i know what you're thinking.
it's going to be one of those posts.

but, actually, as far as my mother goes, this was one of the best visits. mostly because it was the shortest. long enough for her to get a fix of the kids, but short enough that i didn't want to lose my mind by the end of it. two days. perfection.

there are a few interesting tidbits to share.

a) my mother does not cook. or bake. she doesn't have a mixmaster. and she calls her cuisanart a "cuisanar" and i don't have the heart to correct her.

so, here's the story. i was getting mighty frustrated because i was making a new sugar cookie recipe for Emily's bake sale at school tomorrow. i doubled the recipe and didn't realize until halfway through that my kitchedaid is just not big enough to hold a recipe that takes 7 1/2 cups of flour. so, i took all the ingredients out and dumped them in a mixing bowl and pulled out the hand mixer i haven't used since 1998, only to realize that the mixing bowl, my biggest one, was too small as well.
so, in went the hands.
and there was my mother.
standing over my shoulder.
watching every minute.
adding her two cents.

"your dough looks like there's not enough liquid. how many sticks of margarine did you use? how many eggs? MY sugar cookie recipe has orange juice in it."

exsqeeze me? YOUR sugar cookie recipe? which one would that be? i'm fairly certain the last time my mom made homemade cookies was during the nixon administration, but, of course, hers is better than mine.

b) it's become impossible for me to believe ANYTHING i'm told about my childhood.
for example, my father will say,"your sister didn't sleep through the night until she was 2.'
but my mother will say, "your sister was sleeping through the night at 4 weeks."

now, who to believe?
i'm much more inclined to trust my dad, since my mom tends to embellish everything just a wee bit. she used to say that my brother was toilet trained before he was two, but once i had a kid who was toilet trained before she was 2, all of a sudden my brother was toilet trained at 18 months. wtf? does she honestly think that anyone's buying that????