NOW We're Cookin'!

Sam (11) has turned into quite the little baker man!  He likes to help cook, especially bake -- which I love -- so I encourage it! This past week I was home for Martin Luther King Day (I'll take a day off!) and he wanted to make something, so he made scratch  homemade chocolate chip cookies, all by himself. Since I cannot enjoy any of them right now (alas, I'm eating extraordinarily healthy), I did not force him to add WALNUTS, for which he was extremely grateful. And he left some of the cookie balls UNCOOKED in the fridge for him & Grayson to enjoy later...for which Grayson was extremely grateful!

Then we made homemade bread in my bread machine, and he LOVED that! We let the machine do the mixing, then we kneaded it, and baked in a regular pan it in the oven. It's been waaaay too long since I used that fancy-pants bread machine, and we both decided we'll be using it more often (...and thanks to Nath for her reminder-coaching).

Please excuse his SHIRTLESS-NESS...he has this "neck thing" where any clothes or fabric anywhere around his neck just drives him INSANE! He pulls, struggles, pulls faces, distorts his posture, all kinds of stuff to get the fabric off his neck. I finally told him to just take the shirt off and put the apron back on, which was still adjusted down an inch or so, because it was just too much on his neck! (I think it's hereditary, all my boys, including Steve have this "neck thing" -- but Sam's & Chris' seem extremely sensitive.)

And today Sam baked brownies for the Home Teachers, so I hope he'll continue this trend we've got going! Go, Sam!!

And as for me, I've been doing some pretty fabulous cooking myself lately! YUMMMM!!