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Gaia entered the kitchen, pondering what to throw together as a quick bite to eat with quality. Her mind raced with possible options while debating them with her tongue and stomach. Once at the refrigerator door to survey the top and interior of the appliance, she began to hear soft yet sporadic footsteps on approach, knowing them to be her young daughter's.
"Mommyyyy?~" chimed the young snake faunus, wondering what she was up to despite being told not even 40 seconds ago.
Gaia's attention snapped to her right to find her daughter smiling towards her. After a brief moment to pause the train of thought on what to eat, Gaia responded to her daughter's question with a simple "yes?" Before resuming, albeit at half speed to continue listening to her child.
"Can we have some cooies? I'm huuuungry" came the toddler’s response. Unaware that her mother was already considering some homemade sweets.
Gaia lightly chuckled at the adorable request. "Only if you tell me what a 'cooie' is, sweetheart" the lack of a letter in the word made her smile grow even more after it danced across her own tongue.
Gemma put a hand on her chin while remembering the look and more specifically the taste of the sweets she was wanting. Though her limited vocabulary stunted her ability to accurately describe them beyond what she was repeating in her mind. 'Well they're good, and they're... good' continued as she thought more and more about the homemade cookies. Until a revelation hit her that she wasn't told expressly that what she wanted wasn't out of the question.
"So... you will make some cooies?" Asked Gemma with a giddy smile at the mention of her wish being affirmed by herself
Gaia lightly rolled her eyes while keeping her grin. "Yes, I will make you some coo-k-ies, if you help me."
The statement alone was all Gemma needed to hear, happily clapping her hands together twice before stepping into the kitchen. After thanking her mother, she made her way to the fridge to watch her mother's every move in how to create the sweets she wanted.
Gaia smiled before finally opening the refrigerator to scan its contents for key cold ingredients. Settling on milk, butter, eggs, chocolate chips and a jug of juice to drink while making and eating the cookies. Then proceeded to find Gemma struggling to climb onto a stool at the counter, begging for help up.
Carefully lifting Gemma up, Gaia began preparing the ingredients, letting Gemma help by passing her the measured sugar and flour to add to the mixture. Once all the ingredients were in the bowl, Gaia plugged in the hand mixer and started mixing the batter.
Gemma was having a fantastic time with her mom, mixing the batter, and shaping the cookies, even if she knew her mother caught her sneaking a handful of chocolate chips. The two of them filled a baking pan with 25 splotches of the cookie dough before Gaia grabbed it to place it in the oven, talking softly about the temperature and time she normally settled for with her cookies made without an expressed recipe.
While Gaia did, Gemma took a peek into the 15-pound bag of flour to find the same fluffy white powder from earlier that she adored the texture of. After a quick thought danced across her mind of bringing snow to their springtime weather, she was sold on her own idea almost instantly. And began pulling the large bag of flour towards herself until it began to tip, while Gaia was none the wiser, ensuring their temperature was set and that Gemma didn't leave any chocolate chips on the tray instead of on the cookies.
Gemma got her mother's attention back from the stove once she let out a playful shriek as the flour began to pour heavier by the second, and the bag grew increasingly lighter. She giggled as it fell first on her, and then to the floor.
Gaia snapped her attention over to find her daughter now letting herself drop out of the stool, landing her shoes in the flour, causing it to spread even further from the initial pile. It took a solid four seconds before Gaia's mind processed enough information to ask out, "why?" To her daughter now kicking even more of the powdery matter across the kitchen floor, giggling the whole time.
"It's like snow, mommy!" Cheered the toddler now lowering herself down on her hands and knees, staining her hands in the flour. The fun of escaping into her imaginary snowy landscape kept Gemma from noticed her mother's light facepalm.
Gaia began to ask herself if this was Gemma's plan all along, to distract her before making a mess, and getting the playtime she loved in new territory like the kitchen floor.
'No, it can't be that', thought Gaia. 'She probably just wants to goof off after I said it'd take time.'
