family movie night – Page 3

Weekly recap + what we ate: decluttering and swimming

We looked at our calendar and realized that it was going to be one of our only free weekends to take a day trip to Longwood Gardens, so we decided to go on Saturday. The Husband and two littles went to a volunteer garden clean up at the church in the morning and when they came home, we had lunch and then got in the car. We usually go to Longwood Gardens in the morning and spend all day, so this was a bit of an abbreviated trip. I wondered if driving two hours for a couple hours at Longwood would be worth it, and it turns out it was a nice outing. We didn’t go to the conservatory, spending all our time in the outdoor portion of the gardens, and we skipped the treehouses where we usually let the kids play for a bit. But we did walk the meadow path, which is something we don’t always get to do because it is a little on the long side. And we did see the vegetable gardens which is always one of my favorite things. Here is the Rainbow collage from our visit:

One big disappointment was that they have taken out the children’s garden – there used to be a section with a fountain the kids could play in and the gardens were set up with bee themed paths with nooks and crannies to hide in. It was the kind of space that invited a lot of imaginative free play. The Husband talked to a guide and they said that they’re implemented more “interactive” displays for kids – namely little signs with information and prompts for discussion. Which… let’s be honest, I don’t know any kid that is going to say, “Boy, this placard is a lot more fun than these winding maze-paths.” Anyhow, that was kind of a bummer, but even still it was nice to be out in the sunshine and flower and trees and grass. The 12 year old took charge of the two little kids and they wandered down paths together singing show tunes, and when they got tired of that, she would ask for prompts from her siblings and make up songs for them. It’s nice to have moment like that to remember when they are at each other’s throats. We stayed at the gardens for about two and a half hours and then we went home, stopping for BBQ on the way home. It was delicious. All in all, a nice day.

Sunday was Time Trials for the 12 year old’s swim team. I took her to the pool at 7am and then stayed to work as a timer. It was really neat to see her swim and take an interest in her results. She even went up to one of the stroke and turn judges during a quiet moment and asked about the rules and how people most often get disqualified. They weren’t DQing people at time trials, but afterwards, she still went and asked the judge if she would have been DQd so she could learn and work on those things. I think I’m realizing that even though I find parenting a tween really hard, it’s so cool to see her becoming a person and take things on herself. Makes me feel like I just need to trust the process more and talk less.

To celebrate time trials, I took the 12 year old for a smoothie and we tried a Mangonada – kind of a combination of mango smoothie with mango chunks layered with a swirl of sweet and spicy mixture called chamoy, and topped with a tamarind straw. It was amazing and I’ll have more! The rest of the day was occupied by a long visit from a friend who I hadn’t seen in a while and then simple dinner and bed. All in all a nice weekend.

The week before was one of my few weeks without kids and without work. One of the big projects was to clean out the guest room. It has become a dumping ground for all the random things without a home or in transition in our lives. I spent a couple hours this week going through the boxes and boxes of kids’ clothes. It’s kind of a chore because they need to be sorted into stuff the little kids can still wear and stuff that no one will ever wear again. Then this latter pile is sorted into age and then girl and boy clothes. And then there are the shoes. So many shoes. I had a phase when I was obsessed with those Keen water shoes and would snatch them up anytime I saw them at consignment sales. It is kind of a problem. I have a pair in practically every size, and then some. Some sizes that are ridiculous because my kid certainly wasn’t walking when her feet were that size. So there are a lot of shoes. Which is kind of funny because we’re kind of shoe minimalists for the kids. They have a pair of running shoes, a pair of Crocs and a pair of rain/snow boots. And also a pair (or two of Keens).

This isn’t the “before” picture- it’s “during” picture, which I think is even more scary. Putting it here for a bit of accountability.

Also – over the years I’ve also amassed a motley assortment of breast pumps. Breast pumps were never covered in my insurance plan (this feature had been grandfathered in after Obamacare passed), so, counter-intuitively, I decided that I would spend lots of my own money on pumps. I had five electric pumps sitting around. Three of them I love, as much as one can love a breast pump – I mean I think there were days when I spent more time with my breast pump than with my family, so there was a kind of begrudgingly familiar relationship there. Two of the pumps were complete pieces of garbage. They weren’t efficient at all and had so many awkward parts. (I mean all pumps have awkward pumps, but these were particularly not streamlined.) Why was I holding on to crappy breast pumps??? What value were they adding to my life?

To backtrack a little, on the day before, my friend and I went to see an afternoon movie. We went to see Babes – a movie about two friends navigating their friendship as they traverse the waters of motherhood. I can’t remember the last time I laughed so much in a movie theatre. The movie was so so so so funny. But also so on point about so many aspects for friendship and parenthood. There is a moment (spoiler alert) where one character encourages the other character to burn her breast pump. Oh my goodness, the triumphant glee with which they destroyed that breast pump brought me so much joy to watch. The next day, thinking back on the movie, I looked at those two crappy pumps sitting in the bottom of a storage bin and I was inspired. Those pumps were annoying as all get out to use – no point in trying to dispose of them in the perfect way. Chunk, toss. Straight into the garbage bag they went. I felt a tiny twinge of regret about throwing out something that was still in working order, but I’ll get over it.

Two of the other pumps, I ended up giving to a friend with a new baby girl. In addition to that friend, I have another friend (the one who came over on Sunday afternoon) expecting a baby in September, so I passed on a bunch of stuff to her too, including cloth diapers, a diaper pail, a baby sling. Why did I have a diaper pail still sitting around? I wasn’t even using it – it was in the attic, collecting dust and nostalgia.

In all honesty I could have just chucked everything into a donation pile and moved it all out of the house, but every time I pulled the clothes out, I got all sentimental, remembering when the outfit was worn. And when I got sentimental, I couldn’t bear to just sweep everything into a trash bag for donation; some of the pieces I wanted to pass along and know that they would get worn again. So I think that this week, between those two friends, I passed along four or five boxes worth of things – also a baby chair that I think I will need to get back because unbeknownst to me, the Husband is actually really attached to it – it cam all the way from Colorado with us when we had our first child. The guest room does not look any better, though, because most of the things I did purge were in bins, so they didn’t leave much visual clutter in the first place. If anything, the guest room looks worse because the things that were in bins are now all over the floor. Oh well, at least I know that progress is being made, even if it doesn’t look like it.

We’ve been swimming a lot this week. My skin smells constantly of chlorine and sunscreen and no amount of scrubbing will get that smell out. I’m really proud of the 4 year old – one day I forgot her swim vest at home, and she still spent an hour and a half in the pool (with time out for adult swim) – she can now touch the bottom in the shallow end. Neither the seven year old nor the 4 year old can swim yet, but they are comfortable paddling around in the 4ft section in their swim vests. We don’t swim much outside of summer, so every year it’s a bit of a surprise to see how the kids fare in the water. (Though there is a new aquatic center opened up near us, so maybe we’ll take advantage of that during the cooler months?). One of my dreams this summer is to get the 7 year old to swim independently. There were definitely 7 year olds swimming at time trials and their flailing perseverance was kind of adorably inspirational to watch.

We’re still trying to find our routine for pool nights. I’ve been trying to pack a big snack/dinner for the two little kids so they can eat at the pool after their swim session. Then I have them shower and change into pjs at the pool so that when we get home they just have to brush teeth and go to bed. The 12 year old either eats at home or eats at the pool. Sometimes both. The “coming home and going straight to bed” hasn’t been exactly working and there have been a lot of late nights. I don’t know if we just muddle through this erratic bedtime for the next five weeks, or if we should try to tweak the routine/schedule. Oh well, there’s only a couple more days of school and then we’re into summer, so maybe the relaxed evenings are what makes summer memories? Although, once camp starts, our mornings will be more hectic because camp starts earlier than school so we will have to be out the door earlier. My takeaway – there is no such thing as routine.

Towards the end of the week the principal called with the results for the four year old’s Early Entrance to Kindergarten assessment and he said that the 4 year old did not meet the criteria for early entrance. Wump wump. When I asked the principal what they thought she needed a little more time on, he said that she was actually above grade level for Math and letter recognition, but some of the reading skills weren’t quite there. Part of me thinks that if my child can already read, then she should be going into 1st grade, not kindergarten. I do wonder if early entrance to Kindergarten is about a child being highly gifted rather than just run of the mill “ready for kindergarten”. Anyhow, the principal said we can appeal the decision to the school district if we want. The first step would be a more in depth meeting with him.

I know I said I wouldn’t push the early entrance issue if the school thought she should wait, but it’s one of those things when faced with the realities, things always shift slightly. I think we will go ahead and meet with the principal and go from there. I think I also am a little concerned that her current pre-K teachers say she will be bored if she has to repeat pre-K so I want to know what can we/the preschool do to challenge her next year and keep her engaged? Or maybe we need to look into private Kindergarten? The whole thing has left me a little deflated because I had been really excited for her to start school next year – she is the most mature of the three kids, she does addition up to 10 on her fingers, she knows all the letter sounds and can write words if you spell them to her – all her teachers say she’s ready. She had even gotten a place in the same French Immersion program as the 7 year old, which meant that I would have two kids in one school. I’ve never had two kids in one school before! The Immersion program is by lottery, so I’m not sure if she’ll get a place the following year. And now it would mean another year of paying for childcare. Gah. All things that are a little bit of a bummer.

Haiku – I’m trying to take up the haiku habit again. It’s watermelon season, one of my favorite reasons for summer. Only watermelons are big, and not everyone in the family likes eating it….

Why did I ever
Buy a whole watermelon
Right before my trip?

Grateful For:
-My friend who came see a weekday matinee with me and the very flexible week at work that allowed her to do so. Is there anything as luxurious as taking in a weekday matinee? The theatre was practically empty and my friend and I ate popcorn for lunch and laughed loudly together. And afterwards we ran errands at Target together. It was kind of the perfect friend day.

