Date of Birth

I think it is outright irresponsible of me to not post photos tonight, but I had to help Muriel fall asleep after all the excitement, which led directly to me falling asleep, and then waking up to discover it is nearly eleven. I am not inclined to hook up the hardware to make pictures move apartments from the camera to the server, but when I do, tomorrow, you will see Naomi wearing her flower girl dress (again), blinged up with mardi gras beads that my parents brought along, and basically cranked up to eleven. She had a really good time.

I had fun, too, actually. We put the extension in our newish dining room table for the first time, so in case you are wondering, 12 people total is about the best we can do at one seating, and that's if four of the twelve are kids. After dinner, Naomi seated herself on the ottoman as though on a dais, and waited patiently for everyone to find a seat so she could begin the present opening performance. Yikes. She was not, shall we say, appropriately slow and appreciative, which makes me glad we have asked for no gifts at her kid party.

Then there was the moment, when I had lit the candles on her cake (which she insisted on placing herself, after a fairly dignified acceptance that I did a terrible job writing her name across the strawberries in Reddi Whip), and we started singing, that I got completely choked up and could not finish the song. I can't begin to summarize my feelings in that moment, but I wonder if you ever stop time traveling back to the beginning when you celebrate the birthday of your children, or any child you have known since the day they were actually born. Beautiful, tiny baby Naomi is now beautiful five-year-old Naomi. Thanks, Universe!

Five Years Old

I started messing around with this blog post before I looked at the clock, and now that I do, I see that I'm about five minutes past the actual 5 year mark. Five years ago almost right this very minute, Naomi was born. When she (finally) came out, the nurse said, "Well, Dad, what do you got?" And Jim said, "It's a girl!" I said, "Really?" That's all I could come up with. I was so sure she was a boy. "Does this girl have a name?" the nurse said. "Her name is Naomi," he said. Just like that, Naomi was here.

Two years later, on the morning of Naomi's birthday, our friend Sochi was born. It's a good day to be born! We had a fun time at her house tonight, eating chili dogs and cake and ice cream. Tomorrow is Naomi's party, I should say, her first party (not the awesome kid paradise party- that's next weekend).

Care to guess what her dad put together, and we then sadly, pathetically improvised wrapping for?

More Visitors Have Arrived!

I don't know whether to make this cooking focused or child focus or visitor focused. What I know for sure is that it is late and I am sleepy, and this is likely to be not a bit focused as a result. OK, so I worked from home today, and took advantage of this fact to make a pork roast in the crock pot. I have never done this before, and have in fact never cooked a pork roast at all before. But the recipe was super simple (except I did have to go to the store- can you believe I didn't have a jar of apple jelly in the pantry?).

Also, let's say, over lunch hour, I made oatmeal cookies. I never remember to remove the butter from the fridge with enough lead time to have it be all perfectly softened when it's time to make the dough, so I checked with my friend the Internet, and sure enough, lots and lots of people want to tell me what to do about it. I tried one idea on the first stick- rolling it between wax paper with a rolling pin. It was tremendously unsuccessful. The other idea was to grate it like cheese, which I did, except that it kind of went all over the place, and unlike grated cheese, you can't just pick it up and move it around without getting a bit buttery. Of the two, I'd say the grating method is better.

Anyway, my parents' plane was a bit late, and we held dinner for them, so by the time they arrived, it was past bedtime. The girls were Super Kooky, especially Muriel, who could not stop narrating and making dramatic faces. They both did the kind of easily lampooned "look what I can do!" kid behavior. My parents were amused and overwhelmed, I think. For two small granddaughters, they can really make some noise.

Anyway again, the pork was pretty tasty. The cookies were pretty tasty. I'm pretty sleepy. Happy Weekend, friends!

Not Quite By The Numbers

I was going to do a by-the-numbers post, but the only ones I could come up with were:

5: Number of samples I got during my Costco lunch outing. Sourdough bread, pancake, cheese on cracker, chicken chimichanga, chocolate. Stupid bread and pancake for messing up my alliteration.

30: Number of minutes later that I finally responded to an instant message from my boss sent while I was at Costco. Oops.

Oh well. Tonight Naomi and I put together her "goody bags" for her school chums. I was going to say I exercised considerable restraint in the goody selection, but that is only half-true, since in fact I am a cheapskate. That makes it easier to not go overboard. The whole tradition is so fraught, like so many parenting things, because I find goody bags to be extremely problematic (as does, I am sure, the garbage patch in the Pacific ocean), yet I don't want my kid to be disappointed. I should put a little more effort into working this one out, instead of just going with the flow.

