Riley, Roscoe Village, Chicago

Nancy Cutting Out Cookies, Roscoe Village, Chicago

Riley Decorating Cookies, Roscoe Village, Chicago

Rachelle & Nancy, Roscoe Village, Chicago

Christmas Cookies, Roscoe Village, Chicago

Today Nancy, Regan and Riley came over and we made cookies and exchanged Christmas gifts. Riley was shy around Dallas at first but after about 10 minutes they were best friends again. She sure is getting big! Even though she’s tiny, which you don’t dare say to her because she’ll say she’s big. Luckily we’re going to a dinner party tonight and hosting a barbecue tomorrow so these cookies won’t stick around here too long!

The thing about making cut out cookies, it always seems like a great idea and the first 5 are fun but then after that you’re sick of it and you have like 4 dozen more cookies to go. Riley even got bored of it. Guess who ended up doing them all? This is the recipe I used for cookies and this the one I used for frosting. The frosting gets hard quickly, which is good for storage, but it we were losing the race to get the frosting on the cookies before it hardened. We had to keep putting it in the microwave. Both the cookies and the frosting taste really good, though. I wanted to make sure of that. I hate flavorless sugar cookies. Also, I learned a trick. If you spread Karo syrup on a cookie, all of the sprinkles will stick. A good way to clean up Riley’s big sprinkles accident.

• Nancy’s Photos (if you have access)