Month: February 2025

Weekly recap + what we ate: President’s Day, and mundane bathroom things

Last week started with a day off for President’s Day and it was such a lovely day… Nothing terribly special or unique. Not big adventures. Just a really nice day at home. The best thing, though, is I had the two little kids make to do lists for the day, a combination of things that I wanted them to do and things that they wanted to do with their day at home. I’m a firm believer that a good day is a combination of fun and productive activities. The kids seemed to really get into having little Post It lists of tasks and getting to check things off:

The one on the left is the 8 year old’s list and the one on the right is the 5 year old’s list.

We started the day in a leisurely fashion – I did some yoga. The Husband fed the kids breakfast. The after breakfast we cleaned the living room and did some general puttering around the house. We’re still struggling to find a good routine for keeping the house tidy. The tidy habits just aren’t there with me or the kids, but if we leave things to tidy at the end of the day it gets quite out of control.

Then we had lunch – reheated pizza, I’m sure. Because that’s what we always eat for lunch at home. After lunch we went on a walk/bike ride to the park. I love that we live walking distance to a playground and a trail. And since it was a holiday weekend, the parkway parrallel to the trail was closed to car traffic, so the kids had a nice long uninterrupted stretch of road to ride on. We walked from the closest playground to the next one down on the trail and played there for about half an hour before coming home.

After we got home, we watched Wonka- how luxurious does it feel to have an afternoon family movie “night”? After the movie – cute, entertaining, but not particularly memorable, I felt – I made dinner. After dinner, the 13 year old went to basketball and the 5 year old took a shower while the 8 year old worked on his Black History Month project – a poster about Barak Obama. (This is the “Barack Obama” that is on his to do Post It above. I have to say, helping the 8 year old research Barack Obama made me kind of wistful. And really really really sad about the current state of affairs in Washington D.C.) Then we had some family reading time before bed for the two younger kids. We haven’t been reading out loud together as much as we used to – we’ve been going to be so late that it’s usually just pjs, brush teeth, then lights out and cuddles. Sometimes I’ll put on a story podcast for them while we cuddle, but I’m really missing reading outloud from a chapter book. I should try to find a way to put that back into our schedule.

All in all, though, it felt like a really good day – a nice balance of relaxing fun, outdoor fun, and house/life admin. Sometimes I think when we have these family days off, we should try to do something special, but you know what, just a regular leisurely day at home is pretty special too. I don’t think we got in the car until it was time to take the oldest kid to basketball clinic. I do like having a car-free day.

The rest of the week was business as usual – school, activities, etc. I had a super title gig for a recital that featured a lot of beautiful German music and two arias by Handel. I love Handel, so that was a particular treat. One interesting thing about this recital is that the singer did his own translations. Usually when I’m given translations to made into supertitle slides, the singer has pulled them from somewhere else and sometimes they need to be massaged a little bit in order to make good title slides. But this singer, impressively translated everything himself and it was quite well done – no massaging needed.

Mundane Bathroom Things…This next bit was inspired by Elisabeth’s post last month asking for shampoo recommendations. Her post got me thinking how I’m probably the worst person to give recs for personal care products. I started listing in my head all the personal care products I use and it all seemed rather… haphazard…. Through a combination of good genes and apathy, I find myself with a pretty minimal body/face/skin care routine, mostly relying on whatever is around the house. Anyhow, I started going through the list of all the personal care products and items I use regularly and thought it might be the kind of mundane snapshot of life that I’ll be super interested in reading about twenty years from now. Also it might be stupefyingly boring. (If this seems the latter to you, feel free to scroll down to this week’s FIGS.)

Glimpse inside our medicine cabinet. What’s with the ridiculous number of deodorants??? There aren’t that many stinky armpits in the house. Also I seem to be stockpiling eyeglass cleaner. I’m glad I took this picture- it’s inspiring me to do a little clean out. Note the old fashioned ice pack on the top shelf. I love the thing but can never get to it in time when someone needs ice.

Let’s talk about showering – I don’t shower every day. I don’t even shower every other day. I usually shower three times a week. Less if I’m not going into work regularly. Showering is just kind of a lot of work to me. So my preference, though, is to shower at night. Things I use in the shower:

-Soap: Dial bar soap. This is what the Husband uses, so it’s what we have in the house and therefore what I use.

-Shampoo: I used to use Soap and Salve bar shampoo and an apple cidar vinegar rinse. I thought it might be better for the environment because there was no plastic involved, except for the old peri bottle I used for the vinegar. But the shampoo is not that easy to get and I realized that ordering it online hardly makes it good for the environment. So I just started using whatever kids’ shampoo was in the shower. I used to use the 13 year old’s Pantene (which is the shampoo of choice because we can buy it at Costco), but then she started showering in the downstairs bathroom and took her shampoo with her. So… now I just use whatever the little kids use because it’s there. Currently we use Everyone 3-in-1 soap (Body wash, bubble bath, and shampoo.)

-Conditioner: Pantene – but only if I’m showering downstairs in the 13 year old’s shower and it’s there. Otherwise no conditioner.

-Washcloth. Sometimes. Only if there’s already one in the shower. But even then, I never know who used it last so usually I don’t bother.

-Tubshroom. Not personal care per se, this is a little silicone insert that you put in the drain and it catches hair. I do lose a lot of hair in the shower and this thing is invaluable in keeping the hair from clogging the drains. Or at least keeping it from quickly clogging the drains. We still do have to have our drain snaked about once a year.

After Shower Things I use:
-Towel – I have a favorite towel that I’ve been using for probably twenty years. I took it from my parent’s house when I moved out. I love it because it is large, bath sheet sized, but it isn’t thick, so it’s easy to manipulate it to dry off and then I can wrap my hair in it. I get very grumpy if it is in the wash when I want to shower. (Thank you to my Husband to washing my towel, even when he doesn’t tell me he’s doing it ahead of time…)

-Q-tips. i know! they say don’t use q-tips in your ears, but I hate having wet ears.

-Cetaphil body cream – must moisturize after shower. I’m pretty brand loyal about this. I usually get it at Costco because I can buy two giant containers at a time and not have to think about it again for a year.

-Turbie twist, to dry my hair after I towel dry it. I hate walking around with wet hair. When I shower at night, I’ll usually sleep with my hair in the Turbie Twist because it gives my hair a bit of volume in the morning when it is dried.

-Deodorant – not shower specific as usually I only use deoderant if I’m going out in public. I don’t tend to bother with deodorant for hanging out at home. I’ve been using Native lilac and white tea lately, because it smells nice and supposedly is free of aluminum and parabens. Is it really better? Who knows. Everyone’s body chemistry is different so I feel like there’s no magic solution.

-Hair dryer – I prefer to let my hair air dry, but if I happen to shower in the morning and then have to go to work, I’ll blow dry it before I leave the house. I’ve had the Revlon 1875 Ionic hair dryer for over ten years. It was whatever Consumers Report recommended at the time.

Before bed:
-tooth brush – I’m currently using a Dr. Suess kid’s toothbrush. What can I say? It was what was in the toothbrush bin when I had to replace my last toothbrush. Shockingly – I always brush at night, but don’t always manage a morning brush. If I brush in the morning, I prefer to do it first thing because a dentist friend told me that the morning is when there is the most amount of bacteria in one’s mouth.

-Toothpaste – Aquafresh Extreme Clean – I’m actually pretty picky about this. This is the only toothpaste I’ll use if given a choice. Everything else tastes like cotton candy to me.

-Floss – Oral B Glide – this was recommended by the dentist because my teeth are pretty tightly packed together and other floss just shreds when I try to use it.

(I know I should wash my face at night, but I don’t wear make-up, so I don’t feel particular urgency about face washing. If I feel the need to wash my face, I’ll just do a wet washcloth and water.)