Anyway, tonight when we were packing the bags, she worked out a system where she set out three sets of goodies, then got three bags, and packed them up. I gave absolutely no direction on this, she just did this because that is the way her awesome, systematic little mind works. I love it.

Tomorrow, she will be wearing her flower girl power dress to school to hand out the goodies. Ah, to be a fly on the wall, with a camcorder. Tomorrow night, the grandparents arrive. I am researching pork roast crock pot recipes and wondering what else I can manage to clean before they show up. We'll see!

Manic Wednesday

I know, that is a flawed 80s allusion, but it was a flawed decade. I make no apologies. Today is one of those strange days where I am energetic and hyper-accomplishing one minute, and lethargic and extremely grouchy the next. I almost wish I had more days like this, though I am not enjoying the seething lethargy right this minute.

And yes, I did louse up my resolution by not posting last night, but there was nothing to say, and I felt too sorry for all four of you having to read yet another it's late I'm tired here's a tiny thing that happened today goodnight post. So, I am going to call a do-over on Tuesday. That will be covered by the Jim birthday pictures later in this post.

Before I get to that, here is the thing that happened today, at the exactly right point in the crest of my mania wave, that made me almost wet my pants from laughing. I will say up front, you kind of had to be there. I picked Muriel up from school, and as we were pulling out of the parking space, we saw her school chum's dad. "Is that Daddy's Ella?" she said. "Right, that's Ella's Daddy," I said. "I love Ella's Daddy," she said. "He has such a nice round head."

Bwah! She went on to say that his nice round head has a circle on it, by which she meant his haircut. I was laughing really hard at this (sorry, terrible, I know), which delighted Muriel, so she decided to try out the knock-knock jokes she knows. Ivana come in! Dwayne the bathtub, I'm dwowning! Ah, I laughed all the way home.

I hope that's what she remembers from today, not the part where I yelled at her for squirting tomato innards all over her dress and spitting out her dinner. Between the pair of us, we are like charm school dropouts with a bullet. Oh well. Naomi picked up the slack a bit, when I asked why she was distracting Muriel by making her laugh, and she said, maybe I just have the Giggles. She did, too.

OK, that was tonight's post, and here's last night's:

Naomi was allowed to pick one dessert from the absurd dessert bounty at Salty's on Sunday, and somehow she got the best one. These beautiful cupcakes tasted even better than they looked.

I wish I could remember the gimmick of these particular eggs Benedict- cayenne something or other. Birthday eggs!

Here, Jim displays his trophy in the protein shake making Olympics. Just kidding. I am enormously gratified that he likes his appliance.

Speaking of the Olympics, does our Birthday Crown not resemble a cheerful wreath of laurel? Check out the adoring fans.

Oh, and I just noticed that I blew past the 200 post mark earlier in the week. Zowie! See you tomorrow. For reals.

Birthday Boy

There's only one boy in the house, so you may not have too much trouble guessing whose birthday we celebrated today. It was another gorgeous, sunny day, so I will consider that a gift to all of us. Jim played hooky from work, had some Seattle diner breakfast, read some (as part of his resolutions for his next year of life), did some shopping, and had a long run. Deluxe! We went together to pick up his cake and his daughters, went out for a steak (for him), and came home to play a Super Why-inspired letter puzzle that led us to his birthday present, a semi-industrial blender (to make his protein shakes!).

Jim is resilient, smart, kind, funny, good looking (see: protein shakes), I could go on and on. I can't wait to see what he does with the next year of his life- there are a lot of challenges ahead, and it should be interesting. But in the meantime I celebrate the birth of a very good man. Happy Birthday, other J. Khooler!

What a Day!

It is not quite rational how the gorgeous and uncharacteristically enduring sunshine has made every day seem to be dipped in gold. I am used to the clouds here, it's normal for me. But seeing the mountains and the water and the evergreens all shining so brightly really is a tonic for the soul. My friend and I walked down to the lake early this chilly morning and watched the mist rising from the sunny water. It felt like a different life, somehow.

Of course it doesn't hurt that we then spent the late morning stuffing ourselves at Salty's. We met our friends (and brought our visitor along) to celebrate Jim's birthday, a little early. I was impressed by how committed Jim and our visitor were to getting our money's worth at the oyster and crab bar. Mmmm. Naomi had the most beautiful cupcake for dessert (I'll get a picture of that up sometime). Muriel ate bacon with gusto, and about a hundred strawberries.

