Monthly Archives: December 2007

Resolute

It’s that time of year again. Time to watch post-stroke Dick Clark mumble his way through the “Rockin'” New Year’s Eve, start thinking about taking down the decorations, stop counting cookies as one of the major food groups and generally get one’s house in order for the new year. And resolutions. Time for resolutions. Actually, I think last year I resolved to give up making new year’s resolutions, but screw it. I’m a creature of habit, and now is as good a time as any to set some goals for self- improvement. Here are mine:

1. Get healthier. Please to note: this is NOT code for “lose weight.” One of the ways in which I want to be healthier is in my mental attitude about my physical shape. So I’ma try to stop crucifying myself on a daily basis for not being a size 6, one. It’s a drag, and I’m running out of wooden crosses. Two, I need to find a way to be physically active on a regular basis. More, I need to find a way to do this joyfully, so I’ll be able to KEEP doing it. This is a real toughie for me, especially in winter, because I HATE being cold, y’all. HATE IT. So all those picturesque winter sports like skiing and ice-skating and such are RIGHT. OUT. I’m going to start up with T-Tapp and see how that goes, and come the thaw (in, like, May) try to be better about getting out and about with the Hatchling on a daily basis.

2. Get greener. Like the frog said, it ain’t easy, but I’ve been meaning for a while to give up disposable grocery bags, and this year I’m gonna do it, by gum. When I lived in CA I was really good about keeping canvas bags in my car to use for shopping purposes, but I slipped back into bad habits when I moved home to the Midwest. However, I’ve collected a nice assortment of non-disposable bags that I’m going to start keeping on the porch so they’re right there when I leave the house. It’s what Al Gore would want!

3. Give back to the community. Just before Christmas, I joined the Parents Advisory Council for Minneapolis Early Childhood Family Education. It’s a volunteer group that does fundraising for ECFE and builds awareness of the program and its benefits through community events. I figure since I’m benefitting from ECFE (and also since I think it’s like the best thing since sliced bread) I oughta do my part, you know? I’m incredibly lazy about volunteering er, extremely protective of my time – but it will be good for me to do this, both from a community service perspective and from a get-mommy-the-hell-out-of-the-house perspective.

That’s it. Just three. Don’t wanna take on more than I can reasonably be expected to achieve. What are your new year’s resolutions?

Christmas pictorial

We baked cookies. Lots and lots of cookies.
Sugar Cookies

Presents were opened.
Christmas cherub

Drawings were drewed.
A little quiet time

MORE presents were opened.
Christmas morning

We took pictures of it all.
Work it ...

Overall, a most satisfactory holiday. Here’s hoping yours was the same. Now go decorate a virtual gingerbread house. MUCH neater than the real thing.

Embarrassing moments in heterosexuality

Scene: a coffee shop with a large play area, where I’m having a playdate with lovely new friend J, who just happens to be a lesbian, and her 18-month-old daughter.

J (referring to her daughter’s gorgeous hair): Yeah, she didn’t get those curls from me!

Me (thinking): But [partner] has kind of curly hair, right?

J (looking quizzically at me): Uh … yeah, she does, but …

Me (actually slapping own forehead): Oh, my god. ACK. Sorry!

J (laughing): No big deal, we actually say stuff like that all the time.

Lawsy. At least the Hatchling wasn’t old enough to realize what a dork her Mamala is.

Tired. Really. Now have some soup.

Between various kinds of family insanity (’tis the season!), last minute Christmas prep, and the Hatchling having a bad head cold and consequently being Madame Le Cranqueass, I am tired, y’all. In fact, I’m taaaaaaaahred. I’m sure I have interesting things to blog about, but I can’t recall what any of them are. So instead I’m giving you yet another recipe, this one for something savory. Maybe you can have it before you eat the sugar cookies. It’s quick, easy, and oh-so-yummy; just spicy enough on a cold winter day; and you can either put it together right before you eat it or let it simmer in a crock pot all day and make the house smell tantalizing.

