Being a parent is a job that comes with many challenges. How we handle those challenges is up to us. One would think that with a job this important, there would be a manual that would be given out before you left the hospital with your new baby. But that is not the case. Instead we hear words of advice from our parents and friends, read articles in magazines, ask our doctors countless questions, and pray like crazy. And most of the time we do the right thing.
Right now, a friend of mine is going through a difficult time, and I called to lend an ear if she needs someone to talk to (or yell at) and offer any other kind of support should she need it. I also brought her a gluten-free chocolate cream pie as a treat to help her through these trying times.
I started with the recipe for gluten free peanut butter cookies from Carol Kicinski’s blog “Simply Gluten Free“:
Then I crushed the cookies, added a bit of butter and pressed the mixture into a pie tin and baked it for ten minutes. Then I added the chocolate pie filling to the cooled pie shell and topped it with whipped cream and shaved chocolate so it looked as it does at the top of the page.
Tonight I thought I would also leave her with some sage advice (and a poem) from folks far wiser than me:
Children aren’t happy without something to ignore, And that’s what parents were created for. Ogden Nash
I have found the best way to give advice to your children is to find out what they want and then advise them to do it. Harry S. Truman
Don’t worry that children never listen to you; worry that they are always watching you. ~Robert Fulghum
When my kids become wild and unruly, I use a nice, safe playpen. When they’re finished, I climb out. ~Erma Bombeck
When You Thought I Wasn’t Looking
– Unknown
When you thought I wasn’t looking, I saw you hang up my first painting on the refrigerator, and I wanted to paint another one.
When you thought I wasn’t looking, I saw you feed a stray cat, and I thought it was good to be kind to animals.
When you thought I wasn’t looking, I saw you make my favorite cake for me, and I knew that little things are special things.
When you thought I wasn’t looking, I heard you say a prayer, and I believed there is a God I could always talk to.
When you thought I wasn’t looking, I felt you kiss me goodnight, and I felt loved.
When you thought I wasn’t looking, I saw that you cared, and I wanted to be everything that I could be.
When you thought I wasn’t looking, I LOOKED… and wanted to say thanks for all the things I saw when you thought I wasn’t looking.
Pie a Day Give Away 
Love that poem “When You Thought I Wasn’t Looking”!
Me too Deb. It’s so true… it reminds me of the poem “Children learn what they live.”
xxoo