12-24 Part 2 (Cookie Making)

After my birthday dinner, we headed home for cookie making.  My Nan was feeling a bit confused, so it was just us Dorans. I had hoped to be one of those moms with the house perfectly decorated, cookies cute and baked... you know the one.  I have been learning though that I am not 'that' mom.  I feel like I get things done pretty last minute and baking cookies on my birthday is now a tradition (which I like because it takes earlier December pressures off of me).  

I found some cute aprons and since I am a mom who can do some mean bubble- letters I quickly wrote the kids' names on their aprons (I look forward to watching these grow on them...)

She opted for "Just Ali with a star on the i"

I was surprised when he told me he wanted "Goose" on his apron instead of Zach.

Maybe my 9 year old is getting old... he wanted me to drop the y on his apron!

And well... this guy, I had to tie up his apron so he could walk (or in this case, climb the stool in the pantry).

Ali was very into baking this year.  I got a sugar cookie recipe (the "best" Sugar Cookies) off the Internet and we got to work.  Ali literally did everything, she measured out everything and even  cracked the eggs (I had no idea she could do that).  Seany loved watching Ali and she talked him through the steps as all good teachers do.

I knew Z would have nothing to do with cookies this year (especially after Santa mentioned those donuts).  Since I have no idea how to make donuts, Jeff was the one who helped him out!

 Joe... well... don't let that apron fool you.  He didn't help at all in the making of the cookies.  We had the "Santa Tracker" on the computer and he  loved checking in to see where Santa was.  He learned a lot about geography and how fast those reindeer really are!

 He did find moments to leave that computer to taste the batter (which was to his satisfaction).  When the batter was done, we had to let it chill for an hour.  Thankfully there was a Christmas movie on (the Grinch with Jim Carey) so the kids got to watch that while I Jeff and I tidied up the kitchen to get ready for the next phase.

Jeff did most of the donut work himself but he did have Z come and put on the finishing touches.  He put all the cinnamon sugar on the donuts.   Sean looks like he wants to help in this picture, but really he's just begging (probably learning this from the first-borns, Pele' and Cobi).

I called the kids to come and roll and cut cookies when that hour was up, but Ali had some trouble with those skinny candy-canes so she went and watched the movies while I cut the cookies.  Sean spent a long time with that dough in front of him.  Eventually it disappeared (I think Cobi "found"  it). I ended up rolling the (remaining) dough right on the granite and baked the cookies right on parchment paper.  Making cookies in the new kitchen was such a treat!

Of course the kids were all about decorating the cookies.  They each picked one out for Santa and got busy (well... everyone but Sean).  They didn't do too much because at this point, Joe was getting nervous about how fast Santa was moving and was ready to head upstairs to bed!

This is the yummy goodness Santa got, along with a glass of milk.

While the Bigs went upstairs, Z and I headed outside (like I said, the Bigs weren't taking any chances).  Z made reindeer food/dust in his class.  It was glitter (so the reindeer could see it) and oatmeal (so they could munch while they waited for Santa).  Zach was very excited and told me how much the reindeer were going to 'Just love it!"  It was a cloudy night so we figured Rudolph was definitely out there somewhere!

 Jeff and I tidied up a bit downstairs (so Santa wouldn't come in to a mess).  Last we checked, he was getting closer, so we too decided to get up to bed.  Though we didn't want anything from Santa, we knew our kids were hoping for something special and didn't want to ruin it for them.  When we headed up we noticed that someone was probably hoping to spy Santa, but that thing called 'sleep' got the best of him (and soon got the best of us too)!