Warmth. Cookies. Bags.
The air is warm today. Not so warm that we didn’t wake up and add wood to the fire, but warm enough that no little people have been fighting over who gets to stand directly in front of it, which is a pleasant change of pace.
Ben has had ideal conditions for finishing his shed, which will mostly be full of baby gear, but don’t tell Ben, who I think suspects that this shed will be an ideal setting for a poker night?? I don’t know. Maybe someone will want to sit in the baby swing.
I fully intended to actually leave my minivan during the kids’ art class this week, but I had packed a few books in my old Jansport backpack that my mom bought me before my freshman year of high school and onto which I had stitched quite a few cloth patches, but have since ripped off. On the leather bottom is still scrawled “I love Anthony” in permanent marker. But you know. The bag has history. I remember it hanging low on my back as I snapped a picture of my Doc Martens straddling the line symbolizing the equator in Ecuador eighteen years ago. It has been so many places with me. Someday, I will pass it down to one of my wanderlusty children who will look at me blankly and say something like, “Gee. Thanks Mom. But uh. It is totally lame.” Or maybe they won’t because they’re homeschooled and what will they know about cool bags? Exactly what I tell them, that’s what! Anyway. What? What am I talking about? Right. I meant to get out of the van and walk around while I waited for the kids in art class this week, but I had packed a few books and I pulled one out and began to read and then an hour and a half had passed. Just like that. I had eaten a leftover Valentines Day cookie that was still on a tray in the passenger’s seat from our homeschool group Valentines party the day before. I had let the sun pour in and my hair felt warm. I may have dozed off. I watched what appeared to be a drug/money exchange in the parking lot. I locked the doors. It was just all very beautiful and peaceful inside my van, so I stayed and read. But I did enjoy the scenery as we drove home.
The Valentines Day cookies, by the way, were made with a Martha Stewart Christmas cookie recipe, which is foolproof and came in the December 2010 issue of Martha Stewart Living. We used heart shaped cookie cutters, of course, rather than angels or bells, and it worked out just fine. The best part is having plastic wrapped discs of dough waiting in the refrigerator. The worst part is that the nature of the dough requires it to be refrigerated several times during the process of making the cookies so the whole thing doesn’t just melt into a puddle of butter and sugar. You take the good with the bad.
