On a Saturday when I was a kid, my mom had all of us children cleaning in our unfinished basement. The basement collected all sorts of things so this
was a monumental task destined to last for the whole day! After a while, I snuck away and decided that, as a surprise, I would make cookies for
everyone while they were cleaning. So I began. I got out a bowl and a spoon. And then… how do you make cookies? I took a long pause as I thought.
Definitely flour. Sugar. Oh, probably an egg. After some experimentation, and certainly no use of measuring cups, I heard someone coming upstairs.
They would find me! Panicked, I looked about for a place to hide the bowl. On the floor next to the fridge! (Although almost any other spot on
the floor would have hidden it better) and I dashed upstairs to hide. In a few minutes my older sister found me and showing me the bowl she asked,
“Do you know what this is?” I had to confess I knew nothing of how to make cookies and my plan to surprise and delight everyone was a complete
failure. She took it down to my mom and explained for me. I felt miserable. I had done a dumb thing and now I would get in trouble.
As a mom myself now I often reflect on how I was raised and disciplined. I look at how other parents respond to their children’s behavior and how
their children respond to them in turn. I read about child development. But even with all this, there are plenty of times I find myself angry with
my kids and not knowing what to do with them! Surely my mother felt this way many times.
at all times, and I wanted to be just like her. Isn’t that what it’s like to be a grown-up, you finally know everything? As a teenager, I sat at
the same counter listening to my mother tell me about her faults and how she was trying so hard to be like her sister. Inwardly it made me laugh,
because they seemed like such little things to me compared to all her good qualities. But the most poignant thing about these expression of weakness
was how hard she kept trying to be better. So with my own children I keep trying and learning.
will work to perfect what they see. A child looks at their parents with the most forgiving eyes. They naturally love and adore their parents. This
creates an intense desire to copy and even do better.
wrong. She was gentle in talking to me, and I knew she loved me. But that didn’t mean I liked it. So when I went back down stairs with my sister
and my failed cookie dough I wasn’t looking forward to talking to my mom.
pantry and got out her cookbooks. She and my older sisters began looking through for a recipe they could use to transform my mess into actual cookies.
They reasoned that the closest thing would be to turn it into a triple batch of Mrs. Field’s Cookies. When it was finished I remember my mom and
older sisters saying it wasn’t very good, but I thought it was fantastic! I remember sitting on the steps in our garage with my cousins and the
two sisters closest to me in age, eating that cookie dough and taking about it.
day than just the importance of using a recipe when cooking. I learned that mistakes can be fixed. I learned to be patient and kind and understanding
because little children are often trying to do something good. I learned that even imperfection can be delicious with the right attitude. But most
importantly, I knew that she loved me more than she cared about whether I made a mess or tried to get out of doing chores.
– AnnaLisa Davis
