I Blame my Brother

A couple of months ago, my brother who lives in California called me to get him a recipe. Said recipe was on the internet on a cooking website which I had to register for in order to get. Jared tends to call me whenever he needs something from the internet because he doesn't have a computer at home.

I didn't really think about the incident much until about three weeks later when I got a solicitation call from the website. It is associated with a magazine and a PBS cooking show, which of course means they have a "companion book" that goes with the series, because all the PBS cooking shows have one. This phone call offered to send it to me "risk free!" and a "free" trial issue of the magazine as well, just to see if I might like them. Isn't that nice? They caught me on a bad day. I was distracted by my kids and I was weak. I said yes, they could send it to me. I figured I'd get it here copy out the two recipes worth having and send it back.

The trick is when you have a plan like that you should never read the book. I read the book. They aren't getting it back. There's only one recipe in the book I don't plan on making and that's because it's fish and we don't eat fish around here. (Well the kids and I don't. Steve would like to but he has to suffer with a wife who can't even stand the smell of it cooking anymore.) We've tried several recipes now and each one has been fabulous. Steve's comment last night when I let him try the Orange Flavored Chicken was "wow . . . that's really bad. You should just let me eat it all." Silly boy. I wasn't falling for it because I had tried a piece myself before I let him try it. Oh and the recipes in the stupid magazine are just as good. And dang it, I want to subscribe to it too.

Now all the raving aside, the book and magazine make me giggle. This is the most Type A cooking I've encountered. I've never seen a recipe book that took so much pride in recording the process of perfecting a recipe. Each one comes with it's own little write up telling us that they tested fifteen different methods and this one is the perfect one. You musn't cook a pot roast with too much water or too little (and here's exactly what they mean by that.) Orange flavored chicken must have exactly two oranges. Pancakes are too eggy with two eggs. The scientific process of cooking is there in all it's obesessive glory. Most recipe books just give you the recipe, not Cook's Illustrated! They want you to know every single excruciating detail of creating the recipe.

Even though that's what makes me giggle, it's why I like the darn book so much. They do go to extremes to perfect a recipe. It is the best way to make teriyaki or pot roast or pork and the write ups help because it details exactly how they got those results and it makes getting the same results easier. (And also I tend to lean toward type A and I sercretly admire their thouroughness.) I also like them because the food is aproaching gormet good, but it's not even close to gormet expensive or gormet fussy. This stuff is within my budget to make and I'm pretty cheap with my food.

Which all means that when I see my brother today I can thank him for introducing me to this company. He's pretty lucky though, most people who get me to sign myself up for solicitations don't get off so easily.

T-minus 3 days and counting

Did I ever mention why I'm not blogging much these days? It's because I'm busy. not busy as in trying to get out and have fun with the kids. Busy as in going insane with all the stuff I have to do and none of it is really for me busy.

1. My sister is getting married on Saturday. It will be a lovely outdoor ceremony in a beautiful location with lots of beautiful things. She is also doing this wedding for under $2500 which means lots of stuff has to be made. Including the attendants' dresses. In my family, this means three. (my poor oldest sister had to sew five. ) Two are done and hanging in the closet and I'm working on mine right now. I'm excited to get to wear mine, because a girl can only be excited about ivory duponi silk, but I'm not excited to sew it.

2. My sister in law is getting married on the 8th. I'm not doing a lot of prep work for that but I am doing the photos. I'm starting to get a rash thinking about taking pictures in an LDS Church cultral hall. Think of the worst elementary school lighting you know. It's about that bad. I dont' think even custom white balance is going to help when the light from the bright side is white and the light from the shadowed side is a sickly green-yellow.

3. My brother decided to move his wedding from August to . . . . the 8th. which means my imediate family misses his reception and I have to be up at 6am so we can make it to his marriage at 9am an hour away, do pictures right afterward and go another 60 miles to my SIL's wedding.

4. because my sister and brother are getting married a week apart, much of the family is staying the full week. My oldest sister and her family are staying with us. They show up on Thursday. This means I'm expected to deep clean. I'm thinking she'll be lucky if my deep cleaning gets as far as the computer desk. I'll make sure the floors are picked up and vaccuumed but the baseboards are just going to have to go undusted because . . .

5. I have also had several photo shoots this month. Not complaining. I love that I'm getting business. However, it does add stuff on my schedule.

6. I still have laundry for seven people.

7. I still have to feed seven people. (and I do not have the money to let the restraunts cook it for us for the next week.)

8. I still have to take care of my kids and schlep them to swimming lessons.

9. after the weddings I get to proof the photos.

