Valentine’s Day 2024

This year, I decided to get sick at the beginning of February.

It was an awful cold and I was pretty much out of it for 10 days.

That made it a bit hard to make Valentine’s Day desserts at the last minute.

I made some quick sugar cookies.

Seriously quick– no time for neatness or attention to detail.

It killed me…

I also made Rice Krispies Treats dipped in chocolate.

I had no time to decorate them!

But I was on a mission to have SOME dessert by Valentine’s Day, so…

For my son who doesn’t like too much chocolate on his Rice Krispies Treats, I just drizzled some chocolate.

Quite messily, I must say:

And that’s what happens when you get sick before a holiday and have to rush to get something on a plate…

Messy and limited desserts.

But my family was happy eating them– and that’s all that matters. 🙂

Christmas Desserts 2023

Nothing changed this year– I still drove myself crazy with Christmas stuff.

I was contemplating baking less, but every time I named a cookie that I could leave out– either my husband or one of my kids said they love that cookie.

So I made 27 types of cookies/chocolates. 

How did I get so out of control??

This year, I made Lemon Slice Cookies:

I also made some sugar cookie trees with drizzled glaze, to make it a little easier to decorate some of them.

The rest had glaze all over:

I didn’t have time for anything else new, because I had so many of the usuals to make.

But I did make cute stickers to label the cookies I was able to mail.

I love them!

I also made cute gift tags for my chocolate boxes:

I made many platters for friends and family, hot cocoa boxes for teachers (not pictured), over 100 chocolate covered Oreos, and little cookie plates for my kids’ teachers from previous years.

And of course my kids ate some, too.

Although they always wish they could have more. :)

And now I’m wiped out, but happy that everyone enjoyed all the cookies.

Hope you had a great holiday season!

Halloween/Fall 2023

Late again to post Halloween stuff!

But there was no way I could post after trick-or-treating. I was exhausted!

Sadly, this year I didn’t make any cutesie Halloween desserts.

Here are my chocolate-covered Oreos:

And I received a request for 2 brownie pizzas again this year:

I tried to make spider webs, but they were a mess!

The chocolate wouldn’t melt.

Then it melted, but hardened too quickly in the squeeze bottle.

Then I tried a piping bag and the chocolate went over the place.

Then I tried a sandwich bag and it made squiggly lines on its own.

And then I just gave up.

But at least my kids thought they were yummy!

I also made Fall desserts, although less Halloween-y:

Pumpkin Roll Cookies

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bread (which my husband insists on calling “Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Brunch Cake”)

Churro bars and brownies

Carmelitas

We also had some other goodies at our annual Halloween dinner:

My kids carved pumpkins, one of which exploded the next day and left pumpkin guts all over the floor.

Here is the exploding pumpkin:

Sadly, there was no Halloween parade in our community this year.

I really missed throwing the candy out of my SUV.

But my kids still had a great Halloween, and that’s what counts!

And that’s a wrap for Halloween 2023!

Now I really need to go and start thinking about Christmas stuff…

Valentine’s Day 2023

This is going to be a short one.

Just like last year, the Super Bowl interfered with my Valentine’s Day baking!

Haha, I did get to make mini cupcakes:

And chocolate chip bars:

I also made some low fat strawberry cookies with white chocolate chips.

They were not pretty at all, but at least they were yummy!

And that was it. Can you believe it??

Don’t worry, I felt sad for about 5 minutes…

And then I started dreaming up some new desserts for spring– and totally forgot about the Valentine’s day desserts!

Now I’m off to bake. 🙂

Christmas Desserts 2022

Does anyone out there have great holiday time management tips they can share with me??

Last year, I said I would cut down on some things– and I did– but still, I ran out of time.

How does that happen??

Ok, so I did add a few new desserts this year:

These were Gingerbread cupcakes with mini gingerbread men cookies:

Chocolate chip cookies with sprinkles:

Snowball Cookies with mini chocolate chips:

Brown Sugar and Spice Cookies with cardamom glaze:

Maple Star cookies:

White Chocolate Chip Cranberry Cookies:

Coffee Cookies:

And Brownie Bites with chocolate drizzle:

And that was it for the new ones– but I didn’t remove any old ones from my list.

Which brought it to 26 different types of desserts, cookies, and chocolates.

Too much???

But I did cut down on the time for hot cocoa– I made cute little bags instead of full kits:

And I was done with all my goodies by Thanksgiving!!

So why was it that I still had no time and was stressing out during the last 2 weeks before Christmas?

I hadn’t even started shopping for presents or finished decorating!

One of my sons said it was because it takes so long to prep cookie plates for people:

That’s true, I made about 50 different plates, and it takes a while to take 21 kinds of cookies out from all the individual containers.

