It's the most wonderful time of the year

And it's also a baker's dream! Why? Because it's a great excuse to bake mass quantities of your favorite cookies!

In my case, I have ONE tried and true recipe and a lot of those that I want to try. After reading Sara's praises about Martha Stewart's Cookies book, seeing it in the DM BX for 25% off cover, and falling in love with most of the recipes in the book, I decided to buy it! I now have a queue of cookie recipes to try. Maybe I'm a little overconfident in making these recipes for the first time and sending them out to people, but everything I've made and taken to work was promptly devoured. I'm hoping the same will be true with these cookies! And if they turn out bad, I'm not required to send them out. Here's the list of the cookies I want to make:

1. Chocolate-Peppermint Cookies--I must make these after seeing Sara's results!
2. Cigarettes Russes
3. Candy-Stripe Cookie Sticks
4. Lime Meltaways--my tried and true recipe. I have a whole bottle of key lime juice to use up, so I guess these will be Key Lime Meltaways! Easy to make and the recipe yields a lot!
5. Lime Flowers--use up more key lime juice!
6. Chocolate Macarons with Peppermint Ganache --found this recipe on Dessert First (I love that blog!). These won't keep long so they'll be for friends in town.
7. Alfajores de Dulce de Leche (link is to similar recipe)--my aunt makes alfajores, a South American treat, from time to time so this recipe is a must-try for me! 
8. Cream Cheese-Lemon Bows

Now let's see if I can actually get to all these recipes! I just want to make sure there's good variety in the cookie tins people will be receiving from me!

You should have seen my grocery basket: milk, 2 lbs of butter, 2 dozen eggs, 10 lbs of flour, 3 lbs brown sugar, limes, ground ginger, and a huge box of Lucky Charms. Can you guess what I was eating for breakfast and dinner? That's right. I went through that whole box of Lucky Charms in 2 days. Pretty disgusting, huh? I haven't been doing much cooking since Jon left. The only mouth I have to worry about feeding now is my own (well, Sammy's too but that's just dry dog food). That's why I can get away with a grocery list like that!

One aside: anyone watch Secret Millionaire? I'm watching it now and I love it! Such a refresher from all those other reality shows on TV, where the purpose is to receive money. It's a real tear-jerker. Check it out!