Easter Christmas Cookies

Yea for one week until Christmas break! Our friends, Clark and Joey, came over to celebrate Christmas by making homemade sugar cookies and watching a Christmas classic--Home Alone. Turns out our frosting was pastel colored, so we decided our cookies were Easter Christmas cookies. They were soft and delicious just as we wanted. It must've been Joey's expert measuring skills in conjunction with my narration as if we were on our own Food Network show (still dreaming...) Thank goodness we had Clark and James for the hard part of cutting out the shapes and placing them successfully in one piece on the cookie sheets. It's not as easy as it sounds.

SUGAR COOKIES
1 cup butter
1 3/4 cups sugar
2 eggs
4 Tbs. sour cream
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
3 1/2 cups flour (plus more for dusting)

Cream butter and sugar. Add eggs, sour cream, vanilla, and mix well. Add dry ingredients and mix until just combined. Roll dough into a ball, wrap in plastic wrap, and refrigerate for a few hours (or overnight). Roll out onto floured surface and cut into shapes. Bake at 375 for 6-8 minutes. Cool on racks, then decorate.

FROSTING
6 Tbs. butter
6 Tbs. shortening (half a 3/4 cup)
2 1/3 cup powdered sugar
3/4 tsp. lemon juice
1 tsp. vanilla
splash of water

Mix 1st three ingredients. Add the rest and beat until light and creamy. Add water until desired consistency.

D Wade

Thank you, Deloitte, for funding our trip to see one of my NBA crushes--Dwayne Wade. I say "one" because everyone knows my first choice is Lebron James. Anyway, we went to the Jazz game to see them play the Heat, and I brought a pair of binoculars just in case we were too far away. Turns out we were close to the top, so they came in handy. D. Wade didn't let me down. He made plenty of points with some amazing moves (as expected), and they beat the Jazz in the end. Yea! I wasn't cheering too loudly for the Heat, however, because in case you didn't know, Jazz fans are a little crazy. To make matters worse, the BYU Cougarettes came to perform for halftime, and the fans yelled, "Booo!" as they walked on the court. Come on, people!
Anyway, we had a great time at the game, visiting with friends who are also going to Dallas for Deloitte (minus Clark and Joey), and James was pretty happy about his free pretzel and drink. I love the NBA. Check out this stud.



But here's my real crush...

Much to be Grateful For

We headed out to St. George to meet up with the Palmers for Thanksgiving. I love going down there because it's so easy to relax at the grandparents' house. A lot of the Palmers were able to make it, and we spent a lot of time just talking, playing games, watching movies, and of course, eating a ridiculous amount of food. We had a Thanksgiving dinner on Wednesday night, and then when more people arrived, we decided to go to Chuck-a-Rama for Thanksgiving lunch. Thank goodness my mother-in-law stood in line at 10 am for 11 am lunch because the line was out to the parking lot! Apparently, our idea wasn't original. We had an entire section to ourselves at the buffet, and we came home for leftovers a couple hours later. Can you ever have too much Thanksgiving food? I'm always amazed that you can be hungry after you're so full. Here are some pictures of the family event.

My sisters-in-law--Christina & Melissa
Can you tell the Palmer boys know what they like?

Cade & James

Cameron, Weston, and Kyle--loving their endless slushies

We also spent a lot of time at Chris and Christina's, and they even blessed their sweet little girl, Cohlee, on Friday. I've acquired a lot more cute nieces and nephews over the last year!

Cade, Tanner, and Kaitlyn

Chris and Christina with Cohlee

Chris, Dave, and James

James's mom insisted on spoiling us at anytime possible, and we're grateful for her love. We did miss James's dad because of work and my side of the family, but we'll see my parents at Christmas. Only 14 week days until Christmas break!