I should be packing...

So much has happened since the hubs returned from the sandbox :)  I could blog for days.  But considering how often he is home, I'd rather be snuggled up with him.  Sorry if I'm being selfish :P.  We are about to take a mini-vacation for a few days, so I thought I better get a blog up before I get too behind!  So here-goes...


My Halloween photo smash-up!

1) Gettin' Crafty: In my ongoing battle with my desire to have a daughter, I continue to live vicariously though my friends, making girlie outfits for their little girls.  I crocheted a hat and sewed a matching pillowcase dress for my little Haileigh girl.

2) BOO at the ZOO:  Last year, just a few days before the hubs departed, we took our boy to the local zoo to do some trick-or-treating.  While it is nothing in comparison to the Halloween Party our hometown zoo puts on every year, it was still a very enjoyable event.  And considering it would be so close to his homecoming, I've been looking forward to partaking in this for last 365 days!  My son demanded months ago that he would be Robin and daddy would be batman.  Daddy did not argue, but insisted I be his batgirl.  While the hubs and I did not go all out costume-wise for the zoo's event, we are attending a friend's party soon, where we intend on going in full batman/batgirl costume. My son has sense changed his mind on his costume and has chosen a new costume for the 31st.  Considering my love for Halloween costumes, I had no argument in a costume change request.   I'll keep this costume a secret until a later posting.

3)  I made little pumpkin and bat cookies to go in gift baskets to give to the neighbors.

4) Cake jars for the gift baskets...I'll try to post more details about these baskets later.

Summer Vacation in a Box

This week's box is pretty self-explanatory.  In our five years together, my husband and I have never taken a summer vacation, it's one of those downfalls to being a military family.  He's either deployed, PCSing, or we just don't have the time.  We never had a honeymoon for this very reason.  We always talk about that vacation we plan on taking someday but to date, it's never worked out.  So this week's care package is the best I can do, it's our dream summer vacation in a box.  It includes a palm tree, pineapple shaped cookies (and watermelon cookies because they were cute), some crab shaped crackers, milkshake poptarts (because as I discussed in a previous blog, he requested poptarts in all future care packages),  some tropical snacks, Weekend at Bernies II (my favorite movie, set in my dream location-the USVI, which I someday hope to visit with the hubs...but that's a future blog post)... and a few summer toys.  I topped it all off with a big ray of sunshine :)  Happy Summer Vacation honey!  Maybe one day we can actually enjoy a vacation together.

I want s'more...lot's more.

Let me begin by saying OH MY GOSH!!!! These were the yummiest smelling cookies I have ever baked up.  I was drooling the entire time.  This way by far the worst idea I ever had, baking cookies like this while on a diet.  I had to bake them, they were perfect for the box theme, plus my husband's last batch arrived un-edible and I had to make up for that. Throughout the preparation there was this strange force drawing my lips closer and closer to the batter-filled spoon...but I successfully fought the urges.  When the warm steamy cookies came out of the oven, my toddler ran into the kitchen, his nose sniffing in full force and a smile on his face, "MOMMY! What's that smell!?"  Oh he has no clue how lucky he is, I think as I pass him a cookie.  Well, here's the devil looking innocent in the form of a tasty desert...

If you would like your own taste of temptation, you can find the recipe here.

Who gives a hoot?

So this week's care package is still a secret, but here's a hint...I made the hubs some owl cookies.  These were not easy to make, I couldn't find an idea on google that I liked, so I had to come up with something all on my own.  I'm not a creative thinker like that, I need visuals!  I also decided to only make 7 cookies this week as opposed to the typical 2 dozen.  My husband is a health nut, he doesn't even eat these cookies, I'm pretty sure he gives most of them away.  But he enjoys the surprise of the cookies, and I'm just making them for fun. So what's the point in making 24 at a time?  I decided to freeze the remaining cookie dough for next weeks' cookies.   It was nice only having to decorate 7 at a time, but it left no room for error. Luckily, I only screwed up 1.  I wouldn't really say I screwed it up, actually I forgot to decorate it all together, haha.  Luckily, my son didn't mind disposing of the sad forgotten cookie.   The cookies are ready, the box is ready, but I'm not headed to the post office today.  I have another batch of cookies to bake tonight.  Yes, you read that right another batch for the non-cookie-eating, health nut soldier.  Well, I can't help it.  This recipe was perfect for the box theme, plus this batch isn't going to be for show, they're all about taste!  I have a feeling my husband won't be sharing these so much.  You can read all about the in my next post...leaving you won't hint closer to figuring out the theme to the mystery box.

