Cheer Kicks and Chocolate Chips

Gluten free, Dairy free Chocolate Chip Pudding Cookies! 

This is not a cooking blog. Trust me.  That would be the meanest prank on sweet, innocent, trusting people who need a decent recipe.  
I cook. But I am not a cook. I try new recipes. But I follow them verbatim because I just need to feed people, rather than impress them with my skills.  

However, I have always loved whipping up a batch of cookies and I have been known to make a pretty darn good one!  Baking is more my style.  I actually take a lot of pride in how a batch of cookies turns out.  I have a handful of friends who very predictably walk in and immediately ask if I've baked cookies that day. THAT my friends, does this girl's heart some good.  

Until last November. When I was diagnosed w/ Celiac Disease. Which happens to be Latin for "you can never just whip up another anything ever again".  Everything is more complicated.  

I've experimented with numerous gluten free cookie recipes for my family to enjoy.  I can always count on my sweet Ben to yell, "These are better than gluten Mom!"  That kid is the "pleaser" in the family though and I know he's actually dying inside.  The rest of my family is just quiet.  Jerks.

Things got really fun a couple of weeks ago when I had to eliminate dairy from my diet as well.  Don't ask.   I don't want to talk about it.  

What I DO want to share is that I came up with a DELICIOUS Chocolate Chip Cookie that is gluten free, dairy free and includes a little ingredient I like to call... Vanilla Pudding.  Trust me.  These cookies are "Better than gluten!" 

They are so good that yes, I did a few cheer kicks in my kitchen.  I may have swung a dish towel around my head like a helicopter too.  Old habits die hard. 

It's your call whether you tell people that they are gluten free before they taste them.  If you do wait, then you could jump up and down and point your finger at them yelling, "Gotcha fools!  They're gluten free!" ...I mean, if that's your thing.

Your happy dance is also completely up to you.  Do give yourself some room though... just in case you have the impulse to throw your leg up over your head and then point your fingers to the sky.  Anyway... 

A few tips before you start:  
1. The gluten free all purpose flour mixture is up to you.  I preferred the batch I made with the flour mixture recipe by Gluten-Free-Girl but my family preferred the batch made with Bob's Red Mill All Purpose Flour.  (Which is a heck of a lot easier if you're new to baking gluten-free.)  Whatever you do, use one that doesn't already contain xanthum gum OR omit the xanthum gum in this recipe.  
2. Use parchment paper on top of your baking sheet.  
3. The consistency of the dough is weird.  It looks gross like play dough.  
4.  Do not attempt a double batch in your Kitchen-Aid mixer.  It won't be able to handle the consistency and stiffness.  You could burn out your motor and/or not get it all mixed well enough.  
5. Here's the bummer.  And it's a huge bummer for me.  The dough tastes awful.  It really does.  Don't bother.  But the cookies are WORTH IT!  

Ingredients:
2 1/4 cups of all-purpose gluten free flour.
1 tsp. xanthum gum
1 tsp. baking soda
1tsp. salt

3/4 cup canola oil  (If you don't need it to be dairy free use 1 cup of butter for heaven's sake!!)
3/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup white sugar
1-5.1oz. Instant Vanilla Pudding (Or whatever flavor you want!  Butterscotch is great too!)
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
Chocolate chips (I use dairy free)

Pre-heat oven to 350.  Line your baking sheets w/ parchment paper.
-Mix the flour, xanthum gum, baking soda and salt together in a separate bowl.
-"Cream" the canola oil and sugars together in your standing mixer.
-Add the box of pudding and mix well.
-Add the eggs and vanilla.
-Mix well and remember not to expect it to look like regular cookie batter.
-Scoop out spoonfuls onto the lined baking sheet.  I add chocolate chips to each individual cookie because I like to control how much chocolate is in each cookie.  (Add this to the list of reasons I should be on medication.)
-Bake for about 10 minutes depending on your oven.  Check them @ 8 minutes.
-I let them sit for a bit on the baking sheet before I remove them.

Please tell me if you try this recipe and what the honest response is.  I have a lot of very loving people in my life who may just like to see me dance in the kitchen.  

   

And so.

I begin again.  Without knowing where to begin.  Without knowing how.  I need to, despite.

