Crafty II

I enjoy doing artsy-craftsy kinds of stuff.  It's a good creative outlet for me when I can't summon enough crazy to write on this blog, and it keeps me off the streets.  And also it's a good excuse to drink wine because when you drink wine while crafting it is called "enjoying me time" vs. "maybe it's time for an intervention".  I occasionally decide to go all Martha Stewart for the kids' holiday parties, and I decided to go full frontal for this Valentine's Day.

I found this cute idea for secret decoder cookies here and decided to put a little Valentine's Day spin on it.  And because I am generous and kind and V-day is about love, I also decided that I was going to give you the play by play of how exactly I made these fucking cookies.

First of all, I totally copped out on the cookies.  I did not make them from scratch, using only all organic, non-GMO ingredients.  I bought a fucking mix:

Why yes, there are two different types of mixes there.  I read the box of the Great Value ones, saw that it made 40 servings at 2 cookies a serving, and figured I was golden.  I forgot I used one of the packets for a trial run when I did that math.   In my defense, this was also the same night I discovered lemon blueberry rum...

I whipped up some of those bad boys and prepared to Martha Stewart-ize them.  Rolled them mothafuckers out, then cookie-cuttered their asses and prepared to fill them with the crushed cinnamon fire Jolly Ranchers I took a lot of my pent-up aggression about my daughters both suddenly deciding to go on a jag of forcing me to listen to only Katy Perry in the car on.  I recognize that cinnamon candies might not be the best thing to put in cookies going to children, but goddamn.  I'm not going for taste here.  I used fucking store-bought cookie dough.

Filled with crushed candies.  Crushed, similar to my hopes and dreams.

Now I had mentioned a trial run.  I was not about to make all of these without attempting it first.  If it was going to go down in flames (hopefully not the literal ones, but I swear that would be our luck...) I needed to come up with a backup plan.  Obviously it had worked or I wouldn't even be telling you about this (though that might make for an entertaining post, fo' shure...).  At any rate, I had already made up a little trial of the message these cookies would be used to decode.  The blog I linked to above talks about using a blue pen to write the message, then covering it with squiggles of orange, red, and pink.  Fuck that shit.  Twenty five children plus one teacher in each kids class equals 52 Valentine's and I am not going to lie...the idea of handwriting all that shit makes me wanna stab my eyes out.  I fully intended on printing that shit out on the computer, so that is what I did:

The hidden message.

The message decoded.  Much easier to see in person, but it did work.

Holy fucking shit on a cracker, it worked again, bitchez.  Some days I even impress myself.

This victory was short lived, however, as I soon came to the realization that the math that meant that I needed to go to the store for more mix is the same math that means I have to make 52 of these fuckers.  Cutting those things out soon became a exercise in maintaining my sanity, and we all know that I teeter on the edge there frequently.  Soon, however, I get the last few cut out and start to fill them up when I realize that I am going to be short crushed candy.  "Fuck it", I thought.  "I'll just toss in a whole one.  It's not like I need that one cookie to make sure I have enough."  (Note, however, that that same logic did  not lead my to just, oh, I don't know, NOT PUTTING ANY CANDY IN.  No, by God, ALL the cookies must have candy.  ALL OF THEM.)

Poor little cookie, there in the upper right.  Different from the others.  You embrace your uniqueness, little buddy.

I popped that last bunch in the oven and started cleaning up.  Timer goes off and I pull them out, and notice this:

Bottom right, this time, but look at how nice that fucking cookie looks.

That is right.  All that time I spent crushing the candy that the children are not likely to eat, then painstakingly pouring it into each little hole...I could have just unwrapped the candy and tossed it in and been done with it.  And this, bitchez, is why Pinterest is the devil.  Not only is it a time suck, it totally leads you down the path to crushing candy when there is no need.

Next time, the only candy I am crushing is on my phone when I am trying to ignore my children while pooping.  After that I was pretty Martha-Stewart'ed out, so I grabbed some lemon blueberry rum, resisted the temptation to just toss back a few shots, mixed it with a glass of lemonade, and remembered a time when my Saturday afternoons were not spent covered in flour to make cookies that children probably won't eat on a holiday I really don't even celebrate.

Fire

I seem to have this weird propensity to attract fire.  Like, literal fire, though there's been plenty of metaphorical fire in my day, not gonna lie.

I'm not a pyromaniac or anything.  I'm only the kind of crazy that makes me fun to get drunk and commit minor misdemeanors, not felonies.  It just seems that I get all kinds of crazy fire-related shit all up in here.

