Paperwhite Creations: Visions of Sugar-Plums

The children were nestled all snug in their beds,

While visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads.

And mama in her ‘kerchief, and I in my cap,

Had just settled our brains for a long winter’s nap.

Happy Friday the 13^th! I’m so glad it’s Friday, it’s been a long week. Before we get started, I wanted to mention that we are going to participate in our first Craft Fair of the year tomorrow, so we are excited about that for sure. We’ve got our Christmas cards, homemade paper, gift tags, and other various cards ready for tomorrow so we hope that it is a successful first show. We have created some new Christmas cards this year some cute, some classic, so we are excited to share those with people whether it is at the craft fair or in the stores or here on the blog. I have provided a few pictures so you can take a look.

On with the Christmas blog we go! Our next stanza/verse in The Night Before Christmas has to do with sugar plums and the first thing that we thought of when read the words “sugar plums” was sweet treats which we love to create almost as much as we love to create crafts. We thought that we would not share with you recipes for typical baked goods, but for candy-like treats instead. Nicole has had more experience in making “candy treats” than I have so she is taking charge of these recipe tutorials. First, she has a recipe for homemade After Dinner Mints, something that I am paying close attention to because I’ve always wanted to make these, and then she has a recipe for Soda Cracker (Almond) Roka which sounds a little odd but so yummy at the same time, minus the almonds of course! So we hope that you enjoy these recipes; give them a try and maybe you might have some homemade treats that you can stuff stockings with this year.

After Dinner Mints

2 ½ cups Icing Sugar

3 Tbsp. Butter

2 Tbsp. Cream

½ tsp peppermint flavouring

Food Colouring

Mix together the icing sugar, butter, cream and peppermint flavouring.

Dough should be fairly stiff but still pliable enough to roll. Add icing sugar or cream as needed for right consistency.

Divide to tint different colours. Since we were doing this for Christmas we chose white, green and red (which ends up more like pink!). Add a couple drops of food colouring and knead the dough until the colour is evenly distributed.

Roll into rope about ½ inch diameter.

Cut into pieces and put on wax paper (we didn’t have any wax paper so used parchment paper instead).

Let stand for several hours – at least overnight. Enjoy!

Soda Cracker (Almond) Roka

The original recipe calls for almonds to be sprinkled on to of this treat. However, Samantha is allergic so we decided to try it without the almonds, so she could eat some...it turned out pretty well!

Soda Crackers (enough to cover a 9x12 cookie sheet)

1 cup Butter (not margarine)

1 cup Brown Sugar

1 ½ cups Chocolate Chips

½ cup toasted almonds (optional)

Line a 9x12 cookie sheet with foil that has been buttered.