Rudolf For a CURE!

As Santa says to Rudolph~ Rudolph with your nose so bright won't you guide my sleigh tonight, I am asking "Rudolph with your nose so PINK won't you give us a CURE tonight?!" As I was baking cookies today I decided I would make a cookie to promote the CURE during Christmas!  

On Tuesday, December 20, 2011 our old friend Lisa Giardetti Schmalbach passed away after a two year battle of breast cancer at the young age of 38 years old.  Her fight against this devil was so notable & her cause for fighting so hard, her 2 young boys of 13 & 10 is something that I will never forget as long as I live.  I feel very fortunate enough to have reconnected with Lisa this past year.   She gave me some of the most powerful and memorable life advice that I will vowel to do my best to live by for as long as i live.  She touched so many and we were all privileged to be apart of her journey because of Lisa's best friend Kris, and she provided me with yet another life lesson in all of this.  Kris has to be one of the most loyal & inspiring friends that I have ever witnessed.  You couldn't even write a book to describe the passion and support that she gave to Lisa. Both extraordinary woman that I am proud to be acquainted for so many wonderful reasons, I do wish that I had reconnected with them both sooner.  My heart breaks for Kris having lost her best friend at such a young age, along with the heaviest heart for Lisa's boys and family.  

In addition to Lisa, another one of our friends was diagnosed this year with breast cancer and has forged forward through her battle like none that I have ever seen.  She is doing amazing and has through her journey, has had such courage and grace to fight as well is honorable.  They both are a remarkable inspiration to us all we are blessed to have them in our lives. 

With that, please pray for our Lord to gift someone the graces to find a cure for this awful dicease.  Perhaps Santa & Jesus can add it to someones presents under their tree.  It's here the cure I know it, we need to pray harder for it.  Seeing & believing this holiday season is the new black ;)  therefore here is my Rudolf and his new look~  a pink nose & black antlers!

For Lisa, Jen & all the people that are effected by this devil we know as cancer. God Bless!

To read more of Lisa's story you can find read here~ http://www.lisagiardetti.org/

Sweet Product Features

Happy Sunday!  I hope everyone is doing well!  I have been super busy as we all are this time of year with spring sports, try-outs, baking & styling parties!  
I wanted to share in case you missed it features from this week with sweets that I created for two incredibly talented party stylists a few weeks ago!  

First up was a Mod Orange & Grey Baby shower that was featured on 

Hostess with the Mostess by Fresh Chick Studio ~  

I love the color scheme, fabrics & graphics of this party!  

Here is the whole dessert display styled by Rebecca & photo of the the fondant cake pieces that were created to accessorize her store bought cake.  Taking a traditional $9 cake with $25 fondant pieces for a cake that would more or less cost from a bakery $60 or more! 

  

Buying a cake from the bakery to dress up is certainly a trend that is catching on in the party world!  I first starting doing this last summer from my husbands birthday - click here to see!  

Now this is party certainly is fit from a princess with so many AMAZING details created by Nancy of A to Zebra Celebrations that was featured on Celebrations at Home!  

Her daughter turned 4, Hannah and all the little princesses enjoyed personalized crown cookies that day!  I love making the party about all the guests along with the guest of honor!  This was a perfect way to do so! 

Photo's Courtesy of A to Z Celebrations & Fresh Chick Studio

Click on the links to see more of the parties!   Enjoy your Sunday!  I am off to my daughter's track meet in the rain!  Wish her luck!!


Peace, Love & Sweet Treats~

Stacy

Scrumptious is a Fancy word for Yummy! Part 2~

Bringing you 4 more cookie recipes from my favorite bloggers!!  Kate Landers of Kate Landers Events LLC, The Super Chick from Celebrate Today the Super Chick Way! Kim from The TomKat Studio & Bird of Bird Craft Studio!  

This was an extremely fun feature for me and I gained some scrumptious recipes for sure and have plenty of scrumptious gifts to hand out to many for Christmas!!

Not so bad for my 1st Christmas as a blogger I shared a total of 14 Cookie recipes with all of you this season!  I surely hope you had a chance to bake a few!

I set up these cookies on my dinner table and as inspiration to have a few of your girlfriends over for cookies & cocktails to relax and catch up this holiday season!  I always enjoy my Christmas decor~ so I wanted to share a bit of what my table will look like come this weekend.  It is coming together...mainly missing my fresh flowers & green but I won't add them until Friday!  So here you have the final 4 cookie recipes!

Kate from Kate Landers Events, LLC favorite cookie is a Butter cookie.  While she didn’t have a specific recipe to share, I sought one out by googling “The Best Butter Cookie” and let me tell you I found it and here is the recipe.  Hands down the best, reminds me of something my Mimi would make when she would bake tins & tins of Christmas cookies for us.  I also opted to just decorate with sugar and not the icing.  I love a simple cut out Christmas Sugar cookie and I had fun decorating these this afternoon with my 3 year old!  

The Best Butter Cookie ~

via http://www.landolakes.com/recipe/2217/best-ever-butter-cookies

1 cup Land O Lakes® Butter, softened

1 cup sugar

1 Land O Lakes® All-Natural Egg

2 tablespoons orange juice

1 tablespoon vanilla

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

Frosting

3 cups powdered sugar

1/3 cup Land O Lakes® Butter, softened

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 to 2

 tablespoons milk

Food color, if desired

Combine 1 cup butter, sugar and egg in large bowl. Beat at medium speed, scraping bowl often, until creamy. Add orange juice and vanilla; mix well. Reduce speed to low; add flour and baking powder. Beat until well mixed.

