I like summer. Getting through this stuff is like trying to run in the water. What a mess. What a lot of it. And right now. The wind is blowing and it's just downright cold out there. The good thing? I'm home. I don't have to go anywhere. I can cook and clean and do my laundry and crack the whip for that Ron of mine. This stuff will be deeper tomorrow. Eeek. And I read that we only have an 85% chance for a white Christmas.
Tonight is night # 2 for our cookie making sessions. I think we should have enough cookies after this round to feed, well, the whole family anyway. We made chocolate peppermint cookies from a pioneer Woman recipe. Should have used white chocolate instead of Almond bark. I don't like that flavor. We made spritz cookies too. Those are always super easy to make and so buttery they melt in your mouth. Lynn was in the mood to decorate them, so I let her. Seemed a lot of work for something that's going to get popped into the mouth and swallowed in one bite. No one in my family will be getting any of those.
And in more serious news there was an industrial accident in the making of these cookies. I was cleaning up and the kitchen aid mixer popped down on my thumb. Wow! My thumb is still throbbing. It's not bleeding anymore though. Not to worry about blood in the food, though. The cookies were done and safely out of the way.
In lighter news; I brought on a guest blogger to help me finish my Christmas cookie baking saga: my baking partner.
The Baking Partner says: I learned that we are "totally way different." How so, you might wonder?! Well, I'm into petite, pretty and neat to the point of adding extra coloring and details. So pretty, but it will taste the same in the end. I also learned that making cookies with someone else is better because there is someone to talk to. It gets really quite and "lonely" without someone to help clean-up. The other partner said, "We would have never been friends in kindergarten." That's a whole 'nother story for another blog.
PS: I failed to give Sue lessons on how not to use the mixer. I can't say I've ever encountered the same flesh eating problem.
So if you remember, this past summer I froze a "ton" of strawberries. I had gotten them fresh from the farmer's market, we picked a whole bunch up at the U-pick place near Sheldon and of course we ate them fresh=pies and what not. Well, here is the winter I have been waiting for so the better to enjoy them, right?! I have a slight problem, though. THEY ARE ALL GONE!! Ron swears he didn't eat any. Well, I recall eating few. Out of the refigerator freezer. Maybe 2 packages. Maybe it was 3. Well, Ok I can't remember how many but they can't be ALL gone already. It's only December. Honestly, I've moved everything around in the downstairs freezer and there's nothing in there but bags and bags of sweet corn. I am so bummed. This is impossible. Or else I'm losing my mind.
One of my favorite Christmas Carols: "O Come O come Emanuel, and ransom captive Israel. That mourns in lonely exile here. Until the Son of God appears." That name. Emanuel. It gives the depth to the Christmas story. God with us. The rescue for sinners. The ransom from heaven. That word. Christmas. More than the single day. I found this wonderful devotional and it focuses in on the verse that I wanted to center our Christmas on-knowing God "face to face" in a way that is very intimate.
"All right then, the Lord himself will give you the sign. Behold! The virgin will conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Emmanuel (which means 'God is with us')." Isa. 7:14
When the virgin gave birth to this Son, Emmanuel was at last present among us, yet in so many ways he was still hidden from us. Romans 11:33 says, "Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God. How unsearachable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways" Have you ever wondered why God would want to live among us and even within us, when we cannot fully comprehend him?
If you've ever gone to live in a foreign country, you've known the temporary loneliness and frustration of living among people who can't fully understand you. In spite of the hardship, most likely you endured because you knew that one day you would eventually be fully understood.
1 Corinthians 13:12 promises a day when we will no longer see through imperfect eyes: 'now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.'
Could it be that Emmanuel—God With Us—is looking forward to that day just as much as we are, that day when we see him with perfect clarity and know him completely? -from devotional by Mary Fairchild.
Look at these narrow spaces! And a view that looks over things that are a very long way down.. That little box thing? It fits about 4 or 5 people in a very small cramped space that's an elevator. And it shifts sideways as it goes up. Weird feeling. I actually had a hard time looking at the view. Ron took most of the pictures. This irrational fear was similar to how I felt going to the top of Pike's Peak. I gripped, well, whatever was handy and felt woozy the entire time on top. Which wasn't long let me tell you.
Sheesh. It was -11 degrees this morning. One day we're running around without coats on and the next... winter arrives with a vengance! It was the howling of the wind that lulled me to sleep last night, warmed and comfy under a heavy winter style quilt. But only a couple hours before that we were driving smack dab in the middle of a blizzard. We has been just a mile out of town baking cookies and watching football with friends when we decided we needed pizza. That involved sending "someone" into town to pick it up. That "someone" called me as soon as they got to town and said, "We will eat one piece of pizza and then we are going home. You don't know how awful it is out here." 10 minutes later as they made the trek back through the dark blizzard he called again and said, "gather your stuff up, we are going home immediately." No pizza only a one mile dark ride in a raging blizzard. Let me describe... Can't see the road, can't see the center line or the side, the flashing lights of the car ahead of us disappears quickly and we are totally alone. The words, "white out" mean that all you can see is white. There is nothing behind or before and you are left with the mere memory of the road. And it was only one mile. It was not pretty, but we made it.
I have been in 'white-out' before. After the last one, I swore I would NEVER do that again! What could I be going to that could possibly be worth risking life and limb for? I can tell you. It was Christmas Eve. We drove a few short miles from my mother's to Ron's mother's for the afternoon. Family Christmas Eve supper was scheduled at my mom's for the evening. The whole family woud be there. We enjoyed a quiet afternoon at grandma's then started out for the Christmas Eve meal. Imagine our surprise when we found barricades across the road and the big words ROAD CLOSED. We sat a minute. "well, we can't not go." I said. "Mom's expecting us for Christmas Eve Supper. She's got everything ready!" So we drove around the barricades It didn't take too long for us to figure out why the barricades were up. The right hand lane was completely blocked with drifting snow. We drove on the left hand shoulder, unable to see more than just a couple feet, praying that no semi truck heading the opposite direction would also have been foolish enough to be out in such weather. It was the longest, most terrifying six miles I have ever gone. And did I mention that we had 3 kids in the car? I have always said that God watches over fools and little children. There were both of them in the car that night. To boot we were the only ones that managed to get out to the farm for my mother's Christmas Eve meal. And I promised..."NEVER AGAIN" Sometimes there's nothing for it. You are stuck with it. I don't want to have to do that too many more times in my life.
