Smells like ginger

On Sunday evening, I got a great surprise! As the kids prepared for bed, JB asked Isaac if he wanted to go to the "Red Café"* for donuts the next morning. Being as the next day was Monday, I reminded him that he couldn't do this. "Oh yes I can," he replied. "I have the day off!" Apparently, the entire Clinic was given an off day to use at their discretion, and JB saved his for this Monday and surprised me!

 

Having JB home for three days in a row is awesome. On Sundays, the boys know he has to go back to work because he "takes his whiskers off." They'll feel his face and say, "Do you have to go to work tomorrow Daddy?" Everyone loves when JB is home, and having him home an extra day was extra great since 3 out of our 4 kids have a cold. Only Isaac appears to have avoided some sort of head cold. Hannah has her first cold, Abigail has definitely gotten hit the hardest, and Sidge is also out of sorts. In addition, JB's mom has been really sick for the last 10 days or so with fever and cough.

 

Anyways, this post wasn't even planning on talking about that. I was going to talk about baking gingerbread cookies with the kids.

 

I am not a cook. You know those women who just bake and do all those wifely/motherly things? Yeah, well that is definitely not me. Cooking and especially baking, always fills me with anxiety as, quite honestly, I often make a mistake and something gets ruined.

 

But the boys love the story of The Gingerbread Man and they saw some of the mix in the Commissary the other day and asked if we could make them. So yesterday, we went for it. I pulled out our egg replacer only to find it covered with tiny little bugs! Ick! So, onto plan B. I tried using 1/4 cup applesauce and 1/2 teaspoon baking powder for each egg (thanks google!) It worked wonderfully!

 

And, because JB was home, I got some pictures of me doing stuff with the kiddos. Way fun!

 

Rolling the dough and using our cookie cutters to make a gingerbread man, a heart, a star, a car, and a motorcycle.

 

 

 

 

 

Checking on them in the oven



 

We made a last minute decision to decorate the Gingerbread man. We found some chocolate chips in the freezer and some M&M's in the cabinet that worked just fine.

 

 

These were my creations. (The kids used much more liberty in putting chocolate chips and M&M's on their cookies.)

 

Showing off our hard work. We had a great time. No one cried, I didn't make any major mistakes, the egg replacement worked like a charm!

 

 

*I plan to do a post discussing "The Red Café" in a future blog installment. It's a little neighborhood Café with a red awning that we love to visit for ice cream and donuts as frequently as we can!