cookies.

This week was hard. 

Getting back into routines... getting up early... reminding all my first graders of our routines and rules in class. 

I've been exhausted. Corey's been exhausted. 

Our house was a disaster. Truly. 

I came home this evening short on patience. Which is never good. 

I started cleaning. Clean and organized always makes me feel better. 

So the house was looking better (still not great), but I was still short on patience. 

On a whim, I grabbed the gingerbread dough from the fridge. (The dough that we never got to use on Christmas Eve.) Corey and Sophie were upstairs, so Lawson and I rolled the dough out and I let him dig in our big jar of cookie cutters. We made a batch and then had Sophie come help with a batch. (Love, love, love that ready made dough!) 

I fed them a fabulous supper of string cheese and cereal and then pulled out a stash of frosting and a few jars of sprinkles and let them go to town... 

Selfishly... I knew this would be a fun and entertaining activity for them... that I wouldn't have to be involved in. Mommy needed some quiet and some down time. The quiet was totally worth the 30 minutes it took to throw the cookies together. 

Our sweet baby in her gingerbread jammies just toddled around and spent lots of time snuggling on the couch between Corey and I.

We told the kids they could each have one for dessert. I think they each ate 1/2 of one.

Gorgeous, aren't they?!