ADVENT DAY 22: BAKING COOKIES

Back in the day, on a certain December weekend, my sister Nina would arrive at our Orofino house to bake and decorate holiday cookies with Mother. Mother baked traditional spritz and shortbread cookies as well as a "delicate" rolled sugar cookie. As Mother creamed the shortening and sugar, she would say, "Just look at that! Isn't it beautiful?" (And let me tell you, you just don't get that same effect when you substitute applesauce for the shortening.) Mother worked laboriously to press the spritz dough through the cookie press. Nina and I would decorate the wreaths and canes with bits of red and green cherries or "red hots." The shortbread dough was rolled, cut into diamond shapes, the edges of which were carefully crimped and the centers decorated with candied cherry bits. We also mixed sugar cookies, rolled and cut the dough into shapes, then decorated them with frosting, colored sugar, "red hots," etc. Mother and Nina spent hours decorating the sugar cookies with colored frosting, adding outlines and ruffles. Even then I thought it was way too much work on something you're just going to eat. (Martha Stewart I am not!)

Still, Christmas in my own home meant duplicating my mother's traditional cookies. I tried for a while, but when I became a working mother I could just no longer keep up. The cut-out cookies were most important to me so that's where I placed my efforts. And finally, even those disappeared from my Christmas "must do" list. The cookie cutters and my cookie shooter are carefully stored in the back of the cupboard above my refrigerator.

Oddly, I love the cookie magazines that appear during the holidays. I used to buy one or two such issues, finding the same basic recipes year after year. Finally I took a solemn oath not to buy another cookie magazine and I've stuck to it. "You can find plenty of recipes online," I tell myself when tempted. "Or, you could look at some of the magazines you already have."

REAL TIME UPDATE: Hallie called from Seattle this afternoon. "How much snow do you have?" she asked. Mike corroborated my answer – six inches. She and Nick are considering whether they should try to come for Christmas in the midst of winter weather. She's going to check road reports and call us later.

[The top photo is of the kitchen corner of the Orofino house in the late 1950s. Seems like we always had snow in winter and plenty of it. The bottom pictures were taken today. To the right, Mike walks along the driveway he shoveled.] KW