It’s that time of year and it wouldn’t be Christmas without some Spritz cookies at our house. It’s been a busy holiday season with all of our usual activities combined with all of the festivities that happen this time of year. Our little elf Markus has been doing his job around the house, keeping a close eye on the kids and making sure that they’re being as nice as can be. The kids are loving their Lego advent calendars and tend to spend as much time as they can in the room with the tree.

Last year my husband received this amazing gift from my mother and step dad…it’s a Major Award and he was oh, so excited. It stands front and center in our big front window and every time I’m outside I get lots of compliments on our awesome leg lamp.  It’s pretty classy.

The kids had their holiday program on their last day of school for the year and both Jarrod and I were in attendance. These events always get me teary…seeing all the little kids so festive and happy about the season and so excited to perform for their parents and loved ones. Every year the 6th graders perform a very special and fun song. My kids have been looking forward to being 6th graders forever and finally my oldest got his chance to do this very fun song. Next year, both the 5th and 6th graders will be moving on from elementary school, so this was a very special year. My daughter was a bit disappointed that she didn’t get her turn, but she did amazing with her 5th grade performance. And my youngest had lots of fun with his selection of songs for his grade.

The next day we ran some errands and then started our baking. The kids were beyond excited to get going on making some cookies and we started off with some Spritz cookies using the recipe written out by my mom when I was a kid (maybe even before I was born) and the same cookie press that we used when I was little. We doubled the recipe which put my Kitchen Aid to the test, and the kids had great fun sifting all of the flour into a super tall mountain in the bowl.