Grandma's Christmas Butter cookies

My Mom has a recipe for my grandmother's butter cookies.  My Mom made them (with us) every year for Christmas.  They are kind of a lot of work and very unhealthy so we have not always made them.  They are also FULL FAT (butter and crisco) and full gluten (hello 9 cups of flour!).  And you know we don't usually eat like that.  So some years we make them and some years we don't.  This year, we did.

Kate and Elizabeth cutting the maraschino cherries.

The dough gets mixed by hand and typically my Dad or Step-dad or Dave or Will has done this because it takes a bit of strength.  Kate really wanted to do it this year. So, she tried and she did it really well.  Girl is STRONG and determined.












Kate and Dave were trying to put flour on each others' noses....






Hands were washed many times.  No worries.  I am kind of a germaphobe.



Harry is the BOSS of the cookie press.  We used my grandma's original old press.  It is finicky but we have figured it out over the years.  Harry has the magic touch.



I have to say that Elizabeth picked it up quite well too.





She definitely brought her A game.




These are the little moments I treasure in life.  Right here.



First batch going in...















It appears as though I never got any photos of the finished cookies.  They were quite delicious.
I cannot believe I did 2 blog posts in one day.  And I have another one ready to post tomorrow!