After some sleepy stomach-clutching, I took my friend to the Bellevue botanical garden, which even in the pre-spring explosion phase was an extremely pleasant place to be. I overheard the beginning of some "old rose" association meeting in the visitor's center, and someone who had driven from Spokane quipped that they had left in February and arrived in June. Hee. After a stop at the airport (thanks for coming, L!!), I took the girls to the "good" park, with the two separate playgrounds. Home for soup, bath, and bed. And now here I am, thinking I had better end the day right by not staying up past 11. Yawn. I wish this weekend had about five more days in it.

Saturday Night!

OK, this is going to be short. Today was a beautiful day- sunny and amazing, breakfast out at the 5 Spot in Seattle, a trip up the Space Needle and lots of other fun things. Now I am racing the clock to get a post up before the day is over, and I admit that I don't have much. But I had a fantastic time with my friend who is visiting from NYC, and instead of having a rockin' night out in Seattle, we had a kind of rockin' night out on the eastside. Woo!

Tomorrow, a surprise (for the other J. Khooler) with a birthday brunch. Mmm. Updates from that tomorrow. Happy Weekend, people!

Innovation Friday

Maybe it is the fantastically sunny and beautiful weather, the visit from my smart friend, or the gracious refutation of my locked down non-creative character type by mommytude, but I am feeling happy, peppy, and bursting with love. And good ideas. Here are my innovations for the week.

capslock (verb, To type in all caps.).

This neologism sprang from an email conversation with my homegirl in which I had to cop to the fact that I overuse the all caps for emphasis convention in my messages. Of course, though, I didn't really invent it. Here's a little article about it from three years ago. Furthermore, a neologism about emailing is about as innovative as a neologism about shoeing your chariot horse. Oh well. Next try.

Choosing your clothes the night before

I didn't invent this, of course. Naomi did! All on her own, she determined that we should choose her clothing the night before so as to get the big argument out of the way and save precious morning minutes for playing with her sister (or telling on her sister). She reminds me almost every night. This is kind of an obvious strategy, I know, but it is working for us, especially because of the next one.

Giving in completely on wardrobe disputes

OK, maybe not completely, and to be honest, this has sort of developed over the last few weeks, but I have determined that it is a lot easier to just let Naomi wear ridiculously girly outfits if that's what she wants than it is to attempt to get her to agree to wear the clothing I have misguidedly purchased for her in the past that doesn't fit this model. If she wants to wear tights and be cold (it's not that cold here, don't worry), let her wear tights! So I have picked up a few extra pairs, including some "footless" tights that are a big welcome back to the 1980s, but in size 4-6x. Anyway, the point is, we are now on a team together, developing her wardrobe choices (the night before), instead of small child vs. authoritarian rule maker determined to make small child wear every piece of clothing in her drawer no matter
how unhappy it makes small child.

Internet filters

OK, I know these filters already exist as a way to keep the wrong content out of the hands of children or employees at work. And I know you can already block emailers, callers, and texters. But what I want to know is, can I still visit the sites I normally visit, but have all news related to Tiger Woods filtered out? Because THAT is the kind of filter I want.

Hmm, that's it for innovations. The slaw came out too sweet, which seems to be a theme with my old family recipes, so maybe I should start cutting out some sugar, eh? It's going to be another wonderful weekend, spending time with an old friend (known as Old Sol), visiting with my visitor, going out on the town, and a special surprise. I can't stop smiling!

What's (Not) Cooking

Alright, here's my recipe for dessert:


Ingredients:

1 graham cracker
1 spread of "Decadent Fudge Sauce"
1 squirt of Reddi Whip

My parents sent us a gourmet gift basket for Christmas, or New Year's, I guess, this year, and one of the treats was a jar of decadent fudge sauce, which is really only sauce if you heat it up. When it sits in the fridge, it is spread. Or, decadent fudge spread.

Anyway, this weekend is February's dinner for the Tent City (provided by the people at our church). I signed up to bring a salad, and the woman actually asked me if I would make potato salad. It was pretty recently that I admitted to myself that I can't make decent potato salad (how hard is it? But I have never made good potato salad). So I counter-offered slaw. And that is how I found myself in the kitchen tonight, with the food processor and a head of cabbage. The machine works great on cabbage and pretty well on celery, but green peppers do not love the shredding blade, and I am not even sure where the scallions went. Oh well.