Other stuff in my bathroom that gets regular use:
-to clean my glasses, whatever glasses spray came with my glasses from the place I got my glasses. I’m pretty sure it’s just Windex in a branded spray bottle.
-Aquaphor – for every thing that feels dry. Usually my lips, often times my hands if I have an eczema breakout. Also slathered on our faces before we go out when the air is super cold and biting.
-Steroid ointment for my eczema. okay, truth, this tube of prescription ointment is at least eight years old, but it is huge and it still works to calm my eczema when it gets bad. Perhaps I should go back to my dermatologist and get a new prescription, but I am terrible about doctors.
-Lip balm – Aquaphor Lip Repair Stick. Love that this stuff keeps my lips from feeling dry without being too thick or sticky.
-Sunscreen – I use whatever I have for the kids. I had a fancy sun screen last summer, but it made my skin sting and burned whenever I got it in my eyes, so I went back to just using whatever I get for the kids – usually Think Baby or Aveeno, or Coppertone. Last year at some point, I also discovered the amazingness that is spray on sunscreen. That was life changing. I only use sunscreen in the summer, though. I should probably use it all the time.
-period pads – These days it’s the Cora brand, but I’ll usually just pick up whatever cotton topsheet pads I can find at Target.
-period underwear – technically in my bedroom, not bathroom, but it spends a lot of time in my bathroom.
-diaper sprayer. We installed this when we were using cloth diapers, and it actually continues to be quite useful even though we have been diaper free for three years now. I use it to rinse my period underwear, spraying it right in the toilet. Also I will on occasion use the diaper sprayer to rinse by nether regions, kind of like a bidet, but not.
-Kleenex. Always Kleenex brand. NEVER the lotion kind. That just smears when I try to clean my glasses.
-Toilet Paper – Charmin. We are pretty brand loyal to toilet paper. I got us the Kirkland brand one time and there was a meltdown when the TP fell apart as a butt was being wiped. I had to give away the rest of the 24 roll pack. And now we just get the Charmin.
-Advil.
-Hand Soap. Soft Soap because we buy that in bulk at Costco, and I love our soap dispenser that I got a year and a half ago at a sale by a local pottery group:

What I don’t have is any make up because I don’t wear any. I might have some that I keep on hand in case I want to do my face for opening night, but I never really want to make the effort, and I figure I’m just standing around in the dark all night – no one cares what I look like. I guess if I do have any make-up lying around it’s got to be at least five years old. I should probably find that and throw it out.

Whew – I guess it is a long list after all. I didn’t even list most of the stuff in the medicine/linen closet in the bathroom. Like the first aid/medicines that we keep in the bathroom, but I figure that’s not stuff I use regularly. Also didn’t list out the contents of the hair accessories drawer, but that’s because my hair is in a short phase so I don’t usually use the hair ties or clips right now. So there’s a snapshot of one corner of my life in February 2025.

Grateful For: my weekly collection of things I’m grateful for. This month, I’m recording extra gratitudes to add to Elisabeth’s FIG Collective I’ve loved reading everyone one’s FIGs this month.

-Paths and parks.

-School Bus Drivers. One day the 8 year old’s bus was 30 minutes late. Turns out there were some additions to the bus driver’s earlier route that caused trickle down delays. As annoyed as I was to be standing in the cold for 30 minutes waiting for the bus, I’m really grateful to school bus drivers for getting kids to and from school safely. That can’t be an easy job.

-Kids reading to each other:

-That my thyroid is fine. Last year I had a thyroid ultrasound to rule out any issues related to my abnormal period. There was a “not-concerning, but maybe you should have it checked out” nodule. At the time, the ENT said my thyroid is fine, but to schedule a six month follow up. (I guess my abnormal period is just called “being in my mid-forties”.) I had my follow up this week and everything looks fine. There continue to be nodules on my thyroid, but they seems to come and go and are small, so I have another follow up in a year, but no one is concerned.

-Sunshine.

-All the things that make a good morning – healthy breakfast (sweet potato, black beans, cilantro, and scallions), hot tea, a good book, and the crossword puzzle. And fifteen minutes to enjoy it all in peace:

My morning happy place. When it happens.

-Fleece-lined pants. I know I keep mentioning this one, but they are truly life changing.

-It’s Cadbury mini egg season!!!! How much do I love Cadbury mini eggs? The crisp crunchy shell. The smooth sweet chocolate inside. The perfect little size to pop into my mouth. The fact that they are only available once a year. Rejoice! It is Cadbury mini egg season. Oh a discovery! The other day I had some Cadbury mini eggs while sipping my tea and it made my tea taste like a chocolate chai. In light of my M&M conundrum, I am hiding these from the kids.

-That the 8 year old did his homework without either of us having a meltdown.

-A quiet theatre before a performance. The promise of a beautiful evening of music. I think one of my favorite moments of my job is that half hour before a show starts, when everything is in place to begin, and the air back stage is one of quiet anticipation and preparation. I love that energy.

-Laundry freshly washed and hung up to dry, scenting the air with the smell of detergent.

-The five year old’s sassy sense of style:

-Music, played loudly in the car with everyone singing along and bopping to the beat.

-The six pound cabbage. We have a friend who gives us his CSA when he is out of town. Last week, he brought over a HUGE cabbage. Like bigger-than-my- head huge. I put it on the scale to see how much it weigh. Friends, this cabbage weighed more than any of my children at birth. We’ve been slowly eating away at it. Good thing cabbages last a long time.

Yes, that’s a 6lb, 13.9 oz cabbage. I guess that makes it almost 7lbs!

-A brisk and invigorating walk.

-Hot tea in a mug.

-A cake on the counter. One day, I was working from home and, in my procrastination, I decided that I had to do something with the sad looking oranges in our fruit bowl. When I say sad, I mean really really sad. Like the outside skins were dyhydrated to the point that the oranges could be used as baseballs. I found this recipe for whole orange bundt cake (Sunset Magazine’s Whole Orange Cake)- you puree the whole orange and put it in the cake. It was the perfect use for the sad oranges. Having the whole orange in the cake gave the cake a marmalade-like tang, making it not too sweet. This lovely cake sat on the counter all week, and how lovely it was to be able to walk over and cut of a slice to nibble whenever I felt like it – morning snack, afternoon tea, dessert… Doesn’t having a cake on the counter just make a kitchen seem like home?

I did not sift the powdered sugar when I made the frosting, so it clumped a little bit.

Looking Forward To:

-Swimming lessons. I managed to snag a hard to get swim lesson slot at one of the county pools. I’ve been feeling a little anxious that the two younger kids still don’t know how to swim, and I’m really hopeful this is the year they learn. I know once a week swim lessons for six weeks probably won’t do it, but it’s a start. I think I’ll also try to find time to take them to the pool as well for rec swim time. We have a new-ish county rec/swim center that opened last year and I hear it’s great. Apparently there are two hydrotherapy pools – one near the kids’ area and one far away from the kids’ area. That sounds like a great design.

-Spring – there have been some positively spring-like days lately. I’m so excited that the weather is beginning to turn.

-Cherry Blossom season! The predictions for Cherry blossom season have started to trickle in. The Washington Post is predicting mid March.

-Knitting. I’m determined to do something with the yarn sitting in my room. I’ve borrowed some books from the library and my friend loaned me some needles and I’ve decided to make a hat. I’ve knitted and pulled apart the first five rows three or four times already, but I guess that’s par for the course. I get a little excited for the possibilities every time I see the yarn and needles.

-Plans with friends. I have three separate dates on the calendar with friends whom I haven’t seen in at least six months, one of them for a year. Looking forward to catching up.

What We Ate:

Monday: Tikil goman Meera Sodha’s recipe for Ethiopian cabbage, carrots, and potatoes. We ate this with the injera that we bought from the Ethiopian grocery store that I mentioned last week. It was really simple and tasty. Vegan.

Tuesday: Taco Tuesday. We had a friend join us for Taco Tuesday last week. The Husband made slow cooker chicken, and I also made black beans and shrimp for the tacos. On the side – mano slaw, guacamole,

Wednesday: Baked Feta and Tomato Pasta – recipe shared by Julie on her blog. This was so easy and tasty. I thought we would have leftovers, but the kids kept asking for more. It was a touch acidic for the Husband, but I think he feels that way about any tomato-heavy dish.

Thursday: I worked this evening so had a work canteen salad. The Husband made this 15 minute Tomato Egg Noodle from Omnivore’s Cookbook. Scrambled eggs cooked in a ginger-y tomato sauce and eaten over noodles. I had leftovers days later and it was SO GOOD.

Friday: Pizza (carry out) and Lego Batman. I’m pretty sure we’ve seen Lego Bathman before, but the Husband said I should just be thankful that he talked the 8 year old out of choosing the latest Paw Patrol movie.

Saturday: The two little kids and I were at a birthday party. There was the usual pizza, but also the family ordered falafel as the main food as well. The falafel was really tasty, the pita pillowy, there were lots of veggies and pickle toppings and there was this amazing spicy green Schug sauce to top it all off. Gold star to the birthday parents for this spread.

