Monday, December 25, 2017
Merry Christmas
Merry Christmas from our little family to yours! I’m so excited to finally have taken the time to put all our favorite memories from this Christmas season into a video using iMovie for us to cherish forever!
// Song: Jingle All the Way by Dan Bremnes //
Wednesday, December 20, 2017
Christmas Baking + Vegan Royal Icing
It almost feels like we’ve been hibernating, at least from the blog the past couple weeks. It’s so easy for us to get caught up in the rush of Christmas and we consciously made the decision to slow down, and make a break from the blog this month. It’s been great! We’ve spent countless nights cuddled up on the sofa with blankets and bowls of soup watching all the Christmas movies, building telephones and skyscrapers with legos, we’ve covered our fridge with drawings of Christmas trees and snow scenes. This month always seems to fly by and it’s been so nice to enjoy it!
This week is our baking week so the kids and I have been busy making our traditional Christmas favorites of graham cracker toffee, cinnamon rolls, gingerbread, and of course sugar cookies. Every year we love to make a Christmas motto for to remember the season and they’re usually a cliche saying from a movie or song. Kensi and Finn came up with “Jingle All the Way” because this Christmas season is so much fun and Finn loves Turboman from the 1996 movie that we just can’t get enough of this year. We literally watched it four or five times on Finn’s birthday and it was so much fun, I am really loving this season with kids and all the messy chaos that comes with it!
This year I also had to mix things up and find a royal icing Olivia can enjoy since she has both a dairy and egg allergy. Typical royal icing uses meriguine powder which is a huge no no for Olivia. Instead I searched for a vegan friendly recipe and it turned out great for sugar decorating purposes! I’m not sure how this would hold up for the glue on a gingerbread house, we won’t really know until later next week when we build those at grandma’s house. Olivia is happy to munch on the festively decorated cookies Kensi and I did (Finn was only interested in sprinkles and eating). Below, I’m sharing the vegan icing recipe we used for our sugar cookies. I hope you can all find some time during this busy season to sit down and enjoy icing some delicious cookies!
Vegan Royal Icing
4.5 cups Confectioners Sugar
1 Tablespoon Cornstarch
1/2 teaspoon Arrowroot Powder (I buy mine here)
1 pinch Salt
1/3 cup Water (plus a little more to get the icing to your desired consistency)
Food Coloring (I use these! and they can be found at Michael’s Craft Stores)
-Combine confectioners’ sugar, cornstarch, arrowroot powder and salt in a stand mixer or bowl and mix with the whisk attachment on low for 1 minute.
-While the mixer is running, drizzle the 1/3 cup water and increase the mixer speed until the sugar is blended. Beat the icing on medium speed for 2 minutes, scraping down the sides as needed. The icing should be thick at this point (better for gingerbread glue). Here is where I added a little bit more water and continued to mix to thin the icing out for the cookies.
-Divide the icing into separate bowls and color with food coloring as desired. Place each colored icing into a piping bag or a plastic zip bag and begin icing sugar cookies!
This week is our baking week so the kids and I have been busy making our traditional Christmas favorites of graham cracker toffee, cinnamon rolls, gingerbread, and of course sugar cookies. Every year we love to make a Christmas motto for to remember the season and they’re usually a cliche saying from a movie or song. Kensi and Finn came up with “Jingle All the Way” because this Christmas season is so much fun and Finn loves Turboman from the 1996 movie that we just can’t get enough of this year. We literally watched it four or five times on Finn’s birthday and it was so much fun, I am really loving this season with kids and all the messy chaos that comes with it!
This year I also had to mix things up and find a royal icing Olivia can enjoy since she has both a dairy and egg allergy. Typical royal icing uses meriguine powder which is a huge no no for Olivia. Instead I searched for a vegan friendly recipe and it turned out great for sugar decorating purposes! I’m not sure how this would hold up for the glue on a gingerbread house, we won’t really know until later next week when we build those at grandma’s house. Olivia is happy to munch on the festively decorated cookies Kensi and I did (Finn was only interested in sprinkles and eating). Below, I’m sharing the vegan icing recipe we used for our sugar cookies. I hope you can all find some time during this busy season to sit down and enjoy icing some delicious cookies!
4.5 cups Confectioners Sugar
1 Tablespoon Cornstarch
1/2 teaspoon Arrowroot Powder (I buy mine here)
1 pinch Salt
1/3 cup Water (plus a little more to get the icing to your desired consistency)
Food Coloring (I use these! and they can be found at Michael’s Craft Stores)
-Combine confectioners’ sugar, cornstarch, arrowroot powder and salt in a stand mixer or bowl and mix with the whisk attachment on low for 1 minute.
-While the mixer is running, drizzle the 1/3 cup water and increase the mixer speed until the sugar is blended. Beat the icing on medium speed for 2 minutes, scraping down the sides as needed. The icing should be thick at this point (better for gingerbread glue). Here is where I added a little bit more water and continued to mix to thin the icing out for the cookies.
-Divide the icing into separate bowls and color with food coloring as desired. Place each colored icing into a piping bag or a plastic zip bag and begin icing sugar cookies!
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