When Reeah Parker's son joined the Marines in 2004 -- meaning he'd eventually be sent to Iraq -- she turned to her sister and asked, "How will I survive this?"
"You'll bake your way through it," Claire Goebeler of Bowie told her.
It's a piece of advice many families with relatives in the military follow, especially now as the holidays approach. As Parker puts it, "It's not just cookies you're sending -- it's the taste, the smells, the memories of home."
For most troops stationed abroad, a care package takes two to three weeks to arrive -- which means it's time to get serious about baking, packing and sending.
At the Parker household in Germantown, it's called Cookie Day, and on a recent Saturday, Parker and her four sisters divvied up the work with military-like precision.
Someone kept the coffeepot going. There was food to nibble on. Ebby, the black cat, wove in and out between everyone's legs. And every 10 minutes or so, the oven door opened and another sheet of cookies was taken out and a fresh one put in.
The sisters' to-do list was long: soft molasses spice cookies, the ever-popular chocolate chip, tangy coconut-lime cutouts, peanut butter-fudge sandwich cookies, sturdy almond sables, and oatmeal-Rice Krispie cookies.
One sister, Kathryn Newman of Laurel, and her 12-year-old daughter Annie rolled balls of molasses spice dough in sugar. Another sister, Jeanne Parker of Urbana, carefully portioned out chocolate chip cookie dough. Goebeler kept an eye on the almond sables baking on parchment-lined cookie sheets. Meanwhile, Marie Sherrett of Upper Marlboro packed up the peanut butter sandwich cookies.
"Chocolate isn't good for sending when it's hot, but now that it's winter, it's okay," she said.
The sisters made dozens of cookies for Parker's only child, Lance Cpl. Sebastian Parker-Vaughan, 22, who was visiting from Camp Lejeune, N.C., and is scheduled to be deployed to Iraq in July. Until recently, cookies were also sent to Sherrett's son, Daniel, who last month completed his four-year tour with the Navy.
Watching his aunts and mother as they baked, Sherrett, 22, said getting homemade cookies was a huge treat.
"Guys would get a box from Amazon, and it's like no big deal. But people really start swarming around you when they see a box with a handwritten label and it's obviously food from home."
