A Christmas to Remember by Jenny Hale Read Free Book Online Page A

you rather have pancakes?” she asked.
    Their eyes were as big as saucers. “Yes!” Olivia answered.
    “With chocolate chips or bananas? Or both?”
    “Both,” David finally spoke.
    “Yes, both!” Olivia said hopping on her toes.
    “Perfect. Let’s go make pancakes. After that,” she pulled out the small bottles of food coloring that she’d brought from her last job, “I’d like to take these out into the snow and make a rainbow volcano. Would you like to join me?”
    She hadn’t heard such noise come from these two since she’d gotten there. They were whooping and stomping and giggling all at once.
    “ That’s the answer I wanted to hear,” she smiled and stood back up. “Now let’s go make those pancakes.”
    When they got to the kitchen, Carrie pulled two chairs over to the sink. “Wash your hands, please. We need clean hands to make our breakfast. Hold them out.” She squirted foamy soap in each of their hands, piling it up as if they were holding a fistful of whipped cream. When they started to laugh, she squirted more until their little fingers were lost in the suds. “Hang on. I don’t think I’ve put enough on. Rub them together,” she said, trying to hide her own laughter at seeing their expressions, and squirting more. The children looked at each other, clearly trying to decide if she was serious. Then, she turned on the water and asked them to rinse.
    After hand washing was complete, Carrie scooted their chairs over to the island in the center of the kitchen. It was a large slab of granite with cherry wood cabinets underneath and sleek, chrome drawer-pulls and handles. “Hop up,” she told the kids, and they climbed onto the chairs again. Olivia was on one side of the island and David on the other. All they were doing was standing on chairs, but they were giggling like crazy. Olivia’s chest rose and fell with every giggle, her eyes darting from side to side, and David’s smile was wide and jovial, his dimple showing on his cheek just like his baby picture.
    “Why are you laughing?” Carrie asked, nearly laughing herself at the sight of them.
    “I’m very tall,” Olivia said with a grin that spread across her entire face. She put her hands on the counter and leaned on it, hopping up and down in her chair. Carrie laughed and shook her head. She’d missed this age. She set the flour, baking powder, salt, and sugar in front of her and began measuring out the amounts into a bowl she’d found in the cabinet beside the sink.
    “Let’s make sure your hands are dry,” she said, wiping Olivia’s fingers with a towel. “You’re in charge of mixing.”
    “What do I do?” she asked.
    “Put your hands in the bowl. Then, wiggle your fingers until it’s all mixed up.”
    Olivia put her hands into the bowl of dry ingredients. “Oh!” she said. “It’s soft!” She wiggled around, sending a cloud of flour into the air.
    “Perfect. You’re doing great! Keep going!”
    “But what will I do?” David said, his lips twitching downward in disappointment.
    “Not to worry, you get to be the river maker.”
    “The what?” he asked, his face lighting up.
    Carrie set the milk down in front of David, along with an egg and some butter. “You’re going to make a river in Olivia’s mountain of flour. A milk and egg river. Have you ever cracked an egg before?” she asked him.
    He shook his head.
    “Okay then. We’ll need to practice.” She pulled out another bowl and three more eggs from the fridge, setting them in front of David. “Still mixing over there Olivia?”
    Olivia had so much flour in her hair that it looked like cotton candy. “Yes!” she said as a clump of flour sailed overboard onto the counter.
    “Excellent. Now, David. Here’s an egg. Tap it along the side of this bowl until you see a crack in it. Give it a good whack.”
    David tapped. Then harder. And harder, his little toes pressing against the chair in concentration, until he yelped, the yolk drooling down