Christmas fun – Page 2 – Life Off Headset

Weekly Recap + what we ate: Morning routines

This was supposed to be one of the few weeks this fall where everyone had a five full days of school. But… there was the unfortunate incident of the plane in the electrical tower which caused a huge power outage and resulted in school being cancelled on Monday. Then Tuesday and Wednesday, the baby was sick so she stayed home. So it was a lot of unexpected child care this week.

On Monday, I decided to take advantage of the no school day to take the five year old and the neighbor’s kid down to the Botanical Gardens to see the model trains. It actually worked out well – when we have gone to see the Botanical Garden trains in the past, we’ve had to go on the weekend and it’s always been really crowded. This time, the crowds were very light so we could easily see all the displays. I’m glad we went during the week because the train display was smaller than in the past, and probably would not have been as relaxed an experience if I had to fight the crowds to see it.

Model of Union Station, all built of plant matter.

Also – there were baby pineapple plants in the bathroom at the Botanical Gardens. I was so charmed by it, I had to snap a picture:

Monday night the baby started running fever, so I kept her home on Tuesday. She spent a lot of time sleeping, thank goodness, and I got some work done. Other than one incident of vomiting in my bed, she was a pretty low maintenance patient. Even still, she ran a fever again on Tuesday night so we kept her home on Wednesday too. Of course she was more her normal, curious, active self on Wednesday, so I didn’t get as much work done. I actually didn’t mind, though – I was reminded of how during the pandemic I was home and it was just me and the kids and we just kind of hung out and went on walks and baked and read books while cuddling on the couch. And while there was a voice in my head that said, “You really should be working on those supertitle slides!” I think hanging out with my kid is important too – for both of us.

Fun new thing – I’m working on supertitle slides for a concert next week, and one of the songs is in Arabic. I’ve never had to work in Arabic before, so it’s been interesting for sure to match up the translation I was given with the text of the song. Thank goodness for Google and Google translate. At first I was so daunted by the whole things and I kept putting off working on this one song, and I had to remind myself that it’s good to have new work challenges.

Moment to savor: One nice thing about earlier winter sunsets is that when I’m waiting for the school bus in the afternoon I get to see beautiful pink and gold skies. Even as I shiver in the cold there some something breathtaking to see.

I’ve been thinking about my morning routine lately, mostly because there’s been no morning routine this past week and a half. And when there’s no morning routine, habits fall through the cracks.

I’ve been reading B.J. Fogg’s Tiny Habits, and he has developed a method for building habits that can be summed up as:
1) finding the smallest things you can do,
2) finding a prompt to do that small thing,
3) celebrate doing that small thing to make yourself feel good for doing it.

The part I’ve found most helpful is 2), finding a prompt and I’ve been trying to incorporate more prompts in my daily life. There are lots of good behaviours I want to encourage, but I struggle with finding a routine. So I’ve latched on to the idea of finding prompts for things as a reminder to do (or not do) something. For example:
1) The five year old used to wet the bed at night at least once a week. This was mostly because we forget to tell him to go the the bathroom before bed. Also- the ten year old was always leaving things in her pockets, causing havoc on laundry day. So now, after we brush our teeth (prompt – more specifically, after we put our toothbrushes back), the five year old goes to the bathroom and the ten year old empties her pockets.
2) I have a terrible habit of checking my phone at stop lights, and I decided I needed an alternative activity. So now every time I get to a stoplight (prompt), I do kegels until the light turns green to keep me off my phone.

Anyhow, I had set up a series of prompts in my head for the morning, and for a variety of reasons (holidays, the oldest has a morning writing club, just being tired), I hadn’t been doing these things. Rather I was just relying on memory and instinct to do them. My ideal morning prompt/habits would be:

– The Husband leaves for work. The moment the door shuts behind him, we all go do our morning teeth brushing.
-The ten year old leaves to walk the baby to the neighbor’s so they can take her to school. The moment she leaves, I do a ten minute yoga video. (In Fogg’s world, the tiny habit would be – the moment the door closes (prompt), I lay out my yoga mat (tiny action.)) I particularly liked this one because the five year old would do it with me.
-I take the kids to the school bus. When I pull in wherever I need to go after (work or home), as soon as I turn off the car, I do my daily Wordle and Duolingo.

(I still would love to figure out a prompt for journaling… maybe I need to put the journal by my bed and do it as soon as I wake up? I think this is also where routines and habits blend into each other.)

Anyhow, the morning brushing, yoga, Wordle, and Duolingo weren’t getting done this past week. Partly because not having to catch a school bus sucks the urgency out of the morning, and also a couple days, the ten year old’s before school writing club meant that there was no prompt for #2. Wordle and Duolingo usually got done at some point in the day, but I did have to use a couple streak freezes for the Duolingo because I would just forget. And granted none of this stuff was IMPERITIVE, but the morning feels better when I just automatically do things. I feel like when I know that these things will automatically happen after a prompt, I don’t spend mental energy on trying to figure when or if they will happen. (Contrast that with exercise/running – I don’t have a prompt for that because what with the weather and darker days and my current more flexible schedule, exercise doesn’t always happen at the same time and I like to look at my whole day in order to decide where it will happen. )

So I’ve been contemplating the difference between having a morning routine, where the morning is time blocked (ie. 7:00a teeth, 7:15 breakfast, 7:45 get dressed, etc…), versus just having prompts and habits and knowing the rest of the morning activities (pack lunch, get dressed, prep dinner, make breakfast – the essentials) will fall in place around it. I will say we have a luxuriously long morning – the kids are usually up by 6:30/6:45a and the baby goes to the neighbors’ at 8:10pm and the rest of us leave for the school bus at 8:50a. So nothing feels rushed, really. I just think I feel like the morning gets off to a better start when I do more than just the essential survival tasks of food and clothing. Anyhow, here’s hoping the next few weeks I can get back to my tiny habit mornings.

One the List This Weekend:
– Birthday Party (adult)
-Birthday Party x2 (kids)
-Decorate for Christmas/ go get our tree
– Tidy/ Pick up since cleaners are coming on Monday.
-Order Christmas Cards
-Christmas movie
-Bake Cookies (hopefully)
-World Cup Watching.
-Meal Plan for next week.

Grateful for This Week:
– That the pilot and passenger who flew into the electrical tower were able to be rescued safely. I don’t know them, but it must have been horrifically scary. I’m really glad that there were people who knew how to get them down safely.
-All the bloggers who participated in NnBloPoMo – I’ve really enjoyed reading all the thoughts they put into the world this month, such honesty, realness and humor. And now I feel like I have new blogs to pop in and read and the (virtual) world has opened up a little.
-That I’m not working right now and can just roll with the school cancellations and sick days. This week would have been difficult if I had been working because before/after care, which I usually would have used for school closures, was also closed due to the plane/power outage issue. I know so many parents that had to majorly scramble for coverage on Monday.
– Hoopla and my library card. The kids have been listening to Dear Evan Hansen a lot these days. (Also Taylor Swift.) I thought it might be fun to get some music from the show so we can sing it, so rather than buying the sheet music, I put a bunch of music books on hold at the library. When I was loading up my holds list, I noticed that a bunch of these music books were also available as eBooks via Hoopla, so I downloaded those and have been trying to learn Waving Through the Window. There was a lot of music available and I’m eager to dip into more!

Looking forward to:
– Helping my friend celebrate her birthday tonight.
– Supertitle gig next week.
– Getting my teeth cleaned. I know going to the dentist isn’t something people look forward to but, 1) next week is relatively quiet for adventures, and 2) I really like my dentist and hygienist – they are so nice, make me feel taken care of, and make me laugh even while suctioning spit out of my mouth.

What We Ate – This managed to be an eat-from-the-pantry/fridge/freezer week, which is always good the week after Thanksgiving:

Monday: Broccoli Pasta from Bad Manners cookbook. Vegan. This is really tasty for how simple it is. Boil pasta, drain. Sear broccoli in a pan, add garlic and red pepper flakes. Mix pasta in with broccoli. At the table, top with panko parmesan (Panko, nutritional yeast, garlic powder, paprika.) Yes, it’s essentially carbs topped on carbs, but the crunchy savory topping is what really makes this dish for me.

