Christmas Eve!

Well here we are, Christmas Eve! I had lots of make-up-baking to do after my badly timed sickness, but that's okay, I got better just in time. I wanted to make oatmeal cranberry cookies, chocolate chip cookies, fudge and pralines. They pralines were a bust, I blame it on humidity.
It was a beautiful day here and started off sunny, but turned a beautiful Christmasy cloudy gray sky after lunch. My favorite kind of winter sky! But not good for candy making.
Still my cookies did great. Here are a few dozen going into my perfectly clean oven.
The fudge came out right too. Here are all tiny tart tins after a coat of oil awaiting hot fudge. I love these tins, they have a gorgeous patina. I love cute tiny treat things, they make the prettiest individual fudges.
More Christmasy stuff...
Here are some of the finished product, yum!

I am packing everything up for the fam tomorrow. I got very cool cap guns loaded with hundreds of rounds of ammo for the kids. I'm sure Bran & Jim will be cursing my name for a while. On second thought, they will fire through a thousand rounds in two minutes...
According to NORAD Santa is in South America right now. SO exciting! I loved watching the local news report on Santa's progress on Christmas Eve when I was little, and I still do! Part of me will always believe in Santa Clause...there's probably some way you could prove it with quantum physics or something. Or you can just have a little childish faith...It is more fun.
When we were little, my sister and I would sleep in her big bed every Christmas Eve. Dad would read us The Night Before Christmas, a pink and white striped copy permanently checked out from the Church library. God, what heathens! Then we would wiggle and giggle and squirm in bed after lights out in gleeful anticipation of the arrival of the Jolly Old Elf! What was so exciting to me was not the mere miraculous appearance of Santa's gifts in the morning, but the idea that THE Santa Claus was going to come to MY house! Miraculous! And I loved picturing his sleigh and all eight reindeer (plus Rudolph) tapping around on our roof.
I better get myself to bed, you know he doesn't come to houses where little girls haven't gone to sleep...