For now, here's my hooters...

Christmas in July, maybe?

My husband's favorite animal is the penguin. I mean, can you blame him? When God designed these cute little wobbly creatures, he dressed them in a tuxedo.  They're also a bird that doesn't fly, but swims.  Ha, it's like a slap in Charles Darwin's face, and who doesn't love beating up on ole Darwin now and again?  So anyhow, when I first started this whole "themed box" idea, the penguin box was the first one I started working on.  It's taken a very long time to perfect said box, mainly because it's been my favorite box to date and I just looooved adding stuff to it, but partially because it's very difficult to find penguin items in July.  Well, last week I finally was prepared to send out the penguin box so I started working on my penguin cookies.  Here's the process and final product...

Look out! Here Comes the Spider Cookie

So this week I let my son decide on the theme of daddy's box.  After a short debate, he settled on Spiderman.  Since I've recently decided that each of my husband's themed packages must now contain a unique homemade cutout cookie,  I Googled some Spiderman cookie ideas.  I decided to attempt the ones I found on this site.  They didn't come out nearly as professional as the ones I found, but I don't bake cookies for a living.  So I'm still super proud. Here's the process.  First, I made a template for the eyes and placed parchment paper (I was out of wax paper) over the template and used black royal icing to pipe over it.  I filled in the black outline with white thin icing using the colorflow (or flooding) technique from here.  I let that dry for about 4 or 5 hours.  While waiting, I baked the cookies.  Once cooled, I outlined them in royal icing and again used the colorflow technique to fill them in with red.  Once dry, I piped a spider web.  To finish the cookies, I carefully pulled the eyes away from the parchment paper and placed them onto the webbed cookies using royal icing as a glue to hold them in place.  And there you have it! Spiderman cookies.

Combat Cookies

I'm on a cookie kick this week.  Considering this week's box theme is ARMY, I decided I wanted to make camo cookies.  I figured I would bake sugar cookies and decorate them with a camouflage pattern with icing.  So I did a little google surfing for ideas and I came across a whole new idea.  Bake them camo!!! What an awesome concept!

First you make your cookie dough (packaged or homemade will work)

Next you divide the dough into 4 separate bowls and add your coloring (Brown, Green, Gray, and leave the last bowl alone for the tan.) You can use basic food coloring if you'd like. However, I prefer Wilton's coloring because it tastes better and the colors are more accurate.

Unfortunately, I wasn't paying attention and picked up a butter mixture sugar cookie pack, which resulted in a sticky dough that was too hard to work with.  If you made this same mistake, just refrigerate the dough for about an hour before continuing on to the next step.

Now you want to take a little bit from each bowl and mix it together in your hand to form a ball.  I burned my thumb on the oven and it was in killer pain, so I opted to use my cookie scoop instead.  Luckily, this was a much cleaner method anyhow.  I just scooped a little out of each bowl and dropped the balls onto the cookie sheet.

 

Bake at the time indicated on the cookie package or in your recipe...and viola!

CAMO COOKIES!

Since I intend on mailing these to my hubby...I decided to stack them in a jar and use the last of my camo material to cover the jar and make it pretty.  I also hired a team of soldiers to guard these cookies until there safe arrival in Afghanistan.

Freedom isn't Free

My hubby's 4th of July box is packed and ready to go out in the morning! :D  Here's a quick peek at the contents.  Check out the post that follows for more details on baking & decorating the cookies.

Picture Perfect Cookies

Tomorrow morning I'll be dropping off my husband's 4th of July care package.  So tonight is prep night :)  I've been feeling a bit crafty lately, so I did a little online research and found some tips on cookie decorating here.  Instead of just smearing royal icing over a cookie, I learned about flooding a cookie.  It requires a thinner royal icing. You can add more milk to your royal icing or look up a recipe for glacé icing.  The technique requires you to first outline the cookie with your regular royal icing and then use the thinner icing to flow out to the edges.  I used a toothpick to help direct the icing to the corners.  This is a pretty simple technique, hard to mess up.  They turned out super pretty!