-Laughing with my family. Inspired by a mention on Stephany‘s blog, I cued up some Nate Bargatze. Stand up comedy is not something that was ever really on my radar. But I like laughing, so I thought I’d give it a try and pulled up one of his albums the other day while cleaning the kitchen. Oh my did it feel good to laugh. And the 12 year old, who was cleaning alongside me laughed and laughed and laughed the whole time. We’ve had a lot of moody tween lately, so hearing her laugh kind of helped remind me that she can still find delightful things in life. She now wants to listen to stand up all the time – we listened to Jim Gaffigan on the way to Longwood Gardens. I’m discovering a whole new world of entertainment! I don’t always find the content appropriate – I think what was once considered “edgy” is actually kind of sexist/racist/ableist, etc. And body shaming seemed to be a big thing in a lot of the albums. Some of the punching down is uncomfortable, and not in a good way. So yeah, some of it has been a little hit or miss. But when the absurdities of life are brought front and center and I can relate to those absurdities, it’s kind of a hit.

-Music Teachers. We’ve had two music recitals the past few weeks and, let’s be honest, the enthusiasm outweighs the ability in many cases. And yet, it doesn’t matter at all. The teachers are as enthusiastic for the kid who played the 10 second piece as they are for the kid who played the 10 page piece. My kids’ music teachers spend their time day in and day out teaching kids how to make music and never seem to get jaded about what they do.

-Finding my journals. I lamented last week about feeling a little off because I had misplaced my journals. Well I found them! They were under a pile of things next to my desk. Hooray! I haven’t gotten back into the daily habit, but I did make time to jot a few things down every couple of days. It’s a little sad to me how blank May is, but when I look back, I’ll be able to tell that May 2024 was a very busy month, and that’s a kind of record keeping in and of itself.

Looking Forward To:
– Maine! I’ve been listening to podcasts on Acadia National Park to get inspired. Listening to travel podcasts is one of my favorite things to do when I’m getting ready for a trip. I just search my destination and I’ll get a list of podcast episodes that are relevant. I’m excited for hikes and beaches and lobster and seeing friends.

-On that note, there was a list in the New York Times called Read Your Way Through Maine. It’s part of an occasional series where they have an author recommend a reading list tied to a location. (There was one for San Francisco, which inspired some of my reading during spring break.) I love reading books set in places that I’m about to visit, so I’ve borrowed a couple books off the Maine list to read in anticipation of/while in Maine – Landslide is about a women, mother of three teenage boys living in remote Maine, trying to cope when her husband is hospitalized in a fishing accident. Night of the Living Rez is twelve interconnected short stories set in a Native community in Maine.

-Glee! Because swim team practice goes until 7:30pm, we have had to re-think our traditional Friday night pizza and movie. Similar what we do when the 12 year old had Friday night basketball practice, we’ve decided to replace the pizza and movie with pizza and a tv show. During basketball season we watched Galavant, but there was only two seasons of it and we’ve watched it all. We tossed around a couple idea – I had borrowed the first season of Star Trek: The Next Generation from the library, and we thought we might introduce the kids to the Star Trek universe, but at the last minute I was in the mood for something a little more light hearted, and we decided to watch Glee. I had watched it off and on when it first came out, but I didn’t really have a television at the time, so I didn’t get to watch all of it. We are only two episodes in and it’s really fun. Some awkward adult content that I’m not quite ready to explain to the 7 and 4 year olds yet – I had forgotten the whole bit about the celibacy club – but they haven’t asked yet. The musical numbers are fun and the performances crackle; I’m enjoying it.

What We ate: We’ve survived our first two weeks of swim team practice. Last week the little kids started practice so it was the first week with us being at the pool from 5:00pm – 8:00pm. Dinner kind of felt all over the place.

Saturday: Leftover pizza and Kate and Leopold. It was my turn to choose the movie and I wanted a nice cozy rom-com. Does anyone else remember this movie? What a charming, sweet, perfect romantic comedy! And oh my gosh Hugh Jackman just glows through the whole movie. I feel like I’ve said it before here, but he’s just so pretty.

Sunday: Grilled chicken and vegetables. My friend’s 11 year old and my 12 year old have the same voice teacher, so Sunday after their recital, we asked if they wanted to come over for dinner. We stopped at the grocery story on the way home to pick up some chicken, my friend made a marinade at home and brought it over, and we had a great little cook out – chicken, vegetables, salad. Also – just as we were firing up the grill, our neighbor, who works at the farmer’s market, brought us four bunches of asparagus, so we tossed two bunches on the fire too. It was the perfect casual summer hang out with friends.

Monday: Vegetarian Tortilla Soup. Mostly this recipe from the NY Times, but I made it in the InstantPot and added black beans because we had some dried black beans that had been in the pantry for way too long and we kind of wanted the space back. I think my favorite part of this soup is that I dumped the last crumbs of a bag of tortilla chips into it to thicken it up (a trick I learned from Dinner Illustrated.) The chips had been sitting in the cupboard for a while and they were pretty stale, but no one ever wants to eat the tiny broken bits – how do you scoop salsa with that? I abhor food waste, so dumping the last dregs of the bag into the suit felt very satisfying. Vegan (we didn’t do the cheese and sour cream topping) . Everyone liked this a lot so I’m bookmarking the recipe.

Tuesday: Curry chickpea wraps. Pool dinner. This is the cool bloggers’ favorite curry chickpea salad, which I wrapped in tortillas along with some lettuce and brought to the pool for dinner. I love a curry anything and I even bought some mango chutney as the recipe called for (and then proceeded to eat a quarter of the chutney straight from the jar with a spoon. Was I hungry? Was it just that tasty?) I added a squeeze of lime juice to the salad to brighten it up a little. The little kids didn’t love this, but they still ate a couple bites. The 12 year old and I found this very tasty. Though she did say, “This would be better if you added chicken.”

Wedesday: Asparagus frittata and salad. Made from the other two bunches of asparagus our neighbor brought us.

Thrusday: PB & J and mac and cheese. I brought PB&J to the pool, along with cucumbers and apple slices. It wasn’t filling enough and the kids had mac n cheese (from the blue box) when they came home. Along with brie and Triscuits. I ate the brie smothered in the mango chutney. It was delicious. This is the kind of dinner pre-kids me would have eaten but also would have thought, “This really isn’t dinner.” But you know what? This is totally dinner. Smashing paradigms here.

Friday: Pizza (take out) and Glee

Saturday: BBQ at Old South Smokehouse on the way home from Longwood Gardens. It was our first time trying this place, even though we drive past it every time we go to Longwood Gardens. It was tasty, but there were no collard greens on the menu. What kind of BBQ place doesn’t have collard greens on the menu? Also – we introduced the children to hush puppies. The 7 year old would not share his.
Also – not for dinner, but in the morning I did make a strawberry rhubarb crisp, based on the Smitten Kitchen recipe. I had tried out a new farm stand in hopes of finding a replacement for the one I used to go to which is not opening this season. This new one was on the pricy side for me, of course it’s in our county, which probably affects the price. At any rate, I bought some rhubarb there and some strawberries, with the plan to make a pie. Well, crisp is so much less effort, so I did that instead. Only the kids ate the strawberries before I could make the crisp, so I ended up making it with supermarket strawberries, which was fine, but caused me a disproportionate amount of consternation. The crisp was yummy.
Also – side note – let’s talk about the price of strawberries. So right now, strawberries are in the $3.99/pound to $4.99/pound range at the supermarket. The strawberries at the farmstand were $7.50/pint. Which in comparison to the supermarket felt really expensive. But then as we were all enjoying the pint that I brought home, I realized I pay $8 for a large boba tea, and this pint of strawberries is more filling and is better for me than my boba. And I can share the strawberries with the family. So really, if I’m thinking of how much I pay for a treat (which, let’s face it, Boba – which is kind of my one indulgence – is definitely a treat.), then $7.50 for a pint of strawberries really isn’t so bad. Sometimes when I’m trying to weigh the cost vs. value of something I need to put it into perspective like that to help me decide if it’s something truly worth my money.

Sunday: Pasta and jarred red sauce, cut up veggies, leftover mushroom rice. Typical Sunday – simple supper and eating down the fridge.

Weekly recap + what we ate: Tech week and loving one’s job

Props are packed and ready to go to the theatre!

Half way through tech week! I had this idea that I would go one of those “Photo every hour” posts that Engie or Stephany do periodically- I thought it might be a a good way to capture a day of tech for me to look back on. Hah hah. Once we got into the evening rehearsal, shit gets real and I couldn’t keep up. Friday, our first tech rehearsal onstage, was particularly busy – our Production Assistant was out sick, so I had to do their job and my job. I logged 25,000 steps and climbed 34 flights of stairs that day. Part of the reason for all those stairs is that our set is three levels high. Here’s the view from the top level:

(Side note – it’s been much debated on how to refer to the levels of the set. There is a ground level, a middle level and a top level. Now if, in rehearsal, someone says, “Go to the second level,” which level would you go to? I would go to the mid level, but many people would go to the top level. We eventually just ended up calling them “mid” and “top” level.)

But I did take some pictures throughout the day, so here is a dump of pictures of that first day of tech last week, in and around the “intense, running around, and checking attendance, and listening to instructions, and relaying instructions to cast and crew, and why is everyone talking all at once? and making sure people didn’t get run over by the scenery or props, and took their cues on time and oh my god, and, how do we get thirty people onstage through that three foot wide gap? and yes, you should wear the hat now and no, now you take it off, here, just give it to me, and are people going to make their costume changes in time for their next cue? No they aren’t, they’ve just missed their entrance, and where are the dancers? and we need to give them a break, and what is that rule in our union contract? and the director wants to do things a different way, okay we’ll make that work, and we want to add fire? and this singer is now dead, can they go home or will we go back and do their scene again? and oh my goodness, we managed to tech through the whole show, thank GOD” part of the day….

Thursday was a set looks (where stage management and the director looks at the set for the first time and decide that, “Yep, this is what we were expecting.” and we make all sorts of discoveries as to how people will get onstage.) and then a Stizprobe (first time singers are with orchestra – sit and sing).

Friday was the first Piano Tech rehearsal, the first time onstage staging rehearsal for everyone. This is what was in my camera roll for that day:

6:30am – wake up – summer morning sunlight and I make the bed.

7:35am – roll out my yoga mat for 10 mins of yoga. The 4 year old helps.

8:30am – breakfast, eaten at the kitchen counter, with a book. Cottage cheese and blueberries – I’m trying to eat high protein/ high fiber breakfasts and lean away from the heavy carb breakfasts. Which is hard because bagels are tasty.

8:45a – quick 5 minutes of laundry folding before taking the kids to the school bus. Those three small folded piles all I manage to fold in five minutes.

