Grandma's Snickerdoodles

These are my husband's favorite cookie and they are the ones we make for Santa every year.

This is one I like doing with my kids because they can get their hands dirty making the balls.

SNICKERDOODLES

You will need:

• 1 1/2 cups white sugar
• 1 cup butter, softened
• 2 eggs
• 2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon cream of tartar
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons white sugar
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon (you may need a little more sugar and cinnamon)
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• Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
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• Combine 1 1/2 cups white sugar, butter or margarine and eggs. Mix well.
• 
  
• Stir in flour, cream of tartar, baking soda and salt. Blend well. 
• 
  
• Shape dough into 1 inch balls. 
• 
  
• Combine 2 tablespoons sugar and 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon in a shallow dish. Roll dough in sugar/cinnamon mixture and place 2 inches apart on ungreased baking sheets. 
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• Bake 8 to 10 minutes. Cool cookies on a cookie rack. 

These are awesome when they are still warm!

Also, my daughter's preschool xmas party is tomorrow so I shrank down and printed off more 

snowman wrappers and used them on boxes of smarties. Pretty easy for something pretty cute!

Rolo Turtles

As I mentioned in a previous post, I was invited to a Christmas bake exchange this year.  Last year my husband and I did a big one-day bake and in six hours produced all our baking, but it was exhausting and the clean-up took forever. So I'm excited and think this is a brilliant idea because you get all your baking done for the season but only have to make one item!

However, I had to make 8 dozen of that one item. And in a week where I have no fewer than 5 Christmas events and have to bring food to 4 of them, I went on the hunt for something quick and easy. I found the perfect thing on Pinterest (thank-you God for Pinterest!).

Rolo Turtles! These are so easy, I felt like I was cheating.

You will need:

• a bag of pretzels. I prefer Our Compliments mini-twists because they are smaller and compact so less caramel can ooze through and stick to the pan (I couldn't find pretzel snaps like the ones pictured in the original recipe)
• rolos (a pack of rolos has 10)
• pecans (I had no idea pecans were so bloody expensive!)

Preheat oven to 350 F

Line a baking tray with parchment paper unless you have a nice clean non-stick pan, then the paper isn't necessary

Place pretzels on pan in nice tidy rows

Place a rolo candy on top of each pretzel

Bake in oven for 4-5 minutes or until the rolos are shiny but still intact

Remove from oven and with gentle pressure, squish the rolos down with a pecan (watch not to burn yourself)

Cool on pan until pan is no longer hot to touch, then chill in fridge for 10-15 minutes. Voile! Brilliant!

The original recipe I found on pinterest came from So Wonderful So Marvelous