Cape Cod Cranberry Bars with a side of tears

It's kinda funny what things make you emotional when you're grieving. It's not the things you would expect. Handwriting is an odd one to me. It catches me off guard to find something with my mom's handwriting and have a reaction especially because it is not normally something sweet and sentimental. I have a lot of her hand me down books so I often find a random half quote on a 3x5 card, a to-do list or even a grocery list. The first card I found after her funeral was actually had a px list for pens and cat litter but it still made me cry.

But as much as I miss seeing her handwriting, I really didn't want to keep that for my scrapbook so it's very special to me to find something handwritten that has something more substantial behind it.  This recipe is one of those few things.

It's also special because I thought I lost this recipe. She made these every year. She served them to Craig the night he drove me home to Kansas (the night he first met my parents) and I remember sitting there eating them thinking that I was home, finals were over and this, these cranberry bars, being home again, with my family, this was the beginning of Christmas.

I wanted to make it last year and couldn't find it, even when I went to my dad's and searched through all my mom's recipe cards and cookbooks. And google didn't help either. So when I found this card a few months ago, I was so relieved. And then I laughed because she even wrote down the almond extract and then scratched it out because she doesn't like almond extract - and neither do I. But they are quite tasty without it or if you are a weirdo who likes almond extract you could probably add it. Either way, try them for yourselves.

1.5 cups sugar
2 eggs
3/4 cups unsalted butter, melted then cooled
1 teaspoon almond extract
1.5 cups flour (I'm sure the original recipe meant all purpose but I've used soft white wheat too)
2 cups fresh cranberries
1/2 cup chopped walnuts (optional - but Craig doesn't like nuts and he will still eat these with them)

I'd show you a picture but I've already made two batches of these in the past month and can't seem to get a picture before the pan is attacked. Sorry :-)