Despite all that has kept me from opening up and out, I begin again. Despite all of the things in the past two years that have arrested my heart from writing freely-- the good that has been too good to express with enough color and the hard that has felt all too paralyzing to write through.  I must...despite.  And so...

And so this start might be my simple justification. Of my absence:  from writing, from sharing, from engaging in anything beyond soccer cleats, superhero capes and polka dotted skirts.  But to begin again, I am compelled to grieve some of what has been lost. And smile on some of what hasn't yet been celebrated in writing.  So that...

So that I can begin again.  Maybe newer.  Maybe fuller.  Wiser?  That feels like a stretch.  I'm not sure.

Jonathan and I have looked back at all that has been packed into two years.  All.  Packed.  In.  We have laughed hard at the good.  We have almost burst at what feels beyond rich in our lives.  Three of the most beautiful and amazing darned kids on this earth.  That's what they are.  I don't know why we get to be their parents.  But I'm so thankful.  We are so thankful.

Maria's advent into our life completed our home.  Really that's how it feels.  She came in like God's grace snowing down on us (and sometimes sheets of hail and wind with the sass of a pounding rain).  And this child...this child.  She is breathtaking.  She is breathtaking alone and all on her own.  The kind of beautiful that you stare and shake your head at.  Because she actually sparkles.  No lie.  Her smile, laugh and voice actually sparkle.  But what's so much more is how she fits into what we already had.  She's not a complement to it.  That makes her sound somewhat insignificant. Like sprinkles on a delicious cake.  She is a true piece of it we didn't know we needed.  That we didn't realize would be so completing.  And so...

And so her brothers continue to make me marvel.  The term 'child development' sounds so... otherly. So outside of what I'm watching when I'm watching my child, my children "develop".  Watching my children grow and learn and feel and hurt and ask and need and wonder and fear and delight.  All of these developments become more intense as my boys get older and so I feel more intense about them.  More intense around them.  The notes I send in their lunches are painfully thought out and re-written as I hope they read my love in them and not just the words.  The time I spend volunteering in Sam's classroom likely looks desperate and pathetic as I stare at him while I work with his other classmates.  The naps I steal with Ben some weekdays are totally selfish and again...pathetic as I anticipate him being in full day school next year. Because this is all happening so fast.  It's just so fast for me.  And so...

And so just those three and the immeasurable joy and awe that they bring are enough to make me feel too overwhelmed to express fully.  But there's more.  Because our lives are filled with other kids too.  Kids who fill our house every Sunday night to look deeper into who our God is and who they are as they prepare to leave for college this fall. Kids who allow us to be a part of their lives.  Kids who have way more on their plates than we did when we were their age and yet they still find time to pause with us and look at life together.  They still have time to grab coffee, a walk or frozen yogurt with us.  And in this, we are blessed richly.  And so...

And so what is all of this if I don't have someone to share it with?  But I do.  I do.  I have no idea why our love comes so easily to us.  But it does and it has and we'll fight like hell for it if there is ever a time that it doesn't.  Because there is no earthly love so safe in my life than the love I have with Jonathan.  There is no place like the home we are to each other and I don't have a home outside of him.  I don't want a home outside of him.  And so...

And so our past two years have been rich.  I use that word a lot I know.  But I really love it. Because it doesn't mean that it's been perfect.  It means 'abundant', 'highly valuable', 'deep in color'.
Deep in color.  Oh deep in color.

So much color comes from the discomfort we experience.  Yes, here it comes people.  The laundry list of woes and "Are you kidding me?" moments that have peppered our life since Maria was born.

That sweet girl's first year was filled with the pediatrician, emergency room, urgent care, etc.  Scars on her gorgeous, baby forehead, chronic ear infections and ear tubes are some of the reasons health insurance should be one of Martha Stewart's "Good Things."
Her brothers added an adorable pair of green glasses, a case of Mono and a tonsillectomy to the medical bills... and that should have been enough.  A diagnosis of Celiac disease was my contribution to the withdrawal of our health savings account.  Of course that carries with it the coinciding tidings that I can never eat anything containing gluten again.  Ever. Ever, ever.  Like...ever.  Again.  Happy Thanksgiving.  And happy grocery shopping.  And budgeting.  And learning how to cook.