10. I have two fonts to make as well, hopefully to be done in July.

Luckily I get a mommy sanity trip the beginning of August. I think I'm going to need it.

Analgesic Bandaids

You know, you don't have to buy special ones to get this. All bandaids have analgesic properties, but only in users under the age of ten.

Last night Joshua hurt his foot. Steve gave him a bandaid and Joshua went off happily to bed, content in the knowlege that his scrape would no longer hurt just because there was a bandaid on it.

This morning Joshua is up and roming the house for an hour with no problems at all. Then suddenly, he starts hopping on one foot and moaning. He had just noticed his bandaid had fallen off over night. He hopped to Steve to show him the sore, which Steve declared healed enough to go without a bandaid. Joshua argued with his dad about that; Joshua's main point: it still hurt. Of course, it didn't hurt before he noticed the bandaid was missing and technically the bandaid wouldn't help that anyway. Joshua didn't think his dad was using logic at all. Steve distracted him with a minor biology lesson and Joshua left content, if not completely satisfied . . . but not hopping.

Makes me wish bandaids were still magic for me, too.

In Bloom

We have a mature catalpa tree in our front yard. I don't know if I've mentioned this tree before, but I do love it. The house I grew up in also had one of these trees so I have that nostolgic connection besides the fact that it's just a beautiful tree. I was once told that catalpas are native to a more southern zone and were imported here. I wouldn't be surprised if that were the case, mostly because of the flowers.

You see the catalpa is a flowering tree. In our zone, the only native trees that flower grow fruit and stay somewhat small. They are ornamentals and look lovely in the yard. The caltalpa on the other hand grows 40 ft tall and produces no fruit. It also is one of the first trees to lose it's leaves in the fall and one of the last to grow them in the spring. All the leaves will fall in the same day, and if it's a normal fall, they don't even have time to change color. They just all drop at the first hard frost. But back to the subject at hand. Imagine a 40ft tree covered in clusters of white flowers. They have a soft, sweet scent that drifts under the canopy on warm afternoons. The flowers are my favorite part of the catalpa. They make me want to grab a blanket and lay out under the tree for a nap. (not something I actually ever get time to do, I just want to.)

This last week, we had a wind storm. It blew down full clusters of blossoms from my tree. The next day, I gathered up the stems and brought them into the house and placed them in a pint jar on my table, a large bush of white brightening the room. That evening when the house was quiet and the room was lit with two lamps, the scent of the blooms filled the room, a promise that summer was just beginning.

Lasts and Firsts

Steve found a a cute toddler bed at a yard sale this weekend. Since the crib was worn out, we decided to make the switch right away. When the bed got brought into the house, we introduced Libby to it. She sat on it and thought it was the best thing ever.

So I took Rilla and Josh to their ball games and came home to the crib in the trash and the new bed in place. She had napped in her crib but Daddy had neglected to take a picture of her last time sleeping in a crib. He doesn't think like a scrapbooker. Her first night in the bed was hard. She didn't go to sleep until eleven and then was up twice in the night. Sunday she just didn't nap and then at bedtime fell asleep on the floor. I woke up this morning to this:

on the floor again with an empty bed. She refused to sleep in it. At least she didn't wake me up to tell me about it. LOL!

the transition has been harder for Libby than it has for any of the other kids. This is the youngest we've ever made the switch and it shows. She just wasn't quite ready for the bed. I konw she'll love it in a week when she's used to a bed she can get into and out of by herself, but right now, it's not what she's used to so she's resisting.

Part of me wishes we could go back to the crib. I wasn't ready for her to make this switch either. As long as she was in a crib, she was still a baby. She's in a toddler bed. She's a little girl. It's weird to think that I will never have need for a crib again. Right now, Libby is napping in her little bed, too tired to resist the bed anymore. Laying peacefully on her pillow and catching up on all the sleep she shorted herself over the last few days. I think she's starting to transition. It's a bittersweet moment.

Summer Hits

and I mean that quite literally. Summer always hits me between the eyes. I don't see it coming. I'm happily enjoying the beauty of late spring, the flowers, the weather, the bird song, and then BOOM! it's the last week of May and my peace is at an end.

Summer is in full swing in Bedlam. We have been doing baseball/softball/t-ball (which I always call baseball and woe betide the nitpicky child who knows what I mean and still chooses to correct me when everyone is yelling and three people need to be in three different places involving a sport of some kind at the same time.) We have a few weeks left of _____ball. The kids are enjoying it but then we don't take sports seriously around here.

