‘Tis the Season

My internal clock is ticking again, but it has nothing to do with having relationships or screaming, drooling babies. Forget about people, all I want to associate with for the next month is my trusty stand mixer and oven.

Every year I begin making a pile of holiday cookies, cakes, and other baking ideas as soon as January begins, so by the time it’s appropriate to make them, I have a literal heap of papers to sort through. Buche de noel, gingerbread houses, sugar cookies… I must make them all. So many new recipes and ideas of my own, I think I’d having to start baking from sunrise to sunset until the 25th to get through even half of them! But never mind that, I’m still going to attack with vigor as if it wasn’t such an impossible aspiration.

Strangely enough, my first cookie out of the oven wasn’t edible at all, and was made intentionally so! Before you think my head is still clouded from those Thanksgiving spirits, take a look for yourself, because sometimes the best treats are ones you actually can’t eat.

Pour yourself a comforting mug of hot coffee and grab a giant gingerbread man, the holidays have just begun! All I need now is for the snow to come down and the whole scene would be perfect. I must say, I make a mean vegan gingersnap, but I think I should give my poor oven a rest after serving me so well for my feast only a few days ago. Instead, my hook has been lonely during all of the preparations for my big dinner, and only too happy to help me create a new yarn-based treat.

My “icing” around the sides is a bit messy, but I was rushing to finish before the sun went down so I could get decent pictures. Besides that, I’m not so fabulous at doing crocheted edgings in such tight twists and turns, especially when the two layers are thick with stuffing between them. Nonetheless, I think he’s a wonderful cookie, real or not, and a great way to start easing into the mad rush to work through my stack of waiting recipes!