The first day of Spring. A big storm — our first in two years! — looms, but all day, only rain, a fine sleet, or a few snow flurries.

Just for fun, a few of the day’s hits:

First, four hours at Panera, writing. A piece of baguette (a little larger than normal, thank you, Panera workerman) and two coffees. Back home, a quick early lunch (cabbage — the children gag it down) and then the three younger kids (my older son is at classes) and I head to town on a quest: books and ice cream.

In the car, my older daughter plugs her phone into the car stereo. Sixteen Going On Seventeen blares and the kids sing along.

Totally unprepared are you 
To face a world of men 
Timid and shy and scared are you 
Of things beyond your ken — 

Suddenly I bellow: BULL. SHIT.

The kids scream — Mom! — and shriek with laughter.

“You can sing the song as long as you understand it’s a complete lie,” I say. “Have I made my point?”

Yes, they giggle, and I have a hunch that from now on when they hear that song, they will also hear my voice in the back of their heads calling bullshit.

 It’s a good feeling.

At Dairy Queen, the kids get their free first-day-of-spring cones.

At the library, each of us collects an armful of books. I pick out some read alouds, a few books I think the younger two might enjoy, some cooking material, a book on writing, and every single book on Puerto Rico I can find — so many that when I try to carry them, a bunch of them crash to the floor, oops. 

We stop at Kline’s for a second round of cones: today only 75 cents in honor of their 75th anniversary, mint cookies and cream.

On a whim, I pull into Gift and Thrift — Summer clothes, I say, Puerto Rico’s going to be hot — and within minutes we’ve appropriated three of the four dressing rooms, swapping clothes and modeling for each other, affirming and critiquing, no minced words.

I find two dresses and a pair of sandals. My son finds five pairs of shorts and a scooter (only four dollars, so fine). Eventually the situation devolves into vintage gowns and halter tops, so we leave.

We stop into Food Lion for a red onion, cilantro, and milk, and my son spends the rest of his gift card money (y pico) on two chocolate bars, and, on the drive home — along the side of the road, plow trucks idle hopefully — he feeds us pieces.

At home, the junky weather has lifted so I go on a run. Halfway, I spy an approaching bicyclist. Right before I get to him, he pulls over to the ditch. Idiot, I think. You have plenty of space to get around me, and then I realize it’s my husband, how sweet!

Back at the house, the boys are working on a welding project…

Charlotte is feasting on a bunny, and Alice is sulking (maybe because Charlotte won’t share)..

and the girls are making a peanut butter cream pie…

Supper is chili cheese dogs, peas, chips. We linger at the table while I read aloud from one of the Puerto Rican travel books I checked out.

Mom comes over to grind wheat and then scandalizes my husband by cleaning off the table with the vacuum.

She doesn’t wash it afterward, either.

All evening, we read (though the youngest is sad because he wants to play games and no one will join him).

I read to the younger two from A Day No Pigs Would Die, and then the kids head to their rooms to continue reading and I make hot chocolate with whipped cream and flip through a couple Cook’s Illustrated magazines (making exciting plans for the next day’s cooking ventures) and then start Annie Dillard’s The Writing Life. It’s so good! I laugh out loud, interrupting my husband’s reading every two minutes with excerpts.

This same time, years previous: the quotidian (3.20.17), pop quiz: what did you eat for lunch?, the quotidian (3.21.16), piggies!, over the moon, roasted vegetables, getaway, butterscotch pudding.

This same time, years previous: last and first, all things Irish, a good reminder, the last weekend, the creative norm, warmth, no buffer, cornmeal blueberry scones, cherry pie, our house lately.

Monday it snowed (a teeny-tiny bit but it was snow so yay) so I baked cookies. In light of my sludgy cold, ginger seemed the obvious choice.

I’d first made these cookies back in December, but then I never got around to writing about them. They seemed more of a bracing, nourishing mid-winter cookie than a frivolous Christmas treat anyway, what with the whole wheat base and hefty hit of fresh ginger. Besides, to me a ginger cookie is solid everyday fare, the kind of cookie that kids can grab from the cookie jar whenever they get hungry.

Okay, okay. So I don’t let my kids eat cookies whenever they want and we don’t even have a cookie jar, but! These cookies do feel wholesome and nourishing. I mean, what with all the spices and whole wheat and vitamin-rich molasses, they’re practically good for you, right? At least that’s the story I tell myself. I’m sticking with it.

This time when I made them, the cookies were even better than I remembered. I baked the first tray fresh, not even bothering the refrigerate the dough, and the cookies spread out flat. Crispy around the edges, soft and chewy in the middle, and with that strong ginger bite, they were wildly addicting. Even though my husband was so stuffy that he couldn’t detect any flavor (because he, too, has been stricken with The Evil Cold), he so loved the texture that he ate three.

But then I let the rest of the dough sit on the counter for a couple hours while I read by the fire and my husband slept the afternoon away, and by the time I got around to baking the rest of the cookies, the flour had hydrated so that the resulting cookies weren’t quite as thin. Lesson learned: Next time, bake up all the cookie dough straight away, in one go.

Also learned: let the hot butter and spice mixture cool before adding the egg. Otherwise, you’ll be picking out little bits of scramble, oh for crying out loud.

And don’t swing to the other extreme and stick the hot pan in a slick of snow, either, because then the mixture will get painfully thick around the edges.

Basically, just calm down a little. Sometimes “taking it slow” really is faster.

Note: When I mentioned “hydrating the dough” to my mother, she busted up laughing. I tried to explain — the flour hydrates while the dough rests, duh — but my mother wasn’t having it. You mean if I let my cake batter sit out, the cake’s texture will be different? And I’m like, Well, yeah…uh, probably? And then she snorted again so now I don’t know what to think. Am I off my rocker or is she?

Fresh Ginger Cookies
Adapted from Ideas In Food.

I’ve doubled the recipe and am recording it as such. If you’re going to go to all the trouble to measure a bunch of spices, you might as well make it worth your while.

The original recipe calls for just all-purpose flour, but whole wheat adds a pleasant nuttiness.

2 sticks butter
1 cup each brown sugar and white sugar
½ cup molasses
¼ packed cup minced fresh ginger
2 tablespoons cocoa powder
2 tablespoons cinnamon
1 tablespoon, rounded, ground ginger
1 teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon each nutmeg and ground cloves
2 eggs, beaten
2 cups each whole wheat pastry flour and all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
Extra sugar, for rolling

Melt the butter in a saucepan. Add the sugars, molasses, fresh ginger, cocoa, cinnamon, ground ginger, salt, nutmeg, and cloves. Bring to a boil and then simmer gently, stirring frequently, for five minutes. Remove the pan from the heat and let cool for 20-30 minutes.

Working quickly, beat in the eggs. Stir the baking soda into the flour and then add both to the batter. Let the dough sit at room temperature for about thirty minutes to hydrate before shaping into balls, rolling in sugar (I used demerara), and placing the cookies on a parchment paper-lined (or greased) baking sheet.

Bake the cookies at 350 degrees for 9-12 minutes, depending on size and taking care not to overbake them — they should be puffy in the centers and still slightly wobbly. Let them rest on the tray for a few minutes to set up and then transfer to a cooling rack.

This same time, years previous: good writing, the quotidian (3.14.16). opening night, raspberry ricotta cake, chocolate babka, a love affair, sugar loaf, all by himself, for all we know.