We also have a pool pass. I'm still using it in the mornings, but there are times when I think life would have been easier if we had bought an individual pass instead of a family pass. This moring we went to swim lessons, then to lunch at the park and then back to the pool for free swim. By the time we were done I was done. I'm almost ready to start ingesting caffine just to get me through the summer.

So does Mountain Dew taste as bad as cola? ;)

Musings while folding laundry

Wanna know my favorite thing about summer?

Sandals.

I hate folding socks.

They Grow in Spurts

Sarah participated in a talent contest on Tuesday night. She loves this competition because it's basically her only chance to sing for a crowd. She spent two months working on her number and then came down with a cough a week before the show. It gave her a scratch throat and that high E that she was already having difficulty reaching suddenly became almost impossible. She did well though. She didn't place, but she performed well and really wowed the crowd. How can you not be wowed when you hear a 10 year old belt out "Defiying Gravity" from Wicked? Ok, so maybe if you are a judge and tend to be overly enthusiasic about 7 year olds playing simple songs on the violin, but otherwise, really, how can you not be impressed?

It struck me that night as she was getting ready how old she is. She's been in my life for more than a decade. Just recently, she's started really caring about making sure her lip stays waxed and she plucked her own eyebrows. I'm sure that soon she'll want to shave her legs and I'm not ready for that. (She inherited her father's dark body hair.) She wore her new lavendar skirt and white sweater with her silver sandals. She looked so pretty and grown up as she sat and visited with her grandma, leaning in with one leg crossed over the other.

Last week, she wasn't that old. I swear she wasn't. They don't grow gradually, flowing from one age to the next in a coniuous process. They jump and hop in their ages just like they jump through life, moving along in spurts so one minute they are small and the next they are entering junior high.

I don't normally get wistful about my kids growing. I know I've said that before and I mean it. I rejoice in their getting older and growing as human beings. However, Tuesday night my heart couldn't help hurting for that little girl I used to have.

She still will fly at you to give you a hug and that little girl thing I hope never leaves her.

Out of Commission

It's been a while since I posted because Spring flu hit our house. It took out all the kids for a week, and the onset of symptoms was only staggered by a day or so, which means that I had five kids sick at once. I've never had that happen before and usually my kids are pretty healthy. I think they've each been on antibiotics maybe twice in their lives. Needless to say, this was not a set of circumstances I was prepared for. The kids are back at school but the house is trashed and I'm now sick from the same thing.

But that's not what I wanted to blog about. Friday, I had to keep all three of my school kids home. Sarah had to go to school sick on Thursday because it was the day of the major social studies fair, the culmination of months of work and not something she could make up later. She gave her class presentation that day, because she knew she would miss the next day. So Friday, she missed seeing all the presentations. She was sad about that. Joshua, however, was completely heartbroken. A real, live children's author was visiting his school that morning and in the afternoon his class was hosting a Mothers' Tea complete with a play for entertainment. Rilla, being in kindergarten, still just thinks every school day is special.

So in an effort to cheer up my children, we hosted our own Mother's Tea. I spent all morning baking and we did enough different things that everyone got to help with one thing. We made bread in the bread maker, muffins, three kinds of cookie, and weiner wraps (bite sized.) There was also apple slices and carrot sticks and special punch (koolaid with sherbert melted into it) because there was supposed to be special punch at the second grade Mothers' Tea.

We set the table with a nice table cloth and my china, including the tea cups and saucers. They all ate pretty decently although I have to admit the carrots and apples were very much neglected and Matty only ate the muffins (he's a muffin freak.) I got a kick out of the fact that I actually owned a punch bowl for my punch (hey, Mom, you wanna use it for some weddings? lol!) and I had a use for all my pretty dishes. No one spilled anything and no one fought. All in all, it was a good day.

I'm posting this so I have proof that once in a while, I can be a fun mom. Here's a pic of our party minus the bread and weiner wraps.

Permissive

Just a layout I did this afternoon.


journaling reads: Maybe it's because we've learned to pick our battles. Maybe it's because she doesn't exactly ask. Maybe it's because we don't want to trigger a meltdown. Maybe it's that 7:30 am isn't the best time for mommy. Maybe she's just too cute to say no to. Whatever the reason, my 20 month old has taken to eating her breakfast (of dry cereal) on the floor in front of the television. It's highly apparent that we have become . . . permissive in our old age.

ETA: yes, I noticed the spelling error. It's all fixed now, thanks to UnDo. Please imagine a cute polka dot r between the e and the m. Thank you.

