I know many don’t do their Christmas cookies until after Thanksgiving, and then some like me will do them earlier. I’m making my cookies now because then I can take them to our family gatherings and share now, rather than just have them all here to eat by the three of us.

I am making a rolled sugar cookie with cream cheese, and naturally we’ll use a cream cheese frosting with it. (Yes this we all like cream cheese in this family.) The ones I made last year seemed to have gone over well with the extended family, but I couldn’t remember which recipe I used. Therefore it could be a new recipe this year, but most of them seemed very similar so it should be close if not exactly the same this year.

While I was searching on www.food.com for the recipe, I came across a recipe for a cream cheese cookie that’s completely sugar free. It’s what I would call a pinwheel style cookie and uses preserves. Since my dad is watching his sugar intake, I thought I would give these a try as well. For the preserves I choose Smucker’s Simply Fruit in Seedless Strawberry which does not have any sugar either. So these could easily be one of the healthier desert choices available on Thursday.

You might want to ask me how these cookies taste, but the truth is I don’t know yet. Cookies with cream cheese in them need to be chilled before they can be rolled out, so we’ll actually be baking them tomorrow, Though I have tried each of the doughs (naturally) and they both tasted good to me.

from Laura Lambert – Google+ Post

Yes, it’s Thanksgiving already, and we have been able to spend it with family. Yesterday, we drove back to Trempealeau so that we could be with family. This morning Shane made homemade Parmesan herb rolls which we baked at my dad’s for Thanksgiving.

At dad’s we had our traditional huge family Thanksgiving dinner. It was wonderful to see family which we haven’t seen in months. I had a great time and it was wonderful to see my cousins, aunts, and uncle. My cousin Jean Ann has undertaken the planning and organization of our traditional huge dinner since my mother died. And this is greatly appreciated by me. As strange as it sounds I think her taking over the planning as made things easier and less likely to have family squabbles over it.

Personally I also enjoy the fact that she has added meatballs to the menu. I know that I certainly appreciate the fact that I don’t have to either eat a bit of turkey (which I absolutely hate) or do without meat for the meal.

We stayed at dad’s until almost 7 pm at which time we went to Shane’s mom’s. His family had decided that they weren’t getting together en masse. When we arrived at Karen’s we found her on floor. She had fallen and wasn’t able to get up on her own. She had taken a nap there for almost two hours when we arrived. Both Shane and myself were needed to help her back on her feet. While she has Life Alert, she wasn’t wearing it when she fell. Hopefully she’ll remember to wear it more in the future.