Oh and our roommate/friend/brother wasn't exempt from our medical ventures as his lung randomly collapsed last fall as well.  He spent a good five days in the hospital recovering and earned the award for most dramatic ailment of the family.  Absurd right?

In February after these hurdles, we headed to Hawaii to restart and breathe. I realized almost immediately that I had put way too much stock into this trip.  I had seen it as a way to just...begin again. Start fresh. Sadly, there is nothing fresh about five people with the stomach flu in a one bedroom condo. Yes.  We all got the stomach flu.  And we kept it.  We fought it the majority of our trip and when all was said and done, we had 2 amazing days at the beach out of 10 days in Hawaii.  This is when I started getting angry.  And so...

And so that's actually not true.  That's just not true.  I was angry before we left.
Because these are just the hiccups we look back on and now simply laugh about.  Because these trials are so incredibly absurd... but they just happen.  You want someone to blame.  You want to put your finger on what in the heck we have done wrong...but there isn't anything.  So you laugh.  A maniacal kind of laugh maybe. But a laugh nonetheless.  Eventually.

I was already angry though because there are some spaces where laughter has no place.  The kind of spaces in your heart that steal your sleep and consume your moments of quiet.  The spaces that force you to fight what you know you know in an effort to just have peace.  For a moment.  There are spaces that are so precious to you that when evil has darkened even a corner of that space, there is no peace found inside. What is left, I'm embarrassed to say, is anger.  And so...

And so I was already angry.  I was angry as I grasped the details of a tragedy that shouldn't have been.  It shouldn't have been.  Angry and desperate as I watched the fall-out... so warped and sick that I've often pictured the glory some twisted author could make for themselves with this unimaginable and yet very real story.

I was angry to watch people feel betrayed in their hope and turn away from each other.  Angry to watch heartache from the edge of the woods in the lives of people I love... and to feel alone in that.  To feel hopeless in that.  To feel pitifully hopeless while claiming a Hope and Power that I still believe regardless. Angry at those who delight in the demise of love and life... for their own gain.  And to see them succeed.  To see them succeed!  And so...

And so I now know that my silence is not just because I have three kids now, an admittedly larger portion than I imagined.  But because joy in my immediate circumstances has been shadowed by a struggle of real, uncomfortable anger and despair in my surroundings.  The two have left me at a loss for how to write joyfully...with integrity.  Without betraying the honest pain and disappointment that hasn't yet, and likely never will be reconciled.  A pain that I'm embarrassed to admit, has overwhelmed me and stolen some of my joy at times. Stolen my attention.  Stolen my peace.  And yes that's embarrassing to me.  And so...

And so I begin again.  Without knowing where to begin.  Without knowing how.  I need to.

Maybe newer.  Maybe fuller.  Wiser still feels like a stretch.

These Days...

These days my mind swims with what I need to do, what I should be doing, what I must not forget to do, and what I have already forgotten to do.

If I'm not careful, I'm going to miss what they are doing.

These days Sam chuckles to himself but won't share what he's thinking.

These days Ben crawls into my chair at lunch just to be closer to me.

These days Maria litters the house with everything she can pull out of the bottom cupboards.

These days Ben literally bounces and points at himself with excitement when we pick Sam up from school as if to say, "Look Sam!  I'm here! You get to play with me again!"

These days Sam uses, "And by the way..."to start thoughts that should probably begin with "Hey guess what!"

These days Maria loves to wrestle, fall, giggle and squeal on our bed.

These days Ben asks for tea every morning.  But he only drinks 2 sips of it.

These days Sam ask questions about pain and suffering in the world that break my heart.

These days Maria bangs on the cupboard to say that she wants raisins.

These days Sam reads more than he eats.

These days Legos are my best friend.  And of course theirs too... I guess.

These days Ben asks Jonathan to take his shirt off and box with him.

These days Maria hears music, stops whatever she is doing, bounces and sways.

These days Sam remembers the score of any football game he's ever known about.  Not an exaggeration.

These days Maria is learning to kiss with a closed mouth rather than open.  "Mmmah!"

These days Ben finds it odd when a Christmas song doesn't mention Jesus.

These days Sam likes to hold his straw in the place that a tooth once held residence to drink his chocolate milk.  

These days Maria tips her head down, looks up at me through a furrowed brow, head-butts me and then throws her head back to laugh.

