Did you guys know they now make drywall lighter?  Seriously 30%, and apparently it's not BS.  Husband told me the he could pick up a 8' section with no effort, and the 12' ceiling sections went up awesome.

srsly, it says this right on the sheetrock!

I am only super exited about this because it means that my drywalling is basically done.  Two days and done!  Now it needs to be primed (5 gallons of primer for this, says contractor father in law!) and painted.

Hole in drywall for fridge

Close up.

In the Oven!

Every year, the Saturday before Christmas, my mother and I get together to bake ALL the cookies.  OK, we are not really baking all of the cookies, but it's a ton of cookies.  Depending on which ones we make, it ends up being something like 60-ish dozen.  Everyone has their favorite cookie, and we have to make them all.  We use them to take cookie trays to everywhere, work, parties, all the regular stuff.

Yesterday was Cookie Day.  Mom woke up early (at like 6 am) and started making buckeyes and pecan tassies.  I got to mom's house around 9 and we made peanut butter blossoms, snickerdoodles, russian tea cakes, toffee cookies, thumbprints, cut out cookies for my three year old to decorate, and candy cane cookies.

Before and After

You'll have to forgive the terrible iphone pix.  We were too excited to get to cookie day and forgot the real camera.  Oh well.  In recompense, I'll give you all the recipe.

Candy Cane Cookies

Ingredients
1 cup powdered sugar
1 cup butter
1 egg
1 1/2 teaspoons almond extract
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon of salt
red food coloring
Granulated sugar for sprinkling

Directions

• Preheat oven to 375
• Mix powdered sugar, butter, egg, and extracts in a bowl.  (I used a mixer.)
• Sift in flour and salt and mix well.
• Divide the dough in half and color one half with the red food coloring.
• For each candy cane, take 1 teaspoon of each dough and roll into a 4 inch strip.  
• Twist together and shape into a candy cane.  
• Sprinkle with some granulated sugar and bake until very light.  (About 9 minutes).

They look really cute on a cookie tray, and they are not too sweet, which you might appreciate if you had just baked 60 dozen cookies but still needed something to eat with your coffee.


I have not had much of a chance this weekend to post about the construction progress, which is really what I am supposed to be blogging about.  Between cookie day and two Christmas parties, we're pretty beat.  If you want a construction project fix, see this amusing picture of my current kitchen door, which opens to..... the drywall for the new kitchen.

Doorway to Nowhere.  I feel like I'm in Coraline.

When the new kitchen is done, this doorway will be blocked up and the existing kitchen will become a mudroom and powder room.  It used to open onto a small deck.


I think the drywall taping and mudding and sanding will be done tomorrow (Woo!) and then we'll be opening up the windows from the dining room to be the doorway to the new space.

Super, super, super exciting.

Drywall was delivered and is being hung!

This means we have passed all the inspections (5, I think) except for the final!

I can't even tell you how excited this has me.

(I'm posting from work, so I do not have pics.  Having a job really gets in the way of your renovation projects.  But it also pays for them, I guess.)