Christmas Cookie Making

Christmas Eve morning was so much fun. I had my very own cookie making team & we had so much fun making cookies, laughing, & being goofy. I couldn't have asked for a better Christmas Eve & that was the best way to start it. I had my children with me, we were relaxed, not watching the clock or sticking to a schedule for the first time in I don't know how long, & I didn't even care that we were making a huge mess. It's not often I can say any of that. 

I started the morning by making Monkey Bread. Super easy: cut up refrigerated biscuits, put cubes of cream cheese into half of them, mix up melted butter, brown sugar, & cinnamon, toss the cream cheese pieces in the mixture & pour into a baking dish, toss the non-cream cheese pieces in the mixture, pour into a separate baking dish (Blondie hates cream cheese, so I make 2 batches), bake until the center isn't gooey. Like most everything I make, I don't have a recipe. My version of Monkey Bread is a family favorite & I don't make it often. Christmas Eve was the perfect time to surprise everyone with it. 

As I was putting the pans in the oven, this is what I see out of the corner of my eye:

Monkey Bread gooey goodness, yum. 

I turned back to the oven & out of the corner of my eye, I see this happening:

Little Blondie likes the butter/brown
sugar/cinnamon mixture...

...a lot.

Joining the pictures of all my other kids
with proof of our Christmas baking on
their faces. 

All breakfast rules are thrown out the window
on Christmas Eve morning.

Little Blondie pretending to feed Ginger Girl
a scoop of cookie dough.

When Amazing Grace was little, I taught her the secrets to making the criss-cross shape on cookies. You have to dip the fork in sugar so that it doesn't stick to the cookie & make a mess. You also have to say a-booma as you criss with the fork & a-bomma with the cross of the fork. 

It wasn't until last year, 13 years of doing this, that Amazing Grace realized it's not actually necessary to say "a-booma a-bomma" in order to make the cookies turn out right. She was flabbergasted that she'd been doing it with each & every cookie that she had to use a fork to push down on & was just now learning the truth. I told her that was fun part of being a Mommy--telling your kids things & watching them believe you. [My kids still believe that if you go to bed with a messy bedroom, a mouse will come & bite your toes in your sleep.] Whatever gets the job done, I say.

Ginger Girl had the a-booma a-bomma
job for the cookie making.

My little cooking making team baking cookies in pj's
& blankets (Little Blondie's was a gift last Christmas & I
had her name embroidered on it. She loves that blanket).

The nosy stalker
part of my cookie
making team.

The dough eating part of my
cooking making team.

The laughter, the fun,
the memories... 

...that's why I make
Christmas cookies
with my kids.

This is what Christmas is about. I'm a lucky, lucky Mom.

Making cookies with the kids was definitely a lot more fun than making lefse with the hubby man. Hubby & I can make anything fun. It's all in the attitude & baby, we got attitude. Making lefse, though, that just sucks. The biggest pain in the butt project I've ever insisted we do. First, the recipe could have told me that it makes 6,000 pieces. Thank God I had decided to cut it in half anyway, but I still had 3,000 lefse on my plate! And did I mention they're a pain in the ass? We had to make the pain in the ass 3,000 times. 

They were delicious, but not worth it. I'll happily pay for my future lefse needs from this day forward. But making Christmas cookies with the kidlets? Nothing will get me to end that tradition.