Tuesday: Spicy Salmon Tacos – I used the Korean Pork Taco recipe from Dinners Illustrated but subbed in Salmon and Shrimp for the pork.

Wednesday: Comedy night with my friend – I had a vegan mushroom risotto. The Husband stayed home with the kids and they had breakfast sandwiches and hash browns

Thursday: Butternut Squash Soup from Weeknight Vegetarian. Vegan version that used coconut milk to make it creamy. This was simple and tasty.

Friday: Meatball subs from the deli, wolfed down before the 10 year old’s piano recital. No movie this night – the piano recital was followed immediately by basketball practice.

Christmas Movie List 2022

We have a tradition in December of spending many evenings (and some lazy afternoons) watching Christmas movies. A couple weeks ago, we sat down and brainstormed all our favorite and “wanna watch” Christmas movies. Here’s what is on my list:

(Oh also – I would call this list very aspirational. It’s more like the menu so we remember what’s out there.)

Classic Films. As in TMC old.
– Meet Me in St. Louis
– It’s a Wonderful Life
– White Christmas
– Charlie Brown Christmas
– A Christmas Carol (pick a version.)

Classic Films. As in from our younger days.
– Elf
– Home Alone
– Polar Express
– Muppet Christmas Carol

Movies the Husband says aren’t Christmas Movies, but which I disagree
– Little Women (I like the 1996 version, but the 2019 one was very good too.)
– While You Were Sleeping
– The Holiday
-Bridget Jone’s Diary.
okay, maybe this category is mostly Christmas as an excuse to watch rom-coms.

The More Recent Stuff That We Loved
– 8 Bit Christmas (we watched this last year and we like it even better than the original Christmas Story)
– Spirited (We actually just watched this last weekend)
– Frozen (We saw this at the symphony already this year already so maybe not for home viewing this year)
– The Little Prince (Rachel Portman’s opera version. I worked on this opera twice and it’s one of my favorite operas. Here’s an excerpt from a music video that was made of the opera. Fun fact – we have a version of the rose costume in the video. The Opera where I work every so often has a costume sale where they get sell costumes they won’t use anymore, and they had an extra rose costume, so I bought it for my oldest kid.)
– Any Hallmark Christmas movie. I like ones where the hero and heroine like each other from the beginning so we don’t waste too much time being enemies and can just get to the romantic bits and holiday fun parts.

Not Child Friendly (aka, watch when kids are in bed)
-Die Hard
-Love Actually
-National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation (I haven’t seen this, but the Husband assures me the kids aren’t ready for this yet.)
-Joyeaux Noel (Not child friendly because it isn’t in English. It’s about a Christmas Day truce during WWI. I worked on a great opera based on this movie.)
-Twas the Fight Before Christmas (Documentary about a man whose Christmas light display gets out of hand…)

Films we haven’t seen yet, but which are on all the Christmas Movie Lists
– The Santa Clause
– The Shop around the Corner/ You’ve Got Mail (I love the musical She Loves Me which has the same story)
– Nightmare before Christmas (Yes… I really have yet to see this movie)
– The Man Who Invented Christmas (Dan Stevens as Charles Dickens!)
– Gremlins (I haven’t seen this, but the Husband has)
– The Preacher’s Wife/ The Bishop’s Wife
– Bad Santa (this might be a “after the kids are in bed” one)
– Noelle (Looks cute – Anna Kendrick as Santa’s daughter, itching for a chance to prove herself)
-Last Christmas (Henry Golding! Enough said.)
-Jingle Jangle: A Christmas Journey (It’s billed as a musical fantasy. I’m all about musical Christmas movies.)
-Arthur Christmas (Animated movie – looks really cute.)
-Christmas in Connecticut (1945 Barbara Stanwyck movie.)

2022 Movies that Look Fun!
-Hip Hop Nutcracker
-The Royal Nanny (Hallmark – Royal and Nanny usually piques my interest.)
-Christmas With You (Freddie Prinze Jr is now playing the hot dad. Of course.)
– Santa Camp (Documentary)
– Christmas at the Golden Dragon and A Big Fat Family Christmas (Christmas movies centered on stories of Asian families/characters. Wow. Yay for representation. My brother once made a comment about how Crazy Rich Asians was a very mediocre move (he’s wrong), but I said to him, “I feel like Asian people deserve to be in bad cliched rom coms as much as white people do.” Wish fulfilled.)
– A Christmas Spark (OMG!!!! Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman reunion – this one features Jane Seymour and Joe Lando as a widow ans the town’s hottest dad. Must watch!!!!)
-Violent Night (Santa as a bad ass crime fighting hero. This one actually looks a bit violent for me, but I looooove the premise.)

What else should I put on my list????

Weekly recap + what we ate: Thanksgiving 2022

Well we’ve emerged at the other end of Thanksgiving weekend. HOWEVER…. the kids were supposed to go back to school Monday, but there was a massive power outage last night and the schools were closed. Apparently a small plane flew into a electrical tower. No one is hurt, and the power has actually been restored to schools, but the schools need to do some damage assessment before they let the kids come back. So that makes day six of no school.

Given that last week consisted only of two half days of school, it certainly feels as if there’s been a lot of time at home and with the kids the past week and a half. I don’t feel like I have to be the children’s cruise director, but I do acknowledge that life is smoother if on days without school we get out of the house for a large chunk of time. With that in mind, one half day, I had the kids accompany me on my HMart grocery run – I bribed them by letting them pick out their own packs of Pocky as a snack- then took them to the park. It was chilly so I packed some hot chocolate in a Thermos.

The other half day the kids and I went to the library and the park next to the library. I love our library and park because it’s a low key one stop kids destination – there is a big open grassy area that the kids can run around in, there is a playground, and then when we get tired of that, we can go to the library and read book, or, more likely, play on the computers. I ran into a colleague that I hadn’t seen in two years but who just moved to the area, which always perks me up. I picked up another thick tome – Juliet Barker’s biography on the Brontës. I think January might be a Jane Eyre redux month – I want to read “My Plain Jane“, having just read the first book in the series, a retelling of the story of Lady Jane Grey, and found it hilarious. This second book in the series is a retelling of Jane Eyre, which is my favorite book.

Wednesday, was a full day off and I was offered tickets to a dress rehearsal of The Nutcracker, so I took the two older kids. I haven’t been to see The Nutcracker since probably high school. This was a nice traditional Nutcracker with all the expected bit – children, mice, Sugar Plum Fairy, a growing tree, lots of snow, and rows of tutus dancing in perfect unison. The kids were more engaged with the first half, which was where the main narrative arc of the story was. The second half, left them a little restless. My favorite part, though, was getting to hear the orchestra play Tchaikovsky’s score.

We did not go anywhere for Thanksgiving – at one point we had contemplated visiting a friend in New Jersey, but the thought of packing and travelling with the kids seemed so daunting and a nice quiet weekend at home much more appealing. We even made plans to clean out the attic, which did not happen. Thanksgiving Day itself was pretty quiet. As is our tradition, we watched the Macy’s Day Parade starting at 9am. I was a little confused at first because all the musical theatre numbers were shown at the beginning of the broadcast, and I was used to them being spaced throughout the parade, so I initially thought that they weren’t going to show the balloons and floats this year, just the musical numbers. But fear not. They balloons and floats started at 10am. My favorite bit was the cast of the Pitch Perfect spin off performing a mashup of 99 Luftbaloons + Take On Me. It was pretty awesome. Also the excerpt from Lion King – once you’ve seen stilt walkers as giraffes all the other performers seem kind of landbound. I had seen the musical years ago and the puppetry is just as brilliant and thrilling twenty years later seen on tv.

After dinner, we watched Planes, Trains, and Automobiles – I hadn’t seen it before, and the Husband has been waiting YEARS for us to watch this as a family. In years past we’ve watched Scent of a Woman, but this year I guess the kids are at that phase where they’re too young for Scent of a Woman and just old enough for Planes, Trains, and Automobiles. Another holiday tradition that shifts.

