The Island of Misfit Cookies

Last night Youngest Daughter and I made Christmas cookies.  This was partly therapy for me, as I was still regretting my bad behavior on Friday night at the synagogue family dinner.  Sometimes I should just keep my mouth shut.  I should realize that I’m not the only one tired and stressed out.

Youngest Daughter also needed this cookie-making session.  The pangs of adolescence were sharp for her this past week.  We needed some calm Mother-Daughter time.

So we got in the kitchen and made a good mess.  She got creative and decided to meld the different cookie cutter shapes.  She used the 5-pointed star and the 6-pointed star together, and decorated them with red and green for Christmas and blue for Hanukkah.  “Look!  Christmas and Hanukkah are holding hands!”  She started singing one line of “The Twelve Days of Christmas” then a line from “Hanukkah, Oh Hanukkah, Come Light the Menorah,” alternating back and forth.  That drove me batty, but she was determined to sing through all 12 days of Christmas and all 8 nights of Hanukkah in that manner.

Then the cookie shapes got a little more bizarre.  She had the little-person shape melded to the bell, a tree with a reindeer head stuck to it, an angel flinging the little person around, and the front of the donkey with the back legs of the reindeer.  We got covered with flour, but we didn’t have to look presentable.  She took great care in decorating each cookie, but we had plenty of time.  When I was taking the reindeer cookie off the tray, I nearly severed its neck, but nobody was judging our baking skills.

So we have some ordinary Christmas cookies, some weird cookies, and some partially repaired souls.