Sunday: Dinner out at a really tasty sandwich place, Full On. We were out for the 13 year old’s basketball game, which happened to be close to this bar/restaurant that we really like but don’t go to a lot because it’s not really close to our house. The 13 year old and I shared a Buffalo Chicken Sandwich and a Crab Cake Sandwich with onion rings.

Here’s a thought to leave you with: One of my favorite things to read is the weekly chat of advice columnist Carolyn Hax in the Washington Post. I find that she answers readers questions with such a great blend of empathy and pragmatism and without sugar-coating things. Her readers often contribute similarly thoughtful advice. These past few weeks there has been much angst in reader questions about the state of the world and our place in it. I loved this comment a reader submitted to the chat last Friday:

from the chat on Friday 2/21/2025

Hope you have a week of beautiful points.
Tell me about your mundane body care things. How many bottles are in your shower? Blow dry or not to blow dry? What’s your favorite baked good to have on the counter? What else should I do with my 6 lb cabbage. (I think there’s still 4 lbs left.)

Books Read- January 2025

Last month, there was a beautiful essay on Cup of Jo by author Christine Pride called “A Reading Challenge- Who’s In?” Pride writes about the importance of reading books that portray a wide variety of people, situations, thoughts. It’s the Books as Windows idea – that books let you see into other worlds, but also can reflect your own world back to you. (Sometimes it’s “windows and mirrors”). Pride writes:

But as much as editors, agents, producers and development folks may be committed to more diverse offerings, we still have to count on audiences being willing and excited to embrace a variety of stories. There’s a dangerous trap of thinking that “Black stories” are just for Black audiences and “queer stories” are just for queer audiences, etc. […] It creates a mentality that certain books are for certain people. But we can’t always just read books about people like us or who share our histories, backgrounds and viewpoints — not only because that’s boring and reductive, but if audiences only consume certain types of content then only those types will continue to get published or made.

These days, when diversity of thought, situation, and experience is under attack by those who lead the country, I feel like it’s more important than ever that we continue to fill our media diet with viewpoints that are different from our own, and to demand diverse content from publishers and presenters. At the end of the essay, Pride asks readers to suggest books that are both windows and mirrors – books through which readers have found themselves introduced to a world very different from their own, or a book that tells of something from their own experience, something that they feel grateful to have seen reflected. Reading the comments is so interesting because there are definitely books people recommend where I think, “Hmmm…. I wouldn’t have thought to put that book on a list like this…” But then I would be wrong – because I think every book has the potential to be eye-opening to someone. Anyhow, if you’re looking for diverse book suggestions, there is a gold mine of books recommended in the comments of that post.

On to January Books!

The Harmony Silk Factory by Tash Aw – I picked up this novel to read while in Malaysia since it was set in that country. Set in the early 20th century, the novel tells the story of Johnny Lim, an enigmatic textile merchant who is born a peasant, and becomes one of the wealthiest and most influential men in Malaysia. His life is recounted through three separate narrators – his son, his wife, and a British expat who was one of his best friends. The writing in this novel is beautiful, but ultimately I just just very confused by the whole thing, and maybe that’s the point. You get to the end of the novel still without any understanding of whom Johnny Lim was. I did enjoy reading it while in Malaysia, though, and getting a view of the history of the country.

This is So Awkward: Modern Puberty Explained by Cara Natterson and Vanessa Kroll Bennett – I really like Natterson and Kroll Bennett’s podcast “This is So Awkward” (It used to be called the Puberty Podcast) – they combine the science of puberty with solid advice on how to interact with tweens and teens with empathy and calm. This book is similar to the podcast. Each chapter looks at one aspect of puberty – from acne to body odor to periods to sexuality – and examines the science behind that aspect and then gives advice for how to talk to kids about it. They are big proponents of supplying kids with the science behind what is going on with their changing bodies and brains, and using that as a way to talk about why things sometimes feel difficult and tactics to manage. I do wish that there was more guidance on how to navigate things like executive functioning skills and screen time and decision making. I mean I really want to know how to get my tween to stop yelling at me, you know. I guess these things are outside the realm of physical changes. But as a whole, I found this book great as a basis for framework for a relationship that is open and informative.

The Love of My Afterlife by Kristy Greenwood– This was a sweetly predictable romance-ish novel about Delphie, who chokes to death on a burger, meets her soul mate in the afterlife waiting room and then is given the chance to go back to Earth to find him. I thought it was fine read- it’s marketed as a romance, but the novel is more about Delphie’s journey from being an introverted screw up to someone who gets her life together through finding a community. I really enjoyed the premise of this novel. Still, protagonists who operate with a dearth of self awareness and who can’t adult don’t tend to sit well with me, and there were definitely times when I wanted to shake Delphie . Despite that, there are a host of quirky characters and slapstick situations, making this novel a nice light read, even if it didn’t stick with me for long.

My Season of Scandal by Julie Anne Long – Book 7 in the Palace of Rogue series. How much did I love this book! Okay, the cover is terrible – the hero is not the smirky-jerk he looks like on the cover and there is NO red dress in the book. There is a a blue dress that figure prominently. I get that there is a format-ish for romance novel covers, but perhaps at least they should look something like what is happening in the story. But you know what, even that inane cover doesn’t take away from how much I enjoyed this book – for sure my favorite of the series. Catherine Keating is a pragmatic country-bred doctor’s daughter sent to London for her first (and probably only) season. Dominique Kirke is a bleeding heart liberal politician and a charismatic orator who avoids emotional entanglements and idiots. They both end up at the same boarding house, and keep crossing paths at various balls and events where Kirke tries to advise Keating on how to avoid being eaten alive by the social alligators. What did I love about this book? The two main characters are both smart and kind and thoughtful, not prone to doing idiotic things. I liked that they liked each other from the get go- the chemistry between the two of them often made me smile – there were pages and pages of long conversations between the two of them and it never felt superfluous or boring – I really got a sense of why they fall in love, when they do eventually fall in love. (It does take a while to get there…). And the falling in love is the plot – no kidnapping or intrigue or nefarious uncles – just two people trying to make good choices. And Long’s writing is just so good – every word is perfect and does what it’s supposed to do – whether it’s to make the reader laugh or tear up or cheer or move the plot along. This was my favorite sentence:
“He could not locate the ends of his composure to regather it.”
I thought that was a fantastically crafted sentence. My one quibble is that there is a bit of a large age gap which I go back and forth on whether it is necessary. But I think, actually the age gap works better than usual. Anyhow, if you like well-written slow burn character driven historical romances, I would highly recommend this one.

The Scandalous Confessions of Lydia Bennett, Witch by Melinda Taub, read by Amy Hoggart – I’m a sucker for Jane Austen re-tellings, and this Pride and Prejudice twist was pretty intriguing. The title kind of tells the premise – Lydia Bennett is a witch, descended from a long line of witches. Kitty Bennet is her familiar, literally a cat who takes on the form of a Bennett sister when it’s convenient. There are demons to fight -we all thought Wickham was a dastardly rogue, but wait til you hear the truth of how truly wicked he is – spells to cast, balls to go to and neighbors to visit. The book is clever and smart, and I loved that it showed another side of Lydia Bennett. We all underestimated her, for sure. I don’t go for magic/fantasy books a lot, and it took a long time for me to feel like I understood the the magical elements of the story – parts of the world building felt tedious to me. But once the story got rolling, it was very entertaining.

We’ll Prescribe You a Cat by Syou Ishida, Translated by E. Madison Shimoda – I saw this book at a bookstore in Taiwan and was so intrigued by the premise. This novel is a series of short stories that center around a therapist’s clinic that, as the title says, prescribes cats to solve their patients’ issues. This book was cute to start – the descriptions of the cats made me want to reach out and pet them – and then the end kind of went off the rails for me. I was so confused by the ending. I’m not smart enough for super allegorical books, and I suspect there is some of that going on here.

On my proverbial night stand:

The Love Songs of W.E.B. duBois by Honorée Fanonne Jeffers – still working my way through this very big book. I’m super absorbed by it, though.

The Blue Castle by L.M. Montgomery – for Engie’s book club. A delight.

Jellyfish Age Backwards by Nicklas Brendborg – slightly witty, very dry non-fiction book that looks at the science of aging.