The rest of the weekend felt pretty full for a quiet holiday at home. I guess when we stay home, adventure comes to us. We ended up having two park play dates – one at our local park and one at a farther away park that I’d never been to, but which was huge and fun and had a carousel. I might have lost the three year old there and might have been that mother whose child was picked up sobbing by another mother on the playground. Ugh.

In addition to that, I went through the kids’ snow gear and made a note of what I needed to stock up on for this year, we watched football (American) and football (soccer), and tidied and cleaned and I went through the fruit bowl and decided to toss some really old apples, but then decided that I shouldn’t waste food like that so I made applesauce. I took the ten year old to buy some clothes and we found a dress for her upcoming piano recital. There was also church, a visit to the Farmer’s Market and the local co-op to stock up on snacks, a new to us coffee shop, and lighting of Advent candles. And we’ve started playing Christmas music at our house and watching Christmas movies.

Oh and before that, on Saturday night my friend called and said that she was sick but she had tickets for Frozen with the Symphony that night and did I want to go and take her kids? It’s one of those shows where they show the movie and the orchestra is onstage playing the music. So I said sure why not and took the ten year old, the three year old and my friend’s two kids. It was kind of an ordeal getting there – three preteens and a three year old in a car is not for the faint of heart, but we made it and mostly enjoyed the movie (I mean who doesn’t like Frozen?!?). And they blew fake snow over the audience during the closing credits – that was kind of magical.

The three year old wore her big sister’s hand me down Anna dress to the concert/movie, and it was interesting to me how many kids came dressed up. But also interesting is that most of the kids came in costumes from Frozen 2 – it made me feel the passage of time that my three year old’s Anna dress was kind of vintage Anna now.

Lessons learned this Thanksgiving:
– Find a better time to go to Costco. Or maybe there is no good time to go to Costco? I went Tuesday morning before Thanksgiving then I went to Giant to do the grocery shop. It was all so exhausting and crowded. Also- on Wednesday night, I discovered we were out of dish soap and I seriously started contemplating the it wouldn’t be terrible if I didn’t do any dishes for the next few days rather than going to to the store again. Thankfully, the Husband prevailed and went to the store and got dish soap.
– I tried a new fat ratio for pie crust this time and I really liked it. I used to do all butter or half butter/half shortening. This time I did 2/3 butter and 1/3 shortening and it’s not as tasty as a full butter crust, but the texture was perfect. Despite the droopy pie crust, the pies were really tasty.
– Make/ buy the rolls. I decided to skip the rolls this year because it was just us and I didn’t want to have a lot of food, but you know what? I miss having rolls at the table. So next year – don’t skip the rolls.
– Do better at trading off alone time with the Husband. Five days at home with the kids is a lot of togetherness and we all had moments of burnout. We need to be better at making sure there is child-free time for each parent on these stretches.

Grateful For This week: Of course it was Thanksgiving week, so my gratitude list was very long, but some specific things from this week:
– The opportunity to go see live performances. It’s a nice perk of my job that periodically I get tickets to things and get to take my kids. I’m also grateful that I can take my kids and they will usually sit through things, or if they get restless they will sit on my lap and cuddle.
– Neighbors and strangers who help. I had an odd incident on Thanksgiving Day while out on my run; I came across a lady walking up the sidewalk with three suitcases who clearly needed help, but I was so far out of my depths and didn’t know how to help her. I felt so thankful that my neighbor was able to offer some resources and then a random stranger pulled his car over and took the lady to a shelter.
– My kids’ teachers. We had parent teacher conferences last week and I am so grateful to the teachers who help my kids learn – not just book learning, but also learning life skills. I’m especially grateful for the ten year old’s teacher. Our conference was only supposed to be fifteen minutes but she spent over half an hour with us answering questions and talking us through strategies to help the ten year old in areas where she was struggling.

Looking Forward To
– Buckling down and getting the translation slides done for this supertitle gig I have next week. It seems weird to be looking forward to that, but I feel like I’ve spend so much time this past week thinking, and planning, and executing family and children adventures, that being able to do something that is work and not kid related is going to be a nice chance for flow and focus.
– Night out at a comedy show with my friend. I’ve never been to a comedy show, so I’m excited to see what it is like. This one is by a local comedy troupe and is called “Mother of all Comedy Show” and supposed to be about family and the holidays. Hopefully it will be funny.
– The ten year old’s piano recital this week.

One Fun Thing I Read:
I really liked this article about Japanese fans cleaning up after World Cup games. I’ve always been really fascinated by how Japanese children are expected to help tidy their classrooms and the how the expectations are pretty high for independence and stewardship in children. It was really cool to see those traits manifest on an international stage. (Related listening – I loved this episode of 99% Invisible talks about Japanese toddlers going on their first errands and how Japanese cities and culture supports that.)

What We Ate:

Monday: Crispy Chickpeas with homemade Flatbread from Weekday Vegetarian. We had some leftover yogurt sauce from when the husband make chicken schwarma last week, so I thought this would be a good use.

Tuesday: Butternut Squash Curry from Budget Bytes. This was simple and tasty and used up a squash that had been sitting around . We ate it with flatbread rather than rice. Vegan.

Wednesday: Kitchen sink fried rice, recipe loosely based off of Weekday Vegetarian’s Mushroom and Bok Choy fried rice. We had a lot of leftover rice in the fridge so this was a good way to use that up. Because I wanted this to be our second vegan meal this week, I made it with fried tofu rather than eggs. This recipe called for the vegetables to be sautéed then removed from the pan, then the rice cooked in a layer to make it crispy then the veggies added back in – it made for a fried rice that was very veggie heavy, which I liked.

Thursday: THANKSGIVING!!! Duck with orange sauce, roasted potatoes, cranberry sauce, broccoli salad, ribbon jello (which the ten year old made ann which the Midwestern Husband insists on calling “Ribbon Salad”.) Pumpkin and Apple pie for dinner.

Friday: Pizza and the Paw Patrol Movie. My first experience with the Paw Patrol Phenomenon. It was fine… though I was a little annoyed that there was only one female Paw Patrol. Or maybe obviously female. Maybe more of them are females and I just don’t know because I have preconceived gender associations and only the pink dog can be a girl…?

Saturday: Sandwiches at the theatre before Frozen. I think the Husband and the five year old had take out at home.

Sunday: Dumplings and Spirited, a new movie on AppleTV, a Christmas Carol inspired story featuring Will Ferrell and Ryan Reynolds. I mostly enjoyed this movie – it had singing and dancing and was funny and irreverent. And Octavia Butler as the romantic lead – how awesome is that? There was one moment that I found a little cringe-y that almost ruined the movie for me – there are two things things that I personally don’t like being used as plot points and this had one of them.

Weekly recap + what we ate: the last week of the year!

The day after Christmas we went for COVID tests, back to back appointments, with the Husband and the four year old going in first while I waited outside with the COVID positive baby and then me taking the nine year old in when they came out.

The people at the testing center looked exhausted.

“Has it been busy?” I asked, somewhat inanely making conversation with the lady who swabbed our noses.

“Oh yes.”

“Worse than Thanksgiving?”

“Much much worse.”

I remembered to thank her profusely for doing her job. How stressful it must be. Even though a lot of healthy people come to the testing center to get requisite tests for travel and family gatherings, I’m sure there are a good number that actually will test positive.

It was our first trip out of the house in three days, and once we were in the car speeding home, the temptation was great to just keep driving and not go home – that little intoxicating taste of freedom. But, being responsible people, we took ourselves home and continued to quarantine.

The husband, the nine year old and I came back with negative tests rather quickly. The four year old’s test took the full 72 hours and was… positive. wump wump. But in the end, it was kind of a moot point because his daycare center ended up closing for the week anyway due to a COVID related staffing shortage. I feel like so many people I know – people who are super careful and vaccinated and boostered – were testing positive. It has been kind of brutal.

