In Which Things Get Quite Confusing While Pursuing a Cookie Badge

The kitchen looked a little like it had thrown up, but that was alright because my daughter was being independent and baking cookies. There are several different kinds of cookies she has to make to earn her Cookie Badge for Keepers of the Faith; she chose to work on the sandwich cookies today using a favorite recipe, which I cannot reveal because the cookies are a surprise for her daddy who often visits here since these are, after all, also his Treasured Chapters.

In an effort to quell the Control Freak in me, I left the kitchen while she worked. I came in upon her request after all ingredients had been mixed together. She wanted me to taste the batter.

"Are you sure you added enough sugar?" I asked.

She nodded and then offered, "It's kind of salty, isn't it?"

Very keen taster, this one. She described it better than I did--too salty, not necessarily, as I described, just not sweet enough. I verbally went through the recipe with her. And discovered that we needed to review again the fact that a capital T means tablespoon while a little t means teaspoon. Yes, salt can be good but not in tablespoons in a single cookie recipe.

(I've always wondered why Jesus tells us to be the salt of the earth. I get that salt adds necessary flavor, but you really can get too much salt. Of course, maybe this characteristic of salt is just to remind us not to be overbearing and obnoxious. Like the Jehovah's Witnesses that interrupted our school day this morning. Of course, they sent the sweet, little old lady to whom I could be nothing but nice. And I finally researched JW's after she left. Their literature looks so much like Christian literature, I've always been curious about the differences. Google it. Interesting stuff.)

So what was I talking about? Right. The Cookie Badge and the salty cookies. We washed the salty cookie batter down the drain and started over. The next batch turned out cookies flatter than unleavened bread (in sticking with the Bible theme). This new problem was mine; I had taken the original recipe and substituted butter for shortening because, as I've said before, I have a problem with feeding my children lard. Turns out you really must use lard to make the cookies turn out.

So...we used a completely different version of the recipe. By this time, we had gone through I don't know how many eggs, sugar, baking soda, and baking powder. But this batch finally turned out. I inserted my Control Freak a lot in this last batch, but I'm going to pass the poor girl on her badge because the flatter-than-pancake cookies were my fault. She made them according to the recipe; I just took too many liberties with the recipe.

Plus she and her siblings are being so sweet. I'm not sure why this homecoming is different from any of TravelDaddy's other returns, but they have planned a full party for him. Our dining room is decked out with handmade decorations, and these cookies will be center-table.

Of course there might be a little something in it for them as well: We aren't sure exactly when TravelDaddy will get home because he may catch an earlier flight. "If Daddy gets home while we're having school," Jacob asked me tonight, "can we stop school so we can have our party?"