Baking Day

I awoke Sunday to the sound of gentle rain tapping on my roof and a not-so-gentle baby coughing phlegm on my chest.

The cold has returned. The slime knows no bounds.

Corey bundled up Natalie and headed for church. Connor stayed with me and the smiling but sneezing Teyla. I decided there's only one appropriate answer to a cool and gray Sunday, and that is to bake.

It took me a while to get down to business. Blame Teyla. The poor thing would manage to nurse herself to sleep, amidst a tussle of snuffles and gasps. But when I tried to lay her down in her crib, she would wake up and cry most pitifully, reaching out for me with her sweet little hands. I couldn't leave her. Sixty seconds later, of course, she was laughing at Connor and sneezing small monsoons of germs across my kitchen. Such is the nature of the Love Well children when they are sick.

But by 3:00, after four failed nap attempts, I pulled out my beloved red Kitchen-Aid and got to work. Butter was creamed with peanut butter and brown sugar. Chocolate chips spilled across the counter. Vanilla was sniffed. (Can anyone add vanilla to a recipe without inhaling more deeply?) Black bananas were pulled from the back of the fridge and made into bread. And the pièce de résistance -- I heated oil, honey and water, added flour, yeast and salt, mixed in two sunny eggs and spent ten immensely satisfying minutes kneading and braiding challah loaves, Corey's favorite.

Last Sunday, I spent the day hiking among fiery trees, screaming down a mountain next to Lake Superior, throwing off my jacket and admiring the sunshine.

And today, I turned on my fireplace to fight off the chill and baked three dozen cookies, two loaves of banana bread, two loaves of challah -- and I made homemade meatballs for our spaghetti dinner.

This is how I know fall has arrived.