Sugar Cookies

What you'll need:

3 cups all purpose flour  

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 cup salted butter, room temperature

1 cup granulated white sugar

2 large eggs

2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

Make it:

Mix the dry ingredients in a bowl and set aside.
Mix the wet ingredients with a mixer and slowly add the dry ingredients.
Split the dough into two equal parts, wrap with plastic wrap and put into the fridge for either an hour or overnight.
When the dough is ready, roll it out and cut out shapes.
Bake the cookies for 8 - 10 minutes at 350 degrees.





Once the cookies are fully cooled, you can ice them.

Royal icing:

3 egg whites
3 tsp lemon juice
4 1/2 cups icing sugar

Make it:

Mix the ingredients until smooth, tint the icing with colour if you like and ice your cookies.





This recipe makes about 2 1/2 dozen cookies.

Christmas Ornaments

This recipe is very basic and easy to do. Once the dough is made, it is easy to work with and sets nicely. If you need to take a break while making the ornaments, make sure you cover the dough with plastice wrap so it doesn't dry out and harden.

What you'll need
• 2 cups baking soda
• 1 cup cornstarch
• 1 1/2 cups water

Put it Together 

1. Mix all the ingredients in a saucepan and cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until it is too thick to stir with a spoon.

 



2. Cool for 15 minutes. Knead it for about 5 minutes on a surface sprinkled with baking soda. Keep dough wrapped in plastic when you're not using it.



Cut the dough into shapes (If you are making ornaments, use a straw to make the holes in the top for string or ribbon) and set on a drying rack to dry. Flip the ornaments a few times before they are completely dried to ensure that they dry flat.

Once you have molded it, it will take 1-2 days for the clay to dry depending on how thick your craft is. This clay can be painted with either Tempera or acrylic craft paints.

Elf on a Shelf

It seems as though every year there is a new trend right around Christmas. This year, I believe it is the “Elf on a Shelf” that we now have roaming throughout our home.

The elf comes with a Christmas story, which explains how Santa knows who is naughty and nice. Every night your elf will fly back to the North Pole to report to Santa and in the morning he/she will be somewhere in your house…usually doing something mischievous.

Here are some pictures of our elf “Wobbly” and some of the funny business he has gotten into. I will continue to update the pics until Christmas when Wobbly will go back to the North Pole until next year.

Christmas Jello

I named this post "Christmas Jello", but really, you can use any set of colours for any type of occasion. These jello cubes just happen to be Christmas colours.



Make them: Make up one batch of jello at a time and pour into a 9 x 9 inch greased pan. Allow each layer of jello to set in the fridge before adding the next layer. For the white layer, I used just plain gelatin packs with a Tbsp or two of sweetened condensed milk mixed in (to make it white).

Although the mixing is a little tedious, the jello set much quicker than I thought it would have.

This is a nice alternative for a dessert during a time when there are sweets all around us.