Christmas cookies

December was crazy-pants. Between December 1 and 19, I had exactly 4 days when I didn’t have to leave the house. Lunches, pot lucks, holiday activities, doctor appointments. Whew! Last Sunday we took a second trip to see the Holiday Light Show at the Rotary Gardens in Janesville. This time, we bought some of the festive glasses that diffracted points of light to make snowflakes or snowmen around each one. The snowflakes were fun, but the snowmen brought me such joy! I had to laugh. Also, by moving my head from side to side, the snowmen danced! So fun!

I didn’t even bring my camera to the light show. I learned last year that it was next to impossible to get a good shot without a tripod, and I had no desire to haul around a tripod. Here’s a selfie of the glasses.

Snowman glasses

And here’s my best attempt to get a picture of our Christmas tree through the glasses showing the snowmen. Tee hee!

Snowmen around each point of light. How fun is that?

Wednesday was Cookie Day. I had mixed chocolate and vanilla sugar cookie dough ahead of time. Jane made the dough for the sour cream pockets (and forgot to bring it with her and had to go back home to get it). I also made a batch of Mexican wedding cakes, and Hilda made ultranutty pecan bars to share.

Kate brought her six-month-old Corgi, Newton. (“As in Isaac or Fig?” I asked. “Some of both,” she replied.) Newton is as cute as can be. He was eager to smell all the new smells in the house. The boots we wear for chicken chores were especially enticing. Outside, he barked at the chickens, who promptly retreated to the coop until he went inside.

Newton

Soon I was rolling and cutting the sugar cookies. Hilda kept track of the time, switching and removing the trays from the oven. Kate and Jane frosted the cookies. At my suggestion, we agreed to skip the decorative piping on the cookies. It’s a messy, takes a long time, and wastes lots of frosting. We may never look back.

When the chocolate frosting for the bison ran out, we switched to white. White bison occur rarely in nature and were considered sacred harbingers of good fortune by First Nation peoples.

Brown and white bison in foreground; Jane and Kate star frosting the regular sugar cookies

Then it was time for the sour cream pockets. I kept rolling and cutting. Jane did the filling (apricot and raspberry) and pinching. I tried to help, but made a mess of it, as can be seen in the photo in front of Jane’s hand.

Assembling raspberry- and apricot-filled sour cream pockets

The pockets looked fine after they were baked and sprinkled with powdered sugar. We ate all the unsightly mutants, of course.

Sour cream pockets baked and dusted with powdered sugar

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the last of my pre-Christmas tasks checked off my list. Such a relief to not give gifts anymore. I’m kicking back until it’s time to start the prep for Christmas dinner.