The smell and taste of Christmas

My friends often do very, very kind things for me.  I am always so grateful for how much they do for me out of the kindness of their hearts.  Today was one of those days, but so much more than a simple kindness.  It was over the top and truly filled my love cup.

I have been pretty sad that my husband will go to work and my son will attend school on Christmas day.  Even though I know in my head that it isn't a national holiday here and I shouldn't expect it to be, my heart hasn't come to the same acceptance.  When we lived in the US, we didn't have a huge American Christmas (with a tree and a room full of presents).  But for some reason, it is really hard for me to accept that the three of us won't spend the day together, as we have always done.  My husband had to work last year, but at least my son and I were together all day.

When my friend asked me last week if my son and I wanted to come over to decorate gingerbread cookies, I jumped at the chance.  After further discussions, I learned that she had never made gingerbread before.  She just thought it would be a fun activity for our boys.  I provided her with a recipe, flour, and cinnamon.  She secured the remaining ingredients online (I have never seen molasses in Japan and spices, like cloves, can be hard to find). 

My son and I headed over to her apartment after lunch.  She was ready to get baking since she had premade the dough.  As soon as we removed the plastic wrap, my nose inhaled the delicious smell of Christmas.  I had a tear in my eye as breathed deeply.  It brought back so many memories of baking when I was a kid.  Smells often evoke memories much more powerfully than other senses and this one was intense. 

I shared my trick of putting cooking chopstick on either side of the dough to have a consistent thickness when rolling it out.  The boys stopped playing for a few moments to come and cut out cookies.  They were eager to cut out more and more.  They even took turns rolling out the dough.

We popped the cookies into the oven and the boys went back to playing with toys and using their imagination to become superheroes.  My son was pretending to be Captain America, which cracked me up on several levels.

Once the cookies were baked and cooled, the boys got to work.  They were very serious in their decorating, adding warm red or white chocolate and lots of sprinkles to their masterpieces. 

Soon they discovered they preferred eating the sprinkles and we had to remind them over and over to stop eating them.  So, they simply decided to cover the cookies with as many sprinkles as they could and devour the cookies. 

The cookies were crispy and spicy.  Their warmth delighted all of us.  The flavor of molasses, ginger, cinnamon, and cloves is not popular in Japan, but my friend loved it.  I was amazed by how much the boys loved the cookies.

I felt so grateful to have a someone put in so much effort for our boys to have a fun afternoon.  But the gratitude was amplified by the intense happy memories recalled and created.  She sent home a stack of cookies with us that I will keep in the freezer, so my family can savor the day's creations over the next couple weeks.