Easter Cookies

I had really good intentions to write this post the night before Easter when I made the Easter cookies, but after rolling out dough, cutting out 70+ flower cookies, placing them on sucker sticks, and frosting the 70 cookies, I was a little tired. Plus, as a reward for helping me frost a few cookies, I told Mike I'd go to American Reunion with me. Help me readers, I think I married a teenager! Mike doesn't like any movies. Really, he likes about 4 movies - all made in the 80's or 90's - no new movies - but American Reunion is a continuation of the original movie that he fell in love with in the 90's. To his credit, the movie was actually better than I expected. But what's up with that? Anybody know anyone else who stopped liking any movie made after their early 20's? He's the same with his music too? He can't explain it to me, so if anyone else is like that - I'd love to know the reasoning behind it. Batch #33 Almond Butter Cookie Bouquet This was a tough batch - I knew it would be a tough batch before I started, but I foolishly thought - I'm awesome at making cookies, I can whip these up in no time. Never mind the excruciating pain my neck and my shoulders have been giving me - it can't be that bad (tennis season has been especially rough on me this year - and the whole turning 29 thing - my body says it is through). These thoughts weren't actually running through my mind beforehand - it was actually more in hindsight. FYI - when you are having trouble turning your head because it is literally a "pain in the neck" it's not the best idea to make cut-out cookies that are time and labor intensive. The cookies were a huge hit. As I said, Mike helped me frost them - probably because I was hinting not at all subtly about how much pain I was in. He wrote our nieces' names on some of the cookies, he ate the mistakes, he did his best with using the new decorating container thingy I got from Cub - all in all - a pretty great guy.

Overall: We both gave them 4 smiley faces - it was the frosting that made them especially great.

