"Gingerbread" Cookie Tree

This year I was quite busy with work, too busy in fact to make the traditional gingerbread houses and sleighs with my sisters. That made me sad... and my sisters really wanted to decorate some cookies this holiday. My mom doesn't really enjoy the baking scene, and didn't have time herself to sit down and bake with my sisters... so I managed to scrounge up some time to make a simple molassess cookie recipe. This recipe is not a gingerbread cookie recipe, but it does have that wonderful gingerbread-molasses taste that I love. The dough is much softer and easier to work with than gingerbread and you end up with a more fluffy, less dense cookie.

My sisters and I decorated some of the "gingerbread" men and snowflakes, and then I remembered that I had seen a very cute way of arranging the cookies on Kuiadore. The cookie tree looked so elegant that I just had to make them this Christmas. Albeit they don't look as fancy as the one on that other blog, but it was my first time and I only had 3 different-sized star-shaped cookie cutters... I seriously had to improvise. I think they turned out quite nicely for my first attempt. Maybe I'll make them again next year... if time permits :P