Page 20 of Reindeer in the Headlights
It was great having both him and the kittens here full-time. I still giggled remembering the way they jumped the first time the automatic cat litter did its thing. I wished I’d had a camera at that moment.
They were the official bosses of the house. Neither my mate nor I could deny them anything. As it should be. The vet even agreed with us, giving them a clean bill of health and some vaccines they didn’t want on their first visit there. I never considered myself a pet kind of person before. Now I was 100% a cat dad, and I loved it.
Anyone coming over knew it instantly. You couldn’t walk into our house and not know it was a cat house, with their toys scattered everywhere. They were so playful. I adored watching them bat around the little stuffed catnip-filled stuffies, chasing after the feathers on the end of the wand, and using their cardboard house as a scratching post. But my favorite thing was watching them snuggle up together in the sunlight on their little sling beds that were attached to the windowsills.
It was safe to say they were spoiled beyond measure, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.
This morning, I snuck out early to hit the grocery store and pick up some baking supplies before it got too crowded. I had it in my mind that we were going to start some of our own Christmas traditions. We both had some that came from our families, but we were a new family now, and that meant it was time for us to figure out what that looked like.
I was not a baker, unless you included baking the kind you broke apart and put on a cookie sheet. They were the only kind I’d ever made before, but I printed off some recipes that were, quote “easy” off the internet and brought them with me as I navigated the aisles.
It was intense. I hadn’t known that there were so many different kinds of flour and sugar. I stacked everything in the cart, from the vanilla to the food coloring to four different kinds of sugar. Oatmeal, chocolate… you name it, it was in there. I also grabbed some cooling racks and a couple of new cookie sheets. The ones I had were warped and had been used mostly to make casseroles easier to get in and out of the oven.
As I was rounding the baking aisle, there was an end cap that had different cookie cutters. I grabbed a kit that was supposedto include everything you needed to make your own sugar cookies… everything being the rolling pin, the rolling mat, and the cutters, not the actual ingredients.
The cashier looked at my items and then at me. “Haven’t started your baking, I see.”
“No, not yet.”
“Do you have enough butter at home?”
I could kiss them. Butter was part of every recipe, and I had possibly a half pound at home, if that.
“Oh!”
“Go and get it. I got you.”
I ran to the dairy cooler. Why they put the butter at the back of the store was beyond me, and I grabbed a few pounds, unsure exactly how many I’d need, and reached the counter again just as they were ringing up the last of my items.
“Thanks, I appreciate it.”
“Been there.” She pulled a piece of paper off a notepad and handed it to me. “Here are some more holiday recipes for you.”
I looked down to see store-sponsored recipes with shopping lists, and on it were two more for cookies. “Thanks,” I said, shoving it in the bag.
I went home, where I found Wyndham outside collecting some wood from the woodshed. His leg was doing so much better; it had been a far less severe injury than it first seemed.
“I can get those for you. Go inside and get warm.” Wyndham’s eyes were on my head which didn’t have a hat.
“Naw. You finish bringing the wood, I’ll get the groceries.” It was such a silly conversation, and still, seeing him there bringing in firewood had my heart soaring. It was so domestic.
I had everything set out on the counter when he came back. He crossed over to me and kissed my cheek. “I thought you were getting a few things. This is an entire baking aisle.”
He wasn’t wrong.
“I thought we could make cookies.”
“For the entire state?”
“No, not for the entire state.” I playfully shoulder-checked him. “I thought we could make these.” I handed him the recipes, including the ones I got at the grocery store. “It seemed like it would be a good tradition for us to make cookies together.”
“I love the idea, but it might be a better idea if we pick just a couple of these. Maybe three. If we make all these cookies, we’re either going to have to go caroling and hand them out, or we’re not going to fit through the door at the end of the season.”
“Fair enough.”
We spent the afternoon following recipe after recipe, and in the end, we did have far too many cookies. This worked out because Tommy had helped with the truck, so he was going to get some. And of course, there was my brother and anyone else we might see this season.
It was such a merry gift to give. If I had thought about it at the time, I’d have picked up some of those cute little gift boxes they were selling, but I hadn’t, so Ziploc bags it was.