And for only $100 donation I can get the DVD of tonight's program

At least once every six weeks, my father in law asks me if I watch a TV show that he watches. It's usually a different one than he mentioned last time. For a normal family, this would be a nice question and show that he is interested in what his daughter in law likes. For us, this shows an amazing lack of perception and retention of facts. You see, every time he asks I give him the same answer: no I don't watch that show. We don't get network television. We only get PBS and this has been the case for seven years. At first I'm sure many of you think, "oh well, your memory goes when you are older." Since he's not even 55 yet, I actually give him a different excuse.

He can't remember this because we are weird. What family in America actually chooses to go without television? Who can't stand around the water cooler and maintain their side of a Survivor or American Idol conversation, if only to say they would rather discuss CSI? A family usually either chooses to not own a tv at all on moral grounds or they have it all. We don't fit in either category. We just sort of fell into our situation.

When we moved to this town seven years ago, we quickly discovered that getting tv reception was difficult. I know, the average adult would have already called the cable company and never actually discovered this one, but money was tight and we were going to forgo cable for awhile in an effort to actually pay some more pressing bills. Yes, it was weird, but we had just graduated from college and we were in our "responsible adults" phase. We could, however, get reception from the PBS station, so Sarah watched Sesame Street and Barney and we talked about getting cable in a year when finances were better.

A strange thing happened though. We learned to love PBS. I mean love it. We really enjoy Nova; we look forward to American Experience; I'm upset if I miss an episode of This Old House. We make jokes about slimline white telephones and candle light suppers. PBS is fun. No there's not always something we want to watch on tv, but that's when we turn it off or watch a movie. (We do have a Netflix subscription.) There's enough good stuff on and most of it is stuff we really learn from. (Don't bring up hydrogen fuel, because we can talk your ear off about that.) Educational TV doesn't stop with 10 year olds. And suddenly it's seven years later and we still only talk about getting cable or dish as a "someday" thing.

A few years ago, we were visiting Steve's parents. The house was relatively quiet on a Sunday afternoon, so I turned on the tv just to see what was on. I flipped through six channels and settled on PBS. That's when I knew I was well and truly corrupted. I'm sure there is hope for me, but in the meantime, I'm saving $30 a month and learning an awful lot about roof repair.

This Is Why I Will Never Be Nominated Mother of the Year

So. I'm going to have eight eight year olds invade my house tomorrow. Ok, seven will invade and one will already be here. And yes, he won't be eight until the next day. Let's stop quibbling over details, shall we? Anyway. Planned a birthday party. Ok, I got emotionally blackmailed and pushed into a birthday party. Joshua will someday be the World's Best Salesman. You think I'm kidding. I'm not. He doesn't stop. I'm lucky I didn't get talked into letting him invite the whole class. You can all be happy for me that he was ok with seven friends because if not, I would have the entire class over here tomorrow afternoon. He's that good.

I"m in total denial about this party. I have not planned any activities. I have not even bought the birthday cake mix. I may just break down and buy a cake. I never buy cakes. I hate store cakes. So nasty! Mine may not look all that great but at least it's worth eating. This is how crazy I am right now. I'm thinking I should buy a ball of some kind. Or maybe water balloons. burlap sacks? rope and duct tape? Valium? These things go through my mind only when I'm thinking about the party, the rest of the time I try to forget I'm doing this. I'm not one of those mothers who lives to do THE BEST BIRTHDAY PARTY EVER!!1!!1! I love my kids. I love that they have birthdays and we always have at least two family parties and make a big deal out of them the whole day. We buy them fun gifts, like this year the boy is getting a new bike. However, that many kids gathered together, high on sugar and hyped up from the idea of a party totally stresses me out.

The ignore the party technique worked just fine until last night. Last night when my husband called to confirm a time for a project he had commited to help with three weeks ago. When do they need him? Exactly the same time as the party. Eight eight year olds and just me. Oh and four other children of my own. Don't you wish you were me?

News Flash: Pretend Business not so Pretend

why? Because I got my very own checking account! I know. It's about time. I could seriously be much farther ahead on saving for equipment and investing in advertising if I had done this when I first started taking pictures for money. But it's done now and I'm excited. In a few weeks a checkbook will be arriving on my doorstep that has just my name on it. I will be using it for things like tearing out the deposit slip in the back and depositting lots of moolah into the account. Well, that's the plan anyway.

I opened the account with two checks: a photography session fee check, and a royalty check from Polar Bear Press. The royalty check arrived on Saturday and that was almost as emotional as seeing my rub-ons for the first time. Yes, I'm a girl. Not only have I designed a scrapbook product, a company produced it, and people bought it. It doesn't get much cooler than that.

A true (digital) photographer's child

Matt walked up to me as I was editting photos from a shoot on my computer. He stood there for a second and he said: "It's a little bit dark."

