Charlie's cookies, pestering siblings, and a crazy mom

During fall break this week, Ethan went to go volunteer at the  church.  They had run to Walmart for treats and snacks for the youth activities at church.  While they were there my son bought Pioneer Woman's Charlie cookie jar for my birthday present.  He mowed yards to pay for it himself.  He knows I am slowly changing my kitchen to Pioneer Woman stuff. You know what I like most about the Pioneer Woman's kitchen decor?  It goes so well with my vintage items like my Pyrex mixing bowls.  Since Charlie is a cookie jar Sophie and I decided to make cookies to "Fill Charlie's tummy".  You just have to love 7 year old innocence.  It is just too adorable.  Ethan helped out and got everything out for the recipe and Sophie washed her hands.

Then we started working on the chocolate chip cookies.  We made just the standard Toll House cookie recipe. (Just in case you want to make cookies)  For the first time I let her  crack the eggs.   It took a few tries of trying to knock it on the side of the bowl, but she managed it.  The best part, we didn't have to pick any shells out of the eggs.  She was so proud and happy.   We continued to add other ingredients to the cream bowl then I let Miss Sophie add the eggs to the mix.  Her face pouring the  eggs into the sugars for creaming was just priceless.

I even let her use the mixer for the first time.  She thought this was the bees knees.  She did great. I am so happy to say there are no ceiling splatters or splatters all over wall.  She did great.  I was so proud.  You know everybody remembers there first time cooking with mom.  Sophie did much better than I did.  My poor clean freak mom,  I believe I splattered the walls, ceiling, and both of us.  Sophie even got to scoop the batter out and put it on the trays.  She did most of the work herself and she is proud.  Sophie and I had fun.  Now that we are done she is off pestering her brother.

I have sweet kids but boy do they bug each other.  The middle one bugs the oldest, and the youngest bugs the middle one.  Well, for the most part it is my fault with an age spread like  we have (18, 14, 7)somebody is bound to get on somebody's nerves.  They yell and bluster and drive each other as well as mom and dad crazy but when it is all said and done.  They all love each other.

Antique Pillowcase dress shoot

This last weekend, I spent the day with Little Miss doing photo shoots.  She absolutely loves doing shoots.  She begs to do them, and when we are through and heading home she gets sideways with me.  These are some of the pictures from our second set of pictures.  Daddy showed us this little piece of photography heaven in the downtown area of our little corner of the world.   As a utility worker, he knows were all the really beautiful or funky spots are to shoot in town.  Daddy worked as our photography assistant on this day.  

In these pictures, Little Miss rocked a pillowcase dress made from an actual pillowcase.  I got it at an antique store.  It was a single pillowcase and didn't have a match so I didn't feel so bad about making a dress out of it.  This particular pillowcase was hand embroidered and had a beautiful hand tatted lace edge. I made her wings too.  I was inspired by Wife Made

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Little Miss came up with this pose all by herself.  I don't have to pose her much.  She generally comes up with her own poses and if I shoot she will give me gold.  The camera really loves her.

 This is one of my favorites of this shoot.  Her running through the grass with the side of a torn down building in the back ground is beautiful to me.  The quilt top she is running with is one I made from scraps from outfits I have made for her and her brothers.  So this picture has many memories in it.  I will be printing and framing this one.  I will be hanging it in our living room.

I love the simplicity of this shot and the compliment of the blue painted brick with her dress.

At this point she was starting to get tired and flustered

 at her older brother.  He was on the other side of the 

street riding his skateboard.  The noise the board made

 made her mad.  Her blood glucose was also dropping so 

mood swings were starting to abound.  In between shots, Little Miss would yell at her brother.  "Stop making that noise."  And "You are so annoying."  Momma had enough and called it good.