We spent the week rediscovering the joys of our backyard. I googled “classic outdoor games” and came across SPUD, which I had never played as a child, but which the kids loved. The two little kids also discovered the joy of throwing a ball at a pyramid of tin cans and yogurt containers. And of course there were cardboard creations and improvised obstacle courses.

And indoors there was this classic – the set from the Husband’s childhood, with missing pieces supplemented via eBay:

Speaking of childhood nostalgia – we watched 9-Bit Christmas and it was delightful. Full of the hallmarks of a childhood in the late 80s, and the story was kind of great too. It supposed to be a knock off of A Christmas Story, but it’s gentler and more forgiving… perhaps a sign of the times? Anyway, will definitely put that into the Christmas movie rotation.

For New Years Day, I wanted noodles, but we didn’t have the right kind of noodles at home. This is probably laughable, since I have a bin in the cupboard with at least four different kinds of noodles from Asia. Noodles are definitely my favorite food. I love how versatile yet specific they are.

So I decided to try my hand at making udon noodles from scratch. I’ve come to realize that the combination of flour + water + salt is the basis of so many different dishes – noodles, dumpling wrappers, scallion pancakes… All the recipes for Udon noodles that I read called for kneading the dough with your feet. So I mixed up the dough and got the kids involved in the stomping and the rolling. I did have to improvise a bit since we were out off all purpose flour. I don’t know how that happened – probably isolating hot on the heels of bake-heavy holiday season. But I did have whole wheat flour and sprouted flour (a random Hungry Harvest purchase). I also had bread flour, but I didn’t remember until too late, and in retrospect that might have been the best option.

The results were tasty. Granted, toss anything in scallion ginger sauce and it will be tasty, but the noodles tasted simple and doughy. The chew was not as bouncy as ideal, but I think that might have been because of the flour. I’m on the fence as to whether to try again, but it’s good to have demystified the idea of making my own noodles.

We also put together the Swedish climbing wall that we had bought for the kids for Christmas. I thought it was going to be a huge challenge, but it was surprisingly easy and the kids love it. A good indoor energy burner, for sure. And I may once in a while be found hanging from it too…

Throw back food stuffs:
When I was little, growing up in a tiny Canadian town, much of the Taiwanese food that my parents loved wasn’t available in stores. They made their own dumplings. They even made their own tofu – a multi-day process that started with soaking soy beans and involved a rustic metal machine that made grinding noises in our basement, and square molds that sat overnight in our sink. Of course these days, we buy dumplings and tofu at the store. One other thing I remember my mother making were shrimp chips – they came out of this box as hard round translucent discs which my mother fried in oil until they were puffy and pink and crunchy. You popped the fried chip in your mouth and the chip would bite at your tongue before dissolving in a crunch of salty shrimpy goodness. These days you can readily buy ready-made shrimp chips in the snack aisle at the Asian market. Even the local Giant has them in the ethnic food section, though those ones are skinny and shaped almost like French fries.
The other day, I was at HMart looking for fun food stocking stuffers, and I came across a box of uncooked shrimp chips and I had to buy them for my own stocking. Last week, I gave them a go. I don’t love frying things; I find it messy and I never know what to do with the oil afterwards. So I thought I would see if I could fry the shrimp chips using the airfryer function of our new toaster oven. They do lack the umami of being fried in oil, but the crunch shrimp-y goodness is still there. And the novelty and nostalgia.

Other cozy things this week:
In Summer of 2019, pregnant with our third baby, I decided I wanted to learn how to knit. I had learned once, but then found crochet to be easier and more forgiving so knitting fell by the wayside. Both older kids had handmade blankets made for them when they were born, and I wanted to make one for the baby that was coming. So I dug out a book, looked at some online tutorials, and cast on my first row. It was a pretty simple project – knit stich back and forth til the creation felt long enough. I don’t know if it was time or skill or what not, but the whole thing turned out to be pretty slow going. But finally, the week before Christmas, I finished it and was able to wrap it and put it under the tree for the baby to open come Christmas day. She calls it her “Bankie” and I love seeing her cuddled under it. It certainly has flaws, and the colours don’t quite go together, but I think it will still keep her warm and loved.

What we ate:

Sunday: Cauliflower Curry Soup from ATK’s Vegan for Everyone.

Monday: Sweet Potato and Carrot Eggah and Roasted Potatoes. We don’t eat a lot of potates, but a bunch came in our Hungry Harvest box, so I had some to use up. I cooked the for “0” mins in the InstantPot and then tossed them in olive oil and salt and roasted at 400 until the outsides got golden and crispy. They were really good and I’m now looking forward to more potatoes in our box.

Tuesday: Chili. Every year at some point over the holidays the Husband makes chili. He always makes it the night before so it has time to sit and meld. I love eating my chili with pickled jalapenos, onions and sour cream. The Husband likes his with Fritos. So do the kids. I love how chili is meal where everyone wins.

Wednesday: Banh mi bowls. Made with tofu ground beef rather than pork. And eaten with noodles.

Thursday: BBQ Pinto Bean Tacos with mango salsa.

Friday: Pizza (home made pan pizza) and Empire Strikes Back.

Saturday: Dumpling and homemade udon noodles in scallion ginger sauce with stir fried napa cabbage and mushrooms.

Weekly recap + what we ate: Christmas and COVID

The post-present carnage. Can you find the children?

Welp. The week was a blur of last minute Christmas errands and regular life routines. Then Wednesday night, the baby was super fussy, and just wanted to cuddle. And then she threw up on me.

The next day, Thursday, was the first day of winter break for the two bigger kids. I took the baby to the pediatrician in the afternoon. She was back to her regular sunny self, no fever or other symptoms, but these days you can’t take even minor symptoms for granted. The pediatrician declared the baby to not have anything bacterial and then ordered a rapid and a PCR COVID test. Then pins and needles until about an hour or so later when the pediatrician called to let us know that the rapid test was positive.

Again.

It being two days before Christmas, testing sites were all booked up. I think a lot of people were wanting to get tested in anticipation of holiday gathering and travel. The soonest appointments we could get for the rest of the family was for Sunday afternoon. Fortunately we had not planned on going anywhere. We had to cancel some playdates and the one day of winter break camp for the nine year old – luckily they gave us a credit.

So now ten days of isolating at home. At least, depending on the results from the rest of us.

Despite everything it was still a lovely Christmas. We were all together and the weather was beautiful – sixty degrees and sunny. We opened presents, did lots of baking, video chatted with family… all things that were on the agenda anyway.

Some fun things from this past week, including some pre-COVID test adventures:

-A lovely day downtown. We went downtown to see the trains at the Botanical Gardens and then went to the TubaChristmas concert – both things that were seasonal traditions for us, and which this year were outdoors. The theme for the Botanical Gardens train display this year was agriculture around the world. I always love this particular train display because all the structures and buildings are built from plant materials. It’s always great fun to not only look at the intricate detailed displays, but also to try to figure out what plants they are made from. My favorite this year was the Florida orange grove.

Since we had a bit of extra time, we also walked over to see the Capitol Christmas Tree. It’s always a little humbling to see the Capitol building and think of all the work that happens there. This time, though, there was also something a little sobering to see the protective fencing that has been put up around the building. January 6th was almost a year ago, and it seems like such a strange and horrific day that feels close and distant at the same time.

Sign of the times.

The Husband and I have gone to TubaChristmas almost every year since we started dating. It had been cancelled last year, so we were really excited to see that it would be held outdoors this year. There was an open tent, though we stood outside on the plaza out of an abundance of caution. There were only 200 tubas, sousaphones, and euphoniums this year – usually there are over three hundred. But even still, they made a beautiful noise and I loved hearing them play holiday favorites.