The Flat Share by Beth O’Leary – He works the night shift and is only home from 9am to 6pm. She needs a place to stay and answers and ad to share the flat, occupying it from 6pm to 9am. Soon they start leaving each other the least passive aggressive roommate notes ever.

The Formidable Miss Cassidy by Meihan Boey – Scottish lady travels to British Malay (Singapore) to be a companion to an English teen. Mysterious happenings happen. Not my usual fare, but I’m intrigued by the setting.

Weekly recap + what we ate: sick week and random FIGS

It was a massively unproductive week. I was laid up sick for much of the week. What started as a throat tickle on Monday, devolved into me in bed for most of Wednesday. Wednesday also happened to be the snow day. Fortunate or unfortunate timing? Well, fortunate in that the kids didn’t have to go to school. Unfortunate in that it was a snow day and everyone really wanted to go sledding… There were disappointed kids for sure. In the end I spent three days in bed with periodic excursions to take the kids to the bus or to activities. Luckily on Friday the Husband took care of the school bus pick up and drop off so I could continue to rest.

I am a terrible sick person. I don’t like to stay in bed, I get bored easily, I always think I feel better way before I actually do. But I will say there is always one point when I feel like being in bed is doing me no good and I have to get outside. By the third day of being in the house resting, I was convinced that I wasn’t going to get any better staying in bed and went for a walk. My body just craved sunshine and fresh air and some movement. I walked towards the 13 year old’s school and met her as shew as on her way home, and he face lit up when she saw me. I don’t know if it’s scientifically backed, but I did feel better for having gotten out of bed and out of the house. Or maybe it was seeing my kid’s face all lit up with cold and joy. I’m reminded of something I read once (maybe it was Oprah) that said, “Make sure your face lights up when you see your child.” Realizing how much it made my day to see my kid’s face light up made me remember that it works both ways and I need to have that same joy when I see her too.

(note: it was Oprah. Rather Toni Morrison via Oprah. Okay -funny story – Toni Morrison taught at my alma mater. I once sat next to her at a lecture, and fell asleep. I hope I didn’t lean on her or drool or anything…)

Anyhow, whatever illness I had is now making it’s way through the house. The Husband had a tickle and I immediately sent him to bed, bought a humidifier, Cold-Eeeze, and Ricola. I’ve been obsessed with the idea that stress is one of the things that can exacerbate illness, so I’ve demanded everyone be as stress-free as possible. No yelling, screaming, or tantrums. Please. He seemed to have escaped the worst of it, though now the 13 year old is laid up in bed. Oh well, the bug will cycle through the family and we’ll all move on. Hunkering and reducing stress seems like an okay way to spend what is shaping up to be a very very cold February.

Fun thing, though – the 13 year old finally had her birthday party sleepover over the weekend. She’s been doing this formula for three years now and I kind of love that. She has friends over on a Saturday night – they watch movies, YouTube videos, eat pizza, chips, rainbow cake, and stay up way too late. Sunday morning we have waffles and bacon and the kids all go see a movie. Even though her birthday was in January, it took us until February to find a good weekend, due to activities and my work schedule. (It seemed downright cruel to make the Husband be the only parent at home during a tween sleepover…) This weekend was perfect because they kids didn’t have Faith Formation classes on Sunday morning and Monday is a day off from school so we can all recuperate.

I’m really proud that the 13 year old did a lot of the planning herself for the first time. Granted the planning wasn’t terribly timely, but she did take on a lot of the mental load, so I’m calling it a win. Being a new phone owner, she sent all the invites herself, as in she texted her friends with the details and tracked who was going to come. I feel like we’re entering new territory where she can make plans with her friends on her own. No more mom-enabled play dates. There was still a little coordination to be done with other parents to coordinate drop offs and pick ups, but all in all, it feels like we are slowly taking baby steps towards the oldest being an independent being. Some days I stop and realize that she will be driving in THREE YEARS and I try not to freak out too much.

The set up – fruit, chips, chips, chips, cookies, and face masks!

Grateful for: I’m trying to be more mindful of big and little gratitudes this month, in honour of Elisabeth’s FIG (Finding Joy in Gratitude) Collective this month. Thank you Elisabeth for gathering people and thoughts! (There’s my first FIG right there!)

-YouTubers who share their expertise – There was a cushion on our basement couch that had lost a button and as a result was going all shapeless. After years of the Husband asking me if it was fixable, I finally decided that the misshapen pillow would not be worthy of our Super Bowl guests so I went to the craft store and bought upholstery needles. I still didn’t have much of an idea of how to fix this, so I turned the experts – YouTube to the rescue. I found a clear and simple tutorial on how to retuft a cushion and in less than twenty minutes, I had fixed the pillow and it was once again standing upright. I felt so accomplished. In the back of my 5 year journal I keep a list of new skills I learn each year. Button tufting is going on the list.

Sad shapeless cushion.
All fixed!

-Early release days for weather and being able to pick up my kid. I know not everyone can accommodate a last minute early release, so I’m really grateful that I’m in a slow period at work and that I could pick up the kid early when the school decided to close at 1pm for weather. We went to Trader Joe’s and even such a simple thing as running an errand, made for some great mommy-daughter time.

-Non-latex dishwashing gloves for my unfortunate combination of latex allergy and eczema.

-Remote start – I will be the first to tell you that I did not want an mini van. I still find it kind of scary to drive – it’s huge and I have no sense of where the rear end is. The thing is like driving around in a living room, seriously. BUT I am discovering many nice features, and this bitterly cold week, the remote start feature was amazing.

-International grocery stores and international communities. I wanted to make tikil goman (Ethopian cabbage, carrots, and potatoes) since we had cabbage and potatoes to use up. Meera Sodha’s recipe had instructions for a faux injera to eat alongside, and I was totally going to make that. But then I realized, “Wait, there is a a sizable Ethiopian population in our county. I should just get the real thing.” So I found an Ethiopian grocery store on the way home from Soccer Clinic and we picked up two packages of pillowy soft injera made fresh on the premises. It was delicious. We might have eaten half a package right out of the bag. How amazing it is to have so many international grocery stores in our area. (Also – I went down a rabbit hole reading Sodha’s column in the Guardian, The New Vegan. I want to make every recipe.)

The injera was still warm!

-The Kids’ Skating instructor. She is amazing and kind and works so well with the kids.

-The track at the 8 year old’s school. I haven’t been running, because of the cold, but there is a track at the elementary school, and one day after drop off I walked four laps while listening to my audiobook. I’m so grateful that these things are open to the public. I remember when I was little, my parents would take us to the high school and make us run laps, and I hated it, but you know… the older I get, the more I see that my parents were really on to something.

-That the car is okay. I went over a curb funny and suddenly there was this horrible scraping noise when I drove. I pulled over seriously panicking that I had done some serious damage and wondering when I was going to have time to take the car in. After looking under the hood and around the tires, and not finding anything I got down on my hands and knees and reached under the car to see if I could feel anything. Like a detached muffler. (Not even sure if that’s a thing or if I was looking in the right area for such a thing.). Then my hand felt a twig and I gave a large tug and out came a four foot long branch. Oh thank goodness. Problem solved.

-Carpooling to work with my friend and picking up Starbucks (her) and cheesy buns (me) on the way home. Letting her convince me to buy a jelly donut, which I immediately eat in three bites, covering myself with powdered sugar in the process. I don’t regret it at all.

Also this bumper sticker we saw on the way:

There was quite an eclectic collection of bumper stickers on this truck.

And Some Sick Week FIGS:
-Windows. Three days sick in bed can make one tired of staring at the the walls of one’s bedroom. Except there are windows in those walls. And through those windows I could still see sunlight and clouds and sunsets and beautiful skies.

-Mucinex – I don’t usually take drugs when I’m sick, but boy did I need it this time; I was so congested I couldn’t breath or sleep.

-Kleenex.

-Rice cakes, ramen, and soup. Making lunch seemed like an impossible task when i was sick, but I also don’t like being hungry, so I did manage to make some simple soups. One day it was ramen with a cabbage, and an egg mixed in. Another day, it was a riff of this (Rice Cake Soup with Bok Coy and Edamame), though instead of chicken broth I made a “broth” by using water with kimchi tossed in. And I added dandelion greens and ginger because that’s what I had. The hot spicy filling goodness what just what I needed.

-Audiobooks – I mentioned above that I’m a terrible sick person because I get bored easily in bed. I did watch Bridget Jones’s Baby, but too much tv made my head hurt. Audiobooks to the rescue. I checked out a few rom coms from the library and listened to them. I only half paid attention to them, but the soothing voices and just enough plot was enough to calm my brain.

