Weekending 12.03.2012

It is officially Christmas month. To celebrate, I began my weekend with some Christmas festivities. (And not just by vegging out while ABC Family’s 25 Days of Christmas glows in front of me.)

Actually, my sister kind of jump-started the Christmas-month fun with her Tacky Christmas  Cookie Exchange. I think the effort I put into my costume and my cookies is worth some sort of prize though.

If you recognize that outfit, it’s probably because I reused most of it from last year’s tacky Christmas party for my work. The hat (a bow my stepmom made, intended to be a tree topper) and earrings (bell earrings I’ll probably NEVER wear again… imagine bells ringing in your ears every time you move your head for about three hours. Umm… no) were both new. See how clever I am?

Honestly, I think the biggest lesson I learned this weekend (which was honestly a tough choice, with those darn jingling earrings) was to never trust a recipe that says, “the dough is so easy to work with.” The second biggest lesson: don’t use icing piping tools in place of a cookie press, even if the cookbook tells you it’s an easy substitution. (The dough was so thick, it exploded from the top of my icing bag once and busted the bottom of the bag twice by pushing the tip out of the bag.)

The greatest lesson for everyone probably came from Josh, who taught us that the best and least-stressful kind of baking happens with a little help from Duncan Hines. Okay, maybe a lot of help from Duncan Hines. Like, possibly all the help. He told my dad (via Facebook) the cookies were “elegant, delightful, inexpensive, tasty, and took no time to bake at all…seriously.” Maybe next time I’ll remember to dump them in a Christmas tin for him!

Everything turned out great. There were far too many cookies (I think my sister may still be trying to get rid of them!), and they were far too delicious.

As far as my Cinnamon Spritz cookies? Well they turned out beautifully. The consistency was just right (something I was concerned about as I baked them), and they tasted pretty good. The only complaint I received was the lack of chocolate (each cookie got a single chocolate chip).  I doubt I’ll make them again, but I’m happy it wasn’t a total disaster.

I’ve noticed several people (neighbors and folks online) spent the weekend decorating, baking cookies and going to Christmas parties. Did you do anything festive this weekend?

Weekending 11.26.2012

Thanksgiving went by wayyy too quickly. And, um, so did this weekend. I can’t believe it’s already Monday again. Here are some of the goings-on of my weekend:

Friday

• I was exhausted from cooking nearly all day on Thanksgiving (so worth it, by the way), so I slept a lot.
• My dad did some handywork for me around the apartment while my stepmom hemmed a pair of pants for me (a solid 10+ thank-yous later, and I still don’t feel like I’ve thanked them enough).
• I went to a small birthday party for my sister with my best friend, my family and my sister’s fiancé’s family (because my little sister got engaged Friday, and we aren’t even going to discuss how old I feel).

Saturday

• I got a little crazy with Thanksgiving leftovers as my breakfast. I really didn’t expect it to be so much food. (I got the idea from How Sweet It Is.)
• Josh and I spent the afternoon with his family and celebrated Thanksgiving with them. His uncle smoked a turkey, and it looked like a giant piece of poultry-shaped charcoal on the outside but turned out to be friggin’ delicious on the inside. And his 3-year-old niece nearly broke my heart when she cried and screamed for us to stay and beat on the screen door as we left.
• Alabama beat Auburn, but I kind of didn’t even didn’t want to gloat. That wasn’t even a game at all. It was just sad for Auburn. (I joked that at the press conference, Chizik was begging Auburn to please not fire him.)
•  I went to another birthday get-together for my sister. We went out to eat with a few of her friends, then her fiancé–Mike–and I took her out for drinks. (Because not only is my little sister engaged, but she is now old enough to go to the bars. what. even.) It turns out, I am old. I wanted to crawl in bed by midnight, and she was telling us we had to entertain her for two more hours. There is something wrong with me.

Sunday

• I woke up just in time to go to lunch to say goodbye to Mike
• I worked. A lot. And drank hot cocoa to make it better.
• At some point I took a break from working to watch The Campaign. I regretted that decision at about 3 a.m. today, but then stopped regretting it when I remembered how funny it was. That process is still on-going.

What did you do this weekend?

Weekending 11.19.2012

Happy week of Thanksgiving, everyone! I’m super excited Thanksgiving is almost here. I’ll be off work, Josh will be off work, my dad and step mom will be staying with Josh and me, my sister’s boyfriend is coming into town, I’ll get to spend Thanksgiving day with six amazing people, and I’ll eat some fantastic food. Now that is something to be thankful for.

Anyway, here are some of the things I did during the last weekend before Thanksgiving:

I slept nearly all day Saturday. It was magical. Then I felt guilty because I really had too much to do to be sleeping so late.

I went grocery shopping for Thanksgiving foods. I bought all but one ingredient on my list, so that made me feel pretty accomplished.

I’ve been thinking a lot about how much I love bruschetta and how much I’d love to eat some bruschetta. So I made some. Kind of. I piled diced tomatoes (pre-seasoned with basil, oregano and garlic) and shredded mozzarella on Ritz crackers. I call it Lazy Bruschetta.

I burned a gingerbread-scented candle pretty much all weekend, which is probably what let to our baking peanut butter chocolate chip cookies (AKA eating raw cookie dough… we live life on the wild side).

I went to Hooters with Josh Saturday night so he could watch the pay-per-view UFC fight. We ordered a pitcher of Bud Light and were essentially told that we had stolen our IDs and lied about it. Actually, the manager’s exact words were “Those look like real IDs; they just don’t look like you.” I think it’s safe to say I won’t go back ever, ever, ever again.

I attempted to be productive yesterday until my best friend texted me. It’s okay, though. Having coffee with her was probably way more fun than doing grown-up, responsible things. (I realize that comes across as a bit sarcastic, but it’s totally not.)

Last night, I tried to make up for an entire weekend of procrastination. Now I’m just very tired. I’m seriously looking forward to some chill time with the family, when I’m not putting off responsibilities.

What have you been up to this weekend?