Christmas Cookies

The tradition of decorating sugar cookies for Christmas has been part of my family's Christmas celebration for at least five generations.  If you want the background, read my Virtual Advent post from 2009.  The short version is that Grandmas make sugar cookies in holiday shapes and grandchildren gather around the table to decorate them - and eat them.  Due to distance, I had never gotten the chance to carry on the fun with our grandsons, but during the Great Thanksgiving Disaster of 2011 we found a few quiet moments to pull out the icing and sprinkles.

Zerrik - age 5

At first, the boys were more interested in Legos and K-Nex than cookies, so the "big kids" (Amanda and Amy) helped me out.  They are amazingly creative ladies and took more time decorating each cookie than it took me to bake them all.

Eventually the little ones got curious (or finished constructing their Lego creations) and joined us.  Their creative efforts were more along the lines of "how much sugar can you pile on one cookie?" - much like my own at their age. (My apologies to Trey, the eldest grandson.  My snapshots of him were more blur than picture.)

We ate a large portion of the finished product, but there are some in the freezer awaiting Christmas Eve. We will continue the cookie tradition - even if we have to do it in July - and I look forward to the day that the table is full of grandkids making memories that they can pass on.

Amanda

Amy