Briny’s Lew Williams and Jack Taylor assisted in the two-day delivery of about 2,300 cookies
to Briny Breezes residents.
Chuck Foland dressed as an elf was part of the entourage of seven golf carts.
An assembly line of elves bagged the cookies.
Bev Williams, decked out as Ms. Claus, makes the rounds, delivering holiday cookies
to Bill and Cora Lou Miller. Williams, 83, starts baking in September.
Photos by Jerry Lower/The Coastal Star
By Ron Hayes
Up, down and all around the park they rode. Seven golf carts adorned with tinsel garlands. Two dozen elves in Santa hats. Neighbors hungry for holiday calories. And 2,300 cookies.
Shortly before 4 p.m. on the Saturday before Christmas, Briny Breezes’ annual Cookie Parade departed the auditorium. First in line was the music cart, loudspeakers pleading All I Want For Christmas Is You. Two carts back, Ms. Claus rode, resplendent in her billowing red dress, white stockings, white apron and dark sunglasses, celebrity-size.
The sunglasses were neither pretentious nor inappropriate. Here in Briny Breezes, Ms. Claus is a beloved holiday tradition.
For 363 days a year, she is Bev Williams, wife of Lewis, mother of Mike and Laurie, formerly of Mount Airy, Md., a Brinyite for 15 years.
And then, for two days in December, she becomes Ms. Santa Claus, leading her parade of golf carts door to door, dispensing home-baked cookies, kisses, hugs and holiday cheer.
The whole thing was a small good deed that got out of hand, as good deeds sometimes do.
“I started out just baking cookies for neighbors who were sick or alone,” Williams says. “Maybe 15 people.”
She began with one golf cart and one elf in Section 2. And now it’s come to this, a two-day procession through the park, with multiple elves to carry her cookies, holiday tunes ringing out and residents with smartphones rushing forth to claim festive cookie bags and get their pictures taken with Ms. Claus.
“I used to deliver them on paper plates with tin foil,” she says. “This is the first year with bags.”
And, she insists, the last.
“My husband was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s a year and a half ago, and he can’t be left alone,” she explains. “I was president of the swimming club, vice president of the hobby club and in charge of refreshments for the travel club, and I’ve had to give up everything to care for him.”
On this day, though, there is no sadness. The parade was rained out Friday, which also was Williams’ 83rd birthday, so they’re a day behind, but not lacking in spreadable joy.
Lewis Williams rides along in one of the carts, and his wife is all smiles, hugs and kisses as cries of “Merry Christmas!” fill the air.
Jack and Anne Lee are waiting outside their trailer for cookies.
“They’re very good indeed,” says Jack, the former mayor.
“I hide them from him and dole them out,” says his wife.
“We eat them all the very first night,” admits Shirley Hill, wife of Mike Hill, the current mayor.
Eric Wolffbrandt has been looking forward to the cookies every year since he doesn’t know when. “Ever since she started, I guess,” he says. “I don’t know how she does it on such a large scale.”
Here’s the recipe:
Begin in September.
Buy your supplies at Sam’s Club.
Bake two batches of 30 cookies each in your electric oven every morning and two more every afternoon. Take weekends off.
Pack in Rubbermaid containers and store in the auditorium’s freezer.
Repeat until you have 3,000 cookies.
Do not open until Christmas.
“I’m tempted, and I eat some,” Williams admits, “but I’m not bad. I don’t smoke and I don’t drink, so I figure this is my therapy.”
This year, Williams settled on chocolate chip, sugar and a terrifyingly fattening blend of oatmeal, raisins, peanut butter and M&Ms called Monster cookies.
A week before the parade, she and seven kitchen elves gathered in the auditorium to package the thawed cookies.
“Elves are special people,” she asserts. “You must be dependable and smart, good-looking, compassionate, caring and loving. There’s a few around here who wouldn’t make it.”
Nancy Bayless made it four years ago.
“When we deliver, I’m the Advance Elf,” she says with pride. “I knock on the doors and make sure people are home.”
Bayless has heard that this will be Williams’ last year as Ms. Claus, but doesn’t seem terribly concerned.
“She says that every year,” she says, “so we’re not really sure.”
Diana Vaughn, 16 years in Briny, is also one of the chosen.
“I became an elf by invitation,” she says. “Bev has little parties in her home on Fridays, and I’m her helper there as well.”
Together they form a two-person assembly line. Bayless packs the cookies in plastic bags, 10 to a bag, and passes them to Vaughn, who twists the plastic ties and places them on trays, then back in the fridge until parade day.
“I make cookies,” boasted Pat Barnes, 98 and a resident since 1958. “I don’t say they’re any better than hers, but they’re no worse.”
Barnes has heard that this will be Ms. Claus’ last cookie parade, too. She’s heard it before.
Kris Weir, her daughter Remi, 16, and son C.J., 14, came to Briny Breezes in July. This is their first parade.
How will they divide 10 cookies among three people?
“I get eight and they get one each,” the mother ruled.
And so they pressed on, as Perry Como reminds everyone that There’s No Place Like Home For The Holidays and Bing Crosby dreams of a White Christmas.
The west side of North Ocean Boulevard was done Saturday, then they came back Sunday and finished the east side around 6:30.
In all, Williams distributed about 230 bags of cookies and countless hugs and kisses.
In the week before Christmas, Ms. Claus would bring the remaining cookies to the Alzheimer’s care center at her Presbyterian church, her doctor’s, lawyer’s and dentist’s offices.
“It was good,” she reported. “People were happy and we had a good time. Somebody said to me, ‘You’re not quitting, are you?’ and I said, ‘Yes, I am.’ ”
Imagine. A Briny Breezes Christmas without Ms. Claus and her cookie parade.
“But then last night in bed I said, ‘Could I do that one more year...?’”
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