Reward or punishment?

Alicia & her family get together this time of year to make cookies...& this year she invited me to come over as well.  

I was happy & appreciative that she invited me - I mean, wasn't that a nice thing for them to do - to include me in the family fun day of baking?

UHM...after I got there I quickly started to wonder if they DON'T like me & this was my punishment?

When I got there the first batch of chocolate chip cookies had burned.  I should've taken that as a sign (because they are my favorite!) but I did not.

Next up was sugar cookie decoration.  Ya'll - they let these kids decorate these things all on their own.  No one helping with icing, no one supervising sprinkle disbursement,  no dirt devil under each chair, no plastic wrap on the floors or walls.

Madness, I tell ya...

 I had the privilege of sitting next to Jake.  If you aren't familiar w/ Jake - he is like a little nuclear ball of energy & noise.  First he iced a gingerbread man... in this pic he is getting ready to apply sprinkles.

 It didn't take long for the sprinkles to invade the icing bowls.

 And what I wasn't fast enough to get here was Nora sticking her tongue in the sprinkle bottle.

(That's about the time Alicia told me, 'Oh don't worry - we DO NOT eat these cookies!'  

Thank GOD - I was really starting to wonder about them...)

 Just a couple of cookies in & it was time to lick the icing off the knives...

 I may or may not have encouraged Colton to lick the knife again because I wasn't fast enough to get his pic the first time.

You're welcome...

 Jake said (in his loud, nuclearized, jacked up on sugar voice) 'HEY LOOK - I'M USING THE OTHER END OF THE KNIFE.'  

Good thinking, Jake.

 My job was to cringe & attempt to hold my mouth shut put the completed masterpieces onto the cookie sheet.  It's a dirty job, but somebody had to do it.   

 Alicia & I decided that THIS cookie was the ugliest of the bunch...

 Look closely at the table---see al the sprinkle schrapnel?  The floor was just as bad.  I told them they need to invest in large rolls of plastic...

 The kids LOVE to help w/ the baking & Jake used his energy for good (& not all evil) as he was the biggest help of them all.  He rolled almost all of the Snickerdoodles.

 Alicia had to take a few power naps during the day.  Watching all that baking is EXHAUSTING.

 We took a little break to watch Home Alone.  Colton found a nice seat on top of Jake.

 For chocolate chip cookie batch round 2 Colton had taken a spot at the sink to 'wash' dishes.  He had water up to his elbows.  

 I don't know if I've ever seen this many cookies in my life.  All the containers were full & we had chocolate chip & no-bakes on the table.  (And YES I witnessed Alicia eat cookies, dough AND chips.)

Thanks again (I THINK?) for inviting me over.  It was a fun afternoon!