Coffee Loves Winter and Vice Versa

I am the type of person who doesn't need an excuse to drink coffee (Note: I am also crazy about Starbuck's Skinny Green Tea Lattes). My husband, however, is worse. He treats every cup of coffee like it is a zen experience or a sippable portal to Utopia. The only reason he has cut back lately on his java addiction is because the doctor told him to. He was this close (pinch index and thumb together) to seeking a second opinion. We both come from the school of thought that Coffee is Great-Cold Weather makes it better. OR, Cold Weather is Harsh-Coffee Makes it Better. So here is a small list of times when these two thoughts are very very true this time of year.....

1. A cup of coffee is grand in your hand when you have forgotten to wear your gloves at an outdoor winter event.

2. Cold chilly mornings, warm pajamas, socks, and COFFEE!

3. Favorite Christmas CD playing (in my case, that would be Harry Connick Jr.), Christmas cards that need to be signed and stamped spread across the kitchen table, and a hot cup of coffee!

4. A cup of coffee is soooo therapeutic while waiting in the longest line ever so that your kid can see Santa Claus.

4 1/2. Coffee for Santa to keep him jolly. C'mon, there is no way St. Nick stays that happy on milk and cookies.

5. Coffee is a MUST on Christmas Eve just before heading out to midnight Mass.

6. Coffee is a MUST on Christmas Morning--- especially after a late night of product assembly (if you catch my drift) to keep you from looking like the Grandma who got ran over by a reindeer.

7. Coffee to go, Christmas music on the car radio, and a drive together as a family to check out Christmas lights.

8. Coffee so that you're not the parent snoring in the back row at your kid's Christmas program.

9. Coffee in your system makes it easier to plow over---I mean, shop, with all those rude gabillion people who are out at this time of year. 

10. Perhaps my favorite---- a cold winter day strolling the beach, (in my case, the Atlantic), warmest clothes, the salt spray, my husband and my daughter, gloves, and COFFEE!

Sealed with a Kiss, Kirsten

S.W.A.K.

Danish Butter Cookies and Nostalgia

These tins don't just contain cookies, they contain memories. For as long as I can remember, a tin of Danish Butter Cookies has always been a part of Christmas when growing up. It most certainly has to do with the fact that I am half Danish---my Dad is Danish. An entire half of my family lives in Denmark---Uncles, Aunts, Cousins. My grandparents (now deceased) had 4 boys, the oldest being my Dad. He caught wanderlust(probably inherited wanderlust from his gypsy grandfather, my great-grandfather, which is a whole 'nother story) early on and is the only one from that side of the family in the United States.

 Growing up, my mom would save the empty tins to store sewing supplies, barrettes, bows, or coupons. I would use the empty tins to stash away stickers, photos, notes, interesting articles cut from newspapers, or a cross stitch pattern or latch hook pattern that I would have been working on at the time.

Today, when I see these tins filled with little Danish butter cookies, I can't help but go down Memory Lane. Not only do these tins contain yummy buttery cookies, but they also contain sweet memories.

Sealed with a Kiss, Kirsten

S.W.A.K.