Whoever you may be. Please look at my floors. Please notice the floors. Please walk through my house and enjoy the fantastic freshly-mopped-ness of all the hardwood.

But hurry. Because when 47 people come trampling through a short while later, some might notice the floors, but it won’t be for their fantastic freshly-mopped-ness. In fact, some people might say that it seems almost silly for me to have spent so much time mopping the entire house before a barrage of guests, the majority of whom are under the age of 10.

But I am woman. And this is what we do. I am doing it for you, dear first people who will arrive at my house today. Appreciate me.

Since some of you asked, I have posted the royal icing recipe I use for decorating cut out cookies. It really is a perfect decorative icing. It is easy to make, easy to color, and it dries rock-hard quite quickly.

Oh, and to Missy, who asked “Did your kids help?” I answer an emphatic NO WAY. Around here we make kiddie cookies and we make pretty cookies. They are two very different things.

is what several of you emailed me yesterday after I posted about our Painting With Babies episode.

Well, sorry to disappoint, but slacker blogger that I am, I did not take any pictures. Daniel’s hands were thoroughly soaked with paint and I worried that he might put them in his mouth or use them to wipe his eyes. So I rushed him into the tub and scrubbed him thoroughly before I even thought of the camera.

Child safety first, blog second. I know, I know, my priorities are so messed up.

(recipe here)

With our Oktoberfest just a couple of days away, this morning found me mixing up a triple batch of beer rolls. I needed an extra large bowl for the dough’s first rise, so I went looking for my large pasta pot. And looking. And looking. How could I lose a giant pasta pot?

In desperation, I finally called out, “Does anyone know where my pasta pot is?”

“Um, it’s up here,” Kateri answered matter-of-factly from upstairs … where she was cleaning out her pet turtle tank. “I’ll get it back to you just as soon as I take my catfish out of it.”

No problem. I’m sure Racheal Ray deals with this kind of thing all the time.

(Don’t worry, guests. I used a different pot.)

Well, not really. But my “I Love Homeschooling, I Hate Homeschooling” article is the cover story at InsideCatholic.com today.

Oh, really? Did your one-year-old overturn a gallon of white paint on the living room floor and then sit, happily splashing in it, while his older brother watched with amusement?

No? Well, then. You don’t know excitement.