It's a recipe my mom used to make once in a while, sometimes if my dad had a potluck at work. It makes a lot, that's why I thought of it. And I remember that she would store it in one of those giant glass pickle jars, later to be known as sun tea jars. Also, I remember not liking it, when I was a kid, but really, what kid likes cole slaw? The dressing is sugar, vinegar, lemon juice, celery salt, garlic salt, and salt. I left out most of the plain salt, because three teaspoons of salt in any recipe, even if two of them have prefixes and are not just straight up salt, seems like too much salt.

Anyway, with the word "Overnight" in the name of the recipe, I have to assume that I can't really judge it until tomorrow. I'll let you know how it comes out.


Slaw for the homeless! I hope it's good.

Hooray for Visitors!

This is a big month for us, not just because it's Valentine's Day and Chinese New Year and two birthdays and...oh, right, President's Day. We are also having two sets of visitors! I love to have visitors because it means we are seeing someone we like but don't normally see. Also because we tend to clean up the house a bit more than usual. Not this time, sadly. My friend from NYC arrived today, and has already been treated to the sight of a bit of worn-out pizza lying in the middle of the table. Classy!

Anyway, woo hoo! Visitor! More tomorrow. Peace out.

Be Yourself

This is a random spot for this anecdote, but what the heck. In a recent training at work, I took a Myers Briggs personality type assessment, and although it was revealing, certainly, it kind of bummed me out a little. They write the type summaries like the most gentle and loving of horoscopes, of course, but it was hard not to read between the lines. My type is NOT creative, NOT spontaneous, NOT insightful. I don't like to endlessly puzzle over things to come to the most innovative or interesting solution. I LOVE to have a decision made, past tense.

Also at play in this source for musing is the book I'm reading, The Happiness Project. In her quest to systematically make herself happier (and write a book about it), the author discovers that you really do need to just be yourself. You can choose what you do (it goes something like this), but you can't choose what you like to do. So quit pretending you like to see art movies, or watch football games, and do something you actually like instead.

The sum of these two inputs, for me, is that I feel a little trapped in myself. I want to be a creative problem solver! I want to have intuition about things! The point, of course, is to learn to accept what you have been given, rather than glumly bemoaning the fact that you are not more intuitive and creative. I will endeavor to celebrate my mind-made-upedness, my straightforward data gatheringness, and so forth (short-cuttingness!).

Monday

Is there a point to posting if I'm just doing it to stick to my resolution? I don't seem to have quite as much to say this February, although maybe it was like this last time around as well? Today, as you know, was President's Day. We did absolutely nothing to celebrate it, I'm sorry to say, after all the hearts and flowers and dragons and lanterns of the weekend. But I did work from home, since Muriel's daycare was closed, and we had a good day together. It is so fun to sneak up the hall and spy on her playing in her room. She is a tireless narrator, that girl. She built block cities and drank pretend tea and nursed tired and ill stuffed animals and who knows what else.

Oh, and she informed me that when the dizzy bus comes to her school (an old school bus made over into some kind of gymnastics gym on wheels), she's not allowed to go because she didn't ask her mom. Of course the real reason is because I didn't fill out her permission slip and pay for her to go. Hmm. Surely the entire class doesn't go to the dizzy bus? Augh, the peer pressure!

Anyway, back to the office tomorrow, but it's another exciting week. An out of town visitor is coming! Our basement will be clean! Oh the joys!

Happy Lunar Love Day

Before I get to the pictures, two noteworthy things from church this morning. They had a trumpeter today (for whatever reason), and during the offertory, which as Jim pointed out is where they often throw in some not-too-accessible jazz or modern pieces, the trumpeter played loudly into the open grand piano, then paused so we could hear the strings resonating. Magical! Also, every week they read the names of the men and women killed in action in the past week. This Sunday, only two! It really stood out- usually there are more (and when we started at this church, sometimes the list went on for a really long time).

Anyway- here's the photo roundup for Chinese New Year and Valentine's Day. What a fun weekend!


Dim sum, Seattle style.


Lion dance in front of the Wing Luke Asian Museum


Dragon dancers coming up the block.


It was a typical Seattle day. Drip Drip Drip.


Jim decorated the kitchen with lanterns, and also brought home tulips and roses. Here he is, researching power washers online. Now that's romance!


