What's cookin?

Lebkuchen!

Ben had a Christmas in Germany report to do.  The rest of his classmates did other countries and they presented these reports to their class with interesting facts, traditions, foods, and decorations.  We decided to make a traditional gingerbread type cookie called Lebkuchen.  I made it the night before and put it in the fridge, as directed.  This morning, I rolled it out onto the pan, sliced it up into rectangles, and baked it.  I nearly forgot it in the rush to get myself and the kids ready, but 10 minutes before we left, I pulled it out, tossed it into a brownie pan with a lid, and we dashed out of the house with the cookies still hot and smelling yummy!  The teacher swooned when we walked into the room with them and later said they were delicious!

Emma earned her orange belt on Saturday!  Woo-hoo!  We celebrated with sushi and a show--we went to the Bellevue "Snowflake Lane" show, which was 20 minutes of drumming, singing, dancing, and people in Christmas costumes handing out peppermint lollypops.  We finished it up with warm drinks--which didn't work out as well as anticipated...the kids didn't want hot chocolate, and the place we went to was located in the corner of a grocery store.  The chai was awesome!  It was a great time hanging out with Jean.  Thanks again for inviting us!  It was so good to see you again!

I finished up the Double Diamonds weaving the other day.  It turned out so remarkably well...I love it!  I don't know what I'm going to do with it, but this is a lot of fun!  I'm thinking maybe I'll have to sell these with a merchant--maybe I can work out a deal with the candle merchant.  Not that these have anything to do with candles, but she's a friend of mine, and might be willing to draw in a few more customers who go, "Ooooo!  Pretty!"

Working on a new weaving project.  This is more of a challenge because you have to split the stack of cards and turn some of them in different directions for four turns, then put them back together and turn them in the same direction for four turns.  Being able to do this opens the doors to a lot more interesting designs.  I might want to do this again in some other colors--Kelly wants me to make a guitar strap to go with the new electric he picked up a couple weeks ago.  He also picked up a Learn to Play Guitar game/program for the XBox.  Unlike Guitar Hero, this actually teaches you to play guitar.  I think I've heard "Boys Don't Cry" about 140 times in the last few weeks.

Last Monday I went to the quilt guild meeting for our annual Christmas party.  Several people signed up to decorate tables.  Just a couple days before, Tara wrote and said that she had signed up to decorate one, but since she is now in Minnesota, she would not be able to, so I filled in for her at the last minute.  It's not amazing, and it certainly didn't win any prizes, but there was a table, a centerpiece, some candies in the Santa chimney, and some paper plates and napkins.

Sharon also decorated a table...she did a bang-up job, but it was table #1 that won the prize.  By the end of the night, we were calling it Table #Won.  Several people won big raffle prizes that night.  It wasn't funny after about the fourth person in a row.  I didn't win anything, but we had a good time and I got to show Marge's quilt to the group.  I then took it over to her house before heading south again.

Today I got a call from a parent at the school who needed someone to quilt up a present for her sister.  I must have given her a business card some time back...I put it on the frame right away and started working on it tonight.  It would be done right now if I hadn't run out of the brown bobbin thread.  Sigh.  I gotta buy some more tomorrow morning and hopefully I can get it done early and get it back to her in the morning.

Tomorrow's the last day of school before Christmas break!  Yippie!

K