Cookies, Christmas & Betty Crocker: Remembering My Mom

Today is the fifth anniversary of the day my mom died. Those years have passed in a flash and there are times when the loss still feels raw and fresh. At Christmas time, especially, I feel my mother's absence. There are certain things that bring her memory especially close and create that poignant feeling of bittersweet. Cooking from her Betty Crocker's Picture Cookbook is one of those things.

The cookbook, which doesn't have a copyright date but was published sometime in the 1940s, is just about in shreds. It is a loose leaf notebook, with many additional recipes that my mom pasted in here and there. When I open it to the Russian Teacake recipe on page 206 I see her penciled note that these cookies are "Aunt Sue's favorite." I remember making these at Christmas time for Aunt Sue—a dear family friend—when I was a child. After my mother died, I started to make them again, carefully packing them in a holiday tin and shipping them off to Aunt Sue's condominium in Florida. This renewed tradition has become one of my favorite parts of Christmas.

I made a batch last night, using my mom's little glass nut chopper to chop the walnuts. I mixed the dough in the lovely Hall Royal Rose bowl that she grabbed for me at a church rummage sale many years ago. (My mother told me that when she spied the set of three matching bowls, she reached in front of the crowd to claim them saying "These are for my daughter.")

I never look at these things—the bowls, the nut chopper, the dear frail Betty Crocker cookbook—without thinking of my mom. Using them to make a batch of cookies for one of her dearest friends is a wonderful way to honor her memory—and to reclaim a little piece of Christmas past.

Russian Tea Cakes

1 cup vegan margarine, softened
1/2 cup sifted confectioner's sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 1/4 cups sifted white flour
1/4 tsp salt
3/4 cups finely chopped nuts
More confectioner's sugar for rolling

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Cream together the margarine, confectioner's sugar and vanilla. Stir the salt into the flour and blend into the margarine mixture. (I find that it helps to use a pastry blender.) Mix in the walnuts.

Roll into balls about the size of walnuts and place on an ungreased cookie sheet. (I line it with parchment paper since these tend to burn easily.) Bake 10 to 12 minutes until set but not browned (although they will be a little bit brown on the bottom). While still warm, roll in confectioner's sugar. Cool. Roll in the sugar again.

Pack them up carefully, and mail to someone you love.

Confessions of a Vintage Textile Collector (or How I Came to Own 100 Tablecloths).

I'm not especially materialistic or extravagant. I wouldn't be caught dead wearing designer fashions (unless I find them at Goodwill) or driving a fancy car or eating at trendy restaurants. Whatever acquisitive genes I might have, they seem to be programmed to desire old-fashioned, imperfect, history-steeped things.

It all started when I moved into a cute cottage that was built in 1936. It's not a luxurious house and not even especially convenient (the bathrooms are too small, the sinks scratched and rusty, and the staircase is perilously narrow and steep). But there are wonderful coved ceilings, arches, nooks, crannies and cubbyholes. It's a house that wraps itself around you and lets you know you are home.

Such a house needed a few circa-1930s-40s tablecloths I figured. So I ventured onto ebay and plugged in the keywords "vintage tablecloth." Wow! There were many of them, one prettier than the next. I didn't know where to begin.

So I emailed my delightful friend Deb who knows about all things old, and she, it turned out, had been collecting vintage tablecloths for years. She gave me some pointers and I dug in and started bidding.

It didn't take me long to find my dream tablecloth. Printed with red, pink and teal geraniums, it was adorable and absolutely perfect for my kitchen. As a seasoned collector, I now know that this particular cloth was made by Springmaid and it appeared in the 1947 Sears catalog. I also know that, as sweet as this cloth is, on the tablecloth collecting circuit it is common as dirt. But of course, I didn't realize that at the time. I had to have it.

I bid lavishly and won. And then I waited to receive an invoice or email or some piece of information about what I was supposed to do next. As an ebay newbie, I needed some guidance from my seller. I started to panic as days went by without any word from her.

Just as I was giving up hope, I was stunned and delighted to stumble across the exact same tablecloth, listed by a completely different ebay seller. This should have been my first clue that this was a less-than-rare tablecloth. To me, it was simply a miracle. I bid again and won. The nice seller contacted me, and she told me that she happened to have two of these tablecloths and was sending both to me. In the meantime, seller number one resurfaced and, by the end of the week, I owned three vintage tablecloths—and they were all exactly the same.

It was an auspicious beginning. I started out with a respectable little stack of textiles on a kitchen shelf; now they are everywhere.

And why not? Vintage tablecloths are recycled goods, and they are very affordable pieces of art and history. I love the fabulously creative designs, the gorgeous colors, and the friendly charm of these beautiful textiles. I don't hoard and am not a packrat. My tablecloths are all out and about, stacked on shelves, draped over the backs of chairs or—a novel idea—spread atop tables.

Much of what is in my house is just passing through—spending a little time basking in the glow of my admiration before being sold through my antique booth at the mall or on ebay. A little piece of cozy history, enjoyed, admired, and then passed on.