These days Sam and Ben sing different renditions of "Jingle Bells, Batman smells, Robin laid an egg" over and over until I am begging them to find a different song to butcher.

These days Sam won't share about his day at school until after he's had a snack.

These days Ben almost breaks my nose at least once every day.

These days Ben still says "finded", "bringed", "writed", "drawed" and "runned".

These days Sam helps grown-ups choose their teams for the upcoming bowl games.

These days Maria needs to be held while I make dinner.

These days Sam and Ben are sent upstairs to rough house.

These days Maria's thin blonde hair is curly when she gets out of the tub.

These days Sam wants to know if he can get baptized with out being dunked under water.

These days the only time Ben asks for help is when he is at the end of himself and close to tears.

These days Maria climbs everything.

These days both boys hug me as long as they can at bedtime.

These days are good...

School Lunch and Beyond

It was comedy really.  One of those things that you are able to laugh about moments later but in the actual moment you are just thankful a friend was there to witness it so that you didn't have to mouth the words "What the (fill in the blank)?!!" to your innocent children.

Sam is what we call behind his back "not an eater".  To call him 'picky' would be a gross understatement.  We don't know where he came from.  But he is ours and this is something we have to cleverly navigate, pick and choose battles around and sometimes just plain trick him.  For the most part, we are constantly encouraging him to try new things, eat just a tiny bit more, and for the sake of the rest of us who love food...to not speak negatively about it.  Nonetheless, it's hard.  He has a smattering of foods that he definitely likes and wants to eat.  He has another small group of foods that he will tolerate but refuses to admit "liking". There is an equally small group of food that he will eat bite-by-miserable-bite when he knows he has to all the while looking as if he is going to toss it up any second.  And then the rest is absolutely non-negotiable.  There is no way he can be motivated to touch it.

With this comes other obstacles of course!  Sam would rather just eat at home vs. most restaraunts because he knows how I am going to make the food and he doesn't know how it will be made elsewhere.  Eating with friends is a joke.  Well meaning adults who have no experience with this kind of "picky" can be exhausting.  And of course my own fears that some day this country will face an economy my grandparents recall where "peanut butter and honey sandwiches" will be too expensive to make and Sam will just die.  Just. Die. People!  Of starvation!  Because he's THAT stubborn! 
  
Well anyway, Sam started FIRST GRADE this September at our neighborhood public school.  Last year he attended Kindergarten at the very small private school he had also attended for two years of preschool.  So this is all very new to us!  Full days, big classroom, one teacher and... LUNCH at school! 

I have been sending him to school with lunches that he would typically eat,  knowing full well that he will come home with most of it still in his Spiderman lunchbox and that he'll be very hungry upon return.  I'm not completely naive.  I have set my expectations low.  So it was very exciting for me to see him looking over the school lunch calendar one day very carefully and saying to me, "I think I'd like to try this sometime."  I masked my excitement (of course) and let him know that he could choose one lunch a week to buy.  He started studying the calendar and making comments about the choices. 

One Monday morning he decided that he was going to buy lunch that day.  It was grilled cheese sandwiches.  This was surprising to me because grilled cheese sandwiches are usually in the "I'll eat this but I don't like it" category.  Regardless, he was excited.  Very excited.  So I was over the moon!

As we approached Sam's school we joined up with good friends to cross the cross-walk.  I said to my friend Kari (who is totally in the know of Sam's...nutritional preferences), "Sam is so excited to try school lunch today!  He can't wait to have the grilled cheese sandwich!" To which the adult crossing guard replied, "Oh they actually aren't very good.  I think they are way over cooked."

This is the moment I'm talking about.  The moment you realize that grown men and women can completely sabotage some of the grueling work you are doing at home with your kids!  And they get paid for it!!!

Sam of course didn't  miss a beat and asked, "What isn't very good?  What is over-cooked?"
I had to reply, "Oh you know that rule we have that you can't say bad things about food? Well she isn't following our rule. And I'm not her mom so I can't do anything about it."
That's when I turned to Kari and mouthed my all too often chosen expletive because I was in absolute shock.  Kari of course affirmed my shock with the same shock and we walked the rest of the way to the classroom line-ups with our mouths open, eyes crazy and our heads shaking in disbelief.