-The thirteen year old – who took care of the kids on the snow days when I was sick. I’m pretty sure she made them lunch and hot chocolate and let them watch inane YouTube videos all day. I know she did make them go outside for a little bit and play in the snow. But the important thing is she kept them out of the bedroom where I was sleeping.

-The Husband – who made dinner and put the kids to bed and basically solo parented while I was in bed.

-That I’m healing. The second day of being sick, I thought some yoga might heal my congestion, so I went on YouTube and searched “Yoga when sick” and a 15 minute gentle yoga video came up. It was just the easy practice that I needed to stretch a little and breathe. At the end of the video, Sara Beth said something that really stuck with me:
“Instead of telling yourself ‘I’m sick, I’m stuffy, I’m exhausted, I’m miserable’, tell yourself ‘I’m healing.’”
What a wonderful, gratitude-filled way to frame being sick. Rather than focus on how awful I’m feeling, reminding myself that the fever and mucus are all signs that my body is well enough to fight whatever it is that has me down, and that I’m healing.

Looking Forward To – so ironically two of my “Looking forward to” things from last week did not happen because I was sick – I didn’t go contra dancing and we didn’t enjoy a cozy snow day – but I think there is still great value in giving ourselves things to look forward to:

-Getting back into a routine after being sick.

-Voice recital that I’m doing supertitles for this week. There’s some really great music on the program and I always have a really long dinner break when I do this gig, so I’m looking forward to a nice evening walk.

-Finishing this book on audio. This was one of the books I started when I was sick and it’s pretty cute – a bit gimmicky, but not annoyingly so. (I also started another book that wasn’t as interesting, but perfectly soothing in the moment. I probably wont’ finish that one.)

What We Ate:
Monday: Cheesesteak sandwiches, leftover from the Super Bowl

Tuesday: Taco Tuesday. It’s getting to be a tradition. Chicken, shrimp, black beans, mango cabbage slaw, guacamole, salsa, pickled onions.

Wednesday: Sheet pan gnocchi with broccoli and cherry tomatoes. Vegan. (I think, though come to think of it, I’m not sure if we bought vegan gnocchi.)

Thursday: Noodles w/ tofu and mushrooms. The Husband made this. I couldn’t get out of bed to eat it that night, but I had leftovers on Saturday night and they were so delicious.

Friday: Pizza (Take out) and Skeleton Crew – the latest (I think) series in the Star Wars Franchise. This one stars a bunch of kids who seem to be very far from home. And Jude Law.

Saturday: The 13 year old’s sleepover. There was a lot of pizza (from Dominos), and chips. And Rainbow cake. We get this cake every year from our local deli/diner, which in turn get them from David’s Cookies. I ate leftovers from the fridge.

Sunday: Fend for yourself. I’m pretty sure the kids ate leftover movie popcorn and injera for dinner.

Hope you have a healthy week!

What are your go to comforts and cures when you’re sick? Who makes your face light up? Whose face do you make light up?

Weekly recap + what we ate: Snack conundrum, February aspirations, and listening to

This week – work, family, federal chaos. I don’t know if I have the bandwidth to unpack all of that. Or even if I should/want to/etc.

So here are some less consequential things on my mind lately….

The snack situation at our house is pissing me off. It seems like the kids are constantly snacking. Okay, I’m going to be honest – what pisses me off the most is that they are taking my snacks. Specifically my peanut M&Ms. One of my snacks of choice to pack for work is a trail mix of pretzels, peanut M&Ms, and dried cherries. I bought a big bag of M&Ms to do this. (Rather, the Husband bought me a bag when he was at the grocery store.) The kids found it and the bag was nearly gone within the week. Ooooh the rage I felt. Anyhow – my options as I see it are:
1)stop buying Peanut M&Ms. This would make me sad.
2) Hide the peanut M&Ms better. But where? The kids are very persistent.
3) Give them better alternatives. Would this work? Would they eat the bowl of carrots I put out for them? Really they just want M&Ms.
4) have a no snacking rule. HAHAHAHAHA. Nope.
5) get over myself and let them eat the peanut M&Ms.

I realize this is completely irrational. Peanut M&Ms aren’t like beer – it’s not something I can pass off as a “Mommy snack.” I’m trying to think of why my kids can’t have Peanut M&Ms whenever they want in a way that doesn’t make me feel petty. (ie. they can’t have peanut M&Ms because the M&M are MINE!!!!!) Sigh. It’s really hard to be the bigger person in this parenting thing.

So anyhow I’m trying to think of better snacks.

Listening to lately – Despite my musing in my 2024 media diet post about my lack of music listening, I’ve been trying to rectify it somewhat. Some things I’m listening to:
–All Songs Considered. I am so not hip, but I like this podcast because they play music I’ve never heard of (honestly that’s not that difficult. My musical rolodex is quite limited) by artists I’ve never heard of (but probably should know about), and they tell you why they like the pieces.

-Our Tainan playlist. On the bus in Taiwan, I made a playlist by asking everyone in the family (my parents, my brother’s family’ the Husband and kids) to choose one song to add to the list. It’s a little all over the place, but I love listening it because it reminds me of my family:

-Okay you know what is unassumingly charming music? The soundtrack to Bluey. There is even a poppy version of Pachelbel’s Canon that doesn’t drive me batty. I’ve been playing this album when I want something cheerful in the background. The music embodies the happiness I want my kids to remember when they are grown,.


(Note – Pachelbel’s Canon is one of those pieces of music that makes me roll my eyes. Funny story – It was the one piece of music that I was adament would not be played at my wedding. The organist suggested it and was shut down rather quickly. But then, my parents arranged a wedding banquet in Taiwan for all their relatives. And what did the DJ play when the Husband and I entered? Pachelbel’s Canon. What could the Husband and I do but laugh?)

Some light aspirations for February:

-Register the 5 year old for kindergarten. This is one of two big “To Do” of February. She is for sure going to Kindergarten this fall. No one is stopping her.

– Start organizing forms for our tax person. This is the other big “To Do” for us. I start back at rehearsal at the end of March, so I need this done before then. Also our tax guy wants tax documents submitted two weeks before

-Schedule an appointment for window treatments. Now that I’ve donated the 20 year old car, this is the looming-perpetually-put-off item at the top of my to do list.

-Schedule an eye appointment. The situation is sad, friends. I haven’t had my eyes checked in four or five years and things just don’t look crisp anymore. I really need to fix this before I have to spend more time standing in the dark backstage trying to read music by the light of a tiny book light.

-Paint and send some cards.

-Work – clean out the office, organize the laptop situation, order spike tape. I have two supertitle gigs, so I want to make sure I get ahead of that work and not leave it to the last minute.

-home – 30 day declutter challenge. I found a Thirty Day Declutter Challenge online. I like that it’s in ten minute increments.

-write Taiwan/Kuala Lumpur trip recaps.

-Schedule time to see friends.

-Family game night.

-Make it to one of the 13 year old’s middle school basketball games.

-Valentine’s Day. Help the kids write their cards.

-Routine and Habit goals:
* yoga daily
* journal/ track habits daily
*1 vegan dinner a week. Trying to eat more vegetables.
*Go to bed before midnight.
*Read every day.

Grateful For – It’s been so uplifting to read read everyone’s FIGs via Elisabeth’s gratitude challenge. Here are some of my FIGS for the past week:
– The Husband showing me a beautiful sunset. He was on his way out the door to pick up one of the kids and he came back, saying, “Look at this sunset!” It was stunning, all orange-y pink incandescence.

-Hoodies with zippered pockets. Good for when I just stuff my keys in my pocket.

-Our gas grill and the tenant who left it for us. I was a charcoal grill person for the longest time, but then our tenant left behind a gas grill when she moved out. It’s not the same flavor, but it sure as hell is faster.

-Wifi at kids’ activities. Lets me get work done. Or blogging. Like right now at the Agility Center.

-Fresh baked muffins. And a batter that is sturdy enough to sit in the fridge for a few days so that I can make more on a whim.

-A commute home when I hit all the green lights. Makes me feel unstoppable.

-Parks and playgrounds nearby. I feel so lucky that we live somewhere that there’s usually a park or playground within a 10-15 minute radius of wherever we are, so if we have some awkward time to kill between activities, we can find a playground.

