Holiday baking

Yesterday was my holiday baking day. I pretty much baked from morning until night. We ran a few errands in the middle and occasionally had to stop to entertain tot that was climbing up my legs. The result of my hard work…
We plan to give goodies to our neighbors, friends and co-workers. I love to do this every year. Although I don’t recall baking last year, likely cuz I had a 7 week old. This year I made winter birch tree cookies, holiday cherry bars and peanut butter blossoms. I have made the tree cookies and blossoms before but this was the first time baking the cherry bars. A recipe from my aunt Julie and, although tasty, not nearly as good as hers. Maybe it was the soy milk in place of the half and half. Not sure why I put in the soy milk cuz Randall couldn’t eat them anyway with milk powder and whey in the cherry chips. Habit, I guess. Some of my readers might get lucky and get some if their husbands remember to bring them home.

We celebrated our Christmas on Saturday. We opted not to drag our presents to SD/IA only to drag them back to CO. Plus, Randy is too fidgety with wrapped gifts in the house, he has to open them as soon as I let him. Although this year I was getting a little excited myself. Probably cuz he got my presents a long time ago. I tried the shaking thing and did get one gift correct, or part of it. Baking pans. I asked for them so that cued me in when the package was super heavy. But little did I know the baking pans also contained an IPOD. I’m very excited about this new gadget. I’m also excited about not having to deal with CDs on our road trip home. It’s so tiny and I’m scared I will lose it. I’m listening to the Killers right now. Randy enjoyed his present and didn’t have a clue what it was. I got him a Plantronics Bluetooth, along with a hat and an Xbox game book. Lily didn’t get to excited about opening gifts but managed to unwrap a few books, barn that sorts shapes and letters and a small cabbage patch doll. She loves the barn and will carry it around by the handle. She will sit on the couch and stuff all the pieces inside the barn or try and stuff them in the couch until I catch her. She also loves baby dolls. She will hold them up by her shoulder and give them lots of kisses. This morning she gave her baby so many kisses it looked like the baby was slimed. Recently Lily has taken well to books. She will sit down and flip the pages. Sometimes she acts like she’s reading them. When Randy or I try and read a book, outside of bedtime, she will race over to us and snatch it out of our hands to read it herself. Now we try and read as quickly as possible, just to see how far we can get before she steals it away.

Lily’s teeth are through enough that her spirits are happy again. She is so funny and cute. I know everyone says this about their baby(ies) and if you don’t have any yet you will too someday. She loves to travel on our couch. She will grunt a few times to let us know she needs a lift and most times Randy throws (pretty gently) her onto the couch. She loves it and will crawl or walk all over. She is very good about getting down from the couch, she knows to turn around and put her legs down first. Lily remains the same with the dogs--cautiously interested. Sometimes she will touch them but is very good about not grabbing them. Max’s tail grabbed her attention the other day but instead of using it like a reign she laughed about its ability to move so quickly, sometimes getting in her face.

Tonight we are getting together with Joy’s family to celebrate an early Christmas. They won’t be traveling back to IA the same time we are so the kids couldn’t wait until next year to open gifts. I asked each kid for a list about 2 months ago and they were very specific on what they wanted. After we bought Kelsey’s Nintendo DS dog game I found out she didn’t even have a Nintendo DS system. Randy said she hoped to get one for Christmas. Oh boy. Maybe, just maybe, she was a nice girl and will get one. Or we will be returning a dog game.

Anyone a survivor fan? Last night was the finale and I was very happy Yul won. Thank goodness for Grey’s Anatomy and the OC on Thursdays to keep me entertained.