Nativity in the Sun

The light coming through my window was magical..
This is my cute little Mexican Nativity, and the top left
corner is a darling trio we made in Malaysia for Young
Women's. I carted those little pots half way around the
world (All the way from Robert's
Craft) so those girls could do this activity. They
had never seen or done anything like it.
The print in the background is a common one, and so is the frame.
I found this frame at WalMart YEARS ago. I took it
to Asia with me. The back of the frame was hanging
by a thread, so I took it to Pearl, my personal
framer in Penang, and she fixed it up,
for free and it is perfect now. BETTER than new.

Merry Christmas... I DO celebrate Christmas.

Flocking Snowflake Cookies

I found these excellent and beautiful cookie cutters at a cute store in Park City, Utah. I must tell you what an absolute pain in the tukus they were to use!! Especially the one I am holding in my hand below. I would consider myself to be an above average baker, but, even I found this blue cutter an extreme challenge to master. First the dough had to be literally frozen flat before I could even attempt to remove the cut cookie dough from the counter to the cookie sheet. I failed several times, but this cookie cutter shape demanded an absolute perfect alignment from point to point or it would look really stupid. So I had to experiment to get just the right system to make them perfection. It was quite frustrating, but I did prevail. Roll them between wax paper. Freeze the dough before cutting, cut the dough and gently press each delicate cookie out of the cutter, while trying not to let it crack. Then, I won't even depress you by going over the process of getting them off the cookie sheet.

• The next steps were time consuming. The cookie had to be meticulous styled. It was hard to get the hang of the icing, but after several failed attempts we turned out some real lovelies.
• I used Royal Icing and then immediately doused them in Superfine sugar.
• I had to wait over night to attempt brushing off the excess sugar to reveal the finished product.
• I lost several cookies in the attempt too.
• I had to treat them extraordinarily gentle or the tips would break off.
• Sh*%t!!!!
• I baked several dozen, but lost about 12 in the process. It was like taking a bullet to the heart.

I took some to my immediate neighbors. Oh, my gosh this was a labor of love. When Christ talks about loving your neighbors, I can honestly say, it was difficult to give these up to them. Did I really love them enough to let these dearly created darlings go into their possession? Would the guy who lives behind me really appreciate that each cookie took about 10 hours to make? Or would he let them break before they even came out of the ornately wrapped gift bag I put them in? Yes, I needed to do this for them. I have really good neighbors who look out for me when I need them most. They edge my lawn, rake my leaves, shovel my walks, wave at me and make my day, gossip over the fence and best of all, allow me to culinarily experiment on them. It feels better to give than to receive. I'll remember that when I get a $2.00 box of cherry cordials in return..... (I'm going to hell)

1. I used Pam Anderson's excellent Butter Cookie recipe from her first book,"The Perfect Recipe". It really is a perfect cookie.
   
2. I followed Nancy Baggett's flocking advice from the "All-American Cookie Book", the be all and end all cookie making standard as far as I am concerned
3. I also used Martha Stewart's "Cookie Book", for creative ideas.

Don't ask me to copy any recipes down here, I am too wiped out from this project to even think about those kinds of details.

Now...next, I'll be making my Biscochito's for my father when he passes though on his way to see my sister in New Mexico......(I guess I can find energy for those, my Grandma would turn over in her grave if I didn't make them for Christmas:) I wouldn't want that to happen.

Tsunami Reminders of Christmas Past

This is a modest sampling of some of the really pretty hand-painted ornaments I collected while on "vacay" in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia the week the Tsunami hit, Christmas time 2004. I remember being in the hotel room and looking down at my cell phone and feeling horribly, horribly dizzy. We found out 4 1/2 hours later what happened.We lived on the water front of the strait of Malacca in Georgetown, Penang Malaysia (top center of the map), and that day we drove up Gurney Drive and saw a huge wave of water coming toward us. At the time I would guess it was 1/2 a mile out at sea. We mentioned how weird it was to see a wave coming so close to us ( this photo is a North ward view, Indian Ocean in the distance)We said nothing more and continued into the underground parking garage of our condo.
We rode the elevator up and complained of the extreme heat, and Tiny and Dave ran into the apartment and changed right into their bathing suits with the intention of going down for a swim at the pool. When they reached the pool their was an extreme scent of dirty sewer water, they went out to the guard house to check on the smell. The guards began pointing them toward the street where they noticed over turned cars, dead fish and loads of mud on the promanade and into all the property nearby. Dave and Christina ran up to tell us to look out the balcony and see the meyhem, that's when we heard dozens of sirens. The emergency vehicles where heading to the north end of the island just past the view you see above. Over 100 people were killed while sunbathing at the popular beaches on the north part of the island facing the Indian Ocean.

Please, please watch the facinating video I have posted below this post. It must have been taken from the condo just a floor or two above ours. The scars of the poisoned out grass were visible on the property next to ours for the remainder of our time there. The water was filthy as you can see. The Penang govenors were not concerned with the ecology of the island (once known as the Pearl of the Orient) but only with the money they could make from rich people in the big fancy condo's, so the once beautiful beach was distroyed by raw sewage. So anyway, this is also a cool audio of the Hokkien Chinese and the wonderful sound of the expressions they make.



So when I see these ornanments I think about the Tsunami. It was so sad. But the Lord was surely looking out for us. We were almost caught in that muck, by just moments. See the video posted below this one.