Kelly Times Two

Want a quick cookie recipe?  These are so simple, delicious, and eye catching.  In a mixing bowl, combine the following ingredients, except the candies.  Press an M&M in each cookie prior to baking. 1 1/2 cups (3 sticks) butter, softened 1 cup sugar 1 egg 1 teaspoon vanilla 3 1/2 cups all purpose flour M&Ms candies for centers Do not refrigerate to chill.  Fill cookie press with dough, then press out cookies onto a baking sheet.  Bake at 375 degrees for 10 to 12 minutes.  Makes about 7 dozen.  Happy birthday to my sweet sister-in-law, Brenda, who LOVES shortbread cookies and today is her 40th birthday!

Fortune cookies are not Chinese, in case you hadn't heard.  They're American.  I was quite surprised when Cocoa, a Taiwanese girl, handed one to me recently.  It was imported from the States, I quickly discovered.  Anyway, I love to read the fortunes more than eat the cookie.  I wondered if I should be offended by this particular fortune I got, "You will have a beautiful family."  Does that mean we're not beautiful now?  Or, should we get excited about a new addition?  Don't we usually read what we want into those things anyway?  Well, our family has been beautified this past week with little Nini staying with us, and she will be joining us again tomorrow for a few more days. She fits right in, and if we had it our way, she'd become a permanent member of the family.  She did a great job expressing herself to us with her limited English, and loved drawing various works of art, and having me take a million pictures of her designs. ...

Our family got to attend the monthly stake temple day at the Taipei temple on Saturday.   Lindsey and Christopher did their temple work, then waited outside on the beautiful grounds and at the chapel next door until we were finished with our session. After that, we enjoyed hamburgers at a place we heard about called California Grill, then did some exploring. Lindsey arrived last week from Rexburg, completing 32 credit hours and her first year of college at Brigham Young University-Idaho. We are so glad to have her home with us!  She will be with us until she starts school again in September and will be taking two classes online in the meantime.  In addition to Lindsey's arrival, we've been blessed to have the company of 7-year-old Nini (her real name is Yeh Min-Yu) with us this week.  She's so darling and we love having her around too.  It's kind of funny that when Lindsey was a little toddler and she could not say her name well, she called herself Ninnies...

We will now have this as one of our apron options for our Relief Society event on April 30, thanks to my personal shopper, Julie.  Click HERE to see what I'm talking about if you're not sure.  I was really hoping for the red polka dot print and the aqua jacquard, but since the mocha print clashed with those, this is definitely a better choice. The combo has a striking resemblance to my cocoa and turquoise trio, but sisters tend to like the same things!