High Five For Christmas

This weeks High Five 4 Friday Christmas is : Christmas Sweets. We love to bake, and we do a lot of it this time of the year.


1)The best sugar cookies ever!!!

Sugar Cookies. (Gluten-Free, Dairy Free, Soy Free)

2 cups Gluten-Free Flour(see recipe)***
1/4 tsp. salt
3/4 cup Earth Balance Soy Free Butter
1/4 cup + 2 Tbsp. Splenda (or 3/4 cup sugar)
1 egg(Chino Valley Ranch Soy Free Eggs)
1 tsp. pure vanilla extract


Preheat oven to 325 F.
In a medium bowl combine the flour and salt with a wire whisk.
In a large mixing bowl cream the butter and sugar with an electric mixer on medium speed. Add the egg and vanilla, and beat until well mixed. Scrape down sides of bowl, then add the flour mixture. Blend on low speed just until combined. Do not over mix.
Gather dough into a ball. On a floured surface, roll out dough to a 1/4 inch thickness. With cookie cutters, cut dough into desired shapes and place on ungreased cookie sheets. 
Bake for 13-15 minutes, being careful not to brown. Let cool 
Decorate with colored sugar or sprinkles.

*** 1 1/4 cup rice flour, 1/4 cup tapioca starch, 1/2 cup potato starch, 1 1/2 tsp. xanthan gum. (makes 2 cups)

Royal Icing

4 cups sifted confectioners' sugar
3 T. meringue powder
6 T. warm water
1/2 t.  vanilla

Beat 8-10 min. This should be the consistency to trim the cookies, if to thick add water, if to thin add conf. sugar just a little bit at a time.
(makes 3 cups of base consistency icing) 
Put a portion for trim in a decorator bottle (or) bag,
Take a portion of the icing and put in a separate bowl and add a little more water to get a flow consistency to fill in the cookies. You can also add desired tints or coloring. You can also put sprinkles, sugar or glitters on cookies while flow is still wet. Let dry. ENJOY!!!

2)Enjoy Life Hot Chocolate. The best hot chocolate we ever had. It taste like your drinking a chocolate bar.
You can find the recipe here.


3)Peanut Butter Fudge.(found on Pinterest)

INGREDIENTS

• 1 cup Earth Balance soy free butter, plus additional for greasing pan
• 1 cup Earth Balance creamy peanut butter
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 16 ounces confectioners’ (powdered) sugar

INSTRUCTIONS

1.  Butter the bottom and sides of an 8- x 8-inch pan, then line with parchment paper. (The butter helps the paper stick to the pan.) Lightly butter the top of the parchment paper, as well. Combine the 1 cup butter and peanut butter in a large microwave safe bowl, cover with plastic wrap and microwave on full power for 2 minutes. Carefully remove from the microwave, stir, then microwave on full power for an additional 2 minutes.

2.  Remove the bowl from the microwave. Carefully stir in the vanilla and confectioners’ sugar with a wooden spoon or rubber spatula until evenly combined. The mixture may become a little crumbly at first, but continue to stir until the ingredients are smooth and a nice “dough” forms.

3.  Pour the mixture into the prepared pan and spread into an even layer, pushing to fill the corners. Place an additional square piece of parchment paper directly on the surface of the fudge. Refrigerate at least 2 hours. Use a large knife to cut into 1-inch cubes. Store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 1 week.

4)Eggnog Coffee Cake. Perfect for Christmas morning.(This recipe was found on Mandy's recipe box but we changed it to be allergy friendly)

Eggnog Coffee Cake

1 cup granulated sugar

1/2 cup Earth Balance soy free butter 

1 cup So Delicious eggnog

1 cup caned coconut milk(refrigerate)

1 teaspoon rum extract

2 soy free eggs

2 1/2 cups  special flour blend(same flour as in the sugar cookies above)

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

Struesel Topping

1/3 cup granulated sugar

1 tablespoon special flour blend

1 tablespoon Earth Balance soy free butter 

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

Grease bottom only of rectangular pan, 13x9x2 inches, with butter. In small bowl, mix all Streusel Topping ingredients with fork until crumbly; set aside. In large bowl, beat 1 cup granulated sugar and 1/2 cup butter with electric mixer on medium speed, or mix with spoon. Beat in 1 cup eggnog, the coconut milk, rum extract and eggs until blended. Stir in 2 1/2 cups flour, the baking powder, baking soda and salt. Spread in pan. Sprinkle Streusel Topping over batter. Heat oven to 350°F  bake 35 to 40 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 20 minutes.

Eggnog Glaze

1/2 c. powdered sugar

1-2 Tbsp. So Delicious Eggnog

In small bowl, mix all Eggnog Glaze ingredients until smooth and thin enough to drizzle. Drizzle over coffee cake.

5)Cinnamon Apple Creamed Hot Cereal. Perfect for those cold Christmas days.

Recipe here.

What is your favorite Christmas sweets? Leave us a comment below.

High Five For Christmas!

For this weeks HF4F Christmas version we decided to share with you our five Christmas trees. Yes, you read right, five Christmas trees. It's our dad's dream to have a Christmas tree in every room. (We are close, two rooms left)

 1)This is the living room tree and the biggest tree.

2)This is our patriotic tree in the family room. In honor of all military men
and women, and in memory of  our family friend Ian Stewart.

3)This is the tree in our parents room. Which we added this year.

4)This is the tree in our room. Nothing is better then a chandelier as a tree topper.

5)These are the trees in our bathroom. We made these out of ribbon.