10:30am- At work. paperwork. Make rehearsal logs for the day. Usually our production assistant does this, but they are sick this day. That’s my favorite brand of mechanical pencil – and I found that they sell it with a red barrel. Red is my favorite colour, so I ordered a whole box of them.

12:30p – lunch, sitting outside. I’m going to spend much of the day running around in the dark – Gotta grab sunlight when I can.

1:15pm – checking attendance. The rehearsal scheduling department gives me a list of people who are running late to rehearsal.

2:30pm – An hour into the first piano tech rehearsal. My music stand.

4:30pm – random picture of how we want to set this giant 30′ silk onstage – I take pictures of a lot of things because sometimes it’s easier than trying to describe to the crew how we want things to look. Sometimes I say things like, “That guillotine needs to be centered this spot on stage.” And it still isn’t clear because everyone has their own perspective and they move the thing here and there and I try to explain and then finally it goes in the right place and the crew says,. “You mean the upstage edge needs to split center?”. And I say, “Yes, thank you,” And I think to myself, “It probably would have been clearer if I had said it that way. Thank you for figuring that out.”

6:00pm – Run at dinner time. The weather was beautiful.

7:00pm – Quick picture in the bathroom of my piano tech outfit. I always wear the same thing – floral patterned top (Uniqlo) and linen joggers (Gap – patched in two places and maybe need to be replaced soon.). I like to wear bright colours during tech so I can be seen onstage. I do wear shoes, but I had just changed out of my running clothes and hadn’t put them on yet.

9:30pm – one hour left in the evening rehearsal, back at my music stand for a moment. These blue index cards are where I write who is making an entrance. If it’s just a handful of people, I will write it directly on a Post It, but when there are 30+, I write it on an index card and put it in my binder. I often only write first initial and last two letters of last name. ie. John Smith would be JSm. I had an assistant director once who called these the “airport codes” for each chorister. It’s a good feeling for me that I’ve been with these choristers so long that when I’m writing down the mass chorus group, writing their airport code takes no mental effort at all.

11:33pm – screenshot. Sometimes when I’m leaving and I realized I’ve I forgotten to log out of my timesheet, I take a screenshot of my phone so I remember what time I walked out the door. I get a lot of spam in my email.

12:10am – arrive home. I find that the lunchboxes I ordered for the kids have arrived. Yay! In the past week, one child has cracked their lunchbox and the other has lost theirs (I don’t want to be the one to open that lost lunch box when it is recovered…). I do have one extra for each child, but I like having a few spares for those times when the lunchbox doesn’t get cleaned the night before. I love these Sistema lunchboxes because they are relatively inexpensive and they can go in the dishwasher. And they are durable. We’ve had ours for about four years now. I was going to buy just one spare, but amazon also sold them in a four pack for about $12/each, so I went that route. They are getting harder to find, so I worry what will happen when Sistema stops making this size. Maybe I should order another 4 pack…

And that was a photo summary of Day 1 of tech. Day 2 of tech was Saturday, and I didn’t have to be at the theatre until 1pm, so I did a load of laundry (and hung it to dry), took the 7 year old to his morning soccer – the game was on despite the drizzly drizzly weather, and then dropped the 12 year old to her voice lesson on the way to work. On the days when I don’t have to be in until 1pm, I feel like the morning should be luxurious, but then it fills ups, especially on weekends. I spent the first part of the day at work light walking – basically we stand onstage while the lighting designer sets light levels – which is kind of tedious, but can be beautiful:

The evening was a piano dress rehearsal, first time in costume. It’s always a very long night, but we got through the whole show, which is always good.

Here is a random spot of beauty on asphalt, to break up all the work goings on, as seen on my run:

Doing Something You Love. I had a text exchange with a colleague last week. She was asking me about someone that had worked with me as a Production Assistant previously. (Side note: This really happens. Not sure how it is in other industries, but word of mouth is huge. It doesn’t matter who you list as a reference – if I know you’ve worked with someone I know, I will often have a casual conversation about you.). This former Production Assistant wanted to move on from stage management, and I replied to my colleague, “I think I knew she wanted to do something different. I’m always surprised when people don’t want to be stage managers because I genuinely like what I do a lot.” And my colleague wrote back – “Me either… I love what I do.”

Then I heard this interview with filmmaker Caitlin Cronenberg, who is the daughter of a famous filmmaker. And Cronenberg was asked about her feelings on nepotism, and she said, “You know, there are children of people doing things, and it’s because you look at your family member making art for a living and enjoying what they do. And you say, I want to love what I do. I want to make art for a living. And that’s why so many actors, so many directors and producers have children who are also in the business.

And it made me think how the 12 year old used to say that she wanted to be a stage manager, and I always thought that it was because she thought the work was interesting. But maybe, that isn’t it. Maybe she realizes that finding something you love to do – whether that is your job, or something outside of your job – that is important. And maybe she thinks, “Hey, there’s this thing that mom really loves doing… maybe I would love doing that too.” It made me think about how much my children pick up on the attitude/emotions/moods that I exude and how important it is to model that intangible quality – we all want our children to be happy, so they also need to have models of how to be happy. I hope that the 12 year old finds something that she loves doing. She doesn’t have to love it 100% of the time – I certainly don’t love my job 100% of the time; I most certainly don’t love parenting or painting or writing 100% of the time – but she has to love enough aspects of that thing that she finds periodic joy in doing it – not the results, not the end product, but in the doing.

Grateful For:
-The sanitation workers who pick up our trash and recycling. The other day, I came home after dropping the kids at school and the recycling trucks were making their routes. They just finished our house, and then I saw them take my elderly neighbor’s trash and recycling cans back up her driveway for her. It was such a nice thing for them to do! The Husband, who used to work for the county’s solid waste department, says that if you have difficulties putting your trash cans at the bottom of your drive, you can have your house coded so that the sanitation workers come get your trash cans and put them back if you want – there are special colour trash bins for this. I love that. I guess taking trash cans down to the curb was one of those things I took for granted (the 12 year old does it at our house), and I’m glad that there are provisions for people for whom it is difficult.

-Child minders. There are 20 children in our show. I am so grateful for the child minders to when the children to and from stage and keep an eye on them when they are not onstage.

-my sewing machine. I spent Sunday finishing up the 12 year old’s costume for Annie. I had to hem the pinafore, so I plugged in my sewing machine that has been dormant for several months now, and it worked. My mother in law had passed this sewing machine down to me – I believe it belonged to her aunt. It isn’t fancy – pretty much just does a straight stitch – but I don’t need fancy for where I am in my sewing skills. I was able to hem the pinafore. Then I added a pocket with some scrap fabric, because I know when I work on shows we are always asking for pockets in costumes. Then I looked at everything together, and the muslin pinafore looked a little bright, so I tea dyed it. It was my first time tea dying something and the process was pretty easy. It’s hard to tell in the picture, but the pinafore is now a light brown color. Also – another skill I did for the first time, is I made a button hole! The top of the dress dipped a little low in the front, so I added a button and made a button hole. Oh – here’s another gratitude – I’m grateful for creators who post tutorials of how to do things on the internet.

Old faithful sewing machine. I say a prayer of thanks every time it manages to turn on and work. Look – it’s the beginning of a buttonhole!

Looking forward to:
-Opening Night for me!

-Opening Night for the 12 year old!

-Orchestra rehearsals. We start adding the Orchestra to our rehearsals this week. I often think how lucky I am that I get to listen to a full orchestra play all the time. The wall of sound, the colours of the different instruments, the bone vibrating sensation of six trumpets and six trombones playing backstage, right next to me. There is something so amazing about that degree of unamplified music -so immediate and so grand. I love it all.

-Watching Starstruck. I started the third season of this show while making lasagna last week. I loved the first two seasons of this rom com about Jessie, who unknowingly hooks up with a famous movie star Tom in Season 1 and the fall out from that. The show is hilarious and touching. I don’t usually like shows where people make a mess of their lives, but there is something I really relate to in Jessie.

What We Ate:
Monday: Butter chicken – I used the leftover sauce from the Butter Chicken I made a few weeks ago, but I probably should have cooked it on the stove rather than in the Instant Pot because it was very runny.

Tuesday: Not sure – Husband cooked. I took myself out for Thai food because it was the day of the final room run and I wanted to eat something special.

Wednesday: Zucchini Pesto Lasagna from Smitten Kitchen Keepers. We had a bunch of zucchini to use up. And I figured this would be good for leftovers as well. It was tasty, but very cheesy. I find lasagna is always a lot of work, and I could have the same results by just making the sauce and veggies and tossing it with noodles rather than layering and baking in a tray.

Thursday: Not sure – Husband cooked, I think…. I packed dinner, see below…

Friday: Pizza (take out) and an Avengers movie. I packed dinned, see below…

Saturday: No idea.

Sunday: leftovers/scrounge in the fridge. My brain was so fried by this point, I can’t even remember if I made the kids dinner. Oh wait. yes I did. I boiled some pasta, tossed in broccoli during the last three minutes, drained and mixed in the leftover ricotta sauce from Wednesday’s lasagna, for a cheesy, broccoli pasta. (See – I did just what I said above – mixed the lasagna sauce with cooked pasta and veggies and it was just a tasty a much less work.

Since I don’t really have an idea of what the family had for dinner for most of last week, as I was away most nights last week, I thought I’d take a picture of a typical food pack that I bring to work on any given day during tech week when I usually eat both lunch and dinner at work. This was actually from Thursday, but then I ended up going out for lunch that day and didn’t eat most of this and so just re-packed it and took it on Friday:

Lunch: Broccoli Quinoa Salad, avocado, hard boiled egg, plum

Dinner: zucchini pesto lasagna, cut up veggies and apple slices

Snacks for throughout the day: another container of veggies and apple slices, hummus, roasted chickpeas, mini pretzels, string cheese, mixed nuts. (Also at the office we have peanut m&ms, peanut butter pretzels, chocolate caramels, and gummy Nerds.).

Aside from breakfast, this all gets me through the day.

That’s it for last week. It’s been exhausting, but I am excited about the show. Also excited to be opened and to pick up around the house a little bit.

What do you love doing? And taking a poll: Which level would you call the “second level”?

