Freezer Paper Magic

I think I've read dozens of books and blogs and websites extolling the virtues of freezer paper stencil printing and now I understand why. I have made permanent stencils out of the harder plastic stencil sheets and was always disappointed. First, it hurt my delicate crafting hands (I'm a wimp) to push so hard on the exacto knife, and second, the permanence of the plastic stencil seemed fraught with anxiety for me. The freezer paper was almost freeing in it's quickness and impermanence. And yet, if you make a paper stencil you like, you could easiy transfer your design to a more permanent plastic stencil.

I also like the way the speed of the freezer paper stencil gives you the ability to make all your friends a customized, more personal version of something that could seem borderline mass produced, like the apron below. Everyone gets something one-of-a-kind and you still have time to read to the kids and contemplate world peace.

Quick and Dirty Christmas Giving

Here's a really quick project for Christmas giving. It's not actually dirty unless you attempt it with small children and then, watch out. We started making our own hot chocolate mixes this summer for going camping and I am a total convert. I've always thought packaged mixes tasted slightly of microwave popcorn (gag) and making your own couldn't be much simpler. The only crucial piece of equipment is a metal mesh sieve to run everything through. It really makes the difference and makes the cocoa and powdered milk homogeneous and easy to mix with hot water. Without the sieve the mixture tended to be lumpy and hard to mix. Really, who needs all the extra stirring, I'm already so tired at the end of the day. So, just mess around with good quality cocoa, powdered milk skim or whole, sugar and then for the fancy giving add powdered ginger or pulse the mix with a few drops of peppermint oil.

Killer Bunnies

In honour of Postmodern Hausfrau's birthday the girls and I mailed off some Killer Bunnies. The original recipe was for Christmas Mice cookies, very cute with little liquorice tails but somehow not quite right for dearest PH. It was the most fun I've had with the girls in the kitchen for a while. There was minimal mess, no rolling pin wars and each girl got to roughly handle their own ball of dough without infringing on each others territory or my sanity. I put out a bunch of slivered almonds in a bowl for them to stick in their dough balls and make cookie 'monsters'. This distracted them totally and gave me enough time to make these funny little bunnies. Unbaked they sit up quite perkily and when in the oven they slump a bit so it became unclear if they had front feet or giant bunny fangs a la Bununcula (one of my personal childhood favourites which I can't even find a link to send you to for a trip down memory lane).
The recipe for these bunnies or any creature you dream up is as follows:

3 c all purpose flour
1/4 tsp salt
1 c butter, softened
3/4 c sugar
1 tsp almond or vanilla extract
1 large egg
Slivered almonds
Candies of your choice
Melted chocolate to glue candies to cooled cookies

In a large bowl, cream butter 2 mins. Add sugar and cream a further 3 mins until pale and fluffy. Add extract and egg, beat to combine.
In another bowl whisk together flour and salt.
Add flour to butter mixture 1/3rd at a time.
Wrap dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate 2 hours or overnight.
This recipe is meant to make 40 cookies so make fairly small balls. Shape them as desired and stick all over with almond extremities.
I tried sticking the candies into the dough but they didn't stick well. I found it easier to stick their eyes on with melted chocolate after they were baked.
Bake at 350 F for 10-15 mins depending on the size. They should just be turning golden brown on the bottoms.
Cool on racks. Decorate. Enjoy.

Gingerbread houses

It was our first year making gingerbread houses with the girls and if I had known how much candy and icing they would actually eat, and how incredibly crazy all that candy would make them later I might have put this activity off until they were 10. Or just skipped it and told them to try it when they have kids of their own. It was pretty fun though and brought back a lot of memories of doing this in my mom's mom's kitchen. Grandma 'R' and her three girls and the grand kids all in the tiny kitchen assembling our gingerbread version of Santa's workshop, house, sleigh, reindeer, presents, stained-glass windows and all. Downstairs in his workshop my grandpa was busy constructing the box all the gingerbread would sit on with holes placed under each house for lights to poke through and illuminate the houses from within. It was elaborate and delicious and one of my best childhood memories. So, I suppose we'll go ahead and do this again next year.
The final work of art!

WinterWonderland

Here's Arlo riding a pony named Muffin. Boss Hog insists that even though Christmas crafting is in overdrive trying to complete 10,000,000 projects in time for the big day, I should participate in family activities. I am simultaneously full of holiday cheer and a total drag. I am cheerful only when the sewing machine is whirring towards the big festive deadline.

Anyway, since there are so many great things to do and see here at Christmas we headed out for some family fun at Predator Ridge. It's a fancy local golf course that had it's first WinterWonderland event and it was a lot of fun. The kids can't stop talking about riding the ponies. Apparently three minutes on a tiny horse trumps any craft project I have ever devised for them. Go figure. Next up we are looking forward to Caravan Farm Theatre's winter sleigh ride performance. I think the girls will go bonkers when they see the size of their horses.

The Purple Quilt

The idea for this quilt was that Eden and I would potato and apple stamp some purple fabric together in a whirlwind of mother-daughter love and mutual admiration. I would then, according to her wishes, fashion her a new blanket from the stamped fabric (her feet stick out the bottom of her baby blanket that she loves). It would bring us closer and empower her artistic sensibilities in one fell swoop.

Ahem, and then it turned out that she is still only three and had no inclination to stamp three separate yardages for me to quilt. Could not be bothered beyond the first three stamps let alone three whole yards. And you know what, it's lucky for her she bailed when she did because her mother is a total control freak!

I finally pieced this thing together after I discarded the first two yards of fabric that I printed top to bottom and hated so completely they will never see the blogosphere. There was a re-evaluation of my relationship with purple (quite rocky but still civil) and a re-purchasing and re-printing of more fabric. I would likely obsess over this quilt some more but since Christmas is coming rather quickly I bound the edges and started hand sewing in the big magenta squares. Finished photos to follow more than likely after the Christmas hoopla subsides.

Peppernuts

For the past few years I have been getting together with about a dozen friends in early December for a cookie exchange. If you haven't done one before it works something like this:
step 1. organize your group and finalise the number who will be participating.
step 2. pick your top 2-3 recipes and call everyone to make sure all of you are
not making the same chocolate chip recipe off the bag of chips.
step 3. bake like mad until you have 1 doz. cookies for each person in the group
including yourself.
step 4. get everyone together for a cup of hot chocolate, glass of wine etc. and
at the end of the night you go home with x dozen different cookies all
ready to be plated at a moments notice when holiday guests stop by
unexpectedly.
step 5. glow and blush when everyone notices how organized you have been and
gobbles down the beautiful selection of treats you have set out.

This year I (with much help from Eden and Arlo) am making the most delicious Peppernuts. The recipe I will not give out as it is a family one from Postmodern Hausfrau and I don't want to infringe or start a family feud. But, it must be said, is the greatest slice and bake cookie ever. In part of course this is due to the absolutely tiny size of the cookies, totally irresistible, but the spices make it. I have had my nose stuck in Baking in America by Greg Patent for a while and I suddenly realized how limited my repertoire has become. Everything doesn't have to be chocolate? Heresy! But it's true and these cookies are proof.
**Notice the pan I forgot in the oven when we went out to see our small town's Christmas Light-Up. I am sooooo lucky I did not burn down our house in pursuit of Christmas cheer.