C requested that we make gingerbread cookies after learning about them at school last week. I figured, sure, why not. I found a recipe, and J and I picked up the ingredients I didn’t already have in my spice cabinet. The suggestion of cookies was actually perfect as I decided we’d package them up and give them away to C’s bus drivers and his teachers as a “thank you”/Christmas gift. I love it when a plan comes together!

The boys and I combined and mixed the ingredients in the afternoon when C got home from school, then set the dough to chill. Fun fact that I did not know going into this: gingerbread dough needs to chill before the cookies can be cut.

Dough chilling, I make dinner, hubby comes home, we eat, and take a tubby. Then the boys and I head back to the kitchen to roll out the dough and bust out the cookie cutters. We make gingerbread men, gingerbread women, gingerbread kids, Santas, reindeer, ornaments, and candy canes. I pop the first batch in the oven, and the boys stare through the window to watch them bake. Another fun fact: although the dough needs to chill forever, the cookies back up in about ten minutes!

Once all the cookies are made and set out to cool, we head to bed. Around 2 AM, C wakes up. It takes about thirty minutes, but I get him back to sleep. I, however, am wide awake. I decide to be productive. I went across the hall into our junk room-turned-my-office to create labels for the cookie bags. I was still fussing with spacing and print alignment when my husband walked by and said, “There you are. I was wondering where you were.”

After he left for work, I decided that at 5 AM, with the kids still asleep, this would be the best opportunity to get my workout in alone. Usually, the boys wake up, follow me to the basement, and lay all over me when I do floor exercises.

I sneak into my bedroom because, of course, they are sleeping in there, change my clothes, then go down to the hall to our other bathroom to pee and put my shoes on. Guys, I promise you I made ZERO noise until I flushed the toilet on the other end of the house. Our house isn’t that big, but they shouldn’t have been able to hear the flush. Either way, I go down into the basement where, during COVID, A (my husband) went a little crazy filling it with gym equipment. I was just throwing my leg over the exercise bike seat when I heard it. Little, pounding footsteps going down the hall. J comes down the stairs and stops in front of the bike, and with sleepy eyes, he looks up at me and says, in a tone that doesn’t match his tired eyes, “Hi, Mommy!”

I laughed so hysterically that I thought I was going to cry. He reached his little arms up, and I had no choice but to scoop him up, soak up all that cute sleepy warmth, and snuggle my baby for 22 minutes as I rode the stationary bike. He wouldn’t let me put him down because he was scared. Of what? I have no idea. I finally convinced him that if he got down and handed me the remote control, he could watch anything he wanted on the television while I finished up.

I finished my ride, then proceeded to my floor exercise routine, which involved J trying to lay on me when I went down from a sit-up or sitting on my lap between sets. The whole time all I could think was: I should have just let it mellow…