Saturday Kindergarten

This afternoon we held the Izzalini kids' Christmas party and I made three different doughs and five different cookies to take to the event. I thought I'd just stay an hour and chat with people, but I wound up getting involved in their Christmas ornament project and didn't return home until supper time. I made an outsized plastic globe with Santa dreaming of the gifts he's going to distribute and Donner dreaming of getting back to the forest. It was far too subtle for the tall and small people of Izzalini. They all made globes with mangers inside.

Our Izzalini Christmas tree was put together today by a nice young guy with a cherry-picker. Tomorrow we dedicate our outdoor manger scene and then the lights will be turned on. Oooooo! I think the tree is about 25 feet tall and has three strings of lights.

Speaking of cookies, this was the first time I've made any in about 20 years. I picked out three new, simple recipes and made the dough yesterday. Early this morning I formed and baked the cookies and found out what worked and what didn't. Shame on me, I practiced on the kids. They were all gobbled up, however, even the misshapen ones.

As I was working I remembered my mother's one and only holiday cookie. She made a roll-out dough, which I am now convinced contained no butter but only Crisco, and stamped out various theme patterns. They were AWFUL.