Needless to say, he did not choose the grilled cheese when he got to lunch.  He plopped a pile of plain spaghetti noodles,one required baby carrot and a chocolate milk on his tray.  Which... come to find out is the reason he wants school lunch once a week.  Chocolate milk.  Figures.  

Eleven Years

...dance parties with our boys after dinner. 
...the overnight hike when we both thought we just might die up there. 
...our first moments with all three of our sweet babies. 
...the day you brought Ginger home to me. 
...all of the swear words uttered as we remodeled two houses. 
...the two hours in Chicago that I thought you had been mugged and killed.
...all of the nights you have comforted me after nightmares. 
...Paris. 
...the day you threw the bifold closet doors out the front door onto the lawn and swore you'd never install them again. 
...the night of 9/11. 
...that dinner at The Brooklyn.
...the trip to the ER with Ben when he was four months old. 
...weeks at Young Life camps with kids we loved together. 
...our 600 square foot house on Finn Hill.
...the weekends spent with our nieces and nephews before we had our own babies. 
...the road trip to California and up the coast.
...the hike when you realized for the first time JUST HOW terrified I am of snakes.
...the unexpected day spent in San Francisco. 
...the facial that sent you into a full blown panic attack.
...all of the nights that we've hosted parties at our house while we've hidden away in the nursery...loving on our babies...perfectly content to miss out on the fun. 
...the day we spent $700 to save Gus's life. 
...the way you told our parents that we were pregnant with Sam. 
...that awful night in London. 
...countless nights of being up together with sick kids.
...the day we sobbed our goodbyes to Ginger on the floor of the vet's office together.
...everytime we try not to laugh at something the boys are doing. 
...our sweet baby bubbles that have surrounded us after the births of all three. 
...the THREE MONTHS living in Northern Ireland.
...the day you asked my dad to go to Men's Weekend at Malibu. 
...my first Mother's Day. 
...all of the wrestling matches you have with the boys. 
...the fight we had over spray butter. 
...the gazillion times we've watched A Few Good Men. 
...Howth, Ireland.
...the Christmas Eve that we laid in bed and watched The Ya-Ya Sisterhood. 
...the look on your face when we pulled four-month-old Sam out of the car only to realize he hadn't been buckled in his carseat. 
...the late night we realized that hot water had been spewing out from a broken pipe under our house for over a week.
...the celebratory "WHOOOOOO HOOOOOO" you shouted out the front door the night our first African American president was elected. 
...the family meeting we had to tell the boys they were going to be big brothers. 
...our adorable flat in Belfast. 

...the way you love the boys.
...the way you love Maria.
...the way you love me.

Eleven years Babe.  Thank you.

Deep Thoughts by Ben

Ben is three-and-a-half going on six.  Our "middle child".  Our sweet preschooler who owns most of the same expectations as his kindergarten brother, but hardly ever gets (or takes) the credit for being as mature, responsible, self-sufficient, flexible and down right cool as he is.  It's so easy to forget how young he is because he rallies with the big boys so successfully.
This is the boy who about a week before he turned two, told me in his deep, frosty, no-nonsense voice, "I don't wear diapers anymore."  And he never did again.  And he never had an accident.  And he'd lie straight to your face if he actually did because he's way too cool to pee in his pants like a darn baby. 
Anyway, I love moments when I hear his own thoughts come out (usually without any context that we are aware of) and I can see and hear him for the little boy that he is.

Most of these quotes come from the backseat of our van when it has gotten all too quiet:

 

Mom! Chickens are wild aminals.  Mom! Bad guys catch good guys but police officers catch bad guys.  Mom! Did you hear me burp?  "No." Then I don't have to say 'Excuse me.'   Mom! Dolphins are blue and white.  Mom! Some boys have long hair.  Mom! Football players have moms too.  Mom! Every girl has a purse.  Mom! Maria can't eat donuts.  Mom! I'll get everyone who is bad sick.  Mom do basketball players ever wear their basketball shoes at the table?  Mom! Do you know why monster trucks say 'trucks' at the end?  Cause they're a kind of truck.  I won't lick babies.  Hey Dad!  You can't ride a turtle.   Mom! Every girl is a wife.    Mom! Dad is your father.  Mom! Rocks don't float on water.  They sink.  Mom! Who nursed Grampa Mark when he was a baby?  Mom! Moose's antlers are part of their bodies.  Mom!  How old will I be when I'm a dad?  Mom! Maybe Leprechans will come here... They're so fast. 