Weekly recap + what we ate: getting ready for tech week

Some fun and random happenings this past week:

Blueberries: There was an episode of Hidden Brain this week called The Curious Science of Cravings, and the guest is psychiatrist Judson Brewer who researches cravings. At the end of the episode, Brewer talks about replacing his craving for gummy worms with blueberries. It was a very a propos episode because there have been the most amazingly plump and sweet blueberries in the store lately. I’m not sure what genetically engineered magic is going on here, but they’ve been a highlight of my food life right now. I can easily eat half a pint at a time. I don’t want to get too attached, though, because I recognize that this is just a season.

Bring your Child to Work Day. I took the 7 year old to work with me on Thursday. This was exciting because it’s the first time since COVID that my work has allowed people to come into rehearsal. Well, officially. The 7 year old actually went with the Husband to work in the morning first. I thought this was pretty cool – the Husband’s work had a diesel bus come and take the kids on a ride, then they switched to an electric bus so the kids could feel the difference. For lunch, I met the Husband and the 7 year old for sushi lunch, then I took him to work with me. We didn’t have any special activities planned this year, but he watched me take a Teams call, sat with me in rehearsal, played with the set model, and helped us move props around. At one point, he even stood next to me and helped me cue performers onstage. Afterwards he said he had a good time, though whether it was from actually being at work with me, or just from not having to go to school… who knows?

Outfit of the week: We had some really chilly mornings and sunny afternoons, so it’s been about layering this week. I originally wanted to just wear my hooded sweatshirt dress, but I also wanted another layer because the dress looks kind of shapeless if worn just on its own. So I threw on this orange pullover – the pullover used to belong to the Husband, but it no longer fits, so I rescued it from the donation bin when I was looking for an oversized sweatshirt last winter. I kind of love the colour combination.

Of course it’s going to be blazing hot this week, so this might be the last I wear this outfit until the fall.

-Shopping for Annie – I might have mentioned that the 12 year old is in Annie Jr. at her school – she plays an orphan. Tessie. She gets to play an orphan with a name! And lines! A couple weeks ago she came home with the costume list of what she had to bring for her orphan costumes – basically a ragged dress, bloomer, ankle socks and flat shoes. I’m hoping to get bloomers form the costume shop at work, but the rest of it, I thought we would just go to the thrift store and see what we could get. We ended up finding a green plaid dress – something very much of the 1990s, but could probably also work for 1930s and also – it’s rayon and says Dry Clean Only, so I hope the 12 year old doesn’t make any messes on it – or maybe that would be okay for an orphan look), a cardigan, and some sensible brown shoes. I have something leftover from work that could work as a pinafore, though it’s going to require some cutting and sewing. And the dress too needs to be hemmed. Here’s the first pass with things pinned into place. I feel like as things go, “Orphan” is a pretty easy assignment for a first time theatre mom.

She opens the same week as I do – so we will both be in tech at the same time. How funny is that?

Speaking of tech – this week is the start of tech . Fortunately I have a day off before we move into the theatre, so I can do some prep for the long days. On the list:
-Pick out my outfits for the week, so I don’t have to think about it in the morning when I’m going to be tired.
-Grocery shopping so I have food.
-Meal prep – I have some zucchini to use up, so I’m planning to make a zucchini lasagna so that the family can have one meal taken care of, and I’ll have leftovers to pack. Also prep some kale salad – that’s nice and hearty and will keep in the fridge.
-Boil eggs (or rather, I make them in the InstantPot) so I have a quick, easy source of protein.
-make a batch of marinated beans – again, a quick and easy source of protein.
-buy some office snacks – I like to bring a sweet snack and a savory snack – usually gummy bears or twizzler or m&ms, and then popcorn or Whisps. We’ll see what strikes my fancy at Costco.
-meal plan the rest of the week – I have some soups in the freezer that I can just take out for the family to eat.
-pick out a nice light read, for when I need a brain break, and an audio book for the longer commutes. (I think I picked a book – see below.)
– plan running clothes so I can go on runs during my dinner break.
-make sure all the bills are paid. Sometimes during tech I forget.
-Laundry.

Whew. It seems like a lot to try to get done in one free day. Plus get that Annie costume done. And I have another super titles gig that I have to prep the titles for. However, most likely on that one free day, I’ll go to Costco after the morning school bus run and then be exhausted for the rest of the day.

My goals for tech week – well my self-care goals for tech week:
-eat well (well, I mean eat the tasty junk food but also eat just as much, if not more, healthy stuff)
-sleep. Go straight to be when I get home late at night.
-find time to go outside – ideally running, but even just a ten minute walk around the building on a dinner break would be great.
-journal and reflect on how each day of tech went and what to do better. Tech can be a really stressful, and I always feel like I don’t have time to process all the stressors and inputs, but this time around, I do want to make sure I think about each day in a more mindful manner so that I don’t internalize the pain points in an unproductive way.
-remember to hug the Husband and my children. Remember to call home when I can. Find ways to connect even though I’m tired and never home at night or on weekends.

Grateful for:
-A cancelled music lesson and unexpected time with the 12 year old. On Friday, I had to take the 12 year old to her 4:00pm voice lesson. The lesson is usually on Saturday at 1pm, but her voice teacher is also in my show and we had rehearsals on Saturday, so we rescheduled it. It is a bit of a trek, and it was Friday rush hour, so I was a little anxious about being late. (side note – I’ve been trying to be less anxious about being late because lateness anxiety makes me a really bad driver and that is just dangerous. So now, I just tell myself, “The worst that can happen if you are careful is that you are late. The worst that can happen if you are not careful is that you get in a car accident.” And then I decide it’s okay to drive carefully and be a little late. Not that I’m being late in a cavalier kind of way, but in a “Just breathe” kind of way.) Anyhow, we were about half way to lessons when the voice teacher called and told me she had accidentally double booked us, and so sorry but can we re-schedule. Well, I wasn’t going to complain about not having to continue on around the beltway at 4pm on a Friday. So I impulsively got off at the next exit and the 12 year old and I went to get boba teas. And while we waited, we had some nice conversations and played War with a deck of cards a the boba tea shop and it turned out to be a really nice way to spend a newly granted 30 minutes of time.

-The local bike repair shop. There is a bike shop near work, so I took my bike in one day to see if it needed a tune up. The person working there, put it up on a rack, spun wheels, squeezed brakes, looked and squinted and prodded and then declared the bike was in great shape and I didn’t need a tune up. “You just need to remember to clean your chain,” he told me. And he suggested a cleaner to use. And I said, “How do I use that?” And he gave me a sideways glance because I’m pretty sure he was supposed to charge me if he was going to do maintenance on my bike. But then he said, “I’ll show you this one time.” And he cleaned my bike chain. And now my bike shifts much more smoothly. I did buy the cleaner and also two bike lights. My last bike lights went missing, so now I have new ones which is great because I can bike more safely in the evenings now. Since the bike was at work, a couple of evenings I went for a bike ride rather than a run on my dinner break – it’s just much more fun, zipping along, wind in my hair, than running. The terrain where I work can be a little hilly and as much as biking uphill is a pain, it was exhilarating.

-Wearing my running shoes to work. On Sunday I wore my running shoes to work because I wanted to bike home afterwards, and I hate wearing/ packing two pairs of shoes, even if it means doing something as unfashionable as wearing running shoes with a shirtdress. Anyhow – it ended up being a doozy of a rehearsal with us rehearsing in two rooms, having to move props back and forth, changing of original rehearsal plans, tracking down people… I logged over 10 000 steps in that day. At one point, I was rushing back and forth between the two rooms for the umpteenth time (side note – someone once told me that Stage Managers never run. I don’t know if I subscribe to that philosophy.), and I thought, “Hey, my feet feel pretty comfy!” And I looked down and remembered that I was wearing running shoes. I’m really glad that I made a sensible shoe choice that morning.

-Carpool and safe walking streets. Having kids in activities means getting people to places. And having a 4 year old and a 7 year old and a 12 year old means that when there is only one parent at home in the evenings, the little kids have to ride along to the big kid’s activities. Luckily, we’ve been able to find solutions for a lot of the 12 year old’s activities. Our neighbors also have kids in the same swim clinic as the 12 year old, so we alternate driving on Sunday nights. And knowing that I’m working most Sunday nights this month and next, the neighbors will be driving several weeks in a row – I’m grateful that they are happy to drive even when they drive more than we do. Also – the 12 year old can walk to her basketball workouts – it’s a 15 minute walk and now that it’s light outside in the evenings, it’s an easy walk; when it got dark at 5:30pm, I was nervous and would walk with her since even though there are lighted crosswalks, sometimes the cars drive faster than I would like. And then also grateful that the 12 year old’s school is doing Annie – I was disappointed when the 12 year old didn’t make it into the children’s chorus for my show, but I’m now realizing that logistically it is much easier for her to be in Annie because it rehearses directly after school and she can just walk home. (Being in my opera would have required a lot of really hard commuting and late nights.) I also just found out that the school has activity buses, so even if we hadn’t lived in walking distance to school, she still could have gotten home after rehearsal. So grateful that the school provides those buses for the other kids.

Looking Forward To:
-Getting to the other side of Tech. There is a lot of I love about tech and being in the theatre and creating moments on stage and helping people backstage. But also there is a lot that is exhausting and this is a big big big show (for an opera) and I am really looking forward to being on the other side and knowing that it all worked out. And going to Old Ebbits for late night happy hour oysters, which we always do to celebrate at some point.

-Making plans to make plans for a date with one of my friends from my mom’s group. I had lunch with a couple women from my mom’s group, but one in particular just had a baby and I always like chatting with her, and that’s kind of hard in a group setting. I had run to the restaurant for lunch so she offered to drive me home and we agreed to get together after tech and before her maternity leave was over. So I put a reminder in my calendar for the day after final dress rehearsal: “Ask T for a date next week.” I find it kind of silly to have to plan to plan, but I don’t always know what’s going to pop up in my calendar after opening, so didn’t want to schedule it right away. But I’ve scheduled scheduling it!

-I just started this book – I got it for Mother/Daughter book club – it checked the 12 year old’s boxes for romance and theatre. Seems perhaps apt reading for me in this next week. Kind of like when I read Milddlemarch while in Rome:

What We Ate:

Monday: Tofu tacos – the Husband cooked. I don’t know what recipe he used but they were tasty. There was even cilantro lime rice to go with it.

