Christmas cookies!

This is the result of our very first Christmas cookie bake. I've made my fair share of chocolate chip cookies (from scratch, thank you very much!), but I've never attempted sugar cookies...and I've never, ever decorated cookies. Thanks to recommendations of Martha Stewart's sugar cookie recipe, and to googling a simple icing recipe from allrecipes.com, we were set.

10:30 A.M. Jamie gladly wore an apron and helped me push a chair to the counter, so he could properly help out. The kitchenaid mixer provided some entertainment.

This is his "cheese" face. Funnily enough, he claimed that we were making cheese. I suppose it looked like a big bowl of cream cheese in the mixer. Jamie helped with the measuring spoons and cups. Not too much flour ended up the floor. This was a big success. We made the dough and according to the directions, I put it in the fridge for an hour.

We took a break for a Cookie Monster dvd (appropriate, huh?) and before we knew it...

11:30/12:00 P.M. We rolled out the dough, cut circles with our cups, and waited patiently for our cookies to bake. As soon as the first tray was set out to cool on the table, Jamie wasted no time. He hurried to scoot down from his chair, claiming that he was done and was going to eat cookies. I reminded him that we still had work to do, and did my best to keep him from eating up all of our hard work, especially before they had a chance to be iced.

After the cookies were baked, we took a break for lunch and Jamie went down for his nap. In the meantime, I made the icing. This involved food coloring, so it was probably best that I took care of this part by myself. The icing wasn't difficult, thanks to my mixer. Whenever I try out different recipes, I'm always very thankful to have the mixer do the work for me. Very thankful.

5:00 P.M. It ended up taking awhile to get to decorating, as we had to leave for my 30 week prenatal checkup. Once we got home, I washed Jamie up, put another apron on him and let him loose with the cookies. I made his own personal cup of sprinkles, which mostly ended up in his mouth, on the way to the cookies.

All in all, our project turned out quite well. We were pleased with the end result, and we "cheers-ed" with cookies. As soon as Scott walked in the door, Jamie was excited to show him our cookies.

I think we'll have to do this every year. Or possibly again in a week, when we eat up our cookie stash.