-Awesome shopping experience: We decided that we wanted to add some games to our collection for Christmas. My friend had long sung the praises of a local store, Labyrinth Games & Puzzles, so I checked out their website. Turns out they have a service where they will recommend games for you. I filled out a form giving details about whom I was shopping for – ages, types of games we enjoy, price range, etc. Two days later, they sent me a list of four games they thought would suit us. I read the descriptions, chose two, and went to pick them up less than 24 hours later. As much as I enjoy (a little too much) the process of picking out a perfect present with slow thoughtfulness, there is something so beautifully easy about having someone knowledgeable just send me a bunch of options and then clicking “buy”. The concierge service felt almost decadent. Is this what people who have people do? I will definitely do this again, and seek out shops that have this kind of service. I think our local independent bookshop will do this too.

-Celebrating our anniversary. I didn’t really plan anything special, and what with Mandarin class for the four year old and doing the swim practice run for the nine year old, was gone from the house most of the day. But after I got home from the swim clinic run, I whipped up a batch of Smitten Kitchen’s chocolate pudding. I love this recipe because it is so fast and easy and I almost always have the ingredients on hand. There are definitely other recipes that are a little more lush, but none that beat this recipe for it’s high ratio of ease to deliciousness. I got home at 8pm, had the pudding chilling in the fridge twenty minutes later and by the time we were on our second episode of Succession that night, we were enjoying chocolate pudding. Not a fancy anniversary celebration, but sweet and simple. Which seemed appropriate.

-continued mild weather and beautiful morning sunlight at the creek as the baby throws sticks in the water just to watch them drift downstream:

And Christmas memories from 2021:

-Staying up late the night before to make cinnamon rolls and watch the NORAD Santa Tracker.

-This is the first year that I had the nine year old buy presents for her siblings and for the Husband. Seeing what she picked out and how she thought through the process was really fun.

-The baby raiding everyone’s stocking for chocolate. I had to pull the last four chocolate peanut butter cups and put them on a high high shelf.

-matching pjs for Christmas:

-making cookies. We made gingerbread, shortbread and peppermint candy cane cookies this year. The candy cane ones are fun and the kids had fun helping to roll the different colour stripes.

-Jello-O a traditional holiday side dish for us. The nine year old made it this year from a recipe that we thought was Aunt Sara’s, but turns out it wasn’t. Apparently hers is entirely cream cheese and Jell-O powder, without the just Jell-O layer.

-My first attempt at Cornish Game Hen. Which did not go well. They were not cooked all the way through initially so I had to put them back in the oven for twenty minutes. Which was just enough time to learn how to play one of our new games, one which has already become a family favorite. It is simple enough that the four year old can play it with a little bit of help, but also the nine year old can play without getting bored. And it’s short. So you can play it while waiting for dinner to finish cooking…

-Beautiful, incredible sixty degree weather on Christmas day. I will be always grateful for our backyard, but doubly so when we have to isolate. After we opened presents, we went outside and hung out in the backyard for a few hours – the kids with they new toys and the Husband and I with our new books. And the concertina – I’m still attempting to learn to play, and so far I can play a C major scale and a G major scale.

-Then we watched It’s a Wonderful Life, as per tradition.

There were definitely things we didn’t get done this year – we made cookies, but didn’t decorate them, we didn’t get to church or see friends, I didn’t make rolls for Christmas dinner because the dough didn’t rise in time, we didn’t read ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas on Christmas eve (my favorite tradition). But it was still a lovely day – organic and unrushed – and we were all together, so I guess we did achieve the most important thing, even with a positive COVID test.

What We Ate:

Saturday: Dumplings, quick cucumber salad, and ginger-scallion noodles

Sunday: leftovers

Monday: Tofu Pad Thai from ATK Vegan for Everyone

Tuesday: Brussel Sprout Fried Rice from Meena Sodha’s East

Wednesday: Mushroom and Leek Tart. I meant to make a galette, but didn’t get around to making the pastry crust, so I used some puff pastry I had in the freezer, and it turned out beautifully. Will remember for next time: puff pastry + sauteed veggies = easy tasty dinner.

Thursday: Pizza and Polar Express. Movie night early this week because we had anticipated going to church on Christmas eve. Wump wump.

Friday: Roast teriyaki salmon and napa cabbage salad.

Saturday: (Christmas Dinner!) Cornish Game Hen roasted w/ potatoes and leeks, roasted zucchini, jello. Sticky Toffee Pudding for dessert. and all the cookies.

Weekly recap + what we ate: striving for festive

Drive through lights – picture taken by the nine year old!

Another mild week weather-wise. After working the week before, I really wanted to make sure to spend lots of time outside and managed to get two hikes in with the baby.

The first hike was another naturalist led hike organized by a nature centers. I had bundled the baby up, but the weather got increasingly mild and by 11:30am, she had shed almost all her layers except her turtleneck. We’ve done several of these hikes before, but the naturalist always takes a different path and points out different things. This time, she led the children to build a fairy house next to a hole at the base of a tree. Then there was some walking along fallen trees, and throwing rocks and leaves in the river and tree identification.

My second hike was as the end of the week. Inspired by the selfie stand overlooking the Potomac I came across a couple weeks before, I decided to go find another of the selfie stands that the County Parks had put up. The closest one was on a trail called Burnt Mill Trail. This trail ran next to the shopping plaza with the Trader Joe’s and I’d been on the southern part of the trail, but not the northern part where the selfie stand was. According to the selfie stand website, there are actually four selfie stand locations along this trail, but we only found two. The baby was an awesome hiker. There were some parts of the hike where I lost the trail, and she determinedly scrambled up through bramble and dirt paths, sometimes on her hands and knees. Funny how on the straight and easy path she wanted to be carried, but on the steep and overgrown paths, she forged ahead fearlessly on her own. We were never in danger of truly being lost, as the trail more or less followed the curves of the stream, but there were definitely parts where what I thought was a trail was not really a trail.

Aside from those two hikes, the rest of the week was kind of … bleh. I think something about the kids being in school right up til two days before Christmas makes this year’s holiday season seem kind of… rushed. I’ve checked a lot of the usual holiday boxes. The cards got ordered at the beginning of the week (finally) and surprisingly arrived by the end of the week, so they are ready to be addressed and sent out and hopefully most people will get them before Christmas. We have a ton of Christmas books to read, and even if we aren’t reading Christmas books every night, we manage to do it several times a week. We’re watching Christmas movies. (Last week was While You Were Sleeping. I love this movie so much. There something about Sandra Bullock’s smart and sweet Lucy and Bill Pullman’s rugged pining Jack that checks all my rom com hero/ine boxes. I consider this a Christmas movie, definitely.) The tree is up, the mantel is decorated, the Christmas lights are up outside the house.

We went to a drive through light display this past week. I made a thermos of hot chocolate and picked up treats from one of our favorite Asian bakeries. It was a bit of a slog through rush hour traffic to get there, but the lights were beautiful, we enjoyed our treats and listened to Christmas music as we drove through the display, and we got Indian take-out for dinner on the way back.

But something… not sure what… makes it feel like just going through the motion. I think the stress of continued COVID living (omincron!!), the pace of having to still maintain the everyday schedule right until the last minute, and the stress of trying to decorate the house while having a small destructive toddler running around… There was a snow globe accident that was a real low point in our, “We can never have nice things again.” narrative. I mean that was probably overly dramatic, but the snow globe had been a Christmas present when the Husband was nine, so he felt the loss pretty acutely.

Anyhow.. it all feels like a slog. I don’t know.. perhaps it is just a pre-holiday low and once we actually get to Christmas I’ll feel better. We have tentative plans to go to Christmas even service, and that’s always been a bright point for me.

Two fun things this week:

I always like the serendipity when my kids match the playground equipment!

The baby has gotten really good at putting away the silverware. She managed to put away the whole basket… and for the first time, everything ended up in the right slot!

What We Ate:

Saturday: Dumplings and Dan Dan Mian, made by the Husband. The homemade chili oil was amazing.

Sunday: Spaghetti and vegan meatballs with garlic bread. Easy, jarred sauce and pre-made meatballs. This meal was by request of the four year old.

Monday: Squash Malai Kari from Meera Sodha’s East. I had some butternut squash that needed to be used up so I made this curry. Really tasty.

