Four Generations Baking

For at least a decade my grandma, mom, sister and her girls have gathered together sometime after Thanksgiving to bake Christmas cookies together.  I don't know how the idea came about but it did and, one way or another, each year the Four Generations carved out a day in their schedule to bake.
The only time the boys and I had the opportunity to participate was in 2005.  Both Eli and Gabe were so little they were a lot less help than harm!
When I decided to go to California for the no-morial, I asked my sister if she thought it would be possible to bake considerably early this year so that the boys and I could join them.  Though it would be a very tight squeeze, we managed to find one afternoon where everyone could come together to bake cookies!  It would be different than their usual baking day.  They were baking a few weeks earlier than usual with half the time available to bake and the baking took place at my sister's instead of my mom's.  Since time was shorter and so much was going on with family coming into town for the no-morial, we only baked half the cookies that they usually do and we ended up eating about half of  them we made at the no-morial.
The boys and I had a great time and we were so thankful to have had this baking day.  Gabe actually appreciates baking while I think Eli just likes the mess.  At one point I was sure my Grandma was going to pull her hair out while supervising Eli with a recipe.  He was such a disaster, and I think she was completely baffled by his unsanctioned measuring techniques. Clearly, I need to train him up a little better before next time!  
It wasn't Four Generations baking day as usual, but we were all there I and truly appreciate the ladies' flexibility to include us.  
So here is a photo of the kids in my mom's kitchen in Dec 2005 and in my sister's last weekend.  They did their best to recreate the original.

After we were done with all the official baked goods for the night, we embarked on a new challenge.  Something the baking day hadn't seen before.... I had a wild idea at about 7pm for Cookie Wars!  We made chocolate chip cookie dough, minus the choco chips and then everyone created their own masterpiece with items found in the kitchen.  We had a huge variety of "mixins".  Gabe had a mint and peanut butter situation going on, Grandma used coconut and Mr. Goodbar, and mom made a very moist carrot cake cookie.  My favorite was Makenna's caramel apple pie concoction.  It needed some help in the overall design (melting caramel chunks inside the cookie instead of on top, and cookie form) but the taste was really good!  I was also quite pleased with my creation.  I called them Morning Glories and they had dark chocolate granola bars and chocolate covered blueberries inside.  It was very breakfasty and I actually liked them. My brother in law liked them too, he came back for seconds!  The winner was Kaia's skittle cookie.  It was very sweet but the judges have a refined pallet and the skittles were winners.
My sister's kitchen was destroyed after all this baking but our hearts were full after spending such a great time together.  
Next year?

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