Baking Christmas Cookies

Nothing says Christmas more than spending a cold winter afternoon inside our kitchen baking cookies with my girls.  The aroma of freshly baked cookies is pretty hard to beat.  Not to mention, it’s a lot of fun too.

Sunday afternoon we gathered our ingredients together and got to work.  We played classic Christmas music on the Victrola - Burl Ives, Bing Crosby, Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra, Johnny Mathis, Rosemary Clooney, you name it.  We had it going on.

Sugar Cookie dough

It was a whopping 19° outside, but we were warm and toasty indoors as we pulled out my old recipe cards and mixed up three of our favorites.  First was our Traditional Sugar Cookies recipe because that dough needs to chill in the refrigerator at least an hour before you roll it.

While that dough chilled (notice the pretty fabric bowl cover it is wearing) we made up a batch of Chocolate chip cookies with M&Ms  and mini chocolate chips.  The youngest and I made these the first two batches of cookies while the oldest made her favorite Chewy Gingersnaps and worked on homework, simultaneously.

When we finished with the Chocolate Chip Cookies we rolled out the Sugar Cookie dough and used a combination of new and my grandmother's vintage cutters.  My youngest asked me if she could have my grandma's cookie cutters when she moves out on her own.  I am thrilled that she wants them so of course I told her yes.  Of my two girls she is the most sentimental when it comes to family heirlooms.

We had a blast decorating cookies.  We were out of red sugar sprinkles so I mixed up some homemade ones using granulated sugar and a few drops of red food coloring.  We also had a bit of leftover vanilla frosting to use up so we frosted about a dozen of the cookies and put sprinkles on the rest.

Of course there was some serious taste testing to be done to ensure they were up to snuff.  And I am happy to report all is well on that front.  We then got busy putting together and decorating treat bags and goodie plates for teachers, friends and neighbors.  We still have plenty left for ourselves, but there may be another cookie baking session needed on Christmas Eve. 

We can't forget about Santa!