-Movie night and cuddles from the kids on the couch.

-The cherry tree in the living room isn’t dead after all. The Husband on a whim bought a cherry tree last year. It’s been living in our living room and for a while it was just sad and bare. But slowly, so slowly that I hadn’t even noticed, there has been green emerging from the brown branches. And this week, there was even a blossom.

Looking Forward To:
– Contra Dancing! There is a Thursday night contra dance this week near us. Looking forward to going with the family.

-Vanilla. So we ran out of vanilla this week. Or rather we ran out of vanilla at some point before this week and no one clocked it to put it on the grocery list before I wanted to make a big batch of muffins. I had some vanilla beans that my mother in law had bought me for Christmas one year. (Note, my mother in law passed away in 2016, so these have been in the pantry for a looooong time.) I’d been too intimidated to use the vanilla bean, but desparate times….

I scraped a vanilla pod into the muffins. then I read that you could make your own vanilla extract by sticking a vanilla pod in vodka and leaving it for six months. Well…. Last show, a singer had given me a tiny bottle of vodka for opening night. Alcohol is a common opening night present, but I don’t drink, so it’s often a conundrum of what to do with it. Well, this was perfect. I stuck a vanilla bean in that tiny bottle of vodka. And now I wait. For six months. I’m so excited. I also hope I remember it’s there in August.

Open in six months. I guess I have to remember where I put it in six months.

-Another snow day. Looking forward to hunkering, maybe baking. I have some meetings that I’ll take from home. Shhhhh… don’t tell the kids, but there might be movie marathon at some point so I can read. See next point.

-Reading this book:

This book was all the rage last year. It finally came off my holds as a seven day loan, so I’m madly trying to read it this week because if I don’t finish it, the waitlist for this book is like 2000 people long. It’s proving funny and sharp. Also makes me wonder if my wardrobe is boring and normal.

What We Ate:
Monday: Greek Salad and Zucchini Fritters. Vegan. (I used a flax egg for the fitters.)

Tuesday: Taco Tuesday. We had a friend over this time. I made grilled chicken, black beans, shrimp, mango-cabbage slaw. We had also pickled onions, guac, sour cream, avocados. Corn tortillas and wheat tortillas.

Wednesday: Random dinner – I used up the rest of the sunchokes by making another batch of sunchoke chips, and also steamed green beans. The Husband was out running and errand and came home with kung pao chicken and garlic pork.

Thursday: Waffles and tofu scramble (The Husband Cooked). This was our attempt at breakfast for dinner in an age of $10 eggs.

Friday: Pizza (The Husband made it) and Avengers: Civil War. A very unsatisfying movie.

Saturday: DogFish Head Brewery for the Husband’s birthday

Super Bowl Sunday: We had several friends over and there was so. much. food: we made cheeseteaks, dumplings, and snickerdoodles. Our friends brought: smoked turkey, chicken wings, white bean buffalo dip, brownies. There was also a lot of chips, Doritos (Cool Ranch and Regular), and cucumbers and carrots. Also, these Pringles:

I am pretty notorious in my circles for eating anything, but these were… not good. They were meaty with a green pepper aftertaste that tasted both surprisingly accurate and completely artificial.

Hope you have a lovely week!

What are you currently snacking on? What’s one song you would add to my playlist? Any big to do list items for February?

2024 Media Favorites

I try to track the media I consume – I like being able to look back on what went into my brain, and remember if I enjoyed it or not. I don’t have a very cohesive method of tracking, just random scribbles in my journal. I do make longer entries for live performances, though. Here are some things that I consumed that really stood out in 2024. I don’t know if these are my absolute favorites – I find I didn’t take really good notes last year, but these were things that stayed with me (I know these lists are usually posted in January or December even, but.. here you go…)

BOOKS
I read 59 books this year, mostly fiction. I think I’ve re-discovered that I like reading paper copies of books over ebooks. Certainly over reading books on my phone. I get distracted too easily when I read books on my phone.

I DNF books a lot. Not because I don’t like them, but because something more interesting comes along and other things fall to the wayside. I tend to “hate-read” books that I don’t like because I really want to see what happens. I should maybe let that go.

Favorite Reads 2024 :
Ministry of Time by Kalaine Bradley – Time travel isn’t usually my thing. But apparently if you mix time travel with a very attractive Victorian explorer, workplace politics, and political thriller and wrap that in a story that asks questions about what really is “progress”, I guess that ends up being my jam.

Landslide by Susan Conley – I loved this book set in Maine, about a mother of two teenage boys in trying to cope when her husband is injured in a fishing accident off the coast of Nova Scotia. It’s the kind of book that quietly pierces to the core of the beauty and heartbreak of every day life.

Green Island by Shawna Yang Ryan – This book – about Taiwan under martial law, about being an immigrant in America, about how a family deals with trauma and hardship – this book felt very deeply personal to me. These were the times that my parents lived in.

The Adventures of Amina el-Sarifi – Middle aged female pirate gathering a team together to carry out one last heist while battling magical creatures. There is a lot of that description that isn’t my usual jam, but 40 year old bad ass heroines certainly are.

Untangled: Guiding Teenage Girls Through the Seven Transitions to Adulthood by Lisa Damour – Forget that cringey title, this books was super insightful for me in thinking about how to relate to my tween.

Audiobooks:
The Monsters We Defy by Lesley Penelope read by Shyana Small – I loved this audiobook so much that I borrowed the e-book from the library to read it again. I’m not one into fantasy, but the historical aspects set in 1920s DC provided a good gateway for me to sink into this story.

Ten Things That Never Happened by Alexis Hal, read by Will Watt – I really enjoy Alexis Hall’s books for their mix of humor and quirky yet human characters. Will Watt’s narration of this book upped that all for me. This cozy rom com of a book was like my favorite Richard Curtis movie in audiobook form.

PODCASTS:
I’d say next to books podcasts are the media I consume most. I tend to like podcasts that are long conversations about the human condition, or deep dives into something super niche. I do also listen to a lot of parenting podcasts.

House Calls with Vivek Murthy – I am so sad that Murthy, who was Surgeon General under Obama and Biden, will no longer be producing this podcast, what with him losing his job and all. When I think of podcasts that dissect the essence of what makes us human and how we connect to each other, this podcast is right there. I loved his interview with astronaut Kayla Barron – it’s probably my single most favorite podcast episode this year. In addition to the fascinating details on how one becomes and astronaut, Barron has so many wise words to say about life on earth. I had previously mentioned that she frames the ordinary with the extraordinary. (Fixing the treadmil… in space!) She also said something that has stuck with me about building diverse teams, and that is it’s not about diversity for the sake of diversity, it’s about bringing diversity of thought to a project. That’s so important to remember in the current anti-DEI times. Murthy’s interview with poet Ada Limon is also fantastic – it gave me a lot to think about how I spend my days. You’re going to have to find this podcast on your player because it is no longer available on the Health and Human Services website. wump wump.

Sold a Story: This series actually came out in 2022, though I found it still really relevant. It’s an investigative journalism series that looks at how children are being taught to read in America, specifically how a method that had no scientific backing was being used throughout schools.

Nice White Parents: A 5 episode podcast from 2020 that looks at how parents can shape public schools, and not necessarily for the benefit of everyone.

This is So Awkward – Cara Natterson and Vanessa Kroll Bennett are the experts I turn to when I feel like I’m failing at parenting a tween (now teenager). They provide the perfect blend of science and compassion for navigating this stage of parenting.

28-ish Days Later – podcast from the BBC that looks at the menstural cycle from both a biological and historical perspective. I especially appreciated the sentiment that our periods don’t make women weaker – after all what is stronger than being able to deal with having a different body every single day as we cycle though physical and emotional states?

MOVIES: I think I went to see two, maybe three, movies in the theatre last year. We watch movies at home, but mostly for family movie night. I find I don’t have a lot of bandwidth for watching movies on my own. As a result, most of our movie watching is not at all current.

Babes – My friend and I went to a midweek matinee of this movie last spring, when things were kind of slow at work. We laughed so so so hard at this movie. It stars Ilana Glazer and Michelle Buteau in a story about two best friends whose relationship is tested when the perpetually single one accidentally becomes pregnant. There are pregnancy jokes, pumping jokes, parenting jokes, BFF jokes… All of which fell in the “funny because it’s true” category. Was the movie stunningly original? Probably not, but that doesn’t make it any less wonderful. Why haven’t more people seen this movie????

