Valentines Magic

Ahhh, breakfast!

So what happens when your new hobby, chocolate making, collides with your old, well-loved hobby of cookie baking? Magic...and a massive sugar rush...followed by the sugar crash of the century. With all the tasting I did, it took me two double espressos before I was able to be get motivated enough to finish. But after my heart started pumping again, I whipped these suckers right out!

I started off just dabbling with chocolate. I used both milk chocolate and white chocolate tinted with a pink icing color. (By the way, does anyone know of a line of food coloring that uses more natural ingredients? I just detest that chemical-y taste that some of the food colorings impart to your food. Plus, who KNOWS what you're ingesting! The FDA says it's safe but, frankly, I just flat out don't trust 'em. If anyone has any suggestions or has a favorite brand, could you please email me at inbetweendayz at hotmail dot com? Your suggestions would be much appreciated!).

After a few false starts, I managed to successfully pipe the chocolate into filigree hearts and circles then eventually graduated to writing. I have to say that the writing was the hardest part of the whole process. I'm a printer. I print EVERYTHING, from lists to love letters. Heck, I haven't written in cursive since 5th grade and wasn't even sure I remembered how but once I got my uncoordinated brain around the idea that the letters actually have to connect, the words just started flowing.

As the chocolate was left to cool and harden, I whipped up some sugar cookie dough and also the chocolate cookie dough I used for Valentines Day last year. Once the cookies were baked and cooled, it was time to decorate!

Remember the crafts table in Miss Barnett's first grade class? No? Well, too bad for you because it was AWESOME and this reminded me of it! Since I have no elaborate gardens to tend, sigh.... and yes! I'm still pouting so don't bug me about it, I have to find my zen place in other ways and this did the trick. Swirling and smearing and dotting and combining the chocolate with the iced cookies, it was like making those cut-out paper hearts at school and being so excited to run home and show them off.

Since I was duped by my trickster hubby into running a 5K on Valentines Day, (Who the heck organizes a race on Valentines Day?! You wanna know who? A husband who has run out of romantic ideas and figures putting on a race is a great way of skirting his romantic responsibilities! I swear, once I crawl over the finish line, I am going to stagger around until I find him and then I plan to clobber him with one of my cookies!), I probably won't have the strength to type. So, just in case I don't survive, I want to wish you all a very Happy Valentines Day. May your loved one give you something more than a sweaty high-five at the end of a grueling and unnecessary run.