Browned-butter spritz sandwich cookies

Can you believe that it’s December 17th already? I feel like it was September just a few days ago. Now here we are, creeping up on Christmas. How are you doing? Have you finished all of your shopping? Have you baked all of your cookies? How about the decorations, are they hung by the fireplace with care? To make you feel better let me answer these questions. No, no, no and no. I have not done any of the above. I’ve been living in my little fantasy world over here. You know the one. It’s the one where I have plenty of time before Santa comes rolling into town. What happened this year?

When I was little I would get ready for Christmas in November. It was simple, after my birthday was Christmastime! I spent the day after my birthday preparing my countdown chain. You remember those, right? A ring of paper for each day before Christmas and each day you tear off a ring. In the early days of the chain I would behave and tear off the right number of rings. As the days went on I would pretend to forget about the chain, only to be able to tear off three or four when I “remembered.” Such gratification, tearing off three rings!

Then thanksgiving would arrive, marking the official start of the holiday season. (For everyone else that is, I was already celebrating) The morning after thanksgiving we would head to the local garden store and get two trees. A cute tiny one (for my tiny grams house) and a huge one for us. And I mean HUGE, ten to twelve feet. We would bring it home and set it on the deck. This is where it would sit until the week before Christmas. It would taunt me. It would inevitably be buried in feet and feet of lake effect snow!

According to my calendar it’s one week from Christmas. The tree on my parents deck is getting ready to make its appearance inside the house. A few more days after that I’ll be heading home to visit. The holidays are here and they snuck up on me this year. I decided to make some more cookies to try and convince myself that they really are here.

Chorizo and Vegetable soup

This is what it looked like when I stared out my apartment window this Sunday.

Yup. Grey, dark and stormy. It was one of those days where you just want to curl up on the couch and watch a bunch of terrible movies. Sadly for me, I don’t own a couch. It just wouldn’t fit in my palatial, 325 square foot apartment. It was either a bed or a couch and I decided I could probably use a place to sleep.

The second problem I faced was the work I had to do in the lab. Why did I set up chemistry that needed attention Sunday morning? Because I’m a crazy person, apparently. So, I had to trek into work and pay some attention to my chemicals. Now, I only live a mile away from work and I had driven into work the past two days. These two factors combined led me to decide that it was a good day to walk to work. Oh boy, what a mistake.

The walk into work wasn’t particularly bad, just windy. It got to be a problem when I wanted to leave work. Bands of rain came and went over the hours I was in the lab. From calm to downpour and back again in just minutes. How was I supposed to get home? Like I said, bad day to walk to work. Finally, during a break in the weather, I decided to head out.

Halfway home, whoosh! Downpour! Umbrella in hand, fighting the wind, I battled my way home. My poor little umbrella, it was working so hard. I think I managed to keep my head dry. When I got back to my apartment my coat was soaked through. After shedding my soaked coat and rubber boots, I had to laugh. I was completely dry, except for my jeans. From where my coat ends at my mid-thigh, to where my boots begin below my knee, was completely soaked. Wet knees. Time to change into some sweatpants and make soup.

Walnut-Strawberry Quick Bread

Before I moved out to the east coast I was living in Broomfield, Colorado. If you have ever been to this area of the country then you are familiar with its beautiful year-round weather, fantastic views and plethora of health-conscious people. Colorado is consistently ranked as the fittest state in the country, with one of the lowest obesity rates. The first two qualities of Colorado help influence the third. When the weather is nice and there is a mountainous playground at your front door, you tend to enjoy your exercise so much more.

While I spent the majority of my time in Colorado working in the lab, I did take some time to enjoy the sights. I would pack myself a nice slice of banana bread and head out into the wilderness. Just me and my water bottle, against all of the elements of nature, I would set out into the Rocky Mountains. By reading the signs at the entry to the park you expect to be attacked by at least three woodland creatures before you leave.

According to the signs you must… 1. Not go into the areas marked with specific signs because they are raptor nesting areas. Now, I don’t know about you, but personally I don’t think we should be promoting raptor procreation. Didn’t the people of Colorado ever see Jurassic park? 2. If you see a cougar, you should yell at it. I think that having a nice conversation with the cougar would suffice, but apparently this will not keep it from mauling me. 3. Beware of bears. There wasn’t much more helpful information beyond that.

Luckily for me I made it out of the wilderness without getting mauled by raptors, cougars, bears or any other mysterious animals. The Rocky Mountains are full of crazy animals, many of which I was not warned about on the signs. What if I came upon a tap-dancing squirrel or a monkey with a tambourine? Other than thinking that the local circus lost a train car, I would have no idea what to do. I guess I would just have to offer them some of my bread.