Special Double Edition

The month of December has kept us busier than busy. Tin Tin celebrated his 5th birthday on the 10th of the month, along with quite a few of his preK classmates. He was invited to 4 birthday parties this month. (We skipped the princess party.) For Tin Tin, we kept the partying low key. We spent the morning at Chuck E. Cheese and then had cake & ice cream at home.

Tin Tin turns 5

Tin Tin makes a wish

I spent the following week preparing for the holiday party at work. It took me no less than 3 nights to bake cookies and construct gingerbread houses. The Eggnog Sugar Cookies with Marshmallow Fondant were delicious. I used the sugar cookie recipe from Sweetopia and added extra spices for an eggnog flavor. I used this fondant recipe from Peggy. I attached the fondant to the cookies with this buttercream frosting. I also made gingerbread cookie dough for miniature gingerbread cookies and to use for candy cane twist cookies.

Stamped Eggnog Sugar Cookies with Marshmallow Fondant

Candy cane twisted cookies from eggnog and gingerbread cookie dough

I packaged the Eggnog Sugar Cookies into mason jars for the neighbors and then sent Husband and the boys out to make the deliveries.

A dozen cookies for the neighbors

Husband & the boys delivering holiday goodies

The gingerbread houses turned out cute but were no match for my colleagues’ massive, engineered structures, made out of gingerbread and non-edible materials. Can someone say cheating? Anyway, Turtle anxiously awaited the little houses to return home so that he could try to devour them.

The completely edible gingerbread houses

Turtle eats up his favorite little house

Yum.

I escaped from work for a few days to visit my parents for Christmas. On the drive to Indiana, we visited Dinosaur World. I’ve seen it several times from the highway and have always wanted to stop. As luck had it, I found a Groupon the week before, which brought the cost down into the reasonable range.

The boys & I meet the larger than life T-Rex

The boys escape from T-Rex

Husband gets caught

Christmas was a delight. Princess Lei was able to bond with her grandparents. Husband & I enjoyed another holiday without having to cook. And the boys loved their first blizzard. We weren’t able to drive home on the day we had planned because of the weather. So we had to stay and be spoiled by my parents for another day. And I had to miss work a bit longer. Darn!