OK, here are the teeny valentines that Naomi made. She hung Luna's over her bed.


Here's the lineup on our door. These Valentines are about an inch tall.


Finally, my little Valentines with the kooky dolls I made them for their V-day present this year. Love Love LOVE! I almost can't take it sometimes. Happy New Year, Happy Valentine's Day, Happy President's Day, Happy Week to you!

Everything Eve

Tomorrow, as you know, is Valentine's Day, but it's also Chinese New Year (OK, lunar new year). Today we went to Seattle's International District to see what was going on. Dim sum was going on, lucky us! So we tried a different restaurant from the place we normally go on the eastside, then headed out into the rain to enjoy the festivities.

It didn't take long for us to find something- a lion dance in front of the Wing Luke Asian Museum. We were still a few blocks away when the firecrackers went off, which is good, becasuse both of the girls are loud noise-averse. But the drumming and the dancing were right up their alley. We also caught the tail end (har) of the dragon dance, and got to see the performers, including another group of lion dancers, coming up the street.

We didn't stay long, and it rained the whole time, but it was a fun way to mark the start of the year of the tiger. If I were at home, I would be posting photos to back up my story, but instead I am babysitting for some Valentine revellers and trying to write a shopping list for tomorrow's (not well-planned) Valentine's breakfast. Tomorrow will be the photo catch-up. Till then, Sun Leen Fai Lok!

Why, yes, I AM watching the Olympics

I am listening to what seems like a Christmas album version of the Canadian national anthem, and wondering exactly why this opening ceremony had to start so darn late. We kept the kids up for a while to watch the start of the Olympics, but all they got to see was a lot of quick-cutting sports footage (and some beautiful landscape shots in high def). It was fun to watch Muriel pretend to be snowboarding, to be sure. And they were predictably impressed by the ski jumping and the figure skating. But our kids love their sleep, and they keep to a schedule pretty rigorously, so it was hard not to feel a little bad when it was an hour past bedtime and their eyelids got all doubled and droopy. No opening ceremony after all.

Now they are fast asleep, and so is Jim, naturally, so it's just me and Bob Costas. Tonight, Jim hung the kitchen with paper lanterns for Chinese New Year, and also brought home a really amazing amount of flowers, so the kitchen is the perfect storm of February holiday decorations. I'll get some pictures of that tomorrow. I have a little more sewing to do on the girls' wacky little Valentine's presents, and then it's off to bed.

Wow, Macedonia's "real" name is the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. So educational, this parade of nations!

Book Report

So, time for a book report, isn't it? I just finished a book called Old Filth, by Jane Gardam. The story is about an elderly man, a retired lawyer and judge, who had worked both in Hong Kong (Filth is a slang acronym- "Failed In London, Try Hong Kong") and in England. He retires to a small town in England, and the book follows his moves through the last years of his life, and in and out of his memories.

The childhood of this successful, accomplished, well-off (seemingly dull) man is heartbreaking, and the scope and the context of the heartbreak is revealed through his memories. He is a "Raj orphan," a term for children sent by their parents living in the far flung colonies back "home" to England for education and civilization. I just googled the phrase, and nearly all of the hits on the first few pages are related to this book, so who knows how widely this term is actually known.

In any case, the contrast between his relentlessly composed presentation and the hardship and sorrow-laden past he endured reminded me of two things: first, you just never know the whole story about someone, and it's a good thing to keep that in mind, and second, that it is lucky for me that I wasn't around in WWII Britain, because no way would I manage the brave stoicism the whole country seemed to own so relentlessly.

I liked the writing, and that is nearly the only thing that really keeps me at a book. Beyond that, though, and beyond even the introduction of this interesting minor historical and cultural archetype, I felt like the agedness of the protagonist helped me to know more about how growing old must be. You don't always get a main character in his late seventies. And at that age, age seems to matter significantly in the way that you feel, the way that you depend on others, the way others treat you, and the way you experience your days.

Next up: The Happiness Project. I'll get back to you.

Not Again!

OK, I waited too long again, and have no time for a real post. Tonight I spent rather too much time uploading a photo and "designing" Naomi's fifth birthday party invitation. Her party is going to be at a play gym kind of place, but before we arrived at that decision, when there was still a possibility of having it at home, we asked her what kind of party she wanted, and she said "astronaut." RAD! So here's the photo I used for her invitation.



How's that for a cute astronaut? I can't believe she's going to be five. And sometimes, of course, I can't believe she's only five.

