Cookies and Toddlers

You guys!  I have been making  chocolate chip cookies  on the regular for about 2 years in the effort to perfect them.  Today,  think I finally did.

2 sticks melted butter
2 eggs at room temp (this is key, I think)
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp almond extract
2 1/2 cups flour (spoon the flour into the measuring cup and err on the scant side)
1/2 tsp salt
some cinnamon (not very much, but I did not measure)
1 heaping heaping tsp baking soda
 2-ish BAGS semi-sweet chips (Whole Foods store brand.  Could use 2 full bags, but today, I think I ate a half a bag while making the cookies so it was more like a bag and a half-- WHY CAN'T I LOSE WEIGHT??)

Preheat oven to 375.  No rush on the preheating because you have to leave the dough in the fridge for awhile. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.  Mix together melted butter and sugars by hand with a big spoon.  Barely mix.  Add egg and vanilla.  Stir together flour, salt, cinnamon, and baking soda.  Fold into liquid mixture.  Add chips.  EAT A TON of raw dough and wonder why your stomach hurts and you are not hungry for dinner.  You have to refrigerate this dough for at least 3 hours, which is crucial but kind of a bummer. Make teeny little teaspoon cookies because they will get super flat and spready.  You can make about 7 dozen, and they are like 92-ish calories a cookie.  Bake at 375 for 8 minutes (7 minutes on the bottom rack).  Let them finish cooking on the cookie sheets until you get aound to putting  them on cooling racks.  The last 2 or 3 dozen (depending on your cookie sheet stash) will probably stay on the cookie sheets until they are all gone which should be soon because DAMN.

And there you have it.  The culmination of countless batches of cookies and many, many recipes.  My personal cookie nirvana.

Ok, so, there's the cookies.

Now, the toddler.

 My sweet little baby has turned into one.

 Full-on.  She's a kid.

 A kid whose hair fits into a ponytail and who stole one of my old purses.  It's a really good size for her.

 SHE'S NOT A BABY ANYMORE.

She's pretty rough and tumble-- "rock" is a a prominent word in her vocabulary because she loves rocks.

She still nurses, but she certainly doesn't ft neatly in my arms.

She loves to hide which can be scary as hell, and she adores her puppy. Her brothers are her favorite, and she gives the sweetest back-patting hugs.

 Toddlers are the BEST-- I think kids get exponentially cuter until age 3, and Dorothy is exploding lately.  But wasn't she JUST a baby?