Spicy Peanut Soup with Chicken
adapted from Bon Appetit
1 pound skinless boneless chicken breast halves, cut into 3/4- to- 1-inch cubes
1 tablespoon hot sauce
4 cups low-salt chicken broth
1/3 cup creamy peanut butter
2 tablespoons tomato paste
3 tablespoons butter
1 1/2 cups chopped onion
2 tablespoons all purpose flour
1 cup drained canned diced tomatoes in juice
1 cup canned carrot slices, drained
Combine chicken cubes and hot sauce in medium bowl and toss to coat well. Sprinkle with salt and pepper and toss again. Whisk chicken broth, peanut butter, and tomato paste in another medium bowl to blend. Melt butter in large pot over medium-high heat. Add chopped onion and sauté until tender, about 8 minutes. Add chicken and sauté until no longer pink on outside, about 3 minutes. Sprinkle with flour and cook 1 minute, stirring occasionally.

Add broth mixture, tomatoes, and carrots to pot. Simmer until chicken is cooked through and flavors blend, about 5 minutes. (Or until you’re ready to eat – it can stew a good long while.) Season soup to taste with salt and pepper. Serve.

Cookies I have baked

It’s baking season, y’all. This past weekend I made:

Gingerbread cookies (approx. twelvety billion)
Domino cookies* (about 5 dozen)
White chocolate dipped pretzels (a bag’s worth)
Dough for sugar cookies

Upcoming:
Rolling out, cutting out, baking and decorating said sugar cookies
Bourbon Balls
Mini-panettones

I do not mess around with the Christmas baking. Now here’s my great-grandmother’s sugar-cookie recipe. These are so damn good it’s probably illegal.

Oma’s Sugar Cookies

4 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp nutmeg
Mix these all together and set aside.

1 cup butter
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 egg
1/2 cup sour cream
1 tsp vanilla
Beat butter, sugar, and egg together until light. Mix in sour cream and vanilla. Add flour mixture and mix well. Chill in the refrigerator for at least two hours or overnight. Roll out chilled dough to 1/4 inch thick and cut into shapes. Bake at 375 degrees for 10-12 minutes or until edges are just beginning to brown. Frost with sour cream frosting: 1/2 lb. powdered sugar and 1 tablespoon sour cream.

* You know: Club crackers sandwiched with peanut butter and then dipped one side in dark chocolate and one side in white chocolate. To quote Mr. Squab, “they pretty much have everything you could want.”

Toddlers of Mass Destruction

This last Thursday, we had dinner with the Hatchling’s BFF Fiona and her lovely mama. We gorged ourselves on pasta from Fat Lorenzo’s, and by the end of the meal the girls’ shirts were so completely besmirched with alfredo sauce, there was nothing for it but to remove them entirely. And all I have to say about that is this:

If there’s anything cuter than two pot-bellied little girls running topless around my living room and tickling one another, someone should alert Homeland Security, BECAUSE IT WOULD BE LETHAL.

Dinner with Fiona: the aftermath

Ticklefest

You’re damn right, it does

William Shakespeare

This squab hath a pleasant seat.

Which work of Shakespeare was the original quote from?

Get your own quotes:

via Brazen Hussy

Bookish meme

I done been tagged.

Total Number of Books?
Ehm … a bagajillion? I honestly have no idea how many books I own. Doing an extremely rough estimate by linear feet of shelves, I have over 1,100 out in the house, plus probably another 800 or so in boxes in the basement or at my dad’s house … so let’s say around 2,000. It’s a nice round number. I’ve only managed to categorize a fraction of them into my LibraryThing account (are you on LT? Friend me!), but someday I’d like to have them all in there.

Last Book Read?
His Dark Materials trilogy, by Philip Pullman. I figured I’d better reread them in time for the movie, though with the reviews that’s been getting I might not bother.

Last Book Bought?
Lessee … probably the last book I bought was First Among Sequels by Jasper Fforde. Oh, no – that’s the second-to-last. The LAST one I bought was the Penguin edition of Jane Eyre, because all I had was a hardcover copy of the complete works and that’s a pain in the ass to read.

