#1 Son - Christmas 1987

Word of the Day

Ediot - A person who, after giving someone material to edit, continues to revise that same material without informing them.

I peeked inside Christmas Calendar Door #12 and it looks like I need to make a quick trip to the grocery store after breakfast before I actually do something about what's behind there. I'm running out of butter. I started out with 4-lbs. of butter yesterday and I've used up three of those pounds making the Jan Hagel. I'll need more butter to make the Russian Teacakes. Those are HTP's favorites. I make a Sugarfree Russian Teacake which works out great now that I found the powdered sugar version of Maltitol. I'd tried to make my own homemade sugarfree powdered sugar (I know...that sounded confusing) but my version never turned out quite right. Thank goodness the people who make Maltitol finally realized that there are times that you need the texture of powdered sugar for some things. I'm going to make a double batch of Sugarfree Russian Teacakes for HTP and some of my neighbors who can't have sugar and a double batch of regular Russian Teacakes for those of us who can have sugar.

Russian Teacakes

1 cup butter or margarine, softened
1/2 cup powdered sugar (2/3 cup granular Maltitol for the Sugarfree version)
1 teaspoon vanilla or almond extract
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup finely chopped pecans, walnuts, or almonds

Heat oven to 400°F. Mix thoroughly butter, sugar and vanilla. Mix in salt. Add flour and nuts. Mix until dough holds together. Shape dough into 1-inch balls. Place on ungreased cookie sheet.

Bake 10-12 minutes or until set but not brown. While warm, roll in powdered sugar. (Powdered Maltitol Sugar for Sugarfree version) Cool. Roll in powdered sugar again.

Makes about 4 dozen cookies

*****

HTP woke me up last night to let me know that the weatherman had said that the some of the outlying areas would be reaching freezing temperatures during the night. I opened one eye and told him that none of our landscape plants were freeze-vulnerable anymore. However.... Come to think of it, I've got some petunias outside that would have died last night if it actually had frozen last night. Which it didn't. Thank goodness. I wasn't awake enough last night to actually think about my annuals. I'll have to check my spare sheet supply and get things ready for tonight....just in case. I can bring my hanging pots into the garage but there are some plants outside that would do better if I covered them. Global warming has brought freezing temperatures to Arizona? Whatever. It was 42°F last night and that was OK.

Murphyism of the Day

Hendrickson's Law

If a problem causes many meetings, the meetings eventually become more important than the problem.

Noteworthy Quote of the Day

The conventional view serves to protect us from the painful job of thinking.

- John Kenneth Galbraith