Catching up with Fall

I did not blog much this past fall, it got to be a busy few months for a while there. So I wanted to catch up on blogging and post a couple of the things that I was working on...

1) Sewing projects - I like to make at least one Halloween costume each year for my girls. This year worked out to be Megan's turn, and she decided she wanted to be a Bumblebee. I was displeased with a lot of the Bee costumes that I saw in stores and the online costume stores, so I decided to make her this super cute and age-appropriate Bumblebee Costume from Simplicity 2304.


Here is my little baby modeling for me - pardon the blurry photos, she is a Bee in motion.







And here is the complete outfit on Halloween night. My other daughter was Snow White (purchased costume).





2) Christmas cookies! I am not going to post the recipes to each cookie, much too long to list, but I will just list the source. Here I present my Christmas cookie assortment 2010.



L-R they are: Candy Cane Cookies (Gooseberry Patch), Choco-Mint Blossoms (Mixing Bowl), Linzer Cookies (Barefoot Contessa), and Peanut Brittle (Every Day Food). I also made Thumbprint Cookies (Betty Crocker Cooky Book), for some reason they were not pictured.

They all came out great! I would probably not make the Linzer cookies again for a Christmas tray. Although these cookies came out great and tasted delicious, they were a little large and wieldy for a Christmas cookie. I prefer smaller bite-size cookies for a Christmas Cookie tray. The heart cookie cutter I happen to have on hand makes a huge cookie. I may try these again for Valentine's Day. Also next time I will try rolling them out a bit thinner.

Product Review - Trader Joe's

Here is a great product I recently discovered at one of my favorite Grocery Stores - Trader Joe's! If you have not been to Trader Joe's, find a store near you and go immedeately! It is worth the trip.

Before there was a Trader Joe's in my local area, my hubby and I used to drive an hour to go to one in the next state - it is that cool a market.

Onto the cookie - we have our favorite snacky items that we like to regularly get but one time we were shopping at Trader Joe's with our kids and they were cranky and hungry. I am usually packing a few snacks in my bag, but I had nothing to offer them and the situation was quickly escalating, so I literally grabbed the nearest cookie off the shelf where I was standing, opened the box, and let them eat them before we even checked out. They happened to be these Blueberry Shortbread Cookies, my girls loved them ate ate them right up.

It was only later, when we got home and I was putting the food away, did I notice the box and the label. These shortbread cookies contain DHA Omega -3 fatty acids from Fish Oil. Wow! They are healthy cookies! And my kids liked them! I'm ecstatic over this discovery.