Christmas Cookies...a kick-off to the '08 Holiday Season!

Chef Ladybug proudly shows off her masterpiece...Christmas cookies that she decorated!

Don't you just love the gingerbread man on the bottom row in the middle? LOL

The "bestest" part....eatting them!

One final touch....

Concentrating on her work....

Lauren LOVES to use the mixer.

This is the scene that I'll always picture in my mind...my little girl standing on a chair because she is too little to comfortably reach the stove.

I couldn't think of a better way to kick off the Christmas season then to spend time in the kitchen baking with your child. We made all sorts of Christmas shapes using some cookie cutters from our collection. Lauren loved decorating them, and I just let her take charge of that part. As you can see by the picture above, you'll never find a more colorful batch of cookies even if you try! It was so much fun!

Lauren has been enjoying cooking in the kitchen with us since she was 2. I love nothing more then to be cooking in the kitchen and then hear the sound of her dragging one of our kitchen chairs across the kitchen floor. It is times like this that I step back, close my eyes, and try to remember the sound since these moments will be gone far too quickly.

Lauren's love of cooking all started with that Thanksgiving in 2005 when she helped us peel potatoes, and she'd been hooked ever since. How many of you know that Lauren stars in her own cooking show...the Cooking with Lauren show? In the summer of 2007, I made a cooking show when Lauren was 3 1/2. The hardest part about the video was coming up with a song. So, I "borrowed" an idea from another blog and used the same song that another mom used in her cooking video. I edited the video and set it to music on a computer software program that I have called Pinnacle Studio. It is designed to make slide shows and movies using video, music, and digital pictures. It is actually a hobby of mine, and I've made several little videos. I should post them on this blog some time!


Happy baking, everyone!