Five Meaningful Books?
Jesus. Meaningful to whom? Meaningful how? I think I’m going to take a “desert island” approach to this one. Also I’m going to cheat:

Complete Works of William Shakespeare. It’s, like, the alpha and omega, man. You want “meaningful,” it’s all in here.

The Complete Works of Jane Austen. If pressed, I could be convinced to limit this entry to Pride and Prejudice, which is my favorite. But it’s my damn list, so I’m gonna cheat how I wanna.

The Peter Wimsey mystery novels, by Dorothy L. Sayers. THE BEST murder mysteries ever written. You will never convince me otherwise. There are other good writers out there, sure, but in this genre Sayers is the queen.

Plato’s Republic. Enough to think about in this one to last you several lifetimes. That Socrates was one freakishly smart cookie.

The Oxford English Dictionary. Unabridged, of course. I realize this choice might look like my idea of a pun on “meaningful,” but while I’m certainly capable of that sort of joke, this would be on the list regardless. There is a bunch of fascinating shit in that book, know what I’m saying? Plus if you get the compact version it comes with this little drawer and a magnifying glass. That is teh coolest.

Tag 5 Others
Ali at a drop in the ocean
Questionable
Sarah at the caffeinated priest
Eric with a “C”
Katie at Not Done Yet

Parenting Trials

So, last week? The week I basically didn’t post anything? Was a really, really rough week, parenting-wise. I don’t know what it is about almost-20-months old, but lately everything is a mommy vs. Hatchling battle, and I’m sure I don’t need to tell regular readers who’s winning. One low point was when I accidentally engineered it so the Hatchling walked face-first into the bookshelf in her bedroom. I was putting her down for a nap, the room was already dark, and I asked her to close the door and come over to me in the rocking chair. Across the room. In the dark. Real smart, no? We’ve done it before with no harm, but Fate wasn’t letting us off that easy again. She misdirected and walked past me into the bookcase. I heard the thump, followed by the howl of pain, grabbed her and rocked and comforted her, and once she’d calmed down I put her down for her nap. When she woke up and I finally saw her with the light on, she had a huge (ok, not that huge, but freakishly large to my guilt-addled mind), oozing, bloody sore on her little button nose. Arrrgh. BAD MOMMY.

But what’s been worse is that, for whatever reason, she was just having a tough week. Not sleeping well, not eating very well, and holy short fuse, batman. If I had a nickel for every meltdown in the last 7 days … okay, I’d have like $1.50, but that’s a lot of meltdowns! And these aren’t your standard, run-of-the-mill tired or hungry or whatever meltdowns. They’re meltdowns with no discernible cause, or with such a minor discernible cause that you think it CAN’T be THAT. I mean, really? You’re going to pitch a fit because you dropped your baby-doll? It’s right there! Just pick it up again! OK, I’ll pick it up again. Jesus, just calm down!! And so forth. While I consider myself a fairly patient person, I’m finding that I do not cope well with tantrums of this sort. I’ve been getting irritated and impatient, and then snappish and generally unpleasant. With a one-year-old, for chrissakes. I mean, she’s ONE. She’s going to have unreasonable tantrums. I knew this going in. Why am I letting it get under my skin? BAD MOMMY.

Part of the reason, I expect, is that I’ve been having some sleep issues again, and sleeplessness tends to deplete one’s reserves of calm for dealing with cranky toddlers. Either I’ve been up too late reading, or when I go to bed on time I have restless, nightmare-ridden sleep. Super fun! So we’re going to throw some pills at that particular problem tonight (not prescription pills, though – did I mention that Mr. Squab’s new insurance doesn’t kick in until next week?) and see if we can adjust our mental attitude this week. Wish me luck.

On the plus side, I actually mailed out almost all of my Christmas cards today. So there’s that, which is nice.

Nerd Alert

I actually have quite a few things to blog about this week – I got tagged for a book meme, there are some recipes to share, we just decorated for Xmas so I could post some photos – but I just spent about three hours completely reorganizing my address book on Gmail so it’s all up-to-date and collated and ordered by last name, so now it’s time for bed. The nerdiest part is that I found this to be an extremely satisfying way to spend an evening.