Tuesday: Korean Tacos with Napa Cabbage Slaw from Dinner Illustrated. The Dinner Illustrated recipe calls for red cabbage slaw, but I had napa and some watermelon radishes, so that’s what I used for the slaw.

Wednesday: Teriyaki Tofu from America’s Test Kitchen’s Vegan for Everyone. Served with Sichuan green beans. This was a baked teriyaki dish, and I added mushrooms because I didn’t have quite enough tofu. It was really tasty and I had leftover sauce! Can’t wait to use it on something.

Thursday: Take Out Indian after seeing Christmas Lights.

Friday: Pizza (made by Husband) and The Little Prince, the opera by Rachel Portman and Nicholas Wright. Such a beautiful beautiful score.

Weekly Recap + what we ate: wiped out then up and at ’em

4pm on a Tuesday in December. The days continue to shorten.

I got my booster on Sunday, and was completely useless on Monday. I wonder if it was because I got a Moderna booster? Originally, I had gotten Pfizer vaccines with no side effects aside from a sore arm. I had read that there were some negligible benefits from mixing and matching boosters. At any rate, I got the booster at 5pm on Sunday. Compared with getting my original vaccine, which seemed like an EVENT with a site run by the National Guard in a huge white tent, the booster was kind of a very banal affair. I got my shot at the county health center and the fifteen minute waiting period was self monitored – no large wall clocks or health attendants.

At any rate, Sunday I felt fine, but Monday was rough. Despite it being 60 degrees and sunny, I felt chilly all day and could barely function. I took the kids to the bus stop and daycare, and then attempted to take the baby to the park. I pulled up to the park parking lot and couldn’t get out of the car, I was so cold and achy. We went to the library instead – the cleaners were at the house so I didn’t want to go home just yet. At least at the library I could sit while the baby did puzzles and read books. After the library, we got home and had lunch and then I gave up on actually doing anything and spent the rest of the afternoon on the couch watching This Is Us. I usually think of the basement/tv room as the Husband’s domain and rarely go down there to watch tv when he isn’t home. But if there was ever at time I wanted to just hunker on a big comfy couch in front of a big screen… well the day after my booster was it.

That evening we had planned to decorate the tree, but I was so out of it that I just moved from the downstairs couch to the upstairs couch, stopping to make two brie en croutes on the way there. (Or is it bries on croute? actually it’s not relevant because the Husband bought camembert by mistake – so I guess it was camemberts en croute.) We had planned to have snack dinner and trim the tree. I guess snack dinner still happened, and the tree got trimmed. My hazy memory of it was lots of squeals of excitement from the baby. Apparently every ornament was a new source of delight for her.

Christmas Tree – step one is the lights.

Tuesday, I felt somewhat better and ready to deal with life. Namely meeting the locksmith because over the weekend, the baby managed to lock the door to the toy room, and we DIDN’T HAVE A KEY!!!! Which isn’t really a big deal, except that we keep the baby’s clothes in the toy room. Anyhow, the grumpy old man of a locksmith opened the door and then chastised us for having keyed locks on our interior doors and re-keyed the toy room lock.

I have to say that I was tempted never to tell the kids that we had unlocked the door to the toy room. Even for the two days that the toy room was locked… no one asked about it. The kids found plenty to play with around the house – a box of blocks, a cardboard box or two, books. I think we actually got to Thursday before the four year old discovered that he could actually get back in the toy room. It really made me realize that we probably don’t really need an entire room just for toys. Or even the toys themselves. I don’t know that I’m ready to embrace such a minimalist mantra, but I think knowing that it’s possible is a good thought to have in the back of my head.

The rest of the week was taken up by… paid work!!!

Oh green sticky tabs! How I’ve missed you!

I got a call the week before asking if I was available to run the supertitles for a new jazz opera. Initially I was reluctant because finding childcare for the baby always feels like a huge hurdle. But the Husband said that he could take one afternoon off work so that I could go to rehearsals, and the company presenting the work said that I only had to come to one afternoon rehearsal. So I agreed.

I haven’t run titles in a while, but it’s pretty straightforward. It’s basically running a 300+ slide PowerPoint presentation set to music. This piece was a little tricky because some of the slides were stage directions or descriptors rather than just the sung text, so I had to watch the stage as well as read the music. And also the piece was more jazz than opera in certain parts. That’s not a genre that my ear is used to, so it was sometimes challenging to follow. But all in all, I had a great time. I described it to my friend as “All the fun parts of calling a show, without a million other people asking you questions about other things.”

The laptop I was given to use, was one the same one the Opera uses for their title needs, and I was a little sad to see the home screen still had the supertitle files for the three shows we were working on in March 2020 when the pandemic shut everything down. Staring at those files made March 2020 seem both like yesterday and of another time altogether.

It was weirdly familiar to walk into the building again.. to check in with the security guard, to talk to the crew, to hear another voice on headset calling cues and giving pages. To wearing my blacks again. Though none of them fit after all these months and I just settled for dresses and leggings. There is something about sitting through a tech that is so familiar yet still sends gives me chills of anticipation.

The other funny thing about this gig, I realized, was that even though it was my first job back in this building, everyone else had clearly been back at work for a while. There was an ease and acceptance about constantly wearing masks and checking vaccine cards that, while it still felt new for me, was clearly the normal for everyone else I saw… the audience, the crew, the performers. I know I had worked this past summer, but even still, I didn’t think we’d be masking indefinitely. Yet here we are.

Fun things this week:

The older kids have been teaching the baby new phrases. Favorite ones – the four year old has been really into making up knock knock jokes, which have been hilarious in their banal lack of knock knock humour. Like:
“Knock, knock!”
“Who’s there?”
“Truck!”
“Truck who?”
“There’s a truck on the road!”
Anyhow, he’s been teaching the baby to go around saying, “Knock knock!” and it’s hilarious because that’s about as far as she gets.
The nine year old has been teaching the baby to say, “Rock, rock, rock!” As if it were some alternative version of “Rock Paper Scissors!”
I mean objectively these things aren’t that amusing, but when you have the older kids egging on the baby to yell these things as loud as she can, it’s kind of adorable. And loud.

The produce situation has gotten out of hand, so this week I spent an afternoon making kale chips and zucchini muffins. So satisfying to use things up rather than just throwing it in the worm bin!

Quote of the week – we were at a birthday party for the boy across the street – one of those affairs where we didn’t know anyone so we hung out in the basement with the kids. There was a high school student there too, the son of a friend – tall, gangly, and so very game for whatever antics the younger kids wanted to put him through. Anyhow, at one point, the nine year old became very fascinated by the idea of his being a high schooler and asked, “Is high school fun?” And he replied with this huge grin, “Yeah. You gotta have the right friends then high school’s a lot of fun. Good friends and playing sports.” Something about the way he said it made me so happy – like he knew high school wasn’t about grades or your future. I mean sure those things are important, but that’s not what you’re going to carry in your heart about those years.

And this photo from the building I work in… how I’ve missed it:

The building is wearing it’s honors garb!

What We Ate:

Saturday: Birthday party at neighbor’s – Peruvian Chicken and birthday cake– a gluten free, dairy free, egg free cake that tasted amazing.

Sunday: Leftover night

Monday: Snack dinner – camembert en croute, sausage, cheese, crackers, fruit – and tree trimming

Tuesday: Curry noodle soup, adapted from Thai Coconut soup in Vegan for Everyone.

Wednesday: I had soup and sandwich from Whole Foods on my dinner break. The Husband made pork and eggplant stir fry for the kids.

Thursday: Butter Chicken from Urvashi Pitre’s Indian InstantPot

Friday: Pizza (take out) and movie for the family while I went to work.

Weekly recap + what we ate: forest meanders

Tuesday the nine year old got her second COVID vaccine shot. Apparently a lot of her classmates got to stay home after their shots, but I figured since she didn’t have any side effects the first time, she could go to school. Because I had to drop her at school anyway, I decided to check out Blockhouse Point trail, which was in that part of the county. The Best Hikes for Kids book mentioned that it was a moderate hike with a great view of the Potomac. Figuring that the 2 mile hike might be a good way to spend the morning, the toddler and I went to check it out.

