Life and Cookies

I’m baking Christmas cookies! This is a big deal why? Well, let’s just say in my “other life” I baked tons of cookies each Christmas time. I also baked with my much-loved Grammie. She taught me to make homemade frosting, pie and other yummy recipes. Grammie always had cookies in her freezer, ready at an instant to display on a plate to offer to anyone who stopped by.

Recently, I found a holiday tin with the words, “Peanut butter, 2001” taped to it. It brought back memories of helping Gram with her Christmas baking. Gram had shoulder surgery in the fall of 2001, and was unable to complete her usual baking, so I went shopping and made the lists of the traditional treats and spent a couple of long days in her kitchen. Gram directed from the table and I worked. She was able to frost cookies and I did all of the grunt work. We had fun, visiting and remembering times past. She told me about her youth in North Dakota on her family’s large farm. She told of snow and sleigh rides to church. She told of her older brothers and how they would always dump the sleigh in a snow bank, causing all of them to look like festive snowmen. She told me of how she loved to read before going to sleep at night and how her father would knock on her bedroom door and tell her to turn out her oil lamp. That brought back memories of me as a child, holding a flashlight under the covers to finish “just one more page.”

During Christmas of 2001, my life was going through many emotional changes. Working my way through a long divorce, smiles were hard to find. It was comforting to know that the time I spent with Grammie was “safe.” It was a place where you felt loved and I needed that then.

I honestly haven’t baked much since that Christmas. My heart was not in it and too many other things got in the way. Christmas became a time to put on a “game face” for my children and smile even when I felt like going to bed and pulling the covers over my head until the season was over. Baking reminded me of my old home and all of the busyness of being a mom and a wife. Funny how some things, like baking, in this instance, define a time and a place.

Well, this year I decided to get with it and make some family traditional cookies; snowballs, sugar cookies, molasses cookies, to name a few. Sometimes it’s the simple little things that can inspire you to forge ahead and make your way through. For me it was the little dented holiday tin with the masking tape label that read, “Peanut butter, 2001.”

I miss you, Grammie. With each cookie, I think of you.

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

It’s a quiet Sunday evening. Preparing for Christmas and another workweek. Tired of doing that, so now for some bloggin’…

Do I have something wise to say? Some words to live by? Hmm…well, for all of you out there that are apprehensive at holiday time, I say, “Chill.”

Holidays bring out the best and the worst in people. My daughter was talking to me about my “annual holiday funk.” She told me that I needed to snap out of it and get with it. I explained that it is easier said than done. At holidays, especially Christmas, the world tells us its “family time.” Mom, dad, brother, sister, even the family dog should be wishing everyone peace on earth. For those of us that don’t have the typical family unit, it can be hard, especially if you are a perfectionist, someone who strives to get it right. It’s an adjusting of the senses and expectations. I always feel guilt at holiday time…I should have been able to keep the family together (yeah right), I should have a perfect house (in another life), I should be independently wealthy (threw that one in there…ha) and I should be Mother of the Year each and every year. Well…like a broken record that refuses to skip…it just keeps on repeating that same part over and over each December and I get trapped in the scheme. Gerbil in a wheel, anyone?

I think one just gets so used to feeling this way that when the holidays roll around a person goes in to auto mode and starts buying pity party supplies. I don’t know what it is about being the mother that makes a woman feel like it was their responsibility to raise the kids right and to be the keeper of the flame. Why do some dad’s get away with so much less? Why do some men skip out and become less of a parent and not lose one minute of sleep about it?

My kids are raised and have made it through some pretty twisted times. I have tons to be thankful for and believe me, I am VERY thankful. My kids are wonderfully human adults and I am so glad they are in my life. I have awesome friends and co-workers that are like family and I go to work each day with a smile, because I love my job. My soul is at peace with my Jesus and I know He guides my way. I’m a pretty blessed lady.

So…I think I’ve created a habit, because this is the 7^th Christmas I have been single. I think it’s time to put the holiday funk to rest, don’t you think? It’s getting old and I’m bored with it. So I’m officially resigning from the Mother of the Year running and I’m forming an “It is what it is and it’s all good” club.

It will save so much time. J