"I am a champion all by myself."

Benjamin 

Boys Meet Girl

A couple of weeks ago I had to break some "bad" news to Sam and Ben.  They were light heartedly arguing over which one of them was going to marry Maria when they grow up.  Maria is their three-month-old sister.  Some day this will be repulsive to them.  However for now, its a horrible injustice that marrying your sister is illegal. 
"It's ILLEGAL?!!" they both say to me in unison with gigantic eyes and expressions of total shock and disgust with our legal system. 
"Yes," I say matter of factly. 
"Well we'll just lie about it then!" Sam yells through laughter as he runs out of the room.
"Yeah!  We'll LIE!" Ben squeals as he follows Sam to whatever they do while I'm tied up changing another diaper.

Let's just say...they love her.  A lot. 

We knew they were going to love her.  We even knew that their love for her would look different between the two of them.  And it really does. 

When Ben was a baby I remember Sam holding him and saying to me, "I love him so much I want to laugh my head off."  I totally identified with that crazy kind of love.  That's how Ben loves Maria right now.  He has such an intense nervous energy around her that sometimes she actually flinches a little when she knows he's coming.  He gets up close to her and says "Maria I LOVE you!" "Maria you're GOOD!" "Maria I'm your big BRUDDER!" in such a sweet... and somewhat maniacal way.  His kisses leave a slimy wet mess on her head and sometimes I think they just might bruise her.  He talks to her as if she actually understands what he's saying.  "Maria watch this... Did you see that Maria?"  Ben's love for her is obvious.  But it's also very obvious that he can't wait for her to grow older and be big enough to play.  I can't wait to watch that! 

Sam is another story.  I have a prediction that Maria will do no wrong in his eyes for the rest of their lives.  Here's an example of how that plays out right now:
If you know Sam, you know that he HATES messes.  He needs a wash cloth at the table while he eats so that his hands and mouth are never messy.  He actually buzzes around the house to clean up toys that are left out so that there isn't anything in his way to play something else.  Kitchen cabinet doors left open drive him crazy.  BUT...  Maria puked on him this morning and he laughed about it.  Really.  Ben (my Tazmanian Devil) is sent into hysterics over spit up landing on him but Sam (my perfectionist) actually thought it was endearing. 
His linear, scheduled world will screech to a halt for a chance to hold and snuggle her.  When we drop him off at Kindergarten he makes sure to kiss her goodbye.  When we pick him up, he returns straight to her.  He definitely gets the most smiles and it's clear that she trusts him.  There is a sweetness about his love for her and pride in her that I could not have imagined or expected.  And that melts me. 

Let's be real here though.  There are absolutely times where I have to tell them both to back the heck off.  As gentle and sweet as they are, sometimes it's just too much.  This poor girl is never going to know the meaning of "personal space".  I myself am fighting for those two precious words daily.  Especially when I'm nursing Maria.  The boys see nothing private or sacred about my space in these moments.  Why should they?  It happens every 2-3 hours, all day, every day where ever we are.  It's such a normal fact of life to them and I'm so thankful for that.  But it's hardly the time that I want them climbing all over me to get down close and smooch her on the cheeks.  That's my no-fly-zone thank you very much.  
At times their desire to be close to her and snuggle her becomes all too selfish and I need to drop the hammer.  Fights break out over who gets to be closer to her, who gets to hold her, who held her last, longer or better.  She is often reduced to the likeness of a puppy. 

Life and love in this house are far from perfect but all things considered, we are thrilled with how well Sam and Ben have received Maria into their lives!

Although I've shared with the boys that it's illegal to marry their sister, the subject hasn't altogether gone away.  Yesterday they declared that when they grow up they will have a lightsaber battle to decide which one of them gets to marry her.  I tried not to shoot down the idea entirely and suggested that they have a battle with whomever wants to marry her someday.  I was clear that this guy will have to battle both of them and Jonathan.  I truly think that the idea of them one day letting another male into our family to love Maria was too much for them to handle and the conversation just ended.

I am absolutely going to bring lightsabers to the rehearsal dinner of her wedding some day.