Tuesday: Sheet pan chicken and mustard glazed cabbage, from the New York Times Cooking. I prepped this in the morning and the Husband just popped it in the oven when he got home. Some family members did not like the cabbage, but the chicken was a big hit.

Wednesday: Grilled cheese sandwiches – the Husband cooked a variety.

Thursday: Pasta salad with marinated beans. My favorite marinated beans recipe mixed with pasta, chopped peppers, cucumbers and tomatoes. I make the beans and chopped the veggies in the morning, and the Husband made the pasta and mixed everything together when he got home. Bonus – I got to eat marinated beans with avocado and eggs for breakfast one morning:

I added the avocado after I took the pictures. Sprinkled with pepper and some dill pickle sprinkle from Trader Joe’s.

Friday: Pizza (take out) and Legally Blonde. It was my turn to choose the movie, and luckily it was my one night home. Sometimes if I’m not home, they skip over me and I don’t get to choose until the list cycles through again. I wanted a classic, fun movie. Legally Blonde was definitely that – I mean I guess classic for a kid of the 90s – what a fun movie – and more thoughtful than I had remembered. There’s some good empowering messages going on here.

Saturday: I was working, the family ordered wings.

Sunday: Leftovers – whatever people could find in the fridge.

Weekly recap + what we ate + where I went

Still so many blossoms to enjoy! Spring!

I read an interesting diary method once that consisted merely of recording where one went. I thought it was an interesting idea, so here is last week, with approximate travel times.

Monday:
8:50am home –> school bus (5 minutes away)
9:15pm school bus drop –> work (rehearsal studio, 15 minutes)
3:00pm work –> nearby field to catch the Eclipse (10 minute walk)
4:00pm field –> work after Eclipse (10 minutes walk)
7:00pm work –> home (17 minutes)

Tuesday:
8:50am home –> school bus (5 minutes away)
9:15am school bus –> community college campus for art class (10 minutes)
12:30pm community college campus –> work (10 minutes)
6:45pm work –> home (17 minutes)
7:15pm walk around the block, after realizing that I hadn’t walked all day. (25 minutes)

Wednesday (kids were off school this day – the Husband worked from home):
7:10am home –> piano teacher’s house for kid #1’s lessons (7 minutes away)
7:17am piano lesson –> gas station (3 minutes away – my routine of getting gas while kids are at piano lessons – that way I do it every week and it’s a fixed thing in my schedule rather than a moveable one.)
7:30am gas station –> home to pick up kid #2 for piano lesson –> back to piano teacher’s house (17 mins, we were a little late for lessons. Usually all the kids ride along, but since the Husband was working from home, I took one kid at a time)
8:17am piano teacher’s house –> home (7 minutes)
9:00am home –> voice teacher’s house with kid #1 (25 mins – she usually has lessons on the weekend, but we had to reschedule last week’s lesson)
9:30am voice teacher’s house –> walk around the block while waiting for kid #1 to finish her lesson (25 mins)
10:05am voice teacher’s house –> home (25 mins)
11:00am home –> work (15 mins, while sitting in on a work call on zoom)
6:45pm work –> home (17 mins)

Thursday:
8:50am home –> school (10 mins). Actually to parking lot on the trail leading up to school. My friend who lived by the bus stop said that there was a water main break on her street and that it might be best just to drive the kids to school that day in case the bus was late. I parked on the trail because I kind of hate being in the carpool line –> walk up the trail to school with the kids.
9:15a school –> walk back to car –> home (15 mins)
9:50a home –> work via bike (25 mins)
1:15pm work –> Mexican restaurant for lunch (12 mins, walk)
2:30pm Mexican restaurant –> back to work (12 mins, walk)
6:45pm work –> home via bike (30 mins, going home is uphill, so takes longer)

Friday:
8:50am – home –> school bus stop (5 mins)
9:20am – school bus stop –> work (15 mins)
1:00pm work –> walk around the block on my lunch break (30 mins)
7:15pm work –> home (15 mins)

Saturday (Day off of work)
9:30am home –> voice teacher’s house for kid #1’s lesson (28 mins)
10:35am voice teacher’s house –> home (30 mins, google maps took me through the city for some reason.)
11:50am home –> soccer field for kid #2’s soccer practice and game (15 mins)
12:30pm soccer field –> coffee shop – while the 7 year old had practice, I went on a sort of run with the 12 year old, bribing her to run with the prospect of a treat at the end. (25 mins)
1:10pm coffee shop –> soccer field, walked back to the soccer game (25 mins)
1:50pm soccer field –> home (15 mins)
2:15pm home –> friend’s house in Virginia for cookout (45 mins – I vacillate between thinking Virginia is too far to go to visit friends, and thinking that it’s quite close and should go more often. But the GPS took us through the city, which isn’t ever that fun, so today Virginia felt very far away.)
6:30pm friend’s house –> home (35 mins – GPS took us home via the beltway. There must have some bad traffic on the beltway earlier in the day.)

Sunday
8:50am – home –> Agility Center for kid #3’s Agility Class (15 mins)
9:15am – Agility Center –> Grocery Store (5 mins). I usually stay and do some work on my laptop during agility class, but this was the only window for picking up some groceries this day. Around here, Sunday evening produce is pretty sad, so better to go earlier. I don’t like leaving because I’m worried I’ll lose track of time or that my kid will need me. But I set an alarm for 30 mins and just went for it.
9:38am – Grocery –> Back to Agility Center (5 mins) in time to see the 4 year old do some seat drops on the trampoline.
10:00am – Agility Center –> Home (15 mins)
10:55am Home –> Ice Rink with Kids #2 and #2 for Skating Lessons. (12 mins)
11:30am Skating laps while the kids are in lessons. Not really travel related, but I was moving.
12:50pm Ice Rink –> work (25 mins)
1:20pm work –> Farmer’s Market to pick up something for lunch (yogurt drink and empanadas) and apples and carrots. (walking – 5 mins, then 10 min stroll around the market)
1:35pm Farmer’s Market –> Work (5 mins)
6:00pm Work –>Home (15 mins)

Some thoughts on the week:
-I spent 8.5 hours in a car this week. That seems like a lot – that’s almost 20% of my week. And it will be more when we are at the theatre because that commute is closer to 30 mins.
-it was pretty typical for a working week in that most of it was the quadrangle of home to school bus drop off to work to home.
-I don’t really have a “third place”. I don’t know if I really have time for a third place.
-Wednesdays are exhausting, and there was more going on this Wednesday than normal. But I think between me and the Husband who worked from home with the kids that day, he definitely had the more exhausting day.
-One of the longest time in the car was taking the 12 year old to voice lessons 25-30 minutes away. Some days this is more like 35 mins. I really like this voice teacher and I think she is teaching the 12 year old good things (like how to keep time by conducting – I wish someone had taught me conducting patterns when I was starting out as a musician.), but I do wish the teacher lived closer.
-The grocery run was a little atypical. I don’t tend to run errands or do shopping when I’m working. Sometimes if I’ll pick up groceries on the way home if I need to, but mostly the Husband does the grocery shopping.
-getting off work at 6:45/7:00pm is annoying because it is too late to join the family for dinner or do anything after work, but is still close enough to bedtime that I’m tired when I get home. Also getting off at 7:00pm means going in around 11am or noon, and I don’t think I always make good use of that extra morning time. But maybe I should re-evaluate things and have a list of mini tasks I can do when I have that extra hour in the morning.

Anyhow – other things this week:

My watercolour homework, on the tea pot theme – I painted this sort of from a picture. I think the teacup turned out better than the teapot – the handle of the teapot is not quite right, but I think I got better by the time I did the teacup. Here’s the original sketch:

Here’s the painting – I’ve learned that a lighter hand is better with watercolours.

In class, we painted landscapes:

Last week was my last watercolour class. I’ve really enjoyed the class and the weekly assignments. There is one more class next week, but I have to be in rehearsals at that time, so I will have to miss it.

The Eclipse – I was a little “meh” about the eclipse going into the week. I guess I never really registered that it was happening so I didn’t get excited about it. But then I got to work and people were very excited – our general director did not give use the day off, but did say we should all step away from our desk to see it. So I went to the costume shop and asked if they had any shoeboxes and I used the shoe box and some tin foil and tape to make one of those viewers. And then around 3:00, a bunch of us trekked out to a park for a viewing. Our area was only in 87% totality, but it still got a little dark – there were points when I couldn’t tell if it was the eclipse that caused the world to go a little grey or if the sun just went behind some clouds. We all stood around, sharing glasses and chatting and it was a very nice break in the day. I was actually really excited that my shoebox viewer worked to show. Science!

Bare legs and just walking out the door! We had our first week of sunny and warm weather. So sunny and warm, it bordered on being summer. I’m not ready for summer, but the sunshine and clear skies is a good start. I left the house one day and looked down and realized that I was not wearing leggings under my dress, and the sensation of having my legs bare again was lovely. Plus… now that the weather had warmed up, it is “Walk out of the house without anything but your wallet and keys” weather. Just being able to walk out the door and not have to nag/wrangle kids into coats… well that just makes the mornings so much easier. This weekend I also rotated the winter coats into the closet and the raincoats onto the kids’ coat rack. Only then I realized that the kids still needed their winter coats for skating lessons and had to dig them back out.

Although… I was lulled by the warm sunny weather into leaving the house without a jacket on Sunday when we were going to the ice rink! And I tried to convince the 7 year old that he didn’t need me to skate with him, yet he insisted that I did. I was wearing a tank dress with a short sleeved shirt over it. It made for very cold skating. Let me tell you – it is a lot harder to balance while rubbing your arms for warmth.

Ants. Perhaps because of all the rain we’ve been having, there have been ants coming in and out of the house. The 4 year old has decided that the ants are her pets and she actually put food out for them in the yard. Not sure if this is problematic or not. There was one day, when she came up to me, oh so very very very excitedly , and she said with such joy, “My pets are in the dishwasher!!!” I was very confused but then I saw the ants crawling into the dishwasher, and I felt simultaneously charmed by the 4 year old’s reaction and also just… ick!

