“Is two teaspoons of cinnamon enough for this batch, Mommy?” she asked, her flannel sleeves pushed up to her elbows.

“Put in a third,” I said, passing her the little red tin from the wooden spice rack by the stove.

“Your grandfather likes them dark.”

She tilted the tin over the stoneware bowl and tapped its side three times with her index finger.

Outside the kitchen window, soft gray snow drifted against the glass of the back porch lamp in the twilight.

The electric oven on the wall hummed at three hundred and fifty degrees, filling the room with the smell of toasted sugar.