Holiday How-To #5: Decorate for Christmas if you've got a rambunctious toddler (or a cat)

Decorating for Christmas presented a whole new set of challenges this year. Kaylee is a climber, a daredevil, and loves to put things around her neck, so the thought of having a Christmas tree up this year was starting to give me heartburn.

I figured she'd do one of four things:

1. Climb the tree
2. Pull the tree over on herself
3. Try to make the lights into a necklace
4. Remove all ornaments from the tree and hide them wherever it is she is currently hiding 22 of her 24 crayons and all but one of her pacifiers.

I hate heartburn, so we opted to do things differently this year.

First order of business?

We downgraded from last year's tree...

...to this year's tree...


We're pretty partial to our Christmas tree ornaments, some of which were our very first Christmas ornaments on our first Christmases. We don't have a Martha Stewart matching tree and we never will (although I will admit part of me would love to have an elegantly decorated color coordinated tree - I think I'd go with pink and silver). We love our collection of ornaments that commemorate special events that happened each year, and Christmas just wouldn't be Christmas without them.

So...we came up with this idea for our entryway, which - believe it or not - was not inspired by anything in Better Homes and Gardens or the Martha Stewart magazine.


And, for the part of me that loves decorations that are beautiful and color coordinated, we have this, which Kaylee cannot destroy - I hope.


Now, I realize that it's a bit late in the game to be giving you tips for Christmas decorating. I mean - shoot - it's just a couple days away. But, hopefully this will give you some inspiration for next year.

And, I'd just like to throw it out there that I got all my Christmas decorations for 90% off at Target and Michael's during their after Christmas sales last year, so get in on that bit of shopping heaven a couple weeks after Christmas and you'll be set for next year.

Also - for you cat lovers out there, my totally rockin' and not the least bit cheesy wall display of ornaments will work wonderfully if for some reason you decide to opt out of a Christmas tree as a result of an adventurous cat (my dear friend Deb got to experience this first hand this year).

This post is my 5th Holiday How-To post, inspired by Summer's Holiday How-To Blog Carnival at Le Musings of Moi.

Holiday How-To #4: Make to-die-for orange cream cookies

It's no secret I love food. Especially food with lots of sugar. And carbs. Sugar and carbs are where it's AT!

So, it shouldn't surprise you at all that one of my very favorite things about the holiday season is all the yummy goodies. Fudge, cookies, warm rolls straight out of the oven, pie, mmmmm...

One of my favorite memories of Christmas as a child was making sugar cookies with white frosting and rainbow colored sprinkles to leave out for Santa. What is that is just so darn fun about rainbow colored sprinkles on white frosting?

So, this past weekend I went to my first ever cookie exchange, which gave me a perfect excuse to bust out some recipes from my new Betty Crocker Christmas cookie cookbook. I'm trying not to have too many sweets in the house, but hello! I had to make 3 dozen cookies for this party, so the cookie making just had to happen.

I fell in love when I saw the words, "Orange Cream Cookies."

Holy toledo, Batman. Orange cream is one of my favorite flavors in the whole entire world. Orange cream soda, orange cream candy, orange cream ice cream treats, and now you're telling me I can have all that delicious goodness in a cookie? I love you, Betty Crocker.

So, here's the skinny on how you can make these rip-roaring tasty cookies. Now, keep in mind that in the picture in the cookbook, these cookies are a very calm, pastel-ish light orange color. That's because the recipe calls for 5 drops of yellow food color and 2 drops of red food color. Well, I decided to be cheap and buy the store brand food coloring. What I didn't realize is that there are no droppers on the store brand food coloring. I'm guessing I was off in my estimations of what the equivalent of 5 drops of yellow and 2 drops of red were.

Hence, the neon cookies that almost make you want to wear sunglasses.

Ingredients:

1 pouch (1 lb 5 oz) Betty Crocker sugar cookie mix
3 Tbsp. butter or margarine, melted
1 tsp. orange extract
1 tsp. vanilla
1 egg
5 drops yellow food color
2 drops red food color
1 bag (12 oz) white vanilla baking chips (2 cups) **I think 1.5 cups would be perfect - 2 was a bit much)

Directions:

1. Heat oven to 350. In a large bowl, stir all ingredients except baking chips until soft dough forms. Stir in baking chips.

2. On ungreased cookie sheets, drop dough with 1 1/2 Tbsp-size cookie scoop or by rounded Tbsp about 2 inches apart.

3. Bake 9 to 10 minutes or just until dough is set (do not overbake). Cool 1 minute; remove from cookie sheets to cooling racks

Nutrition Info: Ahhh, who cares. Seriously.

This post is a part of Wordful Wednesday at 7 Clown Circus and the Holiday How-To's Blog Carnival going on at Le Musings of Moi.