The story behind the cookies...

First batch - 1:30 PM. My sister is to blame. She gave me the wrong instructions, I know she did. Three times now, I have tried to use the recipe she gave me for the traditional shortbread cookies our family used to make every year around the holidays and each time, they've been dry and I've had to had another half cup of milk to get them to hold together. Even then, they only turn out if they are filled with fruit and stacked on top of each other. This time, same thing. It was a bust. They were grainy. Youngest daughter said, "they taste like crackers." Blah.

Second batch - I left my oldest daughter in charge of making the dough, she didn't read the recipe all the way and mixed all the ingredients in together at the same time. You're supposed to start with the wet stuff, then add the dry stuff. They were much much too dry... so I added a little shortening. Then a little more. Then the dough held together... but they tasted, overwhelmingly, like shortening. I threw the whole thing out.

Third batch - Now I was determined to make Valentine's Day cookies, so Michael researched recipes online and printed one up for us. This time, I let my youngest daughter make the dough. I knew I was in for a treat when I heard her say uh-oh. I looked. The dough was just as dry as the last batch. I threw up my hands asking, "what on earth are we doing wrong here?" I read off the ingredients, one by one. When I got to the butter, I asked if she put in a whole cup. She replied yes, she put in a whole stick. One stick? ONE STICK? That's only half a cup! So that's what was wrong with the prior batch as well. It was then that I realized we didn't have any cream of tartar. How could I have missed that when I reviewed the ingredients? I looked for possible substitutes online and found nothing so we made a quick run to the grocery store. Came back, mixed it in, along with the other stick of butter, and refrigerated the dough for 2 hours per the directions. Pulled it out, and it was so crumbly, I couldn't get it to hold together. Now I was infuriated. I wanted some goddamned cookies hours ago!

Turns out, the dough just needed to be warmed and kneaded in our hands and then it rolled out OK. It yielded about 3 dozen so I spent another 45 minutes kneading, rolling, cutting, baking, repeating.

Then the fun part — decorating! We made 2 batches of the best glazed icing ever and colored it pink, red, white and black. Decorating took up another hour and a half because I'm crazy meticulous and at this point, clearly OBSESSED with making the best damn cookies this family has ever had. It was 9:30 PM when I finally ran out of frosting, with about a dozen cookies left over.

Oh, they'll eat these cookies, damn it. They'll eat them, AND THEY WILL LIKE THEM!

(But aren't they so ca-yuuute?)