For example, when I was in college one of my roommates caught the burner of our stove on fire with some grease.  Luckily for her, I enjoy baking and had some baking soda available (none of my other roommates did) and knew enough to toss it on the flames.  I then proceeded to leave to go to church, where the sermon was about, you guessed it.  Fire.  Though thinking back on this, the fact that I was in a church and it did not catch fire is kinda miraculous in and of itself...I was really only there for the extra credit for a religion class I was taking to be completely honest here.

Fast forward a few years in college.  We had this big old dead tree in our front yard that it took the college forever to cut down because single mothers trying to get out of poverty and their children aren't a priority, so who cares if gale-force winds come in and send it crashing through the roof, amirite?  I look out the window and see that at the base of this tree, there is a little fire going.  I go out there with a cup of water and douse the flames.  Or so I thought.  I then go to a family party for something or another (possibly Christmas?  a winter birthday?  It was during winter break, so your guess is as good as mine).  I explained why I was late and we laughed at the whole "burning bush" thing and joked about looking out for locusts.  I come home and I am telling my roommates about this when I look out the window and the fucking tree is back on fire.  For some reason, I opt to call for security vs. 911.  They tell me to put it out myself.  So that is how, on a cold winter night, I am out in the front yard of the house I lived in with a fire extinguisher trying to get the fire out.  It just kept re-kindling.  Eventually a security guard came to check it out.  Like a half an hour later.  They realize that I have just about emptied the extinguisher, so they decide that perhaps this is NOT something a single person equipped with chemicals can handle so they call the fire department.  It then takes the firemen another half an hour and sticking the hose into the center of the tree for the damn thing to finally quit.

I then meet my husband.  He's quite the lovely man and proposes and we live happily ever after and shit.  But, he failed to mention during our courtship that he routinely sets himself on fire at work. (He's a welder.)  And he always is so nonchalant about it when he tells me, like "Oh hey,  Aaron got a new derby car, and they fired that idiot they hired last week; oh, and I caught myself on fire.  And do you think you can get me some more nasal spray for my tool box?"  Like it's no big fucking deal that a steaming hot piece of weld landed on your shirt and it went up in flames.  I'm pretty sure he doesn't tell me about most of the times he does this because, well, he's married to a crazy woman.

Another time fire and I crossed paths, it was not quite so direct-like.  We were going to Connecticut, I think for my nephew's birthday, and a storm hit back at home.  Now my brother in law was planning on coming with us but at the last minute changed his mind.  Good fucking thing he did, because a goddamned storm came roaring through and lightening hit their house and caught it on fire.  Luckily the damage was limited to mostly cosmetic outside shit...but cheese and tap dancing rice, WTF?

Which brings me to the event that precipitated this post.  A few days ago, my husband was going to cook some ham on the grill.  He went out to pre-heat it, and then came back into the house to get the meat.  (Snickering cause I'm secretly a 12 year old boy.)  As he is prepping it, I happen to look out the window and I see flames.  A lot of flames.  Like a little mini hell burning in our back yard.  It scorched the siding and broke the window on the mudroom because it was cold outside.  That's how we do winter in Ohio, bitchez.  We grill even when frostbite is imminent.  Hell, most winter nights my husband can be found outside with the dogs in front of a fire, hiding from me. I don't blame him.   I'd totally hide from me too.

Apparently I'm being retaliated against for the church not burning all those years ago...

I am almost wondering anymore if I have mystical fire starting powers I was previously unaware of or something.  Like a dragon, but of course I am way cooler.   And not as scaly.  I swear to God though, our backyard has flooded on more than one occasion and now the grill caught on fire.  There better not be any fucking locusts or Imma have to bring my new found dragon powers out on their asses.

Conservations XIV

Charles shows me a video of how to grow a man beard, involving pouring various alcoholic beverages on it as well as using sandpaper and a cheese grater to massage the growing beard:

Charles: Do you want me to do this to make my beard grow?

(Mind you, his beard is covering his neck...)

Me:  Hell no!

Charles: (laughs)  It's good enough?

Me:  I don't want you to fuck up my cheese grater.


Charlie, after we got Gunner:  Mama, when are we going to get more dogs?

Me:  More dogs?  Three is enough!

Charlie: Well, if three is good, five is better...


Texting with Elizabeth:

Elizabeth: I have a doctor's appointment on Monday.  Do I need any insurance things?

Me: Insurance has not changed but you can't use the flex spending card anymore.  Should be a $20 or $40 copay.  Get a receipt.

E: Okay LOL why do I need a receipt?

Me: I want one LOL  To keep track of our medical expenses this year.

E: Why do you need to keep track of that?

Me: If it gets above a certain amount we can get a tax deduction.

E: So should I try to get sick more often?

Me: LOL no

E: Fine just trying to save you guys some money.