My Cookies Story – 2023

As I already mentioned multiple times, this holiday season was challenging, and I knew what was coming in advance. First, when it was just the conference, I planned to bake cookies on the first December weekend, and I asked Lena to mark her calendar. But then Anna’s surgery was scheduled for November 28, and that weekend was not an option anymore.

Christmas cookies are very important to me. It’s not like “just because I promised” or because somebody forced me; it’s just that I really enjoy both baking and gifting; that’s why I wanted to find a way to make the cookies happen. I decided to take December 8 off, and Lena agreed to do the same.

I purchased all ingredients well in advance. I worked on my Christmas messages to friends. One of my European friends agreed to mail my cards to my friends in Russia from her country, so I prepared ten cards, printed the addresses, and attached them to the envelopes.

We baked and decorated, and after Lena left, I started packing the cookies. Usually, I have somebody to help me, but it was not the case this time. Besides, I had to pack more parcels than usual because I needed to mail all my international packages before I left for the conference, and I also needed to pack six packages that were coming to Prague with me.

I think it took more than two hours. Then, I started to prepare the mailing labels. Well, just in time for the season, the USPS decided to introduce a new version of that software, and what would have taken me an hour last year took me about five! I didn’t realize that many of the new fields were optional, and I spent a lot of time trying to answer them. Also, the error reporting was not like it used to be, so I spent more time correcting my mistakes. In addition, cookies turned out to be “restrictive goods” for Germany and Ireland, and it took me a while to realize that it was not my mistake; it was just the way it was. With all of these complications, I went to bed at 1 AM to wake up at 4-30 AM, and I still had to finish.

The last thing with labels was that it turned out that I could not create the labels for my parcels to Ukraine, and I was unsure whether they would take any parcel to Ukraine if I came to the post office in person. And I had no time to check.

I scheduled a pickup for Monday, and I left my parcels by the mailboxes, as I always do with the pickups. There was a thing going on for a couple of weeks before that there were stolen parcels (it looks like somebody got a hold of the key to the gate), so the people in our building were making sure that all the parcels that arrived were brought inside. Because of that, I emailed all the neighbors the day before that I would leave parcels for pickup and that they should not be taken in.

I left Sunday afternoon, and my neighbor saw the parcels that night (about 10 PM). Then, by 8 AM the next morning, half of the parcels were stolen! Also, the USPS pickup never arrived for the remaining parcels. I learned about that when I was already in Prague, and I tried my best not to grieve because I had to do all the conference-related things. My first thought was that my Christmas was ruined, but then I decided I wouldn’t let anybody do that!

Before I left, I asked Igor to take my Ukrainian parcel to the USPS office and see whether it would be possible to mail it in person. When I learned about the stolen packages and missed pickup, I asked him to take the remaining packages and bring them to the post office. It took me several days to figure out which packages were stolen, and then I could inform the recipients and request a refund from USPS. Money was not an issue; the time was. All the time spent wrapping the cookies, fighting with the new shipping system, printing the labels, and making sure the parcels get out on time – all was for nothing. And since I was already in Prague, I could not mail replacements until a week later.

I came back on December 16 and baked some more cookies the same night. I tried to bake some gluten-free cookies, but for some reason, the recipe I used for several years didn’t work, and the dough had a completely wrong consistency. I tried one more recipe but with no luck. I baked something anyway, but nothing close to what I had last year! Then, my friend (with her family :)) came and helped me to decorate on Sunday morning, and then I baked some more. There were still plenty of undecorated cookies, and I tried really hard to be creative. The moment I thought I was done, I realized that there was a whole tin of undecorated cookies left from the previous week!

I packed a gigantic box to take to the office on Monday. Then, I reprinted all the cards that were lost (so glad that I saved everything on my computer!), packaged everything most of the parcels and started to contemplate how to get twenty packages to the post office (I didn’t want to experiment with pickup anymore). I started to get excited seeing the packages lining up on the table, and feeling more like Christmas!

Since the post office is open till 6 PM, I decided to leave work a little bit earlier on Monday, come back home and take Uber to the post office. I was in a rush get a ride, typed “Rogers Park post office” and clicked on the first address without putting my reading glasses on – after all, it was a post office, and the name of the street started with ‘D’. The driver arrived almost instantaneously, I ran down with two gigantic bags, loaded them into Uber’s trunk and hopped into a car. After a while I realized that the ride was taking longer than it should have, and I asked the driver where in the world he was taking me and what did I put into my destination address. He replied: Evanstone post office! Woops …It was too late to change the route, and I already added the ride back. So I checked that that this post office was also opened, and declared that if that was the last misfortune of my cookies saga, I would take it!

… There were still some local packages to be mailed, and I packed them when I finally returned back home. I asked Igor to help me with these ones , and he came and picked the remaining several, and dropped them off the next day. Looks like nothing is lost so far, and most of the packages arrived on time!

So, it’s almost a happy end, if they all will arrive on time at the end!!! Stay tuned!