M’s mom arrived last night, and to say that the girls were excited would be the understatement of the year. We headed a few blocks away for dinner with the promise of cookie making when we returned.
E’s violin concert and holiday party is tonight, and somehow the week had gotten away from us. M also had to bake for his office holiday potluck today, so I decided yesterday that I had better zip home at lunch and put some doughs together so that they would be nice and chilled and ready to cut for cookies that evening. I made two of my favorite cut cookie doughs – a vanilla cream cheese sugar cookie and a chocolate shortbread (with a little espresso powder). I wrapped the doughs up in plastic wrap and placed them in the fridge and got back to my day.
After dinner we took them out and started working. At first the sugar cookie dough seemed fine – just cold. But as I rolled and the girls cut I noticed it was stretchier than usual, and the batch in the oven looked strange. Almost like it was rising vs. spreading slightly. I finally pinched a corner off the dough and knew immediately the problem. I had creamed the butter and cream cheese together, but never added the sugar into the mix. I had made playdough, and we now had four baking sheets covered with inedible snowmen and candy canes.
Into the trash, and up to the bath. I was slightly annoyed with myself, but I got over it. The little one had fun cutting out all those shapes and sorting the cookie cutters (which was the point), and the oldest was going to come back down after her shower and help me with the second batch.
We rolled and cut and baked and then decorated. I only made one batch of icing and kept it white. Piped it out with a #3 tip and let the accumulated sugared decorations in our cookie making stash do the heavy lifting. Not too bad for a Wednesday night effort. 50% right. Sometimes that’s just as good as it gets.
Has anyone ever told you that you’re the kind of parent who makes other parents feel inadequate? I’m totally blown away by your cookie decorating skills. I don’t even OWN frosting piping tips, and I’m afraid I would not have responded so gracefully to two batches of ruined cookie dough. I tend to overreact to kitchen disasters. (Hmm. Perhaps there’s a new year’s resolution here??)
My mad cookie decorating skills pre-date my parenting role. I used to do quite a bit of it – often for sale – but do far less of it now that the kids are here. I have quite the collection of supplies though, and if you ever need a #3 tip you know where to find one.
Occasionally I melt down, but not too often. I was doing too many things at once, and have no one to blame but myself.
Trust me – I drop the ball more than you think…