Our hiking backpack had been in the trunk of my car, and good thing too. When I had parked at the trailhead, I looked in the backseat to see that the baby was asleep. She got quite cranky when I tried to get her to walk, so I put her in the hiking pack, and set off down the trail. I hadn’t used the hiking pack in a while because usually it doesn’t seem worth it for less than a mile and a half, but I’m glad I put her in it this time – the terrain was a little rough and she definitely didn’t want to walk. The trail was a lovely woodsy path that ran alongside a horse farm. We watched some large horses grazing, then continued onward.

By the time I got to the first Potomac overlook, the baby was asleep. Figuring this was a good place for a break, I took the backpack off, sat down on some rocks, had a snack and decided to spend some time reading. The view of the Potomac was beautiful and on the tow path below was mostly empty, maybe a jogger or two passing seen passing by. The weather had warmed up, or maybe I was heated from the hike? (It was really quite remarkable how warm it was because that morning there had even been a sprinkle of snow.) I passed an hour like this, reading in the sunshine. Though I felt slightly guilty for taking such an indolent morning, I couldn’t find it in me to waste the weather, the sunshine, or the baby’s nap by heading back to the car so soon.

After the baby woke up, We had a snack and I managed to get her to hike the rest of the trail loop with me, about a mile and a half. There was one point where I could have taken the fork back to the car or continue the loop. The loop was longer, but I figured that I didn’t know when I would come back to this hike, so I may as well finish the loop with its spur to a second Potomac overlook. The second overlook had a selfie stand, a project of the county parks which I found really helpful and kind of charming. There are sixteen selfie stands throughout the county, and I think I might make it a project of mine to visit all of them. I love a good project to get me to explore different parks.

Thank you selfie stand! I very rarely have pictures with the kids, and this made it easy.

After the second Potomac overlook, we continued on our way, meandering at a toddler’s pace back to the car. We saw mountain laurel and chestnut oaks, examine moss and mushrooms, crunched through leaves and balanced on logs and hopped over a stream. There were a couple of points when I thought the baby would refuse to walk, but a few well timed snack bribes and we actually made it back to the car. When I looked at my watch, it was almost three o’clock! Our intended two hour hike, had turned into a five hour forest wander. It was certainly one of those days where I felt like the real luxury in my life right now is the luxury of time. But even then, I feel this panic about not squandering it.

On Thursday we took a seasonal adventure and went to visit the Seton Shrine for their Candlelight Tour of Christmas Past. The Seton Shrine is a basilica and historic site dedicated to Mother Seton, the first American born saint. They have a program where a tour guide leads a tour of one of the historic buildings then historical interpreters re-enact life at the girls’ school in the 1800s. There were demonstrations of dancing, domestic crafts, and a lesson in French. It was a quiet and lovely evening, though, being over an hour away, it was perhaps a bit of an ambitious outing for a school night.

candlelit campus and a dance demonstration.

Friday the baby and I went on another forest wander with some friends from he mom’s group. One of the local nature centers has trails. The trail we picked indicated that it was a mile loop, but it was certainly longer than that as we ended up on the trail for almost two hours. Even going at a toddler’s pace, I feel like a mile should not take that long! But we had snack and the kids walked on logs and had a good time and for the most part walked. We even saw a buck! He was sitting so quietly in the leaves that we didn’t notice him as we paused to eat our snack. Breathlessly we watched, certain that he would bolt, but he just watched us as we watched him. After we finished our snack, we continued on our path and looked up to see him gather himself up and slowly walk off in the opposite direction. I know deer are plentiful (almost too plentiful) and considered a nuisance in this area, but there is still something magical about seeing them.

One evening this week was the nine year old’s piano recital. Her first in person recital since the very first recital she played in two years ago. That 2019 recital seemed so long ago. I had missed it because the four year old was sick that day. Well… I missed this recital too. A mix up about bringing cookies to the recital reception had me going to two grocery stores (one which didn’t have a bakery department), and then to Trader Joe’s. I hadn’t been to Trader Joe’s since before the pandemic and I’d forgotten what wonderful things they had. Anyhow, I got to the recital just as the nine year old finished playing. I guess even though she was half way down on the program, kids at this age play very short pieces. Well, there is always this spring.

Fun things this week:

People are starting to put their Christmas decorations up. I was walking a friend’s dog, and saw this in their neighborhood. It certainly checks a lot of boxes. The baby really liked this one – it feature two of her favorite things: “Bacca!” which is short for Chewbacca, which is what she calls anything Star Wars related. And “Soopy!”

-At the four year old’s school they have a “question of the day” and I love reading all the answers the kids have. Michael’s answer below struck me as hilarious in its unintentional surrealism:

What We Ate:

Saturday: Chinese takeout with friends.

Sunday: Turkey pot pie made from leftover turkey. I use this one hour vegan pot pie recipe, adapting it however I need.

Monday: Cauliflower Salad from America’s Test Kitchen Vegan for everyone.

Tuesday: Sweet potato and poblano tacos from Dinner Illustrated

Wednesday: Turkey soup made with Thanksgiving carcass.

Thursday: Take out from Dumpling House after our trip to the Seton Shrine.

Friday: Quesadillas and leftover soup before piano recital.

Christmas 2020

Christmas Cinnamon Rolls. Strangely the only picture I took all day.

It’s been a quiet Christmas and Boxing Day here. Lots of sugar was consumed, lots of wrapping paper torn off packages. Many squeals of joy.

The Husband was up early on Christmas morning cleaning up after my late night frenzied tornado of baking. We then had cinnamon rolls for breakfast (as was tradition) and “went” to church. Usually we attend Christmas Eve service, but for some reason the live stream wasn’t working that night so we skipped it and instead went to Christmas morning mass.

All told, it was after 10am when we got to presents. A lesson in patience for the children, I suppose.

The Husband had, the day before, brought up his work monitor to the dining room so that we could watch the Met’s opera stream while we decorated cookies and did our general Christmas Eve puttering. It was the Bartlett Sher production of The Barber of Seville starring Isobel Leonard, Lawrence Brownlee and Christopher Maltman. It was delightful and funny and heartfelt. I once heard someone say that Isobel Leonard seems physically incapable of “ugly singing face” – you know that thing when opera singers contort their faces to make the more heavenly/ awesome/ glorious sounds. Anyhow, I mentioned that to the Husband and he spent much of the afternoon watching her to see if it was true. It was. She is as constantly radiant of face as she is of voice.

One of my late night discoveries while baking was BBC Sounds and the wide variety of music mixes they have. I discovered mix named “A Peaceful Christmas” that combined calming new age-y music with a reading of Shackleton’s 1902 Expedition Diary and the Shipping Forecast. It was kind of the Husband’s catnip and I couldn’t wait to introduce him to it. We listened to it twice in one day. The Husband even put up a screen saver of snow falling on a cabin in the woods and on another screen, a fire in a fireplace, just to get us in the appropriate hunkering winter mood.

After presents we had some family Zoom followed by the kids playing with their new presents then I got to work cooking dinner. The Husband and kids played Mario Kart and had a great time.

Christmas Day menu:
-Charred Brussel Sprout Salad from How to Cook Everything Fast (again!). This was yet another recipe that took advantage of the broiler for quick cooking.
-Roasted Carrots (primarily for the baby, but the kids like these too – super simple: salt, pepper, olive oil and roast at 425 for about 15-20 mins)
– cut up raw carrots (some people don’t like cooked carrots)
-Stuffed pork roast. This was from Saveur magazine. It called for stuffing with pork with dried fruit and apples which had been marinated in bourbon and citrus zest. I might have let the fruit sit in the bourbon for a might too long because the filling definitely tasted more boozy than I had anticipated. Oops.
– no specific dessert, but the house is overflowing with cookies and candy – there is not shortage of sugar.

