This is a compassionate story by Marjorie Newton about baking along side her granddaughter. 🙂
“Gramma, Gramma. Are you awake?
Gramma, Gramma, I want to bake!
I want to make some cookies…or cake…
Right now! Please, Gramma! I wanna bake!
Slowly my eyes open searching for the clock…almost 7 a.m. and, heavens, a little female creature peeks around my bedroom door to see if I’m awake. Now, of course, anyone knows that 7 a.m. is a great time, maybe the best time, to make cookies, even if you’re not quite awake. But if you have a little four year old, red haired, curly headed granddaughter insisting on making cookies NOW, it is definitely the best time. So, I roll out of bed not resisting this little eager child as she leads me from my bedroom. What a sight I must be in baggy pjs and uncombed hair. She doesn’t care how Gramma looks. We are headed for the kitchen to get the baking action started for the day.
Baking has played a huge role in my life. As a child, whenever my mother baked, I stood on a chair next to her at the kitchen counter. Watching her every move, I begged her to let me crack the eggs, blend the sugar and butter together, sift the dry ingredients together, and mix it all in the bowl. In spite of the clouds of flour and the puddles of milk on the counter and floor, I think she enjoyed teaching me the various stages of creating a cake.
The exception to the fun, I am sure, were all the times I found it important to check the batter. The frequency I dipped into the mixture with my little sticky fingers had to be frustrating for her, but if so, she never mentioned it. She was very patient with me. By the time I was nine, she suggested I bake alone, either because she really felt I was ready for my solo flight or she had had enough batter tasting.
The tradition of baking and batter sampling continued with my own daughter as she took to baking as obsessively as I did. Like I had done, she stood next to me at the counter begging to help, especially when it was time to crack the eggs. As I remember, she was much more insistent about doing it “by myself” than I had been, so at a younger age I allowed her to take over the baking process with her own exuberant style. Her creations were new and not found in any recipe book. Fearlessly she unleashed her wild imaginative baking techniques which of course included testing the batter often…so often in fact little was left for the pan and the oven. The final product was camouflaged and oozed with icing, leaving her father and me to guess just what she had made. No matter….whatever it was, naturally, was delicious.
So, now this morning the family baking tradition is again unleashed. I am in the kitchen at 7 a.m. with a large mixing bowl, measuring spoons, wooden mixing spoons, and a cookie sheet spread before me on the counter. I guide my little granddaughter’s cookie making enthusiasm as best I can, but she has her own ideas.
And so I hear, “I can do it myself, Gramma!” and she does as she cracks the eggs with a flair getting them in the bowl and not on the floor. This is her favorite part of the process so it always gets done first even if the recipe doesn’t require it first. The chocolate chip cookie mixture is tossed into the bowl also, some of it missing its mark, but I am still told,
“Gramma, I can do it myself!”
Water is poured into a measuring cup she now claims as her own and poured precariously into the bowl. With a grand flourish she stirs vigorously with her own wooden spoon saved for these occasions. But never, never fear, she does not forget the very necessary sampling of the batter time and time again. With already sticky and often licked fingers, she begins to form the cookies on the sheet.
Suddenly, she stops, pauses a second or two, and then with a huge sigh says, “Gramma, I’m bored. You finish the cookies. I want to garden. I want to plant flowers! Common, Gramma! Now!”
The cookies are abandoned. She drags me to the patio where pots of fresh potting soil wait to be planted with flower seeds….and….and….but I’m afraid our gardening adventures are another story for another day.
Tammy Embrich -- Full time work from home, writer, blogger, YouTube content creator, and LOVES playing with makeup. She is the proud grandmother of 2 wonderful grand blessings. You can visit Tammy at MakeUp Products Online .
Tammy Embrich -- Full time work from home, writer, blogger, YouTube content creator, and LOVES playing with makeup. She is the proud grandmother of 2 wonderful grand blessings. You can visit Tammy at <a href="https://www.makeupproductsonline.com"><strong>MakeUp Products Online </strong></a>.
