Cinnamon! I remember cinnamon in the cookies, I wrote cinnamon down on the paper for what I thought was in the cookie. My grandma had just passed away and she took her famous cookie recipe with her to the grave. But every year she won the Greensville cookie contest at the county fair and this year I was gonna win it for her. But the only problem was no one knew the recipe for her cookies and she didn’t even give them a name so I couldn’t assume what was in them. “BUTTER” Jamie yelled from his room down the hall. I wrote that down under cinnamon and then went to find my mom. 

“Mom, do you Remember anything about grandma’s cookie recipe?” I asked. “Not much sweetie I’m sorry but i do know she used baking powder not baking sugar” my mom responded. I shrugged and exclaimed “I didn’t even know there was a difference” my mom just laughed and went back to working on whatever she was doing. 

I remembered that there were peanuts in the cookies and probably peanut butter too. So I put that on the list, folded it up and shoved it In my pocket. I got in my truck and was about to go to the store when Jamie jumped in the passenger seat while I was moving. “Jeez Jamie are you fixin’ to die you can’t just hop into a moving truck” Jamie chuckled and said “no I’m gonna help you make the cookies” I just shook my head and pulled out of the driveway. 

We arrived at the small market style store near our house to find that it was closed. We started the 80 mile drive into town to go to a grocery store. By the time we arrived at the store it was dark and they were gonna close soon. We walked in Jamie grabbed a cart, we grabbed flour, butter, peanuts, and all the other things on my list, but as we were on our way out walking through the produce aisle Jamie ran off and came back with a bag of lemon. He held it up above his head and exclaimed “ this is what it is the weird flavor that we always tasted after we the cookies it's lemon” 

We got home and pulled out the mixing bowls and cookie sheets and turned on the oven. We started mixing together all the ingredients until we thought it was right. We wrote all the measurements down so we could remake it. But when we pulled them out of the oven they were too puffy and too sweet. We tried again and again but they weren’t perfect, always puffy or not puffy enough or too bland . They were always close but never perfect. It was the night before the contest and we were still baking. We had to run into town to get more flour and baking powder, we ran into one of my grandma's friends. “Oh Tommy, I heard you were bakin your grandma's cookies for the contest,” she said. “Yeah we are but we still haven’t gotten it right” i responded, “well your grandma did have the best peanut butter and vanilla cookies i ever tasted” “WAIT! Vanilla, I didn’t know about the vanilla, thank you Trudy” Jamie and I shouted as we ran to the baking aisle. 

We got home and started measuring out ingredients we poured in the vanilla and put them in the oven for 20 minutes. I couldn’t sit still as the timer ticked down, I was staring through the oven window like a five year old watching their grandma bake. The timers finally went off, Jamie took the cookies out and put them on the stove top. We waited as they cooled and finally were able to taste them. As soon as I took a bite I knew they were perfect, we made a few more batches for the contest and then went to bed. The next day we were handing out cookies when my mom asked how we thought of vanilla. “Grandma’s friend Trudy told us about it” I told her “but your grandma didn’t have a friend named Trudy” my mom said “that's kinda weird” I replied. That day my cookies got voted first place and when they handed Jamie and I the ribbon I saw Trudy again standing in the back of the crowd. She kinda looked like the old pictures of grandma. No one else saw her but she was standing there clapping for me like grandma did at all my football games. I don’t think Trudy ever really existed, I think it was my grandma watching over Jamie and I.