Call Me!

I don't have much to write about this evening; it's late and I want to go to bed. But I already blew the easy photo-only post last night, and I didn't make anything unusual or interesting for dinner, so that's out too. So here's the thing that made me laugh out loud (inside) today: one of Naomi's classmates gave her his digits. She came home with a little square of paper with the boy's name and his phone number.

What are we supposed to do with this, I wonder? The image of Naomi having a chat on the phone with Timothy is cracking me up not a little bit. She has had a few presents from boys before, a little necklace charm, a picture. This is definitely the first time she's gotten a phone number.

If I were a little more awake, I'd muster up a book report- I finished that book from my friend, and it is great. So maybe that will be tomorrow's post, and I'll start it before 10:15. Night!

Playing Dress Up: A How To

Fake Valentine's

Allow me to open with the quote of the day, from Naomi, uttered as I was fetching various craft related items for her during her latest round of valentine crafting: "It's like you're my waitress!" Nice.

Tonight we went to our friends' house to celebrate Valentines Day a bit early, seeing as they will be out of town for the actual day. It was my job to bring dessert, so I pulled out all the stops (ha) and created a white trash masterpiece known as "dirt cake." This is a dessert made of pudding and cream cheese and cool whip and a bunch of Oreos food-processed until they look like dirt. The trick is to disguise the dessert as actual dirt, which of course works better when the tricked party consists of four-and-unders.

Naomi, Muriel, and I made some paper flowers, and I told them we were bringing a decoration for the party. We put the flowers in the bowl of dirt, which had been in the freezer for an hour or so. Here's the "centerpiece," in the foreground.

After a really tasty dinner of lasagna and salad, we told the kids I forgot to bring dessert (there was some dramatic acting with the hostess and myself), so we were going to have to eat the centerpiece. Naomi claims that she knew that it wasn't dirt all along, but the pictures don't lie.

Even Muriel looks, shall we say, skeptical over there.

The girls liked it after all. It's still a little early to say Happy Valentine's Day to you all, but Happy Fake Valentine's Day!

Daily Titling is Harder Than Daily Posting

Ah, Saturday, how can you be over already? It's a race against the clock for today's post, so go ahead and lower your already low expectations.

This morning we went to IKEA for some cheap breakfast and some leisurely shopping. It's been a while, so the kids actually had a pretty good time, though Naomi is close to being too big to really enjoy the kids furniture testing/play area for more than a few minutes. We got a mortar and pestle, the better to make more authentic curry laksa with. We got a moderately crappy piece of kid room storage furniture. We got a frozen yogurt soft serve. Thanks, IKEA!

So, while Muriel napped and the grownups did housework, Naomi started in on the artisanal Valentine crafting. She created a set of Valentines for the members of her household that are so miniscule, you can barely see them. Then she taped them on the door of the recipients room (or in Luna's case, above her dog bed). As she was walking around with the tape in hand, she made the observation that here she is, making Valentines for everyone in her family, and does she see anyone making Valentines for her? So you can see that she has already internalized the message of the holiday...

I actually got to run OUTSIDE today, which was great and a lot more tiring than ye olde treadmill. What a beautiful afternoon. I took the girls to the playground at the health club, then for a swim. And now I will close with a piece of advice that I hope will be valuable enough to justify you reading this otherwise superyawn of a blog post: Never go to one of those conveyor belt sushi restaurants when you are completely famished, especially if they have the speed cranked up to enhance your feeling of panic that the little plate you want might get away. We grabbed a lot of plates, is what I'm saying. Night!

First Friday

OK, to start things off, here's a picture of the muffins Muriel and I made this morning, using a recipe in a cookbook named Brunch that I got from my BFF last year for Mother's Day. The recipe is called "Doughnut Muffins," and I will attest that they are in fact quite doughnutty and junk-foodesque, but also quite tasty, so I am not complaining. I am not going to post the recipe, as it comes from a published cookbook, but I will send it to you if you want it. A lot of butter and some super fine sugar is involved.


And yes, I was a little late to work.

Tonight, it really felt like a Friday around here- the girls ate two pieces of pizza each (leaving their parents impressed, but hungry). We looked through Naomi's school work packet (they work that kid like a slave at her preschool). She is getting so good at writing her name in perfect little letters, which I know is not going to get her a job, but still, it's neat. Muriel put on Naomi's dress up dress, which was comically gigantic. Both girls did a poor job of visiting with my parents on the computer, as they were too busy trying to read stories to them.

