cooking with chaos.

Yesterday afternoon was rich in many ways, and they all have names and faces and personalities.

It started with making bread for dinner with friends tonight.

While the bread rose, I decided I’d make granola bars, too. And maybe blueberry muffins? They sounded good.

Then a few kids joined. They came first with puzzles, sprawling on the kitchen floor while I cooked. They proudly posed with a finished puzzle, and then they all dropped it in excitement to come see the photo…and they were back to square one.

Later an older sister joined, who really loves cooking with me. We took off with the muffins.

The littlest wanted a train track set up, so we put that between the washer and oven with a few warnings of “hot, hot” and “don’t touch.”

Kids came and went, mixing and sharing jobs and toys, as we chopped vegetables and made pumpkin salsa. We made granola bars, while I explained what peanut butter was–they thought it was chocolate– and showed them how to chop peanuts in the blender. We tried chocolate chips–well received, of course–and I stopped them from sticking the granola bar spoon into the salsa.

Lay Tah Oo & Jor Gee asked if they could practice writing their alphabet, which I cheered over and obliged! They sprawled out on the floor to trace dotted letters.

We played a game that practices colors; one they absolutely love. I practiced my Burmese colors yet again and continued to stir the salsa.

The loved the hand blender as they pureed the salsa. I later cleaned blueberry muffin batter and salsa off the back wall from the hand blender experiments.

While we stirred granola bars, the kids admired photos on the wall. They noted Stephen and I being younger and newly married. They mumbled something about Jesus, and finally said something along the lines of Stephen and I and Jesus. I told them that we did love Jesus, but I was a little confused. They kept pointing to our smiles in the pictures, so I thought maybe the words for Jesus and…something else…were similar?

After some attempted dialogue, I determined that they think Stephen looks like Jesus! So adorable. They talked about their “Jesus books” and how Stephen & Jesus’ beards are the same. It was pretty adorable. And kind of made me want to give them a picture of an Asian Jesus.

They were very impressed with the cupcake liners and asked if they could each have one to take home. Honestly, I bought them in bulk about two years ago–some three hundred of them for $4?–and they are horrible. They are cheaply made, tearing when you try to peel them off and sticking to whatever you put in them. {Read: I should have known better.} Seeing their excitement over something I have been trying to use up for years, I started handing out muffin cups by the dozens.

By the end they had “washed” a number of dishes to help. They tried the sugar-topped blueberry muffins and gave raving reviews while they learned “blooo-berrrry” and gave the salsa a few disgusted faces as they headed out the door.

About an hour later, I was showered and ready for our guests to come. Yedi called me outside, where she had prepared a “spread” from the day’s compost, arranged conveniently in muffin cups.

She explained, in these words exactly: “Kelli…cook…Yedi…eye…Yedi…cook…same same!” So she watched me, and then made the same thing 🙂

This is beautiful place. These are such beautiful children and families. Some days I just don’t want to forgot how much joy they bring me in the simplest summer afternoon of cooking.