$2,284.80

That’s the estimated cost of hiring 11 pipers to pipe for you this Christmas. I don’t know about you, but that far exceeds the Christmas budget around here…even for my true love–though he’d be worth it. 🙂

Today, as I was prepping for 11th Day of Christmas pie baking (prep work makes the whole thing so much easier, by the way), I was thinking about the cost of baking pies.

For one pie, not very much at all, really. Even if you paid someone by the hour to do it, pie-making’s not too pricey.

But what if you tried to estimate the real value of time?

You just can’t. How much would you pay for the experience of watching your kids open presents? How much for baking together? For dancing with the one you love? How much would you pay to sit in the peace and quiet with your coffee? What is the cost of the time it takes to read a Christmas card from someone you really miss? What’s it worth for an hour of loud, happy family around a table of good food?

Priceless.

I know that’s cliché these days, but it’s so true. And that’s one of the reasons I’m so happy to have a GUEST STAR on my blog today. My brothers-in-law are here from Illinois, and they wanted to get in on the pie-baking action. So today, my brother-in-law, Clay, and I are whipping up a couple of Piping Hot Chocolate Chess Pies. I’m so thankful for the time we have together! We’re not really “piping” anything, but it’s the closest I could get to those piping pipers.

We’re baking two. One’s going with us to a family get-together tonight, and the other’s for some folks who just need some Christmas cheer–they need Christmas to hurry up! So we’ll bring a little Christmas in a pie plate.

We used a recipe I’ve used before; cocoa, eggs, sugar, vanilla, and evaporated milk. Seems like it turned out great. We’ll see when we cut into it tonight. Besides, whipped cream makes stuff taste awesome, so we’re taking that with us, too.

It didn’t take long to prepare the pies, and we had a good time working on a puzzle while we waited for them to bake. 

Time.

Please remember this holiday season that it’s the most precious gift you can give to those you love!