And I have to make a few plates at a time on different days because there’s no time to deliver them all at once.

What I can’t figure out is how to do it quicker!

Could that be the issue?

Or is it because I do a ridiculous amount of stuff?

I’ll figure it out someday!!

Maybe next year… as I always say. 🙂

For now, here is some Chex Mix my family made together:

And that’s it for this year.

Hope you enjoyed your holidays!!

Halloween/Fall 2022

I spent most of October thinking of Halloween stuff, but ran out of time to do everything!

This happens every year.

But I did get to make some desserts!

Chocolate covered Halloween Oreos:

Brownie pizzas (I got a special request this year, so I made 2!):

Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars:

And Pumpkin Cupcakes (these are always a hit!):

We also had some fun treats:

Mummy hot dogs and Pretzel Bugs!

Just like last year, we threw candy in the neighborhood Halloween parade.

There were so many kids in costumes lining the streets!

Once again, I was super excited throwing candy out from the opposite side–and occasionally hit my son in the seat next to me, hit the truck door, and I may or may not have accidentally hit some of the parents who were waiting on the streets with their kids…

But no one cared– it was fun!!

Hope you had a great Halloween!

Valentine’s Day 2022

This year was way too stressful.

I was trying to make Valentine’s Day desserts but had to stop for Super Bowl desserts.

Why would the Super Bowl be the day before Valentine’s Day??

And since it’s on a Sunday, I didn’t have much time afterwards to do anything for Valentine’s Day.

I did make Italian Bakery Cookies:

My first time trying out White Chocolate Chip Cranberry Cookies:

Yum! I think I will make these for Christmas!

And my usual mini strawberry cake bites with chocolate chips (both white and semisweet this year):

In between all this craziness, I also had to bake birthday cupcakes and mousse bites.

I had such grand plans for Valentine’s Day, so I will just have to try harder next year!

And here are the Super Bowl dessert intruders:

Vanilla Cake with Dark Chocolate Frosting

Brownies

Oh well, the Super Bowl better not get in the way next year!

At least everyone was happy. 🙂

Christmas Desserts 2021

I love to spread Christmas Cheer in the form of cookies, chocolates– and lately, also hot cocoa.

I make a few different types of cookies each time, to add to some of my usual stuff. This year, I added these:

Chocolate Covered Oreos

Mini Elf Bites (Shortbread with sprinkles)

White Chocolate Peppermint Snowflakes

Mixed Berry Thumbprint Cookies

Chocolate Almond Biscotti

And just like every other year, I ended up exhausted. And happy.

But this year, for the first time in many, many years– I realized I’m doing too much. I end up with no time to do more fun stuff with my kids– like watching Christmas movies, going to see Christmas lights, etc.

I made 46 hot cocoa boxes (these included 21 total teachers and bus drivers):

Ten chocolate boxes:

Ten sugar cookie boxes:

And about 35 plates of 15 types of cookies (including those above):

Don’t get me wrong– I love to do this. But I need to scale down a little to enjoy more of the Christmas season with my family.

Believe it or not, it was the hot cocoa boxes that took me the most time. I made all the little designs with my Silhouette, and it took forever (since I’m new to all that). Plus, I made stickers and designed the Christmas tree tag myself.

So, no hot cocoa boxes next time.

What else should I cut down on?

I’m not sure, because I’m already dreaming up more types of cookies!

Lol, we’ll see what happens when next November comes around.

I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season, and Happy 2022!

Halloween/Fall 2021

This year felt a bit more normal, and it was so much fun!

Of course, I had to bake. I made some mini cupcakes:

Halloween sprinkle cookies:

And my annual brownie pizza:

Before trick-or-treating, we participated in a parade in our neighborhood.

We decorated my SUV with bats!

And I wore my new Halloween shirt!

I sat in the back and my plan was to take a bunch of pictures of my kids as they threw candy out of the window to trick or treaters. We had over 1,000 pieces of candy and hundreds of kids lined up in the streets!

And… I took 2 pictures. Yes, 2.

After those 2 in the first 30 seconds of the parade, I decided to throw a Twizzlers just for fun.

It was so much fun that I started throwing handfuls of candy– from the driver’s side of the SUV and past my son.

The kids cheered and it was so exciting!

So I kept throwing more and more…

Until my son told me to stop hitting him with candy.

Apparently not all my candy was making it out the window…

And my husband said we were going to run out before we even made it halfway. So I had to tone it down a bit (but I did keep throwing candy out for the entire parade. I couldn’t help myself). 🙂

We also had fun Halloween food:

And I decorated a bit:

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I hope everyone had a great Halloween this year!