I am technologically challenged:
-Wednesday, I had back to back meetings at work, both of which I could just sit in on and not participate too much. The first one I dialed in from my phone because I had just got home from the 12 year old’s voice lesson. I started the call at home, got in the car, drove to work, then finished the call sitting at my desk. The second call, I logged on to my computer, opened up Teams, clicked on my calendar, then clicked on the link in the calendar for the meeting. The window popped up, then I minimized it so I could check email while waiting for all the participants to join. Well, the meeting got started and I went to click on Teams to maximize the window… and I couldn’t find the meeting. I could heard everyone talking, but I couldn’t figure out what I did with the window where the meeting was. I clicked on Teams again and again, closed some windows, moved other windows around… and the meeting still wouldn’t appear. It was like looking for my lost keys – move things aside in hopes of finding it, but no such luck. And now they were doing introductions and I was muted and I didn’t know how I was going to unmute and introduce myself if I couldn’t find the window where the call was taking place and I started to panic and spiral. And then… just in the nick of time I realized…. the meeting was on Zoom. Not Teams. Feeling like an idiot, I clicked over to my internet browser (because my work desktop is so old that I don’t have Zoom installed), and there everyone was. I unmuted myself just in time to introduce myself.

-Then I had to hook up my computer to a large tv monitor so that we could do a zoom presentation where the speakers would zoom in to a room of people. I was trying to figure out how to adjust the volume on the tv speakers and I couldn’t figure it out. There was no button visible on the monitor and whatever I was pressing on the remote just kept muting the sound. It was a universal remote and very sleek. Almost too sleek. I think the same could be said of the monitor. Everyone wants sleek aesthetics. Heaven forbid you put a button somewhere intuitive to find and operate!

I eventually had to google the remote to find directions. Turns out. the horizontal button by my thumb… you can toggle that up or down to control volume. Oh. My. Gosh. I didn’t even consider that as an option. Don’t buttons just get pushed?

Ethical dilemma – at the 7 year old’s soccer game, the 4 year old threw up in the grass. Not sure what is going on – some kind of virus – the 7 year old was actually sent home from school yesterday for vomiting on his chromebook. Well, because he vomited, not just because it was his chromebook. But then the teacher sent the chrome book home for us to wipe down. I’m a little mystified by that because she had called building services to wipe down his desk – couldn’t they have also done his chrome book? I mean I don’t envy anyone having to clean up vomit, but as long as you’re there… Anyhow – back to the 4 year old and her vomit in the grass. I didn’t have the supplies to clean it up, so we gathered a bunch of leaves and mulch and covered it up. And then I told the parents coming for the next game so they wouldn’t step in it. Though I went back and forth on telling the other parents because one the one hand I was kind of embarrassed that my kid puked on the field and maybe running into icky things out in the wild is par for the course and we did heap leaves on it. But it’s VOMIT. Wait, now that I type that out, I see what a silly internal dilemma that was. OF COURSE you should tell someone if they are about to step in vomit. Wow, where’s my moral compass?

Grateful For:
-My bike for being good form of exercising and commuting all in one. I love things that do more than one thing.

-My car. Because it rained on Thursday and Friday so I couldn’t bike to work. But I could still drive.

-Wifi at the Agility Center. Waiting for kids to get done with classes or activities can feel like a time suck. I’m always trying to figure out how to be productive with those 30-60 minute chunks of time while I wait. Sometimes I will go for a short run, sometimes I’ll read or journal. For those times, though, when I’m coming up on a deadline and need to get some work done, I am grateful for parent waiting rooms with wifi.

-Cozy, cuddly evening in. I’m about to start working A LOT of evening rehearsals so have been savoring the evenings at home watching Bad Batch with the kids. Whenever we can and the laundry cycle lines up, we like to all wear our matching flannel lounge pants that we had gotten in Vermont two years ago:

– Blossoms that are beautiful and oh so fragrant. One my walk during the 10 year old’s piano lesson, I walked past this bush and the smell was so sweetly floral. I’m grateful that I can enjoy smelling the flowers – literally, and, I suppose figuratively.

Looking Forward To:
-Starting rehearsals. We’re at the point where there are many questions and we just have to start rehearsal to answer them.

-Voice recital this coming week for which I am doing supertitles. It’s my last voice recital for the season – well, there’s one more recital, but I can’t work that date, so for that one I’m just creating the translation slides and marking the music and then I’ll pass it along to someone else to go on the day of the concert to run the slides. (I don’t actually do the translations – the singer are supposed to provide that.) I’m looking forward to this concert – there is a world premiere song cycle and lots of Argentinian music and a bandeneon!

-Started this book as part of Mother/Daughter book club. The 12 year old really liked this book and gave it to me to read. It’s by the same author as Dial A for Aunties, which I thought was a fun, if slightly ridiculous book. This book seems a little dark. Not quite sure where it’s going.

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What We Ate: I did not make it home for dinner any night this week, so we did some very strict meal planning, and I think it was a good dinner week – no desperation dinners, yet lots of pantry meals.

Monday: Butter Chicken in Instant Pot from the internet famous Butter Chicken Lady.

Tuesday: The Husband cooked – pasta, shrimp, and alfredo sauce.

Wednesday: Black Bean Chili from Smitten Kitchen’s Keepers. I thought this had a really interesting method where you roast (or broil) poblanos, garlic, and onions until charred, chop it (in a food processor) and use that as the chili base. It was pretty tasty. Vegan.

Thursday: Bahn Mi bowls (sort of this recipe, but we eat it over noodles) with tofu ground “meat”. This is in our regular rotation. It’s pretty quick and very flavorful- I made the tofu ground “meat” and chopped the vegetables ahead of time. The husband made the noodles, and sauteed the tofu to reheat for dinner.

Friday: Pizza (take out) and movie night. I was working so missed out. Apparently the Husband tried to show the kids the Batman movie with Michael Keaton and Jack Nicholson, but the kids deemed it too scary. Then he showed them Raising Arizona, which I don’t know that the Cohen brothers ever made a family friendly movie, so that was kind of a bust too and they ended up watching an episode of Bad Batch.

Saturday: Went to friend’s house to grill out. Our first grilling of the season! We had burgers, asparagus, salad, and potatoes salad (a very tasty version mad with dill and mustard rather than mayonaise). For dessert we brought an assortment of Hostess snack cakes – for some reason we were feeling nostalgic and went to the store and bought all the Hostess snack cakes we could find – twinkies, sno balls, ho hos, cupcakes. It was a fun exercise. Also – she had just come back from Texas with a 10 lb bag of pecans and taught me how to crack pecans together to get to the meat. A new skill for me! How cozy do the pecans look, all nestled in their shell!

Sunday: I worked so I had leftovers from the fridge when I got home. The Husband made dumplings and green beans for dinner for everyone else.

I saw this sign at my friend’s house this week, and it made me laugh, so I took a picture and sent it to my Husband, with the appropriate edits. Tell me what made you laugh this week?

Weekly Recap + what we ate: Re-entry.

This past week was rough. We got home from San Francisco at 9:00pm on Monday night, and the next morning the kids had school and the grown ups had work. I like a day home after vacation before going back to routine, but the plane tickets were a lot cheaper to fly on Monday, so that’s when we booked them. Of course no one was tired at 9:00pm in Washington DC, and they all went to bed super late, which made Tuesday morning torturous. Wednesday morning’s piano lesson was particularly rough. I kind of wish I had just cancelled the lesson – the kids hadn’t really practiced all week, aside from some noodling on the keyboard at my brother’s house, and no one wanted to wake up when I went to get them at 6:45am. Note for next time.

I think it took until Thursday morning for them to get back on track with waking up in the morning, but bedtime has still been much later than ideal. And me as well – I have been staying up way too late and then prying myself out of bed at the very last minute and dragging myself through the morning. I think I just need to get back into a routine. Hah. There was never much of a routine to start – just a lot of things I wanted to get done in the mornings – only pre-trip these things were trying to fit in the hours between 6:45am and 8:45am, and this past week, I’ve been sleeping in later and not getting up until 7am. Which, looking at that is only 15 minutes difference, but it feels huge.

And then, related, on the other end, I’ve been going to bed waaaaay tooo late. There has been a lot of revenge bedtime procrastination – a vicious cycle: I get up too late to do the leisurely activities I want to do, so I stay up late to do them. BUT I don’t do those things when I’m up late. WHAT have I been doing with myself the hours between 11pm and 2am? Well if I’m going to be up, I should be doing those things that will make me feel good – writing, painting, reading, yoga, clean the kitchen, etc. These are the things that will make me feel like I’m using my time well. What am I really doing? Well, lately I’ve been going down rabbit holes of musical theatre crushes from my childhood. I’m pretty sure I spent two hours one night watching videos on YouTube of Michael Ball – he shot to fame in the mid 1980s in original cast of Les Miz and Aspects of Love with his sterling voice of pathos and vibrato. (Also – Andrew Lloyd Weber’s Aspects of Love – was there ever a more cringe-y quasi-incestuous musical? It involves guy meets girl, girl meets guy’s uncle, runs off with him, then eventually guy meets uncle and girl’s teenage daughter. And it’s all very romantic. supposedly. And the music is beautiful. I’m torn as to whether I should continue to think this is a good show. It probably isn’t.)

It’s been a week of doctor’s appointments, back to work, lots of meetings, and rain. So much rain. Because of all the rain, I didn’t get outside much until towards the end of the week. Thursday, I got to go for a run – which was lovely. Cherry blossom season is pretty much over, but there are still apple blossoms and red bud trees that are exploding with flowers.

Saturday, inspired by Elisabeth’s Cool Blogger’s Walking Club, I decided to go for a walk, and savor it. I had been feeling too tired and busy and weather-hampered to go for a walk all week, and was starting to feel a little wilted. Then on Saturday, I came home from work to an empty house as the rest of the family had gone to church, and even though I really wanted to just go into the house and sit down, I went for a walk in my neighborhood. The sky was prepping for dusk, and there were some beautiful clouds – ever since we painted clouds in watercolour class, I’ve been obsessed with looking at clouds and thinking about how I can paint them.

At one point, I walked by a house and was enveloped by the smell of laundry detergent and clean clothes – the house clearly had the dryer going and it was venting to the outside. It’s such a serendipitous moment, to be walking along, and then suddenly be in an aroma cloud like that – it always feels special and unexpected because I can’t see smells; I can’t tell they are coming. I’m just walking along, minding my own business, and suddenly I walk into a familiar scent, immediately identifiable and comfortable and oddly intimate because I’m savoring this thing that is coming from someone else’s house, but I pause and breathe it in deeply anyhow. I also feel like that when I walk by a house around dinner time and I smell dinner wafting around me. I don’t know anything about the people in that house, but I know that someone is making dinner and it will be tasty.

