Blogmas Day 6 - Baking Sugar Cookies

Hello Friends,

I hope you are doing well. During Blogmas, I have decided that every Sunday leading up to Christmas, I will be sharing a recipe for cookies that I try. Every year I always think that I would like to try out more cookie recipes. There are so many out there for Christmas. I love baking and don't often find the time to do it except at Christmas. What better time than Christmas to bake cookies? This is the season to indulge in delicious treats and what do we need more in 2020? Well wine as well but we can have both!

I love eating sugar cookies at Christmas, they are so delicious and also decorating them is a big part of the fun. I decorated some last year in this post here. The cookies turned out a bit crumbly last year, but still tasty. This year I used a different recipe and followed the instructions more closely. The recipe I followed this year is the Best Cut Out Sugar Cookie recipe from Joy Food Sunshine. I will not be sharing her recipe on my blog today, but you can click on the link above for the full recipe! She includes amazing directions that are so easy to follow. I also love that she includes descriptions of the ingredients used and alternatives you can also use.

The dough was cold after chilling for more than 2 hours in the fridge and make it easier to cut out the shapes. I did roll it out a bit too much, so then the dough became warmer and then quite sticky, so I tried to hurry at the end to put them on the baking sheet so I didn't ruin the shapes. Laura suggests on the website not to roll the dough out too much because it warms up the dough. Of course, I read this after putting the cookies n the oven. I used the Christmas tree cutter pictured below to get my tree shapes. I bought this cutter a couple of years ago from Michaels.

I used the method that Laura suggests on her blog to decorate the cookies with the icing, to draw the outline and then fill in the rest of the icing. I love this method because it gives a nice shiny and flat appearance at the end. I enjoyed eating this cookie by the tree with some coffee this morning. It was so delicious! I highly recommend this recipe, it will be my go-to recipe for sugar cookies for years to come!

Thank you so much for joining me for Blogmas day 6! We are moving right along now and I can't believe it is already day 6. I am loving the holiday season so far and I am mostly watching Christmas movies, decorating, and making cookies so far. I am enjoying going to visit other people's blogs posting for Blogmas and celebrating the season. Have you made Christmas cookies this season yet and what recipes do you love? 

If you would like to see all my Blogmas posts so far from this year, please click here.

Have a great day!

Pumpkin Spice Smoothie Recipe and Knitting Progress

Hello Friends,

I hope you are doing well. Today is the Labour Day holiday in Canada and my boyfriend and I are relaxing today, going out for lunch with his mom, and getting ready for another week ahead. I also tried a new smoothie recipe I am excited about. I became interested in making smoothies in the summer and they were and still are my go-to for breakfast. I really love having the Peanut Butter and Banana Smoothie in the morning and the Ultimate Busy Family Smoothie from Kiwi & Bean, they are my go-to smoothies right now to start my day off right. With fall approaching, I was feeling the usual craving for a pumpkin spiced latte or Frappucino from Starbucks and it got me thinking that maybe I could find a healthy smoothie recipe to satisfy my craving. I found a recipe from Andie Mitchell's blog for a healthy sugar-free pumpkin spice smoothie. She found the recipe in Jordan Younger's book Breaking Vegan. I was excited to try this recipe because I love having pumpkin spice flavored drinks and this recipe is also sugar-free, so it is also a lot less calories than your typical pumpkin spice drink. This smoothie was so tasty and filling, and satisfied my craving for pumpkin spice drinks. If you are craving a healthy version of your pumpkin spice latte or Frappucino, this recipe is for you.

Recipe:

Ingredients:

• ½ cup pumpkin puree mod: 3/4 cup (I added 3/4 cups for taste and color)
• 1 cup fresh spinach or kale/ mod 1/2 cup (I added only 1/2 cup because the first time I made it, it tasted too much like spinach and it turned green)
• 1 tablespoon almond butter (I used peanut butter)
• 1 cup unsweetened almond milk
• ½ cup ice
• a few pinches cinnamon
• 1 scoop plant-based vanilla protein powder, optional (recommended: vanilla Vega One)
• 1 teaspoon chia seeds, optional

Blend all the ingredients and enjoy! This recipe would be perfect for snack in the afternoon to give you a boost and to drink while reading under a cozy blanket. I am looking forward to getting my first Pumpkin Spice Latte of the year, I am also looking forward to making pumpkin pie and eating pumpkin muffins. What kinds of drinks and treats do you like to have at this time of the year? Let me know in the comments below!

Recipe from Andiemitchell.com

In knitting news, I have been knitting the second sock and love how quickly it is coming along. I am knitting socks using the Patons Spiral sock pattern which I found on Ravelry. I should have the socks done this week at this rate. I will be happy to have one of my Christmas gifts knitted in September. I will also be starting another gift this month so I will have to start thinking about gift ideas. For the 3timeChic sweater, I am starting to take out the seams on the one side I completed. I realized that I did not sew the seam correctly the first time and it was tight under my arm so I will be starting that part over. I will share my progress with you sometime during this week.

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Have a great day!