Family Movie Night: Pizza and movie night is a staple at our place. Usually on a Friday night or a Saturday night. Some of our (MY) favorites this year that we watched with the kids (who were 12, 7, and 4):
-Night at the Museum – action and excitement
-Next Goal Wins – heartwarming soccer movie. Also Michael Fassbender is dreamy.
-Greatest Showman – we watch this at least twice a year, singing along loudly
-Barbie – subversive bubble gum fun, that had me in tears at the end.
-Mitchells vs. the Machines – Animated movies aren’t my default pick for movie night – I’m trying to watch more live action things. But this movie was delightful and heart-warming.

TELEVISION
Family TV Night: This year we really leaned into family TV night rather than family movie night. What with everyone’s activities, a 30 or 60 minute episode of something was just the right length to fit in between basketball practice and bedtime. Favorite shows we watched:
-Gallivant. WHY WHY WHY was there only two seasons of this family friendly, funny, entertaining show?
-Glee. Some of the subject matter was awkward to explain, but the musical numbers had us all bobbing along.
-Bad Batch, The Acolyte, and really anything in the Star Wars Universe. When we don’t know what to watch, Star Wars
-Star Trek: The Next Generation. When we were vacationing on an Island in Maine, we watched ST:TNG non stop for three days. It didn’t feel as dated as I thought it would.
-The Summer Olympics. So exciting to watch.
-Bluey. I don’t know why it took us this long to get into Bluey. The episodes are short and feel so true to life, perfect way to unwind before bedtime. (Like the one where the kids drop their ice cream cone and declare to dad, “It’s not fair!” and Dad says, “That’s about as fair as it gets, actually.” Made me howl with laughter.)
-Brooklyn 99 and Modern Family. When we just want to spend 22 minutes laughing.

Grown Up Show for Me: I don’t watch a whole lot of TV – mostly because I often would rather read a book at night to wind down. But I do like watching TV as I clean the kitchen, and occasionally I’ll watch something with the Husband. I for sure don’t watch all the shows that are hip or trendy or buzzy. To be honest, I feel like a lot of the stuff that everyone is watching is too violent or gritty or serious or sad for me. Like I’ll scroll through Hulu and every show seems to feature people glaring and sullen. When I do watch something, it’s usually a half hour comedy. We don’t have Netflix, but we do have Hulu, Disney, Max, Peacock, and Prime. Sometimes I feel like I’m missing out by not having Netflix, but I figure there will always be something to watch on the services that we do have, so my sense of FOMO is kind of unnecessary. Some of my favorite shows I watched in 2024:


-Starstruck (Max)- So funny and sweet and relatable, this show is about Jess who has a one night stand with a huge movie star and the fall out from that. I don’t usually like protagonists who are screw ups, but there is something so fresh and honest about Jess that I ended up loving her. I’m half way through the last season and I can’t bring myself to finish watching it because I don’t want it to end.

-Sort Of (Max)- Gender fluid Sabi navigates the dynamics within their Pakistani family and their job as a nanny. This is a show about learning to accept yourself and those around you.

-Acapulco (Apple) – Cute show, told in flashbacks, about young Maximo who starts out as a pool boy at a luxury Mexican resort and rises through the ranks. I like this show for it’s feel-good, sunny humour and the 80s playlists.

-English Teacher (FX/Hulu) – Really funny and sharp comedy about a gay teacher in Austin trying to fight the system and sometimes giving up.

LIVE PERFORMANCES
High School/Middle School Musicals. I didn’t do theatre in middle school or high school. (Shocking, I know, considering it’s now what I do for my job.), so I didn’t really grow up going to school plays. Turns out the high schools in our area do really great shows. This year we saw Beauty and the Beast and A Year with Frog and Toad at the high school as well as middle school productions of Annie and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. They were all delightful. There is something special about going to see a show where you know the kids onstage and where you’ll run into people you know in the audience, a show where things probably won’t be perfect, but everyone is having a once in a life time experience. The high school is doing Secret Garden this spring – I CAN’T WAIT!!!

Silent Night – is this cheating if it’s a show I worked on myself?. I love this opera so much. The music, the story, the bagpipes. I feel so lucky that I got to work on it again this year, and that I got to hear this exquisite score played over the course of four performances.

The Play That Goes Wrong – I think sometimes we go to the theatre to be moved to tears. I know certainly that’s true for opera – we want to see the soprano die and everyone to be devastated. But this play, about an amateur production of a murder mystery where everything goes wrong, made me laugh and laugh and laugh so hard. From identifying with the Stage Manager who loses track of the place and forgets to run a sound cue, to the actors forgetting their lines, to the doorknobs that keep falling off the set. This was an exquisitely timed masterpiece of comedy. Some of the technical aspects were amazing.

ART and MUSEUMS
Mary Cassatt at the Philadelphia Museum of Art – I’ve always been a fan of Cassatt’s art, and this exhibit was a wonderful exploration of her process.

National Museum of Taiwan History in Tainan – My cousin recommended this museum to us, and I’m really glad we made time to go while we were in Taiwan. It was a really well laid out and comprehensive look at Taiwan from it’s early days as a trading port through all the various states of occupation, to present day history.

Museum of Islamic Art in Kuala Lumpur – Stunning art and fascinating history. It was eye opening to see the intersection of Muslim and Asian cultures.

Lobster Museum in Swann’s Island, Maine – Okay so this was basically some guy’s attic collection of lobster men memorabilia that the town decided to put into a building, but I loved it.

Dorothea Lange: Seeing People at the National Gallery of Art – The title says it all – haunting portraits taken by Lange throughout the years. Some well known and iconic, and some that were new to me. The pictures taken in Japanese internment camps were especially poignant.

Pattens and Paradox: The Quilts of Amish Women at the American Art Museum – I learned so much about the art of quilts from this exhibit, which also make me think about the women who made quilts and the intersection between art and functionality and folk art and high art.

MUSIC – Looking at this list, I’m realizing one thing that’s missing is music. I don’t listen to a lot of music in a curated way. That is to say I don’t tend to listen to specific artists or albums. If I want to listen to something I’ll often just listen to the radio and see what serendiptiy brings, or I’ll type some inspirational words, like “Happy dinner” or “Bluegrass excercise” into Spotify or Apple Music and see what play lists come up. I think this is partly because I am surrounded by music at work, so music isn’t the first thing I turn to in my liesure time. Even still I do get a lot of enjoyment from music. This year, I re-discovered the joy of big romantic sweeping musicals (Scarlet Pimpernel, Titanic, etc.), and of just listening to the classical music station when I needed to decompress. As a family we listen to a lot of Disney songs and musicals (SIX is a favorite), and whatever the husband has playing on Pandora (his mix is pretty eclectic, but always has a strong beat and a good tune). Do I feel like I need to change my music habits? Not really. I do feel like I’m out of the pop culture loop, but hey I can’t keep up with everything.

That’s it for my 2024 Media favorites. What about you? Any favorite books/podcasts/movies/tv shows/music/art/ etc. that you discovered in 2024? What music do you recommend for me?
Any goals and aspirations for your media consumption in 2025?

Weekly recap + what we ate: Some adventures and January Highlights

Chesapeake Bay seen from Havre de Grace

I think this week was the first time I noticed that there is more and more sunlight in the evenings. I was driving home at 4:30pmd, after pick up one day, and I noticed that the sky was still light. It’s February! Spring is coming.

It was an eventful week at home. We started off kind of rough with our second visit to the emergency room with a child ever. I guess in 13 years of parenting, having to go to the emergency room twice is a pretty good go. (The first time was last year while we were in Berkeley with my brother.) What happened was the oldest child had fallen and hit her head during her Sunday basketball game and still wasn’t feeling great on Monday morning, so the Husband took her to the ER. (So I guess technically I didn’t go to the ER, just the Husband and the 13 year old.)

After five hours, they were seen with the diagonosis being “mild concussion.” She was told to take it easy and no basketball games for a week. Practice was okay, but no games because they didn’t want to risk another head injury. I’ve never had to deal with a concussion before, so this was new and worrisome to me. (Well I did have an incident once onstage where a singer ran into another singer too hard during a fight scene and got a concussion, but I didn’t have to deal with that other than to fill out the accident form and send the singer to management.)

