And Saturday morning

In a minute I have to start writing the Sunday school lesson for this week but at least I have the supplies (All of 'em, I think) for the baking I am going to do.

Four batches of cookies, I think. Because I realized this morning I could package up the extras, take them down to church, freeze them, and take them out before "Family Christmas" (aka "Jesus' Birthday Party") NEXT weekend, and they will still be nice and fresh for it.

Yes, I am doing meatballs for that but I suspect a few extra cookies would be welcome.

So: I'm going to do a bar cookie, a drop cookie, a "scoop" cookie, and a sliced cookie.

The bar cookies are a new-to-me recipe: apple butter bars, out of my fairly-new Amish cookbook. If they're good I'll share the recipe. They are very simple: essentially a shortbread-with-oats base, and then a layer of apple butter (and I bought the special kind from the Amish store, I hope it is better than commercial apple butter).

The drop cookies will be the pumpkin chocolate-chips that I posted about 10 years ago now. They are very good and I had a can of pumpkin on the shelf I need to use up.

The "scoop" cookies are the very simple one - butter, cake flour, powdered sugar, and peppermint flavor (and I usually put green food coloring in them*). They're rich and the recipe doesn't make TOO many. And most people like them. (And it occurs to me, you could do any flavor - lemon with lemon extract and lemon zest, cinnamon - which would be nice alongside the mint - with red coloring and either a TINY bit of cinnamon oil or maybe a fair amount of ground cinnamon to flavor. One could do a whole rainbow of meltaways, though I'm not sure what flavor "blue" would be. Vanilla, maybe?)

(*I know, some people scream about it, but I also know enough about the "Food, Drug, and Cosmetics Act" which covers these to know that except for rare allergies, the standard approved available-for-home-bakers food dyes are pretty darn safe. And it's nice to have colorful cookies some times. And I am NOT going to extract green from my leftover spinach or some darn thing and hope that it doesn't alter the flavor, which I know some "clean eating" advocates would push. Then again, they'd probably push for No Cookies At All)

And then the sliced cookies are going to be a chocolate sable that Purlewe gave me the recipe for. I think I will mix up the sables first (they have to chill) and also do the pumpkin ones - they take the most effort in scooping and baking.

I did get maraschino cherries and almond extract (the only things I will need that I don't have) for the cake for Monday; that is being done tomorrow. (And if I run out of steam, I could do one of the cookies tomorrow).

So yeah, maybe I am getting a little bit of my "I just want to bake stuff and watch Christmas movies" wish  today. (And I will get more of it in a bit over a week when I'm at my mom's house. I'm sure she'll be up for having me bake some cookies; we usually take a plate to the different neighbors, and especially this year, all the help she got after my dad's death. And we take plates to friends - to Debbie, and to some of the people at church....)

And later today, I am going to knit. I found that Amazon Prime has the black and white version (the only version worth watching) of "It's a Wonderful Life" and though I saw MOST of it last week, I missed the very beginning. And it's a movie I DEEPLY love for many reasons, most of all, that it presents an idea of "community" that I wish we could get to in this country. (Or maybe even a better version than what is presented: not a real high level of diversity there, outside of Annie and maybe the Martinis).

I did wind up wandering through the toy aisles. (I needed to run to the Christmas aisles, which are nearby, for more tins to hold cookies, and also for a giftbag for my AAUW gift) and I wound up buying myself a present for making it through last week.

It's the big stuffed "Spirit" (there is a cartoon series, which I've never seen, about him and his adventures). He was the last one, marked down to $15, and he seemed lonely. I made the mistake of picking him up....it's like how some people shouldn't go to animal shelters because they come home with a dog? I should never pick up a stuffed animal in a store because nine times out of ten, I will wind up buying it.

But like I said, he seemed lonely.

(Someday, I need to get something like a chaise longue for my bedroom to hold the "overflow" stuffies that don't really fit on my bed. Spirit would be a perfect "lie on the bed and look nice" critter because he is large and in a lying position but I have so many critters already).

And he is big. The size of a largish cat:

And yes. I had a brief, more-noble impulse. "You should buy this to free him from the wal-mart" I thought, "and then stop by the nearest Toys for Tots drop-point and put him in"

But then, I got in line and wound up between not one, but two, people who needed to take time after checking out to tell whatever sad thing was going on in their life to the checker (I tried to decamp to the other aisle that looked like it was open, but the woman there was arguing with her manager and then she stalked off, so whatever). And yes, I know: some people have no one to talk to.

But you know what? I pretty much have no one to talk to. That's why I have a blog: I figure, I'm buttonholing y'all, but at least it's an opt-in sort of buttonholing, and it's not like I'm holding up people behind me in some line.

But yeah. I understand the "but I have no one to talk to" feeling but at the same time....some of us just want to pay for our stuff and scram. (This happens a LOT at the post office, where monumental lines are just A Thing and that person who is talking about their recent surgery with the counter person seems not to care. Again, I may have too much of a directive of Don't Inconvenience Other People and I try to keep chit chat to a minimum, especially when there are folks in line behind me)

So I was less-inclined, I admit, to be so generous. So after I got home....well, I cut the tag off and decided he's mine. (I did drop off a "vintage style" Share Bear from the Care Bears, and a "Fingerlings" toy panda earlier this week, so I have already given).

And no, I don't count on getting stuffed toys from my mom any more for Christmas (I did ask for one in particular but I doubt I get it) so I suppose it's OK to buy them for myself.

(I'm keeping the original name of Spirit. I sometimes rename animals that come named but not this time)

Another thing I should do today is get at least some of my Christmas cards out. I'm sending one to a friend in the UK and I have no idea how long International Post takes, so it better go out today....

But yes. I am tired from last week and also sore from both hunching over my desk for so long/tensing up because of some upsetting grading things, and also from walking fast in the cold for exercise...