Happy Birthdays

March 17 Batch #30 Blarney Stone Bars Ladies movie weekend at the cabin. I had a meeting all day at work on Friday - I didn't get out until 3:30. I hate when work life gets in the way of me trying to have fun - how dare you job! Since it was St. Patricks day, I felt I should make a holiday related cookie from the cookbook - it's not that I'm at all Irish in any way or even care about St. Patrick's day - it's just that I have this cookie challenge and I'm not going to make St. Patricks day cookies in September or something. I had a few options - including green Shamrock cookies of course. However, because I was baking these at the cabin, and the cabin doesn't lend itself well to cookie baking (no mixer and only 1 cookie sheet), I decided to make bars - which is also in the cookbook. The bars that are St. Patrick's Day themed are Blarney Stone Bars. The bars were made with some brown sugar, oatmeal, and had toffee bits and pecans in them. I didn't think they were all that great, the one redeeming quality was that it was topped with green frosting (see, St. Patrick themed). One of the ladies really liked the bars, everyone else just had 1 - so clearly not a big hit. March 31st Batch #31 Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies Happy 70th Birthday Mike's Uncle Jim March 29th - my 29th birthday. An excellent day. I was surprised in the morning by waking up and finding 29 reese's pb cups in the shape of 29. Thanks Mike! Dinner Plans - I wanted to make sure that we went out and that I wouldn't have to cook. So a while ago I purchased a Crowd cut coupon to Jax; I had the Filet Mignon. So yummy. I don't think I needed to have worried about Mike not recognizing my birthday though - he went all out. He went ahead and made the reservations and got the Happy Birthday Mandy matches that Jax always does. Then he surprised the heck out of me on March 31st. So a couple weeks ago, I told Mike I wanted a party - I didn't want to have to plan it or have to decide anything about it - I wanted him to be in charge of it. He likes to tease me that he had to give me a surprise party that I asked for. Anyways, before I asked for this "surprise party", we got an invite to our friends' anniversary party for March 31st. Yep - you guessed it - it was my surprise party. I was totally surprised because this "anniversary party" was set up before I had asked for my party. He was already on top of it - he's a good guy. Anyway, what does that have to do with the 31st batch of cookies? Nothing really - I just wanted to share about my birthday - I felt it was a fun day. However, while out to dinner at Jax - Mike's mom texted us to remind Mike that it was his Uncle/godfather's 70th birthday the following Monday. After much discussion about how to properly recognize a 70th birthday I figured I could make the cookies Friday night and get them in the mail Saturday morning. I tried to text Mike's Aunt Joann to ask her what cookies Uncle Jim likes. However, Patsy (Mike's mom) gave me the wrong number. So instead I got a call from an angry Hoosier wanting to know why I was texting him. When I apologized for having the wrong number he wanted to know who I was trying to text (Joann), then he wanted to know who Joann was and who Jim was and where I was from. I'm sorry Mr. Hoosier man who clearly must have to pay for texting - I was just trying to do something nice. So I went ahead and made Banana Chocolate Chip cookies. These were excellent. They taste like Banana Bread with chocolate chips. I gave them 5 smiley faces. Mike only gave them 3 because he thought they were just chocolate chip cookies so when he bit into them, he was expecting a very different texture (crunchy - not soft and moist) and taste. We did get them in the mail Saturday morning - still no word from Uncle Jim if he's received them. They were really soft (a quality I deem a must in most cookies), so I'm worried that they might get all stuck together and turn into one giant lumpy cookie. Let me know how they turned out Jim and Joann. Heimann children - if you're reading this - you know where you can go to get some cookies. April 2nd Batch #32 Butterscotch Cookies Happy Birthday (tomorrow) Dad! So my dad is a pretty great guy. If you haven't figured it out from previous blog posts - he does a lot of work for us. If you have read my previous posts - you may know that he redid my entire kitchen. He actually has also finished my basement, remodeled the bathroom, redid my bedroom, tore out my chimney, added a closet, etc. Just today he was over cutting my lawn. He has started a lawn mowing/snow removal business. Personally, I think it's a huge step backwards from the dentistry business, but hey - he mows my lawn and snowplows my walks, so I'm not complaining. Plus I have the greenest lawn on the whole block which I attribute to the fertilizing he did last fall. In a couple more weeks, he's putting a new roof on my house. I'm not just saying he's great because of all the stuff he does for us (though that is pretty wonderful - everyone I know is so jealous of that), he gives us advice (when we ask), he is always willing to help - thanks for the tax help, and he was always really calm and helped us work out our problems when we were growing up - except for the time I called him #$$#@ of a $%##@ - he was not calm that time. (Except my punishment was going out to pie with him - maybe I should call him a $%## of a $#$@# again, I could really go for some french silk pie right about now). Anyways, it's his birthday again. The thing with dad though is he really doesn't like getting gifts. He doesn't know how to respond; supposedly it makes him feel uncomfortable. It doesn't feel right doing nothing though. I've been trying to figure out for a couple weeks what I could do. Then duh, as I was making Uncle Jim birthday cookies, it occurred to me this would be the perfect thing for Dad. He loves cookies - butterscotch in particular. So Butterscotch Cookies it is. Then I realized, hey - I've got a fancy dinner going today as well (Moist Turkey Breast with White Wine Gravy) I'll invite Mom and Dad over for dinner. Grandma Milly ended up coming too since Mom cooks for her once a week and this way she could have dinner with us and Mom is off the hook this week. So all came over for dinner. The dinner itself wasn't great. Did you know that White Wine Vinegar is NOT the same thing as white wine. So the Turkey gravy was a little too vinegary. The cookies were a big hit. I gave Dad the plate of cookies and said you don't have to share if you don't want to. He said - okay - and then did not share them. Mom tried to get some - he wouldn't let her have any. I hadn't put all the cookies on the plate though, so I was able to give everyone else a cookie. My Dad ate all the cookies on the plate but 2 (I think there were about a dozen on the plate to begin with). So I guess my mission was accomplished. Next batch: Easter cookies - again, not that we normally have cookie at Easter time, but when would I ever make Easter cookies.