Did I say 6:00? I meant two days later…

So, to pick up where I left off on the afternoon of the 24th…

Things got pretty hairy there at the end.  No hairs in the cookies, but a few more grey ones on my head.

The cinnamon rolls were messy to make, so there aren’t really any in-progress shots of that (though all the details you could ever need, are on the recipe’s page).

I was running out of flat surfaces, hardcore.  So I brought in all of our TV trays, and lined the kitchen walls with them:

(I think I caught Roxie mid-blink, there)

I was also running out of trivets and cooling racks, so I made a do with a couple coasters and my oven mitt:

In my harried, frazzled state, that looked like a face, and I found it extremely amusing.  EXTREMELY.  AMUSING.

We were getting to the part where I could’ve really used another pair of hands, as long as that pair of hands would be willing to read my mind, do exactly as I say, and do everything perfectly.  (I don’t think such pair of hands exists, though I bet my mom’s would come pretty close)

(the above photo really downplays the sheer mess on that far counter – I rolled the cinnamon rolls out directly on the counter rather than risk gunking up my breadboard.  Good choice, because butter and sugar and cinnamon splooged EVERYWHERE.  It was such a mess!)

I’d long since stuck my rings and watch on a high shelf to preserve them against the onslaught of icing and cinnamon, but my periodic texting and phone calls throughout the day left my phone in a bit of a state:

(Hey look!  It’s my Keens and my favorite apron, too!)

Can ya see the powdered sugar?

I churned out cinnamon rolls as quickly as I could, and in between tending to those I iced sugar cookies like a madwoman.  One batch of rolls makes 7 pans, of about 7 or 8 rolls each:

They turned out marelously, by the way.  I stuck to the recipe almost exactly.  Here’s one pan before it got its maple glaze:

By about 6:00, I had the last pans of cinnamon rolls in the oven…

and I was still icing cookies.  I knew Jeff would be home at about 6:20, and I wanted to be ready to assembly-line the tins as soon as he walked in the door.

(I drank 6 Diet Cokes that day.  If you look closely, you can probably find a can in ‘most every photo)

Glazed cinnamon rolls:

Sure enough, Jeff walked in the door right at 6:20, and I had the empty tins laid out, ready to set him to work

I handed him the big box of snickerdoodles,and I started divvying up the fudge into each tin.  Then he did the snowballs while I did the lemonade drops, and he did the sugar cookie stars while I did the candy canes…and somehow it all got done.

I even had time to scribble little notes and tuck them into the bottom of each tin:

Tins all assembled, I covered the cinnamon rolls in plastic wrap then laid them on top of each tin, and tied it all up with a pretty bow:

(That one also got a wee little pair of mittens – my original goal was to put a wee little pair of mittens on *every* one, but that had to fall by the wayside).  So I gave the lone pair to Jeff’s cousins, because I’m still trying to make them like me.

From there we dashed off to Jeff’s family holiday dinner, and when we got home I tied up and beautified and photographed the remaining 10 tins (ten tins! tentintentintentin….erm…don’t mind me.)

It was after midnight, and we had to get up at 4am to drive to Kansas City, so I fell into bed exhausted, and vowed that I’ll NEVER do this again.  Never.

Nope, next year I’m going to give myself *3* days to bake

PS>Psst!  The dishes are still waiting!