Christmas is for Cursing at Cookies

"When you're angry count to four.
When you're really angry swear."
~Mark Twain~

Do you remember a few weeks ago I blogged about all of the lovely Christmas baking I was going to do? I included a link to the Toronto Star Advent Cookie Calendar, and ran out to buy the chocolate and marshmallows for the smore cookies? 

Since then, I have been yearning for the time to bake those smore cookies. Well, this morning was the time. I got up, made breakfast, had a very hot, fresh cup of coffee, and decided I would bake the cookies. After all, that's what great moms do right?

I thought that those smore cookies would be the perfect snack along with some hot chocolate at the outdoor skating rink tonight. We called my mumster Vicki, and she agreed to meet us at the park for cookies and hot chocolate. It was shaping up to be a Merry Danny Kay Christmasy day (as my granny would say) indeed!

My sweetie called from far-far-away, my kiddo was fed and outside playing, and I was happy in my little kitchen feeling all warm and fuzzy and domestic-like.  My son had spilled some soap on the kitchen floor earlier in the morning as I sent him up to put a load of washing in before he headed outside.

All warm and fuzzy from my coffee, breakfast and sweetie phone call, I thought that the soap was a great opportunity to scrub the floor. Heck why not? I put some Jimmy Buffett on, and got down on my hands and knees to scrub the floor.  Floor scrubbed and sparkling, I got to work on the cookies.

I measured the flour, the oats, the sugar, butter and spices. I cut the marshmallows in half and cut the chocolate into the right size.  I rolled the dough into perfect little cookie shapes and made a slight indentation in each to receive the chocolate and marshmallow topping.

Sounds like a great morning right? Sounds like the perfect home and December 22nd on holidays?

As I worked away in my little kitchen, my son called to tell me he was going to his friend's house to see if they could come out and play. Again, my son was upset with me for being such a tyrant as to make him wear snow pants in the snow. Go figure.  About one minute after the initial phone call, I pulled the cookies out of the oven to place the chocolate and marshmallows on top. Mmmmm!!!! Yummy! 

I was having visions of skating tonight. The rink is beautiful; it's a circular path poured around a beautiful white gazebo.  Large, old trees canopy the scene with their bare December branches, and the whole park glitters with white Christmas lights.

Tonight we would be the picture of a Thomas Kincaid painting. It was going to be lovely, and as we were surrounded by crisp, cold, night-time Christmas air, we would be munching on fresh cookies and warm hot chocolate.  This was going to be great!

Just after I popped the chocolate and marshmallow topped cookies in the oven under a boiler set on, "HI", the phone rang again. It was my son, "Mom,", he whined, "they're not home. Nobody's home! I'm bored. I want to play. I hate these snow pants....."  

"Would you like to go for a walk around the lake with me honey?", I suggested. "Would you like to come home and play scrabble?", I may just as well have asked, "Would you like me to hang upside down by my toes and whistle Dixie while playing the accordion and juggling knives?".  Nothing would have been good enough. 

As he was debating his next course of action, I smelled smoke. Not just any smoke. It was the scent of burning marshmallows.  "Just come home, " I said, and hung up the phone as I sprang up from my seat at the table. 

I have a very small home. It took one large step to get to the oven, and a very quick swipe across the counter with my left arm to get the oven mitt on my hand. I opened the door, and in the midst of black, campfire-esque smoke, caught one of the new cookie pans with my oven-mitted hand, while the other, like a roller coaster car at the top of a treacherous hill teetered and slid out of the oven and onto my right  foot.

I dropped the pan of cookies in my left hand and jumped back from the pan that landed on my foot.  You know what they say, if you drop buttered toast on the ground and it lands butter side up, it's a good day. Well, when you have an accident with a pan full of gooey, 500 degree Fahrenheit, melted, marshmallow topped cookies and they land marshmallow side down on your foot, it's a bad day.

In the spirit of all things Christmas, I cried out, "Happy Birthday Jesus!". Ok, that wasn't what I said, but what I did say was in the spirit of remembering Jesus.

Of course the cat, who had been disturbed from his death-stare-terrorize-the-bird-gaze, waltzed into the kitchen through the hot marshmallow and melted chocolate goo and then tore across the carpeted living room  floor like a maniac on speed.

Just as I pulled my foot away from the scorching hot marshmallow and cursed, the door opened and in walked my son, completely at his wits end because I had made him wear snow pants in the snow.

He took one look at the kitchen floor (pictured above), and my marshmallow and chocolate covered slipper. "I'm going to get the laundry," he said, and left me to my business in the kitchen. Smart kid.

So, instead of 24 cookies, we're going to be taking 12 to the skating rink tonight. Instead of banana bread and squares, today I'm going to go work on my hardanger work. After I wash the kitchen floor for the second time of course.