Baking. Spicy honey cookies are the essential dessert for our Christmas, but this year I’ve made these already twice in the last 6 days and personally am feeling like I would rather skip sweet stuff at the moment and it’s not even Christmas yet! Maybe that’s for the better…

The recipe is very simple and the result very yummy:

500 g self raising flour
100 g butter
200 g honey
100 g sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
2 teaspoons of ready mixed spices (cinnamon, coriander seed, caraway, nutmeg, ginger, cloves)
grated rind of 1 orange

100 g almonds finely chopped

Preheat oven to 200C°. Grease 2 baking sheets.

Melt the honey, sugar and butter together. Take off the heat and let it cool down. Stir the flour, baking powder, spices and nuts in a separate bowl. Once the honey mixture has cooled down, mix in the eggs. Add the flour, orange rind and mix until blended. Gather mixture into a ball, wrap in greaseproof paper and refrigerate for at least 1 hour.

Roll out the mixture about 8-10mm thick. Stamp out some shapes and place them on the sheets. Brush the cookies with the egg yolk. Bake until golden brown, 8-10 minutes.

Nothing too special, but these ended up as a symbolic ‘Thank you’ for our oldest son’s teachers.

And some ended up in my tummy… or quite a few… a lot of them actually. Eh. They are good!

We have now officially switched in to a relax mode.

All is ready, no more rushing. Time to appreciate, time to enjoy. I’ve been very happy.

Have a lovely Christmas.

has been very patient and a very well behaved boy. He’s been waiting: first for somebody to offer a loving home, then for his display box to be done, then for the great owner (my sister in law, who also has my Barney ) to come in person and take him to the new permanent place to live. It took me ages to finish the idea as I wanted the box to be more than just an empty boring place for my teddy… Since Laurenzo’s new owner loves all things sweet and she wanted her new bear to become friends with Barney – as a result the little bear got some muffins, a cuppa, a calender hanging on the wall, a framed picture of a bagel, a lamp, and some glow in the dark stars with the moon… plus enough room for that Barney to drop by.

My sister in law was happy. Laurenzo exited. I’m relieved.

I’ve been trying my best, among other things like 3 of us being down with food poisoning (thanks to the The Pumphouse ), having to scrub our entire flat as we have some very dear guests arriving tomorrow and just craving to be in peace, I’ve somehow managed to make 3 little ones to cheer us all up.

Niel. He effortlessly knows how to make you smile by telling jokes or by puling funny faces. I love that. Laughing person is a happy one. Niel definitely is

Vinicio. Wants to be like Winnie the Pooh. Eat lots of honey and have a great bunch of friends. And a lot of honey. And honey. Honey.

Odi. My sweetheart. Says his best friends are plants and we have no idea how beautiful green fairies are…

I think these are my last bears, or any other items to go to the etsy shop this year as I’m sooooo behind with making things for my kids pressies , finishing projects I started and abandoned that were meant for myself… If I succeed you’ll see some more work I can do besides making little toys Wish me luck.