My Little Helper

Back in November with my mother-in-law.  Cute!

Flannery has been all about helping in the kitchen lately, from making her daddy's birthday cake, to making hot tea, to making macaroni and cheese, to helping with making lemonade.  I've been really impressed by how she'll stick with me throughout so many steps these days!  And she seems to get such a sense of accomplishment from helping.  Today, while she was stirring in the butter and milk, she said,  "I'm actually really making my own mac and cheese!"

She helped with every step along the way for making, frosting, and adding (gazillions of) sprinkles to her daddy's birthday cake.  And tonight, she even helped him blow out the candles!  (Happy birthday to Robi!)

The best part is that when she's helping me in the kitchen, we get to wear our matching aprons that my mother-in-law gave us back in November.  Seriously, those matching aprons might just win the prize for the "most adorable while still being useful" gift of the year.



How can you involve the children in your life more in chores and household tasks?  

Happiness is a Warm Biscuit

I'm just going to let these photos speak for themselves. Yum.

Share and Create Family Traditions

One of the greatest revelations about happiness I've had this year is that sharing and creating family traditions brings me immense joy. Here are some of my ideas as to why this is so:

1. I'm a creature of habit who likes predictability
2. All of my extended family lives at least a day's drive away, so I miss them a lot, and sharing family traditions makes me feel closer to the people that passed the traditions down to me (i.e., my family).
3. I feel like I'm doing something right when I share a family tradition with my daughter, which feels good.
4. Traditions make our little 3-person family feel like a real team of people who belong together.
5. I'm a homebody, and sharing family traditions adds a little fun to days spent in our little home/neighborhood.

So obviously, if I need a happiness boost, I just need to engage in some good old fashioned family tradition. And in my family, that means doing one of the following:
a) taking pictures. - Huge group photos in which teenagers roll their eyes and someone holds a dog to get them to stay in the picture are the utmost pinnacle of photo success in our family tradition.
b) making chocolate chip cookies. - From scratch. Using my mom's recipe. Yes, you must eat at least a few spoonfuls of the dough. No, so far I've never gotten salmonella. Yes, I do realize it's bound to happen one day.
c) going on a walk - preferably in the woods. preferably at sunset. preferably someplace where you'll pass some horses and be able to throw them an apple or a carrot. preferably walking not for exercise, but for taking in the scenery.

Since I live in downtown Durham, I typically have to settle for a walk around the block and then a or b. Or both.

So yesterday, Flanna and I made homemade chocolate chip cookies from scratch by my mom's recipe, then put the cookies on my grandma Norma's retro hand-me-down platter.

It was super fun. And the cookies, I wish you could taste them, or even just smell them. Yum. A definite happiness booster.





What family tradition do you love to keep?

It's Easter Every Day

As part of my happiness resolution to "Share and Create Family Traditions," Flannery and I made Easter cookies last weekend. From scratch, at that! Cookies are a family tradition on both sides of our family. My mom is a master cookie maker. Her chocolate chip cookies are amazing, and all my friends from childhood say one thing they remember about my house is the smell and/or taste of chocolate chip cookies. Isn't that a neat memory? And then, on my hubby's side, his aunt is an amazing cookie maker, as well. At every holiday get-together, Aunt Sharon brings beautifully decorated (and incredibly yummy!) cookies...our favorites are gingerbread men and sugar-cookie cutouts.

I really love to bake, so this is a tradition that's easy for me to keep. Any time we're looking for something to do, my first thoughts go to baking something. Flanna's gotten pretty good at measuring, pouring, and stirring carefully, and she's slowly learning how to not gorge herself on cookie dough. (I think she gets that inclination from me...Mmmm, cookie dough.)

Anyway, our Easter cookies turned out really cute, thanks to Aunt Sharon's frosting recipe and some new "neon" food coloring I found at Kroger. The neon coloring made really cute pastel colors that were still vibrant. (And now I'm excited about using it to dye our easter eggs when the time comes.)

Making cookies with my mom and sister is something I remember really enjoying, and I hope Flannery will remember our happy baking times fondly one day, too.


What traditions from your childhood do you want to keep going?