Wow, the 2011 holiday season was fantastic.  It was a fabulous end to a wonderful year.  Now, ShortbreadSwee-T is coming through for birthdays, anniversaries, and whatever else comes to mind.

While I was preparing for Valentine’s Day, I hit a real glitch.  First, after I removed my batches from the oven, I found that the cookies did not look like I wanted them to look, and I can’t show/give cookies that aren’t up to my standards (and my standards are high).  I didn’t worry too much, because I knew I had an extra day before Valentine’s Day was here.

The second glitch was a neighborhood power outage.   On day two (the last day), when I planned to remake the cookies, I came home to a complete blackout.  There was no power at all for almost an hour, and when the power returned, it was only a little while before the power went out again.  The intermittent power outages went on for a while.  I soon figured out that there would be no shortbread cookies that night.

I was totally unprepared for that mishap, and I didn’t know what to do.  Here it was, the middle of the night on a work/school night, and I was walking around with candles and flashlights and making PB&J sandwiches for dinner.  At the end of the night I was extremely disappointed because I didn’t have my shortbread cookies ready for Valentine’s Day.

That power outage was a great lesson for me.  I know now that I need to prepare for the unexpected (have the dough and toppings ready – before I’m ready to start baking).  Hopefully, that will never happen again.    ShortbreadSwee-T’s home-made cookies and sweet treats need to be available even during a power outage.

A few days ago, I presented my cookies at a jewelry party, and they were a hit.  It is always good to see people enjoying something that I put my heart into.

Peace & Blessings.