This week’s art class. I really have missed going to watercolour class. I had brought my watercolour pencils on our trip, but didn’t get to work on anything aside from some sketching on the plane. This week’s assignment was “Teapots”.

I don’t love this. I think the perspective on the handle is all wrong, and the teacher had us outline the teapot with black/grey and then blend it in to give a more defined edge, but I didn’t quite manage good blending and I think it looks a little messy. And I tried to paint a curtain in the background, but it kind of just looks strange. I did like painting the woodgrain on the table, though.

Some dilmena/conundrum/things to solve:
– Bloomers. The 12 year old is in her middle school production of Annie and she brought home the Costume list. As an orphan she needs a dress/rags and bloomers. I think we can find an appropriate dress at the thrift store, but bloomers? I’m trying to think if I can sew a pair – they seem easy enough. Or my other thought is to buy PJ bottoms at the thrift store, cut them off and run and elastic around the hems of each leg and sew on some lace or ruffles. I think this might actually be a fun project to do, if I can find the time.

-I badly need a haircut. I also badly need to schedule a well woman appointment. I’ve told myself I can’t schedule the former until I schedule the latter – health before vanity, and all that. This carrot is not as motivating as I want and I haven’t done either. I need a better carrot to resolve this situation.

– where to go in Asia? We are planning to visit my grandfather in Taiwan later this year and I would like to add a second location. I think right now we are trying to decide between Singapore and Malaysia. We need to decide soon so we can book tickets. Anyone been to either places?

-And the same myriad of unsettled things taking up a lot of brain space: Window treatments for the living room. The chaos that is the toy room. Should we move the 12 year old to her own room? (of course we should… just can’t wrap my brain around that plus is would mean un-chaosing the toy room). The four year old’s early enrollment forms for kindergarten? Is there a field trip coming up? Should I offer to chaperone? Is the 12 year having too much screen time? Too little screen time? WHAT TO DO WITH MY CAR????

(Side not on “unsettled”. I’ve been interviewing potential interns for work, and one of the questions I ask is how people deal in an “unsettled and rapidly changing environment”? (ie. tech week…) Only once, I accidentally said, “unsettling” rather than “unsettled” and I got a very strange look and slightly alarmed look. Because being in an “unsettling” situation is very different from being in an “unsettled” situation. I love language and all it’s nuances. )

This tickled me: I make to do lists on Post It notes and stick them on my computer, and on Saturday, I made a list of things to do to prep for the incoming stage management team. As I was looking at the Post It I realized that one of the items on my “To Do List” is “To Do List”. (I needed to print out our stage management team To Do List). There is something very circular and meta about that.

Grateful For:
– Our Spring Break Trip – getting to go, getting home, and everything in between. More recaps to come.

– Our Tax guy. Big accomplishment – We finished our taxes ten days before the due date! By “we” I mean, everything was sent to our Tax Guy, he asked us for more things, we sent them, and then six hours later it was all done. I know I could do our taxes ourselves, but this is one thing I happily outsource. We do, unfortunately owe an eye-wateringly humongous sum of money to the federal government. There had been some mistake on some funds we had withdrawn to buy the van last year – we had accidentally paid state tax on it rather than federal. So luckily, the state has to give us the money back so we can give it to the federal government. It’s just the timeline of it all is going to be tricky since I don’t know when the state funds will hit.

-So on that above note – grateful for my parents who will lend us money to cover some of that eye-wateringly humongous federal tax bill. We will pay them back when the state gives us our refund. I hate asking my parents for money – it makes me feel really irresponsible – but I am glad that I can do so when I need to and they will help if they can.

-Eggs. We got home from our trip at 9:00pm and I kind of looked in the fridge in despair. We had originally thought about picking up Chipotle on the way home, but by the time we got our luggage, we were too exhausted and just wanted to get home. But… we did have eggs in the fridge still and I found some wraps, so we had scrambled eggs in wraps with some carrots that we had brought home from California. I’m sure glad Eggs can last two weeks in the fridge. Also – I need to do better at my post-trip dinner game.

Looking Forward To:

– Final Four Games. I am not a sports fan personally, but we are a sports family- two sports, only really- football and college basketball. Right now it is college basketball season- well the tail end- the championships are today (women’s) and tomorrow. Then we will turn off the Hulu live TV until the fall. (I didn’t make it home from work in time to watch the women’s game, but the rest of the family watched it – they were rooting for Iowa and Caitlin Clark, so were disappointed, but said it was a nail biter.)

-May. I have been looking at my work calendar for the next show and it’s going to be a rough rehearsal period. We have evening rehearsals at least three weeknights a week and then we rehearse on Saturday and Sunday. Normally the rehearsal schedule is structured so that we get Sunday off, but due to other people’s availability, it works best for this show if we have a weekday free day and work over the weekend. I am dreading it already, and looking forward to May when we open and I am on a performance schedule.

– Some beloved colleagues coming to town for that next show. One of my colleagues I’ve known for over twenty years. We met in DC in 2000 when we were both interviewing for the same fellowship (neither of us got the fellowship), and then we have just continued to cross paths. Continued crossing paths is one of my favorite things about my career.

-Not that I’m really looking forward, but thought I would mention – the Solar Eclipse. I had a meeting scheduled for 2:30 – 3:30p, but we’ve moved that to 4p-5p since the eclipse is most visible at 3:20pm where we are. I kind of didn’t really think through what a big deal this was going to be and don’t have glasses. Maybe I’ll bring a colander to work. Last eclipse, the 12 year old was in pre-school and another parent set up this huge viewing in the schoolyard and I remember volunteering there and having to tape the glasses to the pre-schoolers’ heads because we didn’t want them ripping the glasses off. Anyhow, not sure if I’m going to do anything tomorrow or not, but I guess I’m sort of looking forward to there being a phenomenon. I feel as if I’m missing out on something because I don’t really feel as excited as everyone around me. I hear the middle school is giving out glasses to all the kids.

-Reading this book, gripping and sad and frustrating so far:

And listening to this – hilarious. Narrated by Simon Vance and Neil Patrick Harris. How could I not pick it up?

What We Ate – It’s kind of a been a week of sad, scrounging dinners. We didn’t really do a grocery shop til later in the week, so we kind of just cobbled together dinner.
Monday: Eggs/breakfast burritos. (See above.)

Tuesday: Vegetable Barley Soup from America’s Test Kitchen’s Vegan for Everyone. It was a cold and rainy day, and this was a good recipe to warm us up and also clean out the fridge and pantry a little bit.

Wednesday: I worked this evening – I think the rest of the family had eggs. Again.

Thursday: Dinner with our friends at Comet Ping Pong. Our friends just bought a new house, so we went over to see it and say congratulations then we went ot dinner. Comet Ping Pong is always a hit with the kids because they have really good pizza and ping pong tables in the back. I also had a really fantastic lentil salad.

Friday: I ordered a(nother) lentil salad from a place near work since I had to work that evening. The rest of the family had pizza (made by the Husband) and watched Aladdin, the animated movie.

Saturday: The family had Olive Garden after church. I had leftovers and limp Olive Garden french fries from the 4 year old’s doggy bag.

Sunday: Leftover/scrounge night. Olive Garden leftovers, a pork chop the Husband found in the freezer, and lord know what other random things.

Weekly recap + what we ate: Jane Eyre, Into the Fire and mild obsessions

So I spent the better part of the previous weekend before in bed. I had something, not sure what. A chest rattling cough, aches, general tiredness. At first I chalked it up to a lack of sleep, but I think I was more than that and I ended up taking to bed for most of Saturday.

The Husband will tell anyone that I am a terrible patient, I get restless and bored and can’t stay in bed. I try to get up and do things when I should be resting. I can’t just veg on the couch and binge watch something because I need to rest without my glasses on.

So in an attempt to make lying in bed less tedious, I decided to listen to cast albums of musicals which were new to me. I figured there would be music and a narrative that I could somewhat follow if I wanted and that could be a good combination of engaging /not engaging to keep me from bed tedium. I started by listened to How To Dance in Ohio – there was a recent New York Times article of recent musical cast albums of note and this was on the list. How to Dance in Ohio is a musical based on a documentary about a group of autistic young adults getting ready for a spring formal. The musical got a lot of attention for, in addition to other things, casting autistic individuals in the lead roles. It’s a poppy, heart felt musical.

Next, I put on Ride the Cyclone, a musical about a high school choir that dies in a roller coaster accident and they are given the opportunity to audition for a chance to come back to life. This one was dark, man. Very very dark.

For something completely different, I turned to the musical version of Jane Eyre, which debuted on Broadway in 2000. Jane Eyre is one of my favorite books and I’m always interested in versions of it. This is a musical in the vein of the musical of the 1990s – romantic, dark, emotional period pieces. Things that are unfashionable in a musical these days. Jane Eyre I found not as tuneful as some musicals and some dreadful liberties were taken with the story. Also – and perhaps this is just the nature of the source material – but it seems like all the good music goes to Mr. Rochester, all the tortured, soul bearing solos. And once in a while, I found myself thinking, “Well, yes, but what about Jane???”

Anyhow – slight tangent – that sent me down a rabbit hole with all the various film adaptations of Jane Eyre and watching clips of them on YouTube. I’ve seen most of the recent ones. Here’s my take:

Jane Eyre on screen: Clockwise from top: 1983, 1997, 1996, 2011, National Theatre Adaptation and 2006

– 1983 BBC miniseries with Timothy Dalton and Zelah Clarke. I think this adaptation included everything. Maybe? I saw this in high school so my memory is fuzzy. It was quite long and looked like it had all been shot on a soundstage. Timothy Dalton did ALOT of scenery chewing, I do remember that.

– 1997 TV movie with Samantha Morton and Ciaran Hinds. This version took many liberties with the book, which I guess you have to when condensing the book into a two hour movie, but still… why add needless action and out of character scenes? Some if it just didn’t feel in the spirit of the book. Not my favorite Rochester – I’ve loved Hinds in other things (the 1996 Persuasion, for example), but he was just too blustery and uncharismatic in this. Morton was fine as Jane. Honestly, I find that I love the character of Jane so much it’s hard to play her terribly – the source material is just really good. Sure one just has to be plain and mousy and passive for much of the movie, and as long as one hits the notes of ferocity in the right moments, one pretty much gets a passable version the character.