We would love to hear about you Christmas trees. Leave us a comment below. Merry Christmas.

Eggnog Cookies

Today we are making Eggnog Cookies, which we found on Pinterest. But as usual it was not allergy friendly, so with a few tweaks hear is the allergy friendly version. Great for Christmas parties.

Soft Eggnog Cookies

Ingredients:

1 1/4 cups sugar
3/4 cup Earth Balance soy free butter
1/2 cup So Delicious eggnog
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 soy free egg yolks

2 1/4 cups special blend flour*
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

Directions:

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. (Yes 300)

In a large bowl, cream sugar and butter with an electric mixer. Add eggnog, vanilla and egg yolks and beat at medium speed until smooth.

In a medium bowl combine flour, baking powder, cinnamon and nutmeg; mix well with a wire whisk and add to your eggnog/sugar/butter mixture.

Next drop by rounded teaspoons onto a greased baking sheets, 1 to 2 inches away from each other, flatten with a spoon.  Bake for 17 to 22 minutes or until firm when you touch them.

Transfer to cool, flat surface immediately with spatula.

Eggnog Icing
3 cups powdered sugar
1/4 cup Earth Balance butter
1/2 cup So Delicious eggnog

In small mixer bowl, beat the powdered sugar and butter until well blended. Gradually beat in eggnog until icing is smooth and the desired consistency. You may need less or more eggnog depending on the consistency you like. Then frost the cookies and let the icing harden. 

*1 1/4 cup rice flour,1/4 cup tapioca starch,  1/2 cup potato starch,1 1/2 tsp. xanthan gum

Christmas production

This last Sunday our church had their Christmas production. And it was wonderful. I don't know how they do it but it gets better every year. This year me and my sister( twin B) got the amazing opportunity to be apart of it. They wanted to make the back drop bigger this year so they asked us to come up with a couple drawings.

This is what we came up with.

It was so much fun working on these buildings and then to see them in the program was amazing.

This is the stage all together.

These are close ups of the two buildings.

Leave a comment and let us know about something that's brought you joy this Christmas season.

High Five For Christmas

It's Friday and you know what that means, it's High Five For Friday  Christmas. As you might have noticed we changed Friday with Christmas. For the Fridays leading up to Christmas we are going to have Christmas inspired HF4F. Starting with our five favorite Christmas songs.

1)Deck The Halls by Tenth Avenue North(We love their video to the song)

2)12 Days of Christmas by Relient K. After hearing there version of this song it will never be the same.



3)His Favorite Christmas Story by Capital Lights. This song tells a beautiful story.



4)Christmas Shoes by FM Static. This song will make you cry.



5)The Chipmunk Song by Hawk Nelson. This is the perfect song for the band Hawk
 Nelson.(our favorite band)




What's your favorite Christmas song? Leave us comment below.

One Of a Kind

     

I'm so excited to share with you this one of a kind Ashley (that's me) design. For those that don't know, I'll be going to school for fashion soon. And though I've made things such as dresses, pajamas, ect. before, this was my first time making anything by starting with making my own pattern.
 I've wanted to attempt this for some time now, so I was try to think of what the first thing I make should be. That's when I was inspired by this fabric that I had laying around and I'm kinda crazy for peplum skirts. Of course after I made mine, my sister(Twin B) had to have one too.

  Shout out to all fashionistas ! Where do you find inspiration for your fashion? Leave me a commit below.

Top 25 Christmas Movies!

It's December 1st, which is the beginning of the count down to Christmas. So to help you get in the Christmas spirit we are sharing our top 25 favorite Christmas Movies. One for every night to Christmas.

                          
1)The Christmas Card                2)White Christmas                  
(our all time favorite)            (You always need the classic)


                
 3)The Heart of Christmas            4)The Christmas Shoes
(This one will make you cry)    (You will need a box of tissues near by)


              
5)It's a Wonderful Life                  6)Matchmaker Santa
(This is our dad's favorite)          (New to hallmark this year)


               
7)The Most Wonderful Time           8)A Christmas Story
of The Year.                    (It's not Christmas til you have
(We've seen it five times this year)    watched A Christmas Story)


      
9)Miracle on 34th Street              10)Frosty The Snowman
(Must be the black and white (Burnt out 3 VHS when we were kids,
            version)            what can we say, we love Frosty)


                  
11)Love at The Thanksgiving       12)The Muppet Christmas Carol
Day Parade.                       (Or Mickeys Christmas Carol)
(New to Hallmark this year)


     
13)Annie Claus is Coming to Town     14)Christmas Magic
(As you can tell we love Hallmark)(A classic Christmas angel movie)


              
15)A Princess for Christmas          16)The Christmas List
(You always need a movie          (We watch this one every year with
with a Princess)                           our mom)

      
17)borrowed hearts                  18)A Season for Miracles
(Another great Christmas       (Once again a great Hallmark movie)
angel movie)


 
19)Mrs.Miracle/Call Me Mrs.Miracle             20)November Christmas    
(We couldn't pic one, they're both great)    (Must have a box of tissues)



         
21)a Boyfriend for Christmas             22)Snow 1&2
(Great for a girls movie night)     (Great comedy for Christmas)


                 
23)A Charlie Brown Christmas             24)Alabaster's Song  
(How could you go wrong with    (This is a childhood favorite of ours,
Charlie Brown)                 we even named the angel on our tree Alabaster)




 
25)Three Days
(The cover does no justice for the
 movie, but it's all we could find)

What is your favorite Christmas movie?  Feel free to leave us a comment below.