Sweet Success!

Enjoying their "tea party" at the new table Douglass Charles got for his birthday.


Charlotte enjoying yet more sugary goodness. If you like her top I got it from Katie's Creative Creations at www.facebook.com/katiescreativecreations. Too cute!

A June Cleaver I am not. Oh, you may think because I like to cook, I sew and craft, and I am ridiculously domestic that June must be my middle name. There are many reasons I am not Mrs. Cleaver - one being my lack of house cleaning skills - but first and foremost, I have NEVER been successful with making a simple and delicious chocolate chip cookie.

To me, the chocolate chip cookie is the qualifier and honestly, without this skill all one's homemaking skills don't count. Oh, I have tried many a recipe, but my cookies come out pathetic, always flat, crispy and no good after they have cooled. So... I married a man that never fails at this delicious task.

Friday afternoon it was rainy and I knew we needed a project - something to get us through until naptime. Charlotte loves baking, but with groceries slim, I wasn't sure what I had in my cabinets to muster together. I found some chocolate morsels, I normally have necessary baking goods on hand, so I decided we would make the dreaded chocolate chip cookie for dad - he hadn't been feeling so well so we wanted to cheer him up.

Determined that I would at least try to make a good cookie I pulled a cookbook off the shelf that I KNEW would have baking recipes that warranted success - my Mennonite cookbook. Now my link to this cookbook is another story I will have to share at another time, but I reminisced about the delicious cookies Mrs. Weber and Mrs. Classen used to make when I was a child - Tollhouse has nothing on these ladies.

So... I set out, Charlotte excited and we picked a recipe. About thirty minutes later after mixing, spooning the batter, and placing them in the oven I waited with baited breath - would they be flat once again? I opened the oven and much to my dismay the cookies were PERFECT! They tasted delicious and were honestly the best batch of cookies I have ever made! Even Doug, the master chocolate chip cookie maker, was impressed.

Ironically, when I went to determine where my success lay I was dumbfounded when I realized that I had taken parts from one lady's recipe and parts from another without even knowing it. Can you believe it? After nearly 30 years of trying to make the perfect cookie and I am not even sure what measurements for the ingredients I used.

At least now, even if I am never successful again, I can know that at least once in my life I conquered and created a very delicious, chewey, chocolate chip cookie. :)