The pork was slightly overcooked, but I was pretty happy with the meal overall. I do want to try the pork roast again. It was my first attempt butterflying and stuffing a roast and I didn’t get it as tightly rolled as I wanted to. But being able to broil in one oven and roast in the other felt pretty awesome.

After dinner we went on a walk to see the lights in our neighborhood. It being dark, we attached some battery operated Halloween lights to the stroller, and it turned out to be both practical and festive.

“You should keep the lights on that stroller even after Christmas!” a fellow neighbor out on an evening constitutional told us.

There were some really fun light displays to see. Since we go out rarely in the evenings these days, I hadn’t realized how many people put lights up this year. I would be happy to make the post Christmas dinner light constitutional a new tradition.

We capped the day off with watching Meet me in St. Louis while drinking hot chocolate with marshmallows. Truth to tell, I may have fallen asleep after “Ding Ding Ding Went the Trolley” and woken up just in time for “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.”

Christmas often feels like the true end of the year. There is so much leading up to it – excitement, anticipation, planning… it is An EVENT. Kind of like opening night. The message of Advent being a season of active waiting came up frequently in church this year, and I took it to heart more so than in past years. Something about the limbo of pandemic living really made that message resonate. So we have this season where we wait for something. And then it arrives in a flurry of activity and emotion.

Then we get up the next day and still have a week more to get through until we get to turn the fresh page of the new year. That week feels somewhat anticlimactic. Perhaps because I very rarely work that entire week, I like to think of the week between Christmas and New Years as kind of a bonus week – a time to gather and reflect and organize for the next year. Of course New Years as new beginnings is somewhat arbitrary, despite being convenient. New resolutions and re-assessments and soul searching can (and should) happen as needed, I think.

But even as I peer into the murky future, I reflect on the past – a post mortem of the season, say. To do better: start the cinnamon buns Christmas Eve afternoon and go to bed earlier. More cookie drops to friends. More time outside. And there were for sure things this Christmas that I hope we carry to next year. The neighborhood walk to see lights, new matching pjs, lots of hot chocolate. Thank you pictures texted immediately (with accompanying flood of emojis chosen by the kids). Dumplings on Boxing Day. BBC Sounds Music Mixes. Time with family.

Weekly recap + what we ate – SNOW!!!

It’s been a festive and celebratory week.

There were certainly many things that just made me weary – Distance learning continues to be… challenging. I find Christmas and gift buying kind of overwhelming and mentally taxing. The baby seems to have two modes these days: clinging barnacle or destructive tornado. I’ve been really bad about making sure I get enough sleep, which is making me cranky and short tempered.

But overall, a lot of fun things brought me joy this week.

I keep a list in my journal of things I’ve learned to do. This weekend I added “changing a bike tire” to that list. The eight year old’s bike has had a flat for some time now, and the parts that the Husband ordered for it finally came in. He talked me through one tire and then I did the other tire. I also disconnected and removed the hand brake because it wasn’t really working and the eight year old preferred the pedal brake anyway. I realized as I was working that the bike is just a series of pieces screwed together. I had always been intimidated by the idea of bike repair, even simple stuff like changing a flat. But when I could see it as merely screwing and unscrewing, the whole process was somewhat demystified. The tricky part, of course, is keeping track of what one is tightening or loosening and not losing the bolts. I’m surprised it took me so long to figure this out.

On Sunday, we were invited to a driveway birthday party for a friend of the eight year old. Everyone signed up for a time slot and we drove up and hung out in their front yard. I convinced the Husband to get out his baritone and play Happy Birthday to the birthday girl. Before we set out for the birthday party, he made some booming baritone music to everyone’s delight at home. It was definitely a highlight of the weekend. Making music is such a joyful thing. Even when it is effortful, there is such a sense of accomplishment.

Speaking of music – Every so often I get obsessed by a certain song and want to find all the versions I can and listen to it and then also find the sheet music and learn to play it. This week it was More I Cannot Wish You from Guys and Dolls. I had heard Loudon Wainwright III perform a version of it on Fresh Air, and it kind of wrenched something in me. I had forgotten about the song because it wasn’t in the movie. There is something in the heartfelt simplicity of the song that is so perfect. I’ve been listening to it on repeat this week and evenadded it to the 3 year old’s bedtime playlist.

For the record, this bedtime playlist:
-Put on Your Sunday Clothes (movie version)
-Octopus’s Garden
-Put on Your Sunday Clothes (Broadway Revival)
-Rocketship Run
-More I Cannot Wish You
-Try to Remember
Certainly a sentimental mix of songs….

Christmas lights. This was not the most impressive display, but the one that I managed to remember to take a picture of.

Tuesday we went to a drive through light display in a local park. Usually we go to the zoo’s light display, but it was closed this year because of COVID. Still wanting something festive and this drive through light display seemed to fit the bill. I picked up some Christmas cookies from our favorite bakery and we cranked up the Christmas music and we set out. It was delightful (pun!). Afterwards we battled rush hour traffic home and picked up Indian food for dinner.

Wednesday, there was snow! Kind of crazy given that it had been 60 degrees the weekend before. The eight year old loves snow. I managed to find snow suits for everyone and outside they went. I had a vague fear that by the time I got the baby into her snow gear, the older two would be ready to come inside, but I was wrong. They were outside for almost two hours. Having no sled, the eight year old got out the kiddie pool and tried to push her siblings around in it. It was the baby’s first real snow and she seemed to have a good time, taking off into the snow without fear. I think I do need to put a reminder in my calendar to look for the snow gear in November; while we had snowsuits and hats, the mittens were kind of… not quite adequate. Also I need to order some better base layers. But no one really complained. I think, for some odd reason, my kids don’t seem to mind the cold. Or maybe they were too enthralled by the snow. They got two great days out of the snow before it melted away.

On Friday our new range arrived! We had been without an oven since the summer. It wasn’t one thing, really, just a rather slow demise. By August, it was taking an hour and a half to preheat and the burners had to be lit manually. I’d been having a hard time pulling the trigger on buying a new one; big ticket items tend to paralyze me and being unemployed kind of compounded that paralysis. But the Husband did the research, took the lead on things and we finally ordered a new one last month. We had been making do with just the toaster oven and anything we baked had to be able to fit in an 8″x 8″ pan. Which meant a lot of bar cookies and only four scones at a time. I especially missed having an oven when I wanted to roast a whole sheet pan full of vegetables. Some of my favorite recipes that involved the stove I learned to adapt to cooking in a frying pan, or I figured out how to roast things in batches and combine them.

The new range has a double oven and six burners. It feels so decadent, but I’m very much looking forward to being able to baking pans and pans of cookies again. There is a little issue with it not sitting flat against the wall, but someone is coming to fix that soon. Until then… I’m so excited to be able to bake again!

In anticipation of the new oven, I dug out my sourdough starter and began the slow process of reviving it. I’m always a little skeptical about the viability of my sourdough starter after it sits for months in the fridge for a while. But somehow nature always surprises me and after about a week things are bubbling again. I did have to pitch a batch once after it turned pink and putrid, but I’ve have more successes than failures, thankfully. I do have a jar of starter in the freezer as a back up.

Cute Baby Things:
When I ask the baby if her diaper is dirty, she will walk to her room and pat the changing table. It makes me really happy. And really, anything that can make diaper changing happy is a plus.
Also: Baby playing Parcheesi. Not as cute as it seems. Actually quite difficult.

Onward to Christmas!

What We ate:

Saturday: Pasta with red sauce (from the Italian Deli next to the Husband’s office), bagged salad, and garlic bread. So simple, yet so good! Also watched A Christmas Story, in our tradition of a Christmas movie on Saturday night.

Sunday: Tostadas w/ BBQ pinto beans, pineapple salsa and coleslaw

Monday: Udon noodles with cabbage, carrots, and tofu.

Tuesday: Indian Take Out

Wednesday: Roasted Salmon with Broccoli, Beans and Rice

Thursday: Butter Chicken from Indian Instant Pot. I also threw in some potatoes that had to be used up.

Friday: Pizza and A Christmas Carol (George C. Scott version)