Once upon a time... (though not one in chronological order)

1) Once upon a time, I came across a recipe for some delicious-looking cookies. I made them, and they were delicious. Then I made another batch, and another, and another, and another.

Spicy Molasses Cookies
1/2 cup butter, softened
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup molasses
2 T honey
1 large egg
2 1/3 cups all purpose flour
2 tsp baking soda
2 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp ground cardamom
1/4 tsp ground black pepper
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup candied ginger, finely diced (another option: raisins)
sugar, for rolling

Preheat oven to 350°F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat.
In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until fluffy. Beat in molasses, honey and egg until smooth.
In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, spices and salt. Working by hand, or with a mixer on low speed, stir flour mixture into molasses mixture.
Stir in chopped candied ginger.
Roll dough into 1-inch balls and roll each ball in extra sugar before placing on
baking sheet. Sprinkle with coarsely ground salt.
Bake cookies for 10-12 minutes, until the edges are set but not browned.
Cool for 5-10 minutes on baking sheet, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.


2) Once upon a time, I had 50 minutes in between the end of church and the train I had to catch, and since my mom didn't approve of my shoes we drove to DSW (15 minutes away), I tried on a bunch of shoes, found a pair that was more appropriate, and we bought them, and got to the train on time. We're awesome.

3) Once upon a time, I was downtown at the wind was so strong that I could lean into it at about a 30° angle.

4) Once upon a time, the Midwest felt bad for me because last year I didn't get to see any snow, so it compensated by snowing almost every day and being freezing cold all the time. There're about two feet of snow on the ground at the moment, and it's still going.

5) Once upon a time, some of my friends from Truman came to visit Chicago, and I got to get together with them, and it was fun. We did lots of shopping and went to Chinatown and enjoyed (i.e. hated) the constant snow.

6) Once upon a time, I walked around in the snow all day and my shoes got soaked through, and my feet were freezing, and it really made me want to buy wool socks. And slippers, so that my feet would be warm when I was inside.

7) Once upon a time, I bought wool socks and nice slippers. The world has a conspiracy against women though-- women aren't allowed to have warm things, so I had to buy men's socks and men's slippers. Have you noticed that? Look at women's sweaters in any store-- they're made of cotton almost universally, or have a small wool content. Men can easily find thick, nice wool sweaters. And they don't seem to make wool socks for women, just for men. And look at slippers too-- women get fluffy cotton clog-style slippers, so that half of their feet will be partially warm. Men get sheepskin slippers with backs on them... and oh yeah, they're less expensive than the cheapo women's slippers. It's so frustrating.

8) Once upon a time, I reformatted and printed out my entire recipe collection, and started keeping them in a handy-dandy recipe notebook.

9) Once upon a time, I rearranged all the furniture in my room. The biggest challenge is the large bookcase, since I have to take all the books off it to move it. The bunk bed is suprisingly easy to move. (I'm super good at moving furniture-- I've been compulsively rearranging my room since I was about four. And no, that's not an exaggeration. At four, I had figured out how to easily move furniture.)

10) Once upon a time, I got re-addicted to Pinochle, one of our family's favorite card games. We have been playing for at least an hour or two a day.

11) Once upon a time, my parents were super-hard to buy for, but I found something for each of them. I can't say what until Thursday at the earliest.

12) Once upon a time, I found out that I have orthostatic hypotension, which means that when I stand up after sitting or lying down for a while, I get a bit woozy and black out (as in, temporary blindness, not fainting). I always thought this was normal, since it's been the norm for me for my whole life. But apparently mostly people can walk straight and see when they get up. Who knew? Anyway, Wikipedia told me that some people get good results from upping their sodium intake to 10g a day, which is about four times the usual recommendation. I'd been worried because I regularly eat twice as much as I "should" and still crave salt, but apparently that was just my body trying to self-medicate! So now I no longer feel guilty when I eat a ridiculous amount of salt.

13) Once upon a time, I went to see Kristen perform in her guitar class holiday recital. They played Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer painfully slowly. After the concert, she played it for us at normal tempo. She's getting quite good at guitar! After the after-concert concert, she and I and a bunch of her friends went to Guthrie's, a board game bar in Chicago. We got burgers and played Taboo and Kristen had made me a gingerbread cake, because it happened to be my birthday.

14) Once upon a time, I turned 22. I feel old.

15) Once upon a time, I cut myself badly while shaving... I still can't quite figure out how I cut my left ring finger while shaving my legs though. I obviously have incredible, though previously unrecognized, talents.

16) Once upon a time, I went to the eye doctor and found out that my contact prescription gets to be upped again. Then I got my eyes dilated.

17) Once upon a time, I got a new kind of lotion that smells like vanilla and gingerbread. It's wonderful. But I smell my hands several times a day now, which probably looks kind of silly.

18) Once upon a time, I babysat a little girl who had ice cream for dessert and then asked for a pickle. I thought I was the only non-pregnant person in the world who likes to follow ice cream with pickles. Turns out I'm not as unusual as I thought :) OK, I'm still unusual, but not as uniquely unusual...

19) Once upon a time, there was a hawk sitting on our tree. Our neighbors' tree has their nest, but they rarely come visit our trees.

20) Once upon a time, we were going to go to the grocery store, but they'd lost power and were closed. We had to go back the next day. The shopping list: ice cream and pickles.

21) Once upon a time, I found six wooden monkeys in my room. I'm not sure what I'll do with them.

22) Once upon a time, I made and wrapped Christmas presents for a bunch of my friends at school, and then forgot to give them to most of said friends. They'll get them in January, I suppose, or whenever it is that I remember.

23) Once upon a time, I went to the zoo and saw a beaver and ducks and giraffes and a bear that sat in a very cute way.



24) Once upon a time, I discovered that it's possible to take pictures of falling snow.


25) Once upon a time, I wished you all a very merry Christmas!