Wintery Weekend

Happy Monday, friends!

This Monday, I am dragging a bit. I'm feeling a little under the weather, so no judging if there's a typo here or there, okay?

Saturday morning I woke up early to get my grocery shopping in before heading out for a group run. I did 7 miles, which is my longest run since the marathon in October. My foot felt fairly decent for most of it, and ok after. The inside post tibial tendon wasn't happy though. Seriously - can I get an upgrade on this body? Maybe switch for a titanium model?

Anyway, Travis and Emily were supposed to finish up their Christmas shopping and get some wrapping done while I was gone. I was a bit disappointed to only see 2 presents under the tree for me when I got home. I'm not being materialistic here, I just happen to know that the hubster got me more than 2 presents. However, he said wrapping took a lot longer than he thought with Ms. Emily. So that explains things.

That evening, we drove around town to look at Christmas lights. We got in our jammies, brought a Christmas CD with us, and even had hot cocoa! It was a fun little outing.

No judging my nighttime-car-selfie. That overhead light is just not very flattering.

Sunday we woke up early for church. Accidentally wayyyy to early. I'm not sure what happened there, but we were all sitting around with nothing to do for a while there. It was raining when we left for church, but started snowing while we were there. I was trying to protect Emily's hair with her hood, and her sweater also had a hood, so she ended up looking like a little Eskimo.

When we got back from church, Emily and I put together a gingerbread house. It was one of those kits that comes all pre-cut and with the candy, so it was relatively easy. Although, Travis is the artist in our family and he sat this one out. So, I'm pretty proud of the way our house came out!

While we were constructing our house, I was trying to make 2 different batches of cashew butter with the load of cashews I got from a vendor at work last week. I did this vanilla cashew butter recipe, and this salted dark chocolate one. For some reason, the cashews took forever to grind down into butter. Like - over an hour to get both these done. My mixer was one hot little appliance when I was finished. The kicker? Neither recipe is that outstanding. The vanilla needs more vanilla, the chocolate needs more chocolate...eh, live and learn.

Also, I'd like to confess something here to all my blog readers.

I have bought way too many Christmas cookies to count. Which means that I've been eating way too many cookies. Plus, we're baking cookies this weekend. You know, the kind you can't really buy in stores - family recipes and sugar cookies for Santa. More cookies for me to eat! You're welcome, Waistline.

Have you made a gingerbread house? What's your favorite Christmas cookie?