Since then, I have taken days off when I can to have mom time. Sometimes they are planned and sometimes, like that day, I suddenly realize how desperately I need them and I just find a way to make them work.
Today was one of those days, and thankfully, I had already planned to be off. The big kids are on fall break from school, and I have managed to squeeze in a long weekend. We've been busy all weekend, and today we were supposed to go to the Children's Museum for our one "big" adventure of their break, but it was closed for renovations. Amazingly, when I asked the kids if we could, instead, go next Friday and spend today at home decorating for Halloween and making cookies, they were excited about that plan.
So that's exactly what we did, and somehow those activities filled the day. Cookie making alone, was quite an endeavor. The kids had to be warned multiple times that this was a three step process. First we would make the doll, roll it out, and chill it. (Random side note: I have learned to roll the dough between sheets of wax paper and then chill it. It makes such a difference! No more battles with flour and a rolling pin!) Then we would cut out our cookies and bake them. Finally, after they cooled, we could decorate them. Thankfully, aside from Natalia getting way too excited before we made the dough and right before we decorated the cookies, things went pretty smoothly.
Natalia is finally attempting to learn the alphabet, and we are always covertly trying to encourage her. When it was time to decorate the cookies, I was really excited when I found some sugar letters in the pantry that were left over from decorating a birthday cake. (I decided not to focus on whose birthday cake and for what birthday these were purchased nor the fact that the (relative) healthiness of the homemade dough was completely canceled out by these little chemical gems.) She was really excited to add them to her cookies.
It turns out, the kids were all excited to use the letters, although Leon was the most excited. He wrote "Leon" on one cookie, and then he spelled out "Mike!" on another. (And, yes, he used the exclamation point. His brother is THAT exciting!) Then he attempted to spell out "Happy Birthday" with no worries about where the letters might fit.
In the end, we had a very colorful display of cookies.
Having finally cleaned up from that project, I am looking forward to one more day of mom time. Tomorrow I am off to drive preschool carpool, and crazy as it sounds, I couldn't be happier.
