The tree is up, the stockings are hung and cookies have been a baking. I'm official in the holiday mood, it just took a little longer this year is all. I turn once again to the beloved candy cane. In my previous life in Phoenix, when I was a school teacher, I actually grew quite sick of candy canes. Every year kids would give me Christmas cards and every year there would be a candy cane attached to it. When you teach junior high and you teach a little over 100 kids...that adds up to a lot of candy canes. But now that I have been out of teaching for a few years my love for peppermint candy canes has been growing back again...just like a lizards tail. I still can't put them on the tree...this year I think ours are jolly rancher flavored, but I have brought them back into my baking and into my hot chocolate(yum!). I was violently killing candy canes with a mallet for another idea that I had. It went bad and I had to do somehting else. My friend A, or my goat as I like to call her, has … [Read more...]