– 1996 movie with Charlotte Gainsbourg and William Hurt. I saw this in the movie theatre when it came out – I was in high school. What an odd odd pairing. William Hurt was much too old to be Rochester. I’m realizing that Rochester, while 20 years older than Jane is actually only in his later 30s, which, now that I’ve crossed into my 40s, seems much younger than it seemed to me when I first read the book as a teenager. So. William Hurt’s older and weary Rochester was perhaps a little too old and weary for me. Charlotte Gainsbourg was fine as Jane. This movie did also have the virtue of having Anna Paquin as young Jane.

-2006 mini series with Ruth Wilson and Toby Stephens – Ruth Wilson is my favorite Jane. There is something slightly off kilter about her Jane, and she found the humor in the character too. I think this Jane/Rochester pairing had the best chemistry – you could really sense that these two could be happy together for the rest of their lives. I could do without all that hair on Toby Stephens, though. I thought this was a very thorough adaptation – I need to re-watch it because I remember liking it very much.

-2011 film with Mia Wasikowska and Michael Fassbender. Wasikowska is fine as Jane – she takes the outward calm and bland approach to Jane. Fassbender is my favorite Mr. Rochester – he has, I find, the right blend of humor and hope without being too gothic or grim or melodramatic, never mind that he is probably too good looking to play the part. But does any one every really believe that Jane is plain and Rochester homely looking?

-I have to say, though, my favorite adaptation is the National Theatre’s stage version of Jane Eyre. I watched it during the pandemic when it was made available to stream for free and I think it’s brilliant, as an adaptation, as a piece of theatre, as a piece of storytelling. The whole production takes places on a series of platforms and versatile group of eight (or six? can’t remember) playing all the parts, including the dog Pilot. There is something really visceral about this adaptation that I love. We all think of Jane as this really calm and collected and internal character, but somehow onstage, she can be just as histrionic as Rochester and it works.

After I worked through my Jane Eyre obsession, the next soundtrack I put on was The Scarlet Pimpernel, a 1997 Frank Wildhorn musical, based on the book about a bunch of English noblemen who, during the Reign of Terror in France, band together to save French aristocrats from the guillotine.

The musical got three different revisions on Broadway – so I feel like either it was amazing or amazingly bad. I’m in the camp of amazing. But it was also panned quite badly by the critics, so I’m probably wrong. I’ll never get to see it, so I’ll never know for sure. When I was in college, I remember watching on tv the Scarlet Pimpernel company perform the musical number Into the Fire on the Tony Awards and I was so very taken by Douglas Sills, who played the lead Sir Percy Blakeney. Into the Fire is the number where Percy persuades his friends that they must go to France and save the aristocrats, and if you ever need a hearth thumping inspirational “St. Crispin’s Day” speech type of musical number, this is it. Anyhow, the first time I saw this number on the Tony Awards broadcast, I was immediately smitten by Douglas Sills and the heartbreakingly enthusiastic optimism with which he led this ensemble. I remember thinking he was the most beautiful man on earth. You should go watch it.

There’s something about revisiting the obsessions of one’s youth and the way it can take you back. Sometimes I watch things that I loved twenty years before, and say to myself, “Wow, I can’t believe I liked that!” or, more accurately, “Wow, twenty year old me had terrible taste!” (I think Phantom of the Opera is like that – I still love all it’s schlocky melodrama, but I don’t think it’s as objectively good as I thought it was when I was younger.) And sometimes I’m like, “Wow, that still packs a punch!” Into the Fire is definitely the latter and I’ve been finding myself newly obsessed by the whole musical recently. I will admit that the soundtrack itself has a few too many “Love is miserable” type power ballads for my taste, but they are sung with heart and a certain lack of irony that is hard to find these days. And the bigger ensemble numbers are nimble and clever. It’s been fun re-discovering this piece and I’ve been listening to it on repeat and scouring the internet for YouTube for clips and articles and interviews about the production- I would say it’s been 95% of my Google searches the past week. It just has such a fascinating creation story – how it was written and re-written and re-written and how it launched Sills’ career, and how critics hated it. Every so often I get very fixated on something and go on a Google bender. I’ve even set Into the Fire as the alarm for the kids to get dressed in the morning. At 7:57, the first strains of Into the Fire plays and the two little kids – the oldest one has gone to school by then – go get dressed. And they know they have until the end of the number to emerge fully dressed from their room. It’s worked shockingly well this past week.

The other thing my recent obsession with Scarlet Pimpernel made me think about, as I dredged up pirated videos on YouTube is that I will probably never get to see this musical live. And certainly never with the dashing Douglas Sills in the lead. And that makes me a little sad, because it reminds me how ephemeral theatre and live performance is. This thing that I do for a living, what is the value if it doesn’t give people something they can bottle or hold on to or replay whenever they want? We create moments to savor, moments that you live in and then are left to remember rather than relive. Even when I watch grainy footage of musical numbers, I am very much aware that that was corner of time that I was not there for, and all I can have is this four minute shaky video clip on YouTube. And even thought that moment was captured on video, it kind of exists as a relic, not as the piece itself. It’s very different from a movie that was created, yes of moments that were filmed, but a movie is created to be frozen in time. Theatre is just not like that. Watching a video of a theatrical performance makes me very aware of how I will never get to experience that performance, that moment of theatre live. It’s a little sad, but also makes me realize how, whether I’m working backstage on a show or seeing it from out front, I am grateful to be part of that story that is being told that night and the people who are telling it. I guess this is also true of a lot of things in life…

Other things:
Watercolor homework – poppies. I feel like it’s a little unrefined and almost cartoonish. I still haven’t gotten a hold on how to blend colours seamlessly. Also part of the assignment was to paint the background first, and then paint the poppy over it, and I’m not really happy with how you can see the background through the poppies. But… the texture in the grass was done with a cool technique where you sprinkle salt on the paint while wet and as the salt dissolves in the paint, it creates cool swirls of colour. This is probably stuff that you learn to do in elementary school, but pretty cool nonetheless.

Then this week we are working on working with watercolor pencils, which is fun. Here was what we did in class, experimenting with the different ways one can use water color pencils.

Lunch Hack of the week:
One day, I asked the four year old what she wanted for lunch. And she said “Chicken!” So I stuck a Costco size package of chicken wings into the InstantPot with a bit of Cajun seasoning and made a week’s worth of chicken wings. Batch cooking has made for really easy lunch packing – a couple of chicken wings thrown into their lunch box, half an apple sliced up, cucumber slices, and two Oreos. I’m sure I’m breaking all sorts of food safety rules by having the cooked chicken sit in the fridge all week and having the kids eat it, but no one’s gotten sick yet…

I’ve also been on a muffin making kick lately. The biggest hits are Morning Glory muffins from the King Arthur Flour Baking Book and these chocolate muffins made with applesauce. The four year old has been wanting chocolate muffins, but most of the recipes I saw were too cake-like for me. I don’t know if these are necessarily any healthier, but the apple sauce gives it a firmer texture. The kids gobble them up. One day, I came home to find that of the 24 mini chocolate muffins and 12 morning glory muffins I made, all that was left were two mini muffins and 1 morning glory muffin with a bite taken out of it. It was so sad, I took a picture for my Husband. He told me it was too sad and not blog-worthy. So I’m sticking the picture here, just to prove him wrong:

Okay – traumatic experience of the week – My friend was showing me around her house, which they have been doing major renovations to. We walked through all the finished parts and oohed and ahhed over how great everything looked. And then she took me to her upstairs bathroom which was being gutted and renovated. It had been torn down to the studs, including the floor. It was just crossbeams and the floor beneath. Which was actually the ceiling of the kitchen below. Then her cat ran into the gutted bathroom, and my friend stepped into the bathroom to get the cat out and, stepping onto what seemed like solid floor, but was really only dry wall of the ceiling below, and her foot plunged through that drywall, the cat fell through the hole that her foot made, into the kitchen below, and then the rest of my friend plunged through the hole, only saved from falling all the way through by catching herself by the armpits on the crossbeams. OMG, I thought my friend was going to plunge to her death right in front of me. And the whole time she was saying, “Is the cat okay?” I quickly reached down and helped haul her back up and out of the bathroom and we decided that the door to the bathroom could stay shut. I always thing of houses as VERY SOLID things, but once in a while, I realize that they are actually quite vulnerable feats of engineering and craftsmanship. Like when you realize all that’s between you and the room below is couple of crossbeams and a piece of drywall.

Grateful for:
-That my friend did not seriously hurt herself – or her cat – when they plunged through the ceiling.

-The lady at watercolor class who came over to me at the beginning of class and said, “I noticed that you had the expensive watercolour paper, and I was wondering if you wanted this extra pad I had of the not so expensive stuff so that you don’t have to use up all your good paper?” I was so touched! When I originally went to the art store, they only had the expensive stuff – I mean it’s not the “so expensive I don’t want to use it” kind, but it was definitely better than the “buy it in a 30 sheet pad from Michael’s” pad that the teacher had recommended we get. The lady at class had accidentally bulk ordered the basic 30-sheet pad, so she had extra. Then she said, somewhat darkly, “It’s more paper than I’ll be able to use, given my age.” Which was also kind of touching and frank.

-Apple Music. I mean I pay for it, but to have all this music at my fingertips is amazing, especially since the last time I was really into listening to music, it involved expensive purchases and lugging three binders of CDs around with me.

-That running doesn’t hurt. I don’t think I will ever like running. But it’s good for me and I do feel better afterwards, so I will try to keep running a few times a week. I only started running the year that I turned 42, so I’m pretty new at it and it’s not terribly easy for me. I get tired and hot and bored and can’t catch my breath. Lately, though, I’ve noticed that mile 2 does not feel as impossibly hard as it did two years ago. Last week, I managed to run three miles on two of my runs – I don’t usually get that far, but I got to 2.5 miles on both runs and felt like, “Okay, I think I can just do that extra half mile.” I know 3 miles is kind of paltry to a lot of serious runners, but to me, it feels like a reach goal on an average