I used Maraschino cherries with stems but the bodies weren't big enough for the Hershey's Kisses heads. And there wasn't enough surface area to get the ears to stand up. So the second half of the batch, I used fresh Bing cherries with stems. The body vs. head proportion was much better. Another helpful hint is to stick the flat side of the Kiss in chocolate and then press the ears onto the flat side of the Kiss before applying the head to the cherry body. The mice set up pretty quickly. Then you use gel icing in a tube later to make the nose and two eyes. They turned out really cute.
Bob did some chores and maintenance on The Beauty and The Beast. We had a light lunch early since Peggy's party is at 6:00. We got cleaned up around 4:00 and the bathtub sprung a leak so Bob had to redo our temporary fix. We headed down 95 to Peggy and Michael's. It was weird again to drive into our old neighborhood. We arrived at the same time as Janet and Robin from across the street. It was fun to see Peggy's house all decorated for Christmas. She gave us the grand tour.
Dinner was great; huge Fiesta bowls of chili (your chili bowl could not be the same color as the plate on the table!) cornbread and cranberry salad on the side. Strawberry Cheesecake for dessert with my little Christmas mice sitting next to big hunks of cheesecake! The mice were a hit and as I described the small and large bodied versions we dubbed the larger ones "Big-Body Bings!"
After dinner we played a rousing game of Catch Phrase. It was a fun evening and it sure was nice to see familiar faces. Glenda was there as well as Ellen and Dwayne. It brought back lots of memories of early morning walks with the Cedar Hills ladies. We were home by 10:00.
It's 11:47 p.m. and 45.8 degrees.