Gaia's train of thought derailed once her eyes fell on Gemma now laying fully in baking flour, before then rolling like a pin to spread the flour further out on the surface. First came the fury of making her once clean floor dirtier, before she then heard the heartwarming giggles of Gemma playing with the powder.
Gaia let go of any previous anger and simply watched her daughter have a field day playing in the flour. Even if it meant work to do later in cleaning both the floor and her baby girl, she realized that such things could be put on hold in favor of letting harmless fun run its course.
Gemma after rolling and spreading her arms to spread the flour even further looked up to find the slowly growing smile of her mother looking down at her. Neither had any words to say in mind, only each other's smiles.
Gaia couldn't help but crouch down at her daughter’s feet to watch her closer, her smile not fading an inch. "I love you, Gemma". Finding nothing more appropriate as her method of telling her daughter thank you, for how she had made the day through this alone.
"I love you too, mommy!" Replied Gemma, before returning to her creation of an indoor snow angel. Unaware that her mother had scooped up a handful of the flour and brought it to her lips, Gemma giggled once again when she felt the small cloud of powder blown onto her torso and arms, before then playfully whining about it.
Soon, the door hinges squealed to signal the opening of their front door. Immediately pulling Gaia's attention up towards the kitchen entrance to look out for their company. The huffing and sound of loud footsteps running up the stairs was enough of a signal for her to know her husband and son were back from their daily exercises and fencing lessons.
Gemma kept her smile and resumed rolling in the flour, even as she heard the faint voice of her father on approach. Her mother was out of view when she first heard Adam's surprised voice asking what happened.
"Gemma, what are you doing?"
After the question came, Gemma stopped to face her father while remaining on her back. Her smile grew even more as she announced, "I made it snow!", while tossing a loose handful up and onto herself.
Gemma rolled onto her stomach to push herself up onto her knees, revealing just how much flour coated her lime green shirt and blue shorts, as well as her hair and skin. Adam lightly shook his head before revealing a slight grin to his wife and daughter.
"You made it snow, huh?", asked Adam, going with his daughter's story to overlook the microscopic inconvenience from the mess.
"Yeah! Because who doesn't love snow and cooies!"
At the continued mispronunciation, Gaia let out a snicker. She had spent all the time of prepping them and talking to Gemma about how she learned to cook before meeting her father, yet she still kept her adorable mistake in mind enough to keep saying it.
"I know I love them, and I love that it was all your idea, Gemma", added Gaia through her smile.
Adam let out his own chortle in response to Gemma's giggle and final pushes in the flour piles before they became too spread out to clump together into large fun piles. After which, Adam began his offer to get Gemma to get out of the mess of flour.
"Come here, sweetpea", came his voice with one arm spread for her, after which he was met with a flour coated hug from his toddler daughter, and a smile of approval from his wife.
"Gemma, why don't you and daddy change out of those dirty clothes and get cleaned up, so that you don't get your cookies all dirty with flour?", suggested Gaia, hoping to mitigate the spread of the flour as much as possible, to keep from having to clean the entire floorplan of their estate.
"That's a good idea, right Gemma?", added Adam, who also was not too fond of the idea to see his house in need of such a deep clean. "Let's freshen you up for your prize of those cookies you helped making."
"Okay!", chimed Gemma before trying to let go of her crouched father, but ended up finding herself in a tighter grip, and being raised to be carried by him.
Gemma giggled as her father carried her up the stairs, grinning the whole way before they crossed paths with Aidan, who looked on in surprise at his powder coated sister being held in their dad's arms. He started to put together a sentence containing the question of why but was shut down when the father answered for him.
"Our precious Gem here made some cookies, and had a little extra fun in the process"
Upon hearing the explanation, Aidan grinned. "I gotta go see this disaster" was all the father and daughter heard before Aidan bolted down the stairs. Adam chose to ignore it and continued on to the bathroom to help start filling a bath. Gemma on the other hand scolded, thinking it was rude of her brother to joke in such a manner. Though the thought phased out of her mind almost entirely upon realizing she was getting a bubble bath to play in while she cleaned up.