By Maureen Wright

As the Advent season rushes by with only six days until Christmas, I am thankful for the Presbytery of West Virginia. When I talk to colleagues about my work here, I always highlight that in the Presbytery of West Virginia people and relationships matter. I am thankful for the opportunity to serve as your Transitional General Presbyter and Stated Clerk. I am thankful to work with a wonderful staff. Chris Alfred, Leslie Bremar, Susan Sharp Campbell, Mark Miller, Amy Robinson, and Kathy Weed join me in wishing you a Merry Christmas! We do so by sharing a Christmas cookie or goodie memory. I invite you to share your own cookie memory in the comment section below.

Chris Alfred – Growing up, every year in December, my little sister and I would go across the street to our neighbor’s house. While there, we’d bake Christmas cookies, rolling out the dough and decorating them with sprinkles and icing. The kitchen would be full of laughter as we tried to make the perfect sugar cookies. After the baking, we’d sit around the table to play our annual board game, Journey to the North Pole. We’d race to be the first to reach Santa, all while munching on the cookies we’d just made. Those simple traditions filled the season with so much joy, and I still look back on them with fondness every Christmas.

Leslie Bremar – My grandmother has always made almond spritz cookies each year. It was one of the cookies that I looked forward to as the Christmas season came. I always got a special tin with them inside because she knew how much I loved them! As the years have passed and I have become an adult, I have taken over in making the almond cookies for the family. In my learning and perfecting of the process, I have a new appreciation for her in making my special tin of cookies! I now know how much work goes into the making of them. I know how much love she baked into those cookies!

Susan Sharp Campbell – One year when I was in elementary school, I received a box of gingerbread boys from some cousins. I remember them being one of the best gifts I ever received. Ever since that time, gingerbread boys have been one of my favorite things about Christmas. Now, for Christmas gifts for my cousins and others, I make small gingerbread boys, like those in the box, using a recipe from one of the first cookbooks I ever owned.  Over the years, I’ve lost or destroyed several cookie cutters – they don’t do well in the garbage disposal –  and I have always found a replacement. Many years, after baking eight large trays of them, I wonder why I keep making them. But I continue the tradition, thankful for those first ones given to me in love and hoping that mine reflect the love I have for family and friends.

Mark Miller – My perception of the general populace’s fondness for fruitcake = thumbs down. I believe most people have had bad fruitcake experiences, but I’ve never had to suffer that particular holiday fate. My mother used to make a great fruitcake with candied fruit, dates, walnuts, and other stuff…. and then she’d dump a bottle of something on it, wrap it up, stick it in a large tin, and set it on a dark shelf in our basement. This happened around Thanksgiving I think, and then (if I remember right) it made its first appearance the week of Christmas. I loved that stuff! And there was always plenty left over because peoples’ general tendency is to avoid fruitcake. More for me!

My mom passed away during my freshman year of college. It was several years later when I met and married Cheryl, and then told my mother-in-law this story. Ever since, she has made fruitcake for me during the holidays. The UPS guy just delivered this year’s version a couple days ago – in all its brandy-soaked glory. It needs to dry out a bit, but it’ll soon be in prime condition. I’ll be eating on it throughout 2025 without a worry or care about anyone trying to get after it other than me. That’s because (of course) it’s fruitcake.

Amy Robinson – The first year I joined Mom to bake cookies as an adult, we got way too excited. We had our three favorite cookies, which yield at least a double batch, plus one or two others we liked, then Mom had found a lot of new ones to try on the internet. We ended up making 10 or 12 different kinds. I hadn’t prepared for that and was still at their house at 11 o’clock at night decorating and packing cookies. It was a fun but very long day. We still spend a Saturday in early December together baking cookies, but now we only do two or three other kinds besides our favorites.

Maureen Wright – While my grandmother has been dead for over 40 years, my strongest Christmas cookie memory is of her making springerle cookies every year. Springerles are a traditional German cookie flavored with anise. Baking springerle cookies takes a commitment; the eggs are whipped until foamy, then the sugar and anise oil are added and beaten for a full 10 minutes. The beating continues for 15 more minutes once the flour, salt, and leavening are added. After an hour (or overnight), the dough is rolled out, and they are formed using a press – a board or a rolling pin. Once cut out, the cookies must rise for 24 hours. Then the cookies are baked. The last Christmas that she was alive, my sisters and I gathered at my grandmother’s to help make the springerles. When we commented that her mixer was smoking as we beat the ingredients together, she calmly told us that it happened every year! It was our joy to be with her as she passed on the springerle tradition. To this day, springerle cookies mean love and Christmas to me.