Sous Chef

I've never really been that good at doing playtime at a toddler level, I get bored fast and it seems like each time I sit down to play "doll house" or "doctor" I can think of a million things I need to do around the house. Especially lately what with trying to get the new house looking the way I want and prep for the new baby and such. Lucky for me Bree is getting old enough that she can be included more in what I'm doing around the house. Her new favorite thing to do is cook. She plays Sous Chef and dumps all the ingredients into the bowl or skillet and stirs and then I do the rest. This has been great for us since I can still be "getting stuff done" off my list of TO DO items and Bree has a blast while also getting some quality interaction time with mom. So, everyday we either make dinner together or we bake cookies or a quick bread or something along those lines. It's good for both of us since Brianna gets to learn about measuring and doing things in order by the directions (a GREAT listening skill for her) and I've ended up doing a lot more baking than normal...a bonus since it's been one of my goals to always have a healthy, homemade snack on hand. (After all, I'd much rather hand my kid, or husband for that matter, an oatmeal raisin cookie or a slice of banana bread that I know has some nutritional value than most of the crappy pre-made snacks you get from the store.) So, like I said it's a good thing all around.

However, this isn't to say that we haven't had some baking mishaps. One of the first things Brianna figured out is that she has to pour things into the bowl SLOWLY, especially liquids. She learned this the hard way after pouring them in so fast they sloshed out the other side. Same goes for stirring, also learned the hard way. And just today she learned about pepper...that too much is just too much and that it makes you sneeze like crazy in large amounts. Yep, while I had my hands full sliding dinner into the oven she managed to very carefully measure out about 5 tablespoons full of the stuff, 1 spoonful at a time out onto the cutting board. (Thank goodness it wasn't into anything we were going to eat!) "Too much pepper!" I exclaimed and quickly gathered up the pepper and measuring spoons. Naturally then she started sneezing and we had to have a little discussion about pepper and also how we only add ingredients when Mommy is helping. It was kind of funny though....

Yep, the whole cooking together thing does take a little patience on my part but I have to say overall, it's way less stressful on my nerves than having a whiny toddler pulling on my pantleg the whole time.