Sunday, February 3, 2013

Happy Groundhog Day!

Molasses cookies with raisin eyes:  groundhogs for Groundhog Day
Happy little baker at Grandma's: Liliana makes groundhogs and gingerbread men.
Liliana holds one of Great-Grammie's dolls while visiting.



   
     To celebrate Groundhog Day, we of course made the happily obligatory fat little molasses cookies shaped like groundhogs with their little raisin eyes, plus created a funny little groundhog "costume" out of construction paper--an ode to all the sillies up at Gobbler's Nob who are wearing actual groundhog costumes as they survive the cold of sunrise while awaiting Punxy Phil's verdict of coming Spring.  Brian and I made the sunrise trek to watch the proceeding a few Groundhog Days ago and we had such fun and Brian took a ton of pictures of all the homemade groundhog costumes.  I remember that everywhere we went that day, people handed out groundhog cookies (the restaurants, the stores, etc).  I also remember Groundhog Day 1995 when my Mom sent me a care package to me at college filled with groundhog cookies and that when I passed them out to others on my dorm floor, I got some aghast looks until I realized that my friends weren't familiar with the groundhog cookie tradition and that when I was describing them as "Groundhog Cookies," they thought they were made out of groundhogs.  Ah, my, now I am always careful to call them molasses cookies or ginger cookies.  No need to have people think I'd eat a groundhog.  Rabbit, yes.  Pheasant, yes.  Groundhog: No, no, no.
Happy Groundhog Day!