Then the real high jinks started. For some reason Muriel decided to help Naomi get her pajamas on, then Naomi decided she was going to change Muriel's diaper and help her get her pajamas on. She managed to do it. There was a high volume of giggling. And that was just the parents. When they get going, those girls are pretty comical.

Anyway, happy weekend, you guys!

Yes, I Do Know That I am Lucky to Have a Job At All

Today someone generously left some books they no longer wanted on the little table in the office kitchen. One of them caught my eye, a slim red paperback volume, because the title of it made me heave that big interior "what am I doing in this job?" sigh: Best Kept Secrets of Peer Code Reviews. Talk about your page turner!

But after a little self-absorbed glumness on that account, I remembered a couple of the other little office oddities of late, and since this is a daily blog, people, this is what you're getting today. First, on that same table, someone left an US Weekly (I think) with pictures of the two Twilight stars on it. And someone else, I guess, thought it would be funny to write in some captions on the cover, what the stars were saying, or thinking. But they weren't funny at all, the captions, not even a little bit. It wasn't even clear that they were meant to be funny, which raises the question: is there any other point to this kind of minor vandalism? Other than satire or whatever? I wish I could remember now what they said. Something like "How does my hair look?"

Next, while the code review book at least makes sense in the context of my workplace, and the US weekly, while less so, is at least a popular publication in some sense, a few weeks ago someone left another piece of reading material in the kitchen, and it was... a catalog, the size of a monthly periodical, of the Christian Louboutin Barbie collection. The who and the what? Still no satirical or other captions added to the cover of the Barbie catalog, though to be fair to the artist, I should probably leaf through and see if anything thought-provoking has been added to the interior.

The oppressive beeping air freshener has returned to the bathroom. Beep! My very presence necessitates freshening. Beep! I am just washing my hands!!

Last, and absolutely least, for a week and a half or so, this spot on the way back from the kitchen, near a couple of lonely cubicles in the hallway, smelled just exactly like the pickly jalapenos you get on nachos at a sports arena. Although, to be fair, I haven't had nachos at a sports arena in a very long time, and my frame of reference is working at a sports arena to raise money for "band tour" in high school. Having had that experience, though, I have smelled many a pickly jalapeno (to say nothing of the joy of cleaning out a metal pot with nacho cheese sauce charred all over the bottom), so I knew what I was smelling. But there was no visible source of jalapeno odor. A little mystery to work on. Or I could just learn the best kept secrets of peer code reviews!

How to Have a Good Weekend

I'm a little late with this, seeing as the weekend was a few days ago, now, but I have to say, it was a pretty good weekend. Friday night I finally made myself start a book I had been given by a friend (along with an exhortation to please read it already!), and it was so great to start one that was so good so fast. Sometimes I have to work my way into a book, and this often has the result of me not reading any books at all, despite wanting to and enjoying it when I do. More on that book when I finish it up, probably in the next few days. I have to add, though, that I love the way a good book stays in your head. The whole next day I was trying to remember what show I had watched on Friday night, but no, it wasn't TV, dummy!

On Saturday morning we made oatmeal cookies together (yum!), then headed to our friends' house for a play date, which means we got to hang out with our nice friends who have two daughters very close in age to our own (while the kids ran around with very little involvement on our parts), talk about Kindergarten choices and what it all means, and then hit the dim sum place. If you ever go to dim sum with us, please, be assertive, because Jim is the bossiest dim sum foreman in town. Not that I don't like everything he picks. I had some quiet drawer tidying time while Muriel napped, and Jim and Naomi hit the Home Depot (we're in the market for a new ceiling fan). Wow, drawer tidying! But really, it was fun.

Sunday we got up so early, we somehow found time to make (and eat) pancakes and have a fun, leisurely bath (the girls) before church. Usually baths are in the evening, and rushed, and lately also screamy, due to an impatient mother dousing already tired and whiny children when they are not ready for it, incessant quarreling over bath toys, and a slate of recurring scoldings for this and that. Delightful! But Sunday's was all mellow and playful and cooperative. Church involved no Sunday school teaching, and I remembered to pick up my cake pan (I get a lot of pleasure out of very small accomplishments!). Lunch at the Chinese bakery! Yes, we do eat a lot of Chinese food.

