We have snow. It started around one with small flakes. Right now the flakes are huge and sporadic. I keep watching. They mesmerize me. We probably have a couple of inches, but some spots have less. I can see my walkway. Let it snow, let it snow!

I am a busy elf. I have started my Christmas goodie making. Yesterday I finished my toffee. While I was finishing the candy, my dogs sat below the counter drooling. I gave them a piece without the chocolate thus perpetuating their drooling.

When I was a kid, by this week, most of the Christmas preparations were finished. All that was left was the baking. My mother set whole afternoons away for the cookies. One of them was spritz cookies. My mother operated the press. You pushed the dough in the press down to the medal plate at the bottom. Each plate had a different design like a wreath or a tree. We never decorated them except my mother would add food coloring to the dough so the trees were green and other cookies were red. I have family stories about spritz cookies. My father only ate the non-colored cookies. He said the food coloring changed the flavor. We just smiled and nodded. One year I gave my mother an electric spritz maker. It went rogue. Dough flew all over. She never used it again. When my sister and her family from Colorado came for Christmas, she had made all sorts of cookies. I too had made cookies. We both made spritz cookies. They were part of our family Christmas lore. I have my mother’s press. I make the cookies every now and then. I color the dough.

Sugar cookies have always been my favorite. My mother had tin cookie cutters with a sort of handle on the top. Now they call them vintage. She had Santa with a pack on his back, a tree, an angel with wings, a reindeer and my favorite, a camel. She’d do the mixing and the rolling, and we’d do the pressing and the decorating. The kitchen smelled so wonderful while the cookies were baking. She’d pull the cookies sheet out of the oven and put them on the counter. We always begged for one. She’d give us one still warm from the oven. It never disappointed. We’d decorate after the cookies had cooled. That was the most fun.

Today I have some more Christmas to make. I won’t tell what as some of friends need to be surprised. Christmas is filled with surprises.

The morning is cloudy, and it will stay cloudy all day. The temperature is tolerable at 35°. It is winter after all. The air is perfectly calm, nothing moves, not even the dead oak leaves hanging off the ends of the branches. I made my toffee, almost. I just have to cover it in chocolate and nuts. I even made two batches. It is destined to be a Christmas gift though I might save a few pieces for myself.

We used to watch Santa Claus on TV. The program came from a New Hampshire station. Santa sat at a table and talked to us. He read stories and letters to Santa. Sometimes an elf joined him in the workshop. The elf looked liked a gnome. Santa was surrounded by shelves filled with toys. On Christmas Eve he’d say good-bye before his big trip.

We always took a light ride. We had favorite places. The block in Saugus was one of them. Every house was covered in lights. Every house was awesome. We went slowly in a line of cars and went up and down the streets. That is one tradition which has held over the years. I still take a light ride, and my sister does too.

We always wished for a white Christmas mostly because snow is always the backdrop for Santa and his sleigh. Over the year my sled was kept upright in the cellar. The runners would get a bit of rust but not the permanent sort. I remember leaving a reddish trail as I dragged the sled over the snow. It didn’t drag easily until the rust was gone.

I had the good fortune to live on a great hill. My house was on the corner almost to the top of the hill. I’d pull my sled to the top, plunk it down then run and jump on. I was always on my stomach with my feet in the air and my hands on the front steering bar. Only little kids sat upright. Sometimes we’d go so fast we couldn’t stop at the end of the hill so we’d hope for no cars as we crossed the street below the hill and ended up in the field. It was always a slog pulling the sled back up the hill.

I loved cocoa in the winter. My mother made it with milk and Nestle’s cocoa which came in a cardboard container with silver on the top where the opening was. Sometimes the container was a bank with a slit at the top for the money. My mother always put Marshmallow Fluff on the top of the cocoa. It would melt and spread across the top. I remember a marshmallow mustache.

My dance card is so full it’s groaning. Today is my fourth concert in a row. Next week I have five plus practice and my lesson. A four string instrument had taken over my life, but we’re singing Christmas carols which make the concerts fun for us. We all wear green or red and fascinators on our heads. We have music makers and bells. We are an enthusiastic bunch.