Cookies for my Christmas spirit to share...

Well, it's December 1st, and for every year since we decided to give artificial trees a try just so we could decorate earlier... this is the 1st December 1st that we won't be decorating. It's not that we won't be decorating at all, just not quite yet. I've been really torn over how to celebrate differently this year and coming to terms with all the changes in my own physical challenges as well as dealing with major family changes has made me think about things, really think about things. I decided that scaling back our usual decorating style, which takes days to accomplish, might just help us find our way back to the gentle I've been missing. But today I found myself missing more than just the gentle... I also had little pangs inside of me, asking myself whyyy I wasn't busy doing what I can do on my own to start decorating until Enz is home to help. But, I'm still holding out with my new plan and instead decided on baking Christmas cookies to help my spirit begin to feel the Christmassy beautiful instead of fretting over the lack of looks because once again I revert back to my beloved Dodger and his very wise words of, "Looks aren't everything..."

"Looks aren't everything..." also applies to my cookies. I love making cut-out cookies!! And I still use the same old butterscotch cookie recipe that my mom always made with us a wee ones; it never fails in bake-shape or disappoints in taste. I don't go to extremes in decorating but I do try to give each cookie the little extra pizazz-in-simplicity it deserves.

Making these cookies really helped me to realize that even just the little things can burst my spirit into full-on joy! I maybe could have made a few more cookies... if not for the fact that I love the raw cookie dough SO much but I still managed to get enough baked so all is well! I won't be doing as much baking as I normally like to do this year but at least I got the most-important-to-my-heart ones made and ready to share with my family and friends.

The burro, the camel... they've always been nestled tightly in my heart.
I messed up a star so I fixed it by filling in with icing and adding sparkles; that's
the great thing about a low-key celebration, it's not necessarily in the
'perfect' but just simply in the 'being'. 

Trees and ornaments... so, technically, I guess I did start decorating today! ;)

My mom LOVES the giving spirit of Santa to be mixed in with the true
teachings we believe and celebrate so I always make Santa Cookies just for
her... but I dressed my Santas in hats of blue this year (because I still kind of feel
just slightly blue). My mama will still thoroughly love them, I know!

What are the little Holiday traditions that bring you full-on joy??