Cookies!

In the middle of opening presents as a child, we would take a break and Mom brought down a huge tray of all the different Christmas cookies she'd made throughout the few weeks before. Sugar cookies, B'rer Rabbit Molasses cookies, Spritz flowers with maraschino cherry centers and green 'ribbon' cookies, kolachkis, little round powdered ball cookies (what were they called?), and several others.

My mom wrote a cookbook a few years ago including all the recipes she used from when we were kids. (I'd do that, too, but it would be an interesting mix of 'what-can-you-make-with-what-happens-to-be-in-the-house?' and 'how-do-you-make-dinner-for-6-with-found-food?'
Mom includes almost all the Christmas cookies she made... so I made some of them this year... I wanted to give a little plate of cookies to my friends at school. I got white ironstone dessert plates from the Salvation army. They are beautiful and at 20cents each a good bargain.
Here are the Spritz cookies I made. As I was mixing them, I put myself in my mom's shoes and thought of her using 'oleo' for butter (just margarine) and distinctly heard the chunk chunk chunk of the 'cookie gun' from my childhood... we were never allowed to help with the Christmas cookies... chocolate chips? yes. Cake, yes. Pie, yes. Christmas cookies? NO! These were mom's works of art for her family.

I also made "Pastel Pretties", which my brother-in-law says I must rename. I never realized there was anise in them! I made meringue mushrooms, too, which is something I've made in the past... they're beautiful and delish. I made fudge and plan to make a few other things before Thursday.