Gained weight just reading this. Love your sweet family pics.

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  2. Beauitful cookies and beautiful memories! And lots of calories too!

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  3. I don't know.... I just don't feel like there were enough cookies this year. It seems lacking somehow.

    Bwahahahahahaa!

    GIrl you OUT DID yourself! I love the visual of you sweet mama and you planning it all out and working together. So cute. (I also think your mama's tights are darling.)

    I just baked all weekend too. And is it just me, but after I bake all those things, I really don't care if I eat any of them?

    Okay girly... Merry Christmas!

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  4. Amazing! Everything was SO good and so beautiful. My kids woke up asking for more cookies. LOL
    We couldn't get enough.

    And Molly loved those Gingerbread Snowflakes too. Must have been the shape and texture or something?

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  5. Whoopie Pie making sister in the house! So here's the link http://dreamydesserts.blogspot.com/2008/10/pumpkin-whoopie-pies-with-creamy-cream.html

    These are absolutely INCREDIBLE! Don't be turned off by the amount of oil in the recipe and you for sure want to use a pastry bag. Refrigerating them absolutely brings the flavors together. Enjoy!

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  6. WOW!! Everything was amazing!! Corn syrup and sprinkles! That's such a great idea! On the gingerbread snowflakes--can you tell me the recipe you used for piping the white frosting? I know that's such a lame question but it looked like it was really easy and it dried really hard. I always have trouble with that.

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  7. Dawn your moms house is AMAZING!! My sister even has pics of her backyard on her phone for decorating inspiration. And the cookies! OMG holy cookies! Can I pay to get an invite next year? =] I love how festive you guys get during the holidays, it inspires me to make sure Jude + Eve gets an overload of holiday spirit as they get older too.

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  8. Oh my word!!!!! Those are all beautiful cookies!!!!!

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