This year I had the pleasure of making sugar cookies with my littlest neice, Lainie. She thoughtfully chose the shapes from Grandma's jumbled drawer of cookie cutters. Lainie was methodical in choosing the best looking of all the bells, stars, candy canes and angels. Her mother, my sister, Susan and I poured over cookie cutters long forgotten from our childhood. We lemented the Angel cutter and her reluctance to let go of the dough. We laughed over tiny gingerbread boys, whose arms either broke or burned. Susan told Lainie stories of decorting techniques from our youth. The way we placed a silver ball on each star tip, the sprinkles to make the bells shimmer and the occasional red hot carefully placed. Susan and I both agreed that the tree was a favorite, because it is large and a good choice when limited to "just one more". Lainie appointed herself the cutter, as she loved pushing them through the dough. Susan made the frosting, a simple buttercream with a dash of sea salt and lemon extract to cut the powdered sugar taste. As if by some magic, not a single gingerbread boy broke or burned a tiny arm or leg. It was the miracle of Christmas cookies.