The thing about a mild concussion is that there’s not a lot we could do except limit activity and stay vigilant. So it felt like we were hovering between being on high alert and not having to do anything about it. We did go back to the doctor on Friday when there was some vomiting and general sluggishness, but we were told that it can take up to two weeks to feel normal again. So wait and see, I guess.

Wednesday the kids were off school because it was a grading day, and I took the two older kids on our New York City adventure. The day deserves its own post, but here are some picture highlights:

Bagels!
Iconic buildings!
Theatre!

Wednesday night was when that awful plane and helicopter collision happened over the Potomac. I didn’t know about it until after we got home from New York. DCA is such an important airport in this area- we fly out of it all the time. At work, I often see planes headed that way or coming from DCA, and helicopters are constantly flying overhead. Some of the footage of the collision was taken from the rooftop camera on our building. It all feels very close. There is something really cruel to me about the Potomac these days. Just last month, a pick up truck went off the Memorial Bridge, plunging into the river and now this. I can’t help but to think that Potomac is angry about something. Which I know sounds crazy, but I think that’s just the way things feel in D.C. right now.

The rest of the week, I worked from home, and it was a week full of meetings, so I felt like I spent a lot of time on Zoom. I like the flexibility of working from home, but I feel like I sometimes get distracted. After getting off a call, I would need a brain break and I’d go do laundry or read a chapter of my book, or what not, and then it would be hard to sit back down at my computer. I might go into the office next week so that I can focus better.

Saturday we had a little adventure to Havre de Grace, MD. It’s a little town on the bay, at the mouth of the Susquehanna River, about 90 minutes drive from us. We picked Havre de Grace because we wanted to explore a new to us museum that was on the list of “Reciprocal Museums” that we could see with our Walker Art Museum membership. On that list was the Duck Decoy Museum in Havre de Grave. YES! A WHOLE museum devoted to duck decoys.

I thought it would be a quaint little one room affair. Friends, this museums was two stories – three huge rooms of duck decoys and duck decoy adjacent exhibits. The information was fascinatingly niche. There were certain craftsmen who got a whole exhibit case to themselves, complete with life sized mannequins. The museum reminded me a lot of the handicraft wing in the American Art Museum, and made me realize how readily accessible creative pursuits are to everyone. These were not men (and they were all men, mostly White) who went to school to learn how to carve duck decoys. Most of them did this as a hobby while holding down jobs – grocers, post masters, military me. It was inspiring in a lot of ways, reminding me that I should also take time to do creative things.

Did you know that Cecil County duck decoys are characterized by a flatter tail and rounder body?
Just one of the many walls of duck decoys.
The tools and process of making duck decoys.

We continued our day in Havre de Grace with a walk to a playground so the kids could run off energy:

Then we went to Mass at a beautiful little church there. I’m not Catholic, but it’s always interesting to me to go to Mass at different churches and see how even when the people are different, the rituals are all the same. Afterwards we went out to dinner at a tasty seafood restaurant. It was a lovely little half day trip, all in all.

Well, it’s already February. Hard to believe at the beginning of this month we were on another continent. Some January highlights:
-Making it home from our Asia trip.
-Yoga (almost) every day. I’ve been doing 10-20 minutes of yoga a day, and there were two days when it didn’t happen, both days that I was travelling. Though when I think of it, I could have probably fit in something on those days. I even did 15 minutes of standing yoga the day we were stuck in the Seattle Airport for nine hours.
-Snow Days, snow delays, and sledding.
-Celebrating birthdays for the 13 and 8 year olds.
-Candy cane beets and crunchy winter salads
-The start of basketball season for the 13 year old.
-our NYC trip to see Hadestown.
-Dumpling date with my friend K.
– A very smooth and enjoyable rehearsal process for the new works that I stage managed.
-A January that felt like a real winter, and just long enough to not feel endless.
-Ice skating. The two little kids are taking skating lessons. They are now in the same class, so I go skating while they are in lessons. I listen to an audiobook while I glide around the rink. I have a vague goal of learning how to do a backward crossover.
-A cozy MLK day at home with scones and cookies and reading and games.
-playing Skyjo.
-That Duck Decoy Museum.

Some January lowlights:
-the 13 year old’s minor concussion.
– not getting out and running – the weather has been so cold. I know last year I ran in 20 degree weather, but I couldn’t rally to do it this winter.
– WTF is going on with the new administration? I mean it’s very clear that there is a strategy of strewing confusion and panic wide in hopes that no one will know how to fight back. The stress and worry and confusion is palatable in the air everywhere here. I try to limit my intake of news, but it affects so many people here that I feel like I should have some idea a what is going on.

Grateful For – Elisabeth has a series going on this month (just this month?) Called FIG (Finding joy In Gratitude). I usually include at least three things I’m grateful for in these posts, but for February, I thought I’d aim for seven things:

– Glimmers of sunlight still lingering at 4:30pm.

-Reciprocal museum memberships. How else would we have discovered the Duck Decoy museum?

-The old Subaru. Welp I did it. I took my old car in and donated it to the technical program at the high school. It wasn’t as emotional as I thought I was, which I guess means that it was time, but I still felt sad about it. That car served its previous owner for nine years and then served us for almost another thirteen years. It drove me to Colorado and back four times and ferried all of our children around when they were babies. I’m really grateful for that car. And for the friend who sold it to us.

– Smiles and laughter and hugs from the 5 year old at pick up time.

– Pianos and music making and my parents for signing me up for piano and voice lessons when I was a child. I spent an hour noodling around on the piano one evening. I don’t do that enough.

-Medical insurance and living four blocks from the hospital.

-That we are no longer in a pandemic. We watched a documentary this week – “Cirque du Soleil: without a Net” about what happened the the Cirque show O when the pandemic hit and then how the show came back. It was a little surreal to think back on March of 2020. When we asked the two little kids (8 and 5) if they remembered the COVID pandemic, they said “no”, and the 13 year old tried to explain it to them. That was interesting to hear her account. But also she talked about parts of being stuck at home and not having to go to school that she enjoyed, and that is something that I don’t think about very often. But all in all, I am glad that we aren’t living in a pandemic any more. Not necessarily because we were forced to stay home, but rather because that time of uncertainty was so so so so stressful.

Looking Forward To:
–February! We had our family meeting on Saturday and in addition to looking at the week, we flipped our calendar pages and looked at the whole month. There’s a lot to look forward to in February – birthdays, Super Bowl, some interesting gigs for me. It’s going to be a full month, but I’m not in rehearsal, so it will be a good month for quite evenings at home too.
– Every day things. I was inspired by all the comments on last week’s post on routines and a “boring” life. I loved this comment from Melissa:
“I probably get a ridiculous amount of satisfaction from making the bead and opening the curtains so the sun streams in.”
The comments made me think about how I take these boring routines for granted sometimes. So this week, I’m going to make it a goal to look forward to doing these every day things the best I can. This week, I’m looking forward to:
-Making the bed every day, nice and neat.
-Wiping down the counters at the end of the night so that they are clean in the morning.
-Lining my shoes up in the boot tray when I come home.
-putting the window shades up to see the sun.

What We Ate:
Monday: Butternut Squash and Fennel Risotto. I always think risotto is a good idea, and then I make it and I remember that I don’t actually like eating rice as a main.

Tuesday: Taco Tuesday – We had a taco bar: Chipotle Chicken and Black Beans, Shrimp, mango cabbage slaw, pickled onions, guac, avocado, sour cream. The 8 year old wanted to try hard tacos, so that’s what we did, and they were tasty.

Wednesday: New York City – the kids and I had burgers after the show.

Thursday: Sunchokes and chicken. The Husband sliced the sunchokes thin and then baked them, so they were like chips.

Friday: Pizza (homemade by the Husband. He even make an Indian one with tikka masala sauce rather than tomato sauce. I think I liked that one more than other people.) for the movie, originally I had picked The Mummy, but the kids declared it was too scary after about 10 minutes, so we switched to we watched Cirque du Soleil: Without a Net.

Saturday: Dinner in Havre de Grace. I hade the Bouillabase. It was tasty

Sunday: Scrounge for yourself. The Husband made the kids egg sandwiches. I had an amazing loaded sweet potato – roasted chick peas, sour cream, cilantro, avocado, and green onions. I’ve never thought to load a sweet potato the way I load a baked potato and I have to say, I was missing out. This was so delicious. Or maybe that’s just the sour cream talking?

I don’t take pictures of everything I eat, but this was really tasty.

Hope everyone is having a lovely first week of February!