And that's when I knew I had lost my mind.

Almost the entire month of December has passed by, and I haven't had the urge to do any holiday baking. Until today, that is. I don't know what got into me, but I made the turn down the baking aisle at the grocery store, and I suddenly started throwing things in the cart: butterscotch chips, toffee pieces, sprinkles, powdered sugar. There was no one there to stop me, and clearly, I was unable to control myself.

When I got home I had the brilliant idea to bake gingerbread people and have Lola help me decorate them. This was to be the ultimate bonding experience. Mother and daughter, decorating cookies together, with Josh Groban singing sweet songs of Christmas in the background.

Not that we don't engage in other mother-daughter bonding experiences. Just yesterday, we both rubbed lotion on our feet (on our own feet, not each other's feet) and then put on fuzzy socks. It was a like a small glimpse into a future of pedicures and drinking margaritas while poolside.

As you can tell, our foot lotion experience made me very optimistic.

Even though my friend Maria had just told me about her experience decorating cupcakes with an almost two-year-old (in which the toddler proceeded to frost a single cupcake, then lick off all of the frosting, repeating this cycle several times), I believed Lola and I could do this together. That this would be fun.

Riiiiiight.

So, I baked the gingerbread people, made some frosting, set out the sprinkles and M&Ms, and then,

Lola grabbed the sprinkles and dumped them all over the floor.



She did not appreciate the paparazzi capturing this moment.




After the sprinkle incident, I decided to roll with it. You know, sprinkle spills are bound to happen, right? No biggie.

So, then Lola decided that she wanted to be in charge of the M&Ms. I gave her the bag, and while I am sure you expect to hear that she then dumped that bag on the ground too, please note that no, the M&Ms did not go on the floor.

Instead, they all went into her belly.

(Thank God Josh was sleeping when this happened (and that he doesn't read this blog), because if he knew how many M&Ms she ate, I would be in big trouble.)

And let me tell you, Lola, as I discovered tonight, can eat a lot of M&Ms. I've always wondered how she would behave if she was presented with the opportunity to eat an unlimited supply of something. Would she be like Archie and eat until he gets full and then walk away from the bowl? Or would she be like Gizmo and eat and eat and eat until her belly swells up and she can no longer move?

Clearly, there is a reason why Lola and Gizmo get along so well.

But, don't worry, she didn't eat so many that her belly exploded. Instead, she ate enough that she kind of wigged out and I just couldn't take a photo of that sort of crazy.

So, we brushed her teeth (a lot) and then she went to bed. I finished the cookies, and they look just alright to me.