Holiday Baking

almond-crescent-cookies

I did more baking last week. My friend Laura made some delicious almond crescent cookies for us last year, so I made them this year. They are melt-in-your-mouth buttery deliciousness. And fairly simply to make as you mix them in the food processor. The addition of cinnamon and sugar on the top is excellent. You can find the recipe here.

carrot-cake-cupcakes

Then I made cupcakes for my daughter’s school birthday celebration last week. She requested carrot cake cupcakes, so I found this recipe, which turned out really well. Not overwhelmingly sweet, but more of a cake-like muffin. I left out the nuts and added some butter to the frosting to make it thicker. And we added chocolate sprinkles to make them more appealing to kids. After being totally skeptical about the carrots in the cake, several first-graders asked me for the recipe. Isn’t that funny?

Etsy Finds Friday

12-18-09

Letterpress & Silkscreen Calendar, $22 from ilee papergoods.

Blank DIY Printable Calendar from A Little Hut, $5.

Color It Yourself Calendar, $25 from Daisy Janie.

Letterpress Calendar with Ribbon, $24 from delphine STUDIO.

Letterpress Calendar, $24 from Paisley Tree Press.

Letterpress Calendar, $28 From seesaw designs.

Seasonal Lettpress Calendar, $22 from Becca Heuer.

2010 Letterpress Calendar, $42 from Ink + Wit.

Printable Calendar from Sweetbeets, $6.

Gumdrop Tree

gumdrop-tree

This is one candy tree that I wouldn’t be tempted to eat. I find gumdrops totally unappealing, but once they’ve been glued with a hot glue gun onto styrofoam, they are even less so. Candy is a theme around here right now as we are planning for my daughter’s Willy Wonka birthday party. (Is it a good idea to invite an entire class of first graders to your house and give them a bunch of candy?)

Anyway, I looked at a few tutorials, but decided to go with the trusty glue gun after reading this one. I found gumdrops to be scarce and the ones I found weren’t very pretty. And man, these things are like sandpaper on your hands. But I made two of these trees, using two big tubs of gumdrops for each tree (about 18″ tall).  Hopefully I can just spray these down with polyurethane and store them in an airtight container to use again, but that sort of grosses me out. We’ll see.