He was right.

Seven Minutes in Heaven

This morning when the alarm went off, I hit the snooze button.  I tend to avoid doing that.   The snooze only gives me seven more minutes, but this morning I wanted that seven minutes.   I wanted to snuggle up against my husband as he slept away, oblivious to the alarm.  I love how warm and cozy my bed feels when I'm supposed to be getting up.  It's that little bit of childhood comfort coming back to me for a few minutes.  I can snuggle down under my down comforter and rest my head against Steve's shoulder, give myself just a few more minutes of safety and joy.  Heaven my way.  

The singing starts early

Libby has started singing. Her favorite song is Bob the Builder. You can't recognize more than two words in the entire song, but she's got the tune down pat. If I knew how to embed sound files I would do that for you all. Everyone needs to have their heart melt a bit once a day.

The Termite Problem

Steve spent all yesterday tearing out the wall in our livingroom. This is what it looked like at eleven pm:

notice that there is no window in that wall nor is there a door. The still weren't even done framing at that time. Steve's friend Brad helped so much. It's good to have good friends like that who are willing to rearrange their schedules to help us out.

I still don't have dry wall on the wall, but we do have a window and door in place. We are thinking that the termites contained their damage to that one wall. If that is not the case, I really don't want to know. LOL!

Slow Learner

I got a Pottery Barn Teen catalog in the mail the other day. Lots of fun, bright colors and patterns. (BTW, polka dots are back in.) Steve was looking over my shoulder while I flipped through it. I stopped for a moment on the page for this lounge set. "I want that!" he said, stabbing the page. That would be awesome in the family room. (The one we don't have yet.) I looked again at the prices and said, "If you want to spend that much on a couch, I could find a really nice one for that."

"I don't want really nice. I want comfortable and relaxed. I like that one."

"but it's so expensive. I could make it cheaper. Really, all I would have to do is . . . " and I detailed the process of building the lounging couch.

Aparently, I learned nothing from the Evil Skirt episode.

Shoe Torture

The other day I was discussing with my baby sister (who's 24. you never get over being the baby. Of course, I tend to think of her as the baby more now that I have a baby of my own that I would dearly love to stay my baby forever.) where was I? oh yes. Talking. We were discussing me buying shoes. Well, I was discussing. Ranting more like it. I was off on my favorite rant about how no one carries W in cute styles anymore. 10 years ago I could walk into a Payless, find a cute shoe and then find it in W. not now. There are about four W in each size. One basic pump, One ugly loafer (think nursing shoe,) One basic running shoe, and one truly horrendous sandal. The cute ones? the trendy ones that all the teenagers are buying? no wide. In fact, the straps on the sandals are getting tighter. I swear they are.

My sister listens politely for about 3 seconds (you think she might have heard this before?) and says, "well why don' t you just buy a bigger size? Just keep going up until it fits." Which I find out is what she does.

And suddenly, I'm faced with the horrible thought that this is why I can't find inexpensive, wide shoes. Because everyone else does this. And they don't care that the foot bed is too long and the toe of the shoe sticks out farther than it should, so you look like you are a little girl wearing your mother's clown shoes.

I care. Which is why I don't have very many shoes in my closet. There's always a trade off, isnt' there?

something different for me

I don't usually do this. This being put out quotes on my blog. I believe that inspiration is very personal. Something is inspiring to me and makes me think because of the particular place I am in my life. The things I'm struggling with, trying to change, to make better determine what inspires me and I can't pull inspiration from something that doesn't speak to that place. I'm sure other people can. I can't. If I'm not in the right place, often these "inspirational quotes" sound trite and pompous to me.

But today I was in the right place to hear a song for the first time. Sister Hazel, whom I don't normally listen to. This morning, the cd player held a single song burned to CD and it played over twice as I drove to and from the pool. I'll only post the pre-chorus and chorus:

Pre-chorus:
Yeah yeah
I bet you haven't heard
A word I've said
Yeah yeah
If you've had enough
Of all your tryin'
Just give up
The state of mind you're in¡­

Chorus:
If you want to be somebody else,
If you're tired of fighting battles with yourself
If you want to be somebody else
Change your mind...

My mind has been changed just enough recently that I could hear the wisdom in the words. I could hear and say, yes, that works, and yet still see that I have more changing to do. The changes I have made have been good. It has been a struggle to keep going until the results came. But they are coming now and I want more of the good stuff in my life. Changing your mind doesn't happen in a moment. The life epiphany doesn't change you. It helps you see that change is needed. Changing happens over weeks and months. And so I'm changing. Little changes. Step by step. It's a good path.