Christmas Cookies. Yum. Yum. Yum.

A week ago, we could hardly wait for Christmas to arrive. Now, we can hardly believe the holiday has come and gone. We had such a great time visiting with family and friends, and even got to see a little snow! It was, indeed, a very merry Christmas.

Jacob and Annabelle were so excited about Christmas...especially Jacob. He looked at the calendar often and every morning he announced how many more days there were until Jesus' birthday. "Just THREE more days 'til Christmas!!!!" he would say, with a grin from ear to ear. He couldn't wait to see if Santa was actually going to bring him the space shuttle he wanted.

I thought it might be fun to do a little holiday baking this year, so a few days before Christmas, I headed into the kitchen with my two eager helpers. Donned in their new Christmas aprons from Papa and Nana, they each ran to get a chair to stand on so that they would be able to see and reach the top of the counter. We made pretzel-Rolo treats and chocolate peanut butter cookies -- both very easy recipes. Annabelle's job was to lay out the pretzels on the cookie sheet. She did very well, but added one extra step -- taking a bite of each pretzel first. I had to replace many of her pretzels with new ones since I didn't think anyone would really want to eat half-eaten pretzel-Rolo treats. Jacob unwrapped the Rolos and stuck one on each pretzel. Then, later, he placed the pecans on top.

We all unwrapped Hershey's kisses for the peanut butter cookies. Again, Annabelle could not help herself. At one point, she had both cheeks full of chocolate. I also caught her licking a few before putting them down on the plate. No, I didn't use any of the licked ones for the cookies...at least...I don't think I did. :)

Our baking days were a success. Jacob and Annabelle made a plate for Santa on Christmas eve. The next morning, Santa had left a note saying their cookies were the best he had ever tasted...even better than the ones Mrs. Claus makes. ;)