During Muriel's nap, Naomi and I went to the Bellevue Art Museum, which seems to lean toward fantastically artistic handicrafts, rather than straight up art, whatever that means. There were four main exhibits: ceramics, glass, wood block prints, and wood carvings. This was Naomi's first visit to a museum (as a sentient person) outside of the categories of "science" or "children's" (or "flight," since she has been to that one a handful of times with her dad). How did she like it? She loved the revolving door into the museum, going up the long, gentle stairs, giving me the impression she was about to touch something despite my repeated admonishments, rolling the wheel on the kinetic sculpture-benches, and riding down in the gigantic elevator. She recognized a dodo bird on one of the woodblock prints, and informed me that they are extinct. One of the wood carvings included an anatomically correct male torso, and there was some excited discussion and (ahem) pantomiming of how this anatomy differs from her own. Yep!

Oh, and that night, too, Naomi tried her hand at reading, and realized she could figure out some words, especially in books she already knows pretty well. It was funny to hear her brag about how great she is at reading, even though of course I countered her with how cool it's going to be to practice it and get better and better, blah blah focus on the process blah blah.

This is a long lead-in to the thing I wanted to tell you guys about, which is this DIY how-to website I found (www.instructables.com) when, inspired by our visit to the artsy craft museum, I did a search that night on woodblock printing. 'Cause woodblock prints are neat! I will confess I am a lazy internet user, and I don't find myself going down a lot of paths. But this site, I think, could keep me interested, not only because it tells me how to do stuff I will probably never try, but because all these interesting people are out there actually doing these things. And telling me about it! I love it.

Catfish!

More accurately, steamed catfish with ginger and scallions. This is a super yummy dish that is very fast to make. It creates a lot of sauce, so start the rice before you start steaming the fish. We make this in a shallow enamel pan, but you could use any shallow dish that is somewhat heatproof.

Here are the ingredients you'll need:

1-2 pounds of catfish
fresh ginger root, 2 thumb size pieces or so, cut into strips
one bunch of scallions
1-2 teaspoons of sesame oil
soy sauce

Put the fish in the pan or dish, and put the ginger strips on top. Drizzle a little sesame oil on top.

Put the pan on a steamer in a wok or big pan with water in it. Cover and turn up the heat to get the water boiling.

Steam for about five to seven minutes, then pour a splash (1-2 tablespoons) of soy sauce on top. Cover and steam a minute longer.

Chop the scallions (just the green part) and sprinkle them on the fish. (We used to do this when it was finished cooking, but since that E coli scallion scare a few years ago, we always steam them a little.)

Cover and steam another minute or two.

Check for doneness- poke the thickest part of the fish and make sure it's opaque.

It really only takes a few minutes to steam this fish, and if it's overdone, it's not as nice, but it's still pretty good.


Here, with its good friend Napa cabbage. Mmmm.

Part 1 of 28

Last year was the year of monthly resolutions, which for me worked pretty well. It turns out I could do a lot of things daily on a short term basis. I didn't completely build or change all the habits I was after (I still don't exercise every day, and I still don't eat 5 servings of fruit and vegetables every day, I must confess), but I went some distance toward the changes I wanted. This month we repeated last January's theme of no buying anything new (with two exceptions: Jim bought a camera-related app for his iPod touch, and I bought some dinosaur-related presents for a five year old's birthday party). And this February, I'm going to repeat last February's resolution of a post a day. Because it's a short month! And there's a lot going on!

We also have had a habit of eating out too much, which I was going to say was a bad habit, but probably not according to the restaurants who've been getting our money. We cut back on that a lot this month, and I even tried to do a week with no grocery shopping, cooking entirely with what had been lingering around in our pantry and freezer for an indefinite period of time. I didn't make it a full week, though our pantry does have fewer old oddities in it.

It's pretty easy to cook at home regularly once you...start cooking at home regularly. We have a lot of (yawn) standards, and those standards are matched by a lot of frozen meals from Trader Joe's. Jim and I agree it's time to add a couple of dishes to the menu. I got a Jamie Oliver cookbook for my birthday (thanks, J.!), and we have yet to try any recipes from that, and there's also the second Jacques Pepin fast food book, which has gone largely untested so far. Yep, lots of new cooking to do.

So, while I am not saying that my post a day resolution will result in a recipe and/or food report per day, I am hinting that I hope to include a couple of posts about food, including a couple of recipes. See, I have given myself something easy to write about! Now keeping my resolution will be a cinch! In that spirit, look for Jim's famous (and my favorite) catfish recipe tomorrow.