The family bakery will be extremely busy on December 24th. Before dawn Sofie goes with her parents to help out. She fills pastry cases, bags orders, answers the phone and even waits on a few customers "out front" once the shop opens. This spunky brown-skinned girl enjoys a one-time stint in the busy bakery, especially when a girl from school is one of her customers. An appetite-whetting array of baked goods is pictured in Hamanaka's oil-on-canvas paintings reproduced in full color. The illustrations display bakery workers and customers from diverse backgrounds and enliven Heath's story about a child's foray within an adult world of work. Recipes for marzipan and cinnamon star cookies are included. (Ages 4-8)