Candy time in the kitchen!

HI everyone!  I am not stamping much as it is Christmas baking time and here are some of yesterdays projects!

The candy is my kids favorite and a family tradition, since my sons live in Washington State and I am here, naturally I have to make it and send it with their sister when she leaves the 22nd for her dads for the school break.  Its my famous secret recipe! I just poured it in greased pans and left to cool, then it's broken with a knife.  I put powdered sugar in the bowl and start adding them. I ruined 3 batches yesterday (not normal)!  I also mixed up my famous stovetop simmering potpourri that I have been selling for about 16 years and always have requests for it. Just a couple tablespoons in a pot of simmering water and your home smells like you have been baking for days! and the last photo is of the candy centers I shaped last night- fondant with coconut and walnuts in them, they will be hand dipped in chocolate (yes, REAL dipping chocolate not choc chips) later this morning after some cleaning is caught up and this blog is finished! Then this afternoon I have to cut out the sugar cookie dough I have waiting in the frig and get them baked and ready to frost.(my mom's secret recipe and family favorite!) My favorite frosting is the Wilton buttercream recipe. (yes, I decorate cakes also) I learned from my sister when I was 9.

these are candy flavoring OILS

the only thing you can use when making cooked candy for flavoring.  And in the back left red and white pot on the stove top you can see my simmering potpourri!

this is the candy cooling,  I made 9 different flavored batches

FINISHED~  now to bag it up and put it in the boxes for my sons!

these are my fondant centers, they will be hand dipped in chocolate today, and then I made sugar cookie dough yesterday as well and I will be cutting those out and baking them this afternoon.  My hubby comes home at 5 from Boston and business meetings and I will meet him at the airport, then head to watch my daughter cheer at the game tonight!

A very busy day indeed.  Tomorrow is Shopping day, this is the first year that I dont have shopping all done by now.  I hope your day and weekend are wonderful and full of the magic of the Christmas Spirit!

And speaking of which here is a wonderful poem from my email box this morning

An unknown author wrote:

" 'I am the Christmas Spirit."

I enter the home of poverty, causing pale-faced children to open their eyes wide in pleased wonder.

I cause the miser's clutched hand to relax and thus paint a bright spot on his soul.

I cause the aged to renew their youth and to laugh in the glad old way.

I keep romance alive in the heart of childhood and brighten sleep with dreams woven of magic.

I cause eager feet to climb dark stairways with filled baskets, leaving

behind them hearts amazed at the goodness of the world.

I cause the prodigal to pause a moment on his wild, wasteful way, and send to

anxious love some little token that releases glad tears--tears which wash away the hard lines of sorrow.

I enter dark prison cells, reminding scarred manhood of what might have been, and pointing forward to good days yet to come.

I come softly into the still, white home of pain; and lips that are too weak to speak just tremble in silent, eloquent gratitude.

In a thousand ways I cause the weary world to look up into the face of God, and for a little moment forget the things that are small and wretched.

I am the Christmas Spirit.

This is the spirit each true Christian seeks. This is the spirit I pray each may find. This is the Christ spirit. No quest is so universal, no undertaking so richly

rewarding, no effort so ennobling, no purpose so divine. The Christmas season seems to prompt anew that yearning, that seeking to emulate the Savior of the world.

Comments

[Lorie]

Ummm...Gwen, you know I live in WAshington too! You could just send some of that candy my way! J/K! Kind of...no really...I'm just kidding! You were definitely a busy girl! Thanks for sharing your baking fun!