Divide dough into thirds. Wrap each in plastic food wrap; flatten slightly. Refrigerate until firm (2 to 3 hours).

Heat oven to 400°F. Roll out dough on lightly floured surface, one-third at a time (keeping remaining dough refrigerated), to 1/8- to 1/4-inch thickness. Cut with 3-inch cookie cutters. Place 1 inch apart onto ungreased cookie sheets; sprinkle with decorator sugar. Bake for 6 to 10 minutes or until edges are lightly browned.

Combine powdered sugar, 1/3 cup butter and 1 teaspoon vanilla in small bowl. Beat at low speed, scraping bowl often and gradually adding enough milk for desired spreading consistency. Tint with food color, if desired. Frost and decorate cooled cookies as desired.

My friend Genevieve from Celebrate Today the Super Chick Way! Loves her Peanut butter cookies!  These too are my husbands favorites I felt it necessary to make it a bit more scrumptious by chopping up some Reese’s cups and baking them on top! 

Peanut Butter Cookies:

Recipe from www.joyofbaking.com

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (177 degrees C) and place rack in center of oven. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

In the bowl of your electric mixer (or with a hand mixer), beat the butter and sugars until light and fluffy (about 2 - 3 minutes). Beat in the peanut butter. Add the egg and vanilla extract and beat to combine. In a separate bowl whisk together the flour, baking soda, and salt. Add to the peanut butter mixture and beat until incorporated. Fold in the chopped peanuts, if using. (If the batter is too soft to form into balls, place in the refrigerator for about an hour or until firm.)

Roll the batter into 1 inch (2.5 cm) balls. Transfer the cookies to the prepared baking sheet, placing about 2 inches (5 cm) apart. Then, using the tines of the fork that has been dipped in white granulated sugar, make a crisscross pattern.

Bake the cookies for about 10 to 12 minutes, or until the cookies are lightly browned around the edges. Remove from oven and place on a wire rack to cool. Can be stored at room temperature, in an airtight container, for about a week. Freeze for longer storage.

Makes about 40 cookies.

Peanut Butter Cookies:

3/4 cup (170 grams) unsalted butter, room temperature

1/2 cup (105 grams) light brown sugar

1/2 cup (100 grams) granulated white sugar

1 large egg

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

3/4 cup (185 grams) peanut butter (smooth or crunchy)

2 cups (260 grams) all purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup chopped peanuts or 1/2 cup chocolate chips (optional)

Another sweet & spicy cookie is Bird of Birds Crafts shares with us a recipe that she has been baking for years for gingerbread cookies!  For these sweet treat that I used as an idea to let me friends know where to sit.  I am also using my baked cookies as gift tags this year with all my gift recipients’ names on a cookie to label them! 

Below is Birds recipe.  To bake mine I bought at the Fresh Market a ready to bake gingerbread squares.  I rolled them like dough and cut into little men.  A time saving trick in case you don’t want to bake them from scratch. 

Bird Party’s GingerBread Cookies~ This is the recipe I use every year and it comes from The Good Housekeeping Institute

350g plain white flour
1tsp bicarbonate of soda
2tsp ground ginger
100g butter
175g light soft brown sugar
4tbsp of corn syrup or clear runny honey or golden syrup
1 egg beaten
currants etc for decoration
1. Sift flour, bicarb. and ginger into a bowl
2. Rub butter until looks like breadcrumbs
3. Stir sugar in
4. Beat syrup with egg and stir into the mix, kneading to form a smooth dough
5 Roll to about 5mm thick and cut the shapes and decorate with currants
6. Bake at 190deg C or 375 F gas mark 5 for about 12-15 minutes
XOXO
Bird

Now for Kim from The TomKat Studio!  Kim is the very 1^st blog that I followed & shop I bought my 1^st custom printables for one of my girl’s party.  While Kim’s recipe isn’t an actually cookie, they certainly are a sweet treat and she also share a free printables with her recipe!! 

Chocolate Scotcheroos!

Chocolate Scotcheroos
1 cup light corn syrup
1 cup sugar
1 cup creamy peanut butter
6 cups Rice Krispies
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips (I use a little bit more ;)
1 cup butterscotch chips (I use a little bit more ;)

Place corn syrup and sugar in 3 quart saucepan. Cook over medium heat, stirring frequently until sugar dissolves and mixture begins to boil. Remove from heat. Stir in peanut butter. Mix well. Add Rice Krispies cereal. Stir until well coated. Press mixture into 13x9 pan coated with cooking spray. Set aside. 

Melt chocolate chips and butterscotch chips in a saucepan over low heat, stirring constantly. (OR melt using half power, 30 seconds at a time in the microwave ~ as I do!) Spread evenly over cereal mixture. Let stand until firm. (I put in the fridge for 15 minutes so they firm up quicker so I can start eating them sooner)

YUM. I promise.

There you have it!  For Scrumptious Sweet Treat recipes for you to try & share with your family and friends this holiday!!!  

Peace, Love & Christmas Cookies~

Stacy