Of goodies and nostalgia
Monday, December 21, 2009 - Posted by Sunny - 4 comments
Last week was my goody baking/making week. I started a list of things I wanted to make in early November and picked things up for them as I saw them on sale. I started with the double peppermint bark that I'd intended to put with my parents Christmas gifts but I sent the box before I'd made it. I continued with chocolate scotcharoos, kissy cookies ( I made a three batches of these because Derek loves them so much )and muddy buddies. Hyrum helped me dump in the ingredients for all of these delectable treats. He loves to help and I love having a helper in the kitchen. It's much better than doing them all by myself. Plus the holidays are all about making happy memories. So that children can live on nostalgic happiness for their entire lives and what is more nostalgic and happy than making Christmas treats with mom?

Which brings me to my Saturday goody making/baking. When I was young I remember digging our the leather worn brown paper bag that contained all of the cookie cutters. We didn't make sugar cookies too often but regardless I loved looking at them. When my parents remodeled the kitchen this last fall they brought the cookie cutters out to me. There were some new cookie cutters added to the mix and the leather worn brown paper bag had been replaced with a plastic one but I felt the same thrill as I saw them again.

Hyrum shares my love for cookie cutters and absolutely adores making sugar cookies so I knew now that I had my retro cookie cutters that we'd have to make sugar cookies this year. When we picked out the cookie cutters that we would use for our cookies Hyrum insisted on this one.

What an astronaut has to do with Christmas we'll never know but unfortunately this particular cookie cutter likes to hold onto cookies to the point of destruction so we were unable to get an astronaut Christmas cookie.


Derek and Hyrum are the cookie cutters. I make the dough and bake the cookies and the boys cut them out. Derek says that I see sugar cookies as a spectator sport. If that's the case then Hyrum definitely sees it as a full contact sport.

And if you don't watch him he will cut cookies with reckless abandon


We also gave him a chance to roll out the dough. And this is something that we found ourselves doing a lot of.

Hyrum...Look at momma!

My fearless cookie cutters after their hard work was done.

Derek is going to hate me for posting this picture. He thought his hair was crazy. But I like this picture of my boys.

Also when I was young my mom always made old fashioned hard candy for Christmas. We'd have wintergreen, spearmint, grape, pina colada, licorice ( which they always called anise on the bottle ) and others different years but always cinnamon...ALWAYS cinnamon. I don't know if it was because I was in my own house this year or if it was because Hyrum was getting older but I just really wanted to try making hard candy this year. But I was also very nervous to try them on my own. So after several nervous calls to my mom I started.

When the candy is done it's 300 degrees fahrenheit so naturally we didn't have much of a role in actually making the candy. Our job was making the candy trails in powdered sugar.

But as soon as that oil was poured into the syrup and the kitchen filled with the strong smell of warm cinnamon a flood of memories poured into my mind. Derek ( who actually poured out the candy into the trails ) says that he still has the smell of cinnamon in his nose.

It turned out EXACTLY how I remember it and I want to make hard candy every Christmas from now on. Hopefully Hyrum has the same fond memories of making trails in powdered sugar and breaking up cooled candy.

Doesn't it look good? Yumm! Does anyone else have nostalgic treats that you find yourself wanting to make now?


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4 comments:

    Kyle and Amy Brinkerhoff said...

    That all looks really good. I didn't get any of my Christmas baking done this year. That was one thing I had to let go this year because of the baby. I found that I had too many other things to do instead. Thanks for the Christmas card by the way. When Addy saw it she said "There's my Hyrum." She misses him a lot too. We should get together after the holidays are over. What do you think?

  1. ... on December 22, 2009 at 5:58 PM  
    2. Nikki said...

    I didn't make any sugar cookies and I still ate SO many. :( I love all the messy pictures!!
    I SO want to make hard candy with the kids. Can you believe I never have yet?! Hopefully this week!

  2. ... on December 27, 2009 at 10:33 PM  
    3. Laurie said...

    One more reason that I believe we are kindrid spirits - I LOVE cookie cutters, and have far too many - and I'm not quite ready to pass any of them on to my children yet....and I love making sugar cookies (I think all of my kids at least love eating them!) Our favorite homemade treats at Christmas are angelitas and peppermint icecream with hot fudge sauce. Looks like you all had so much fun!

  3. ... on December 27, 2009 at 11:11 PM  
    4. Laurie said...

    (kindred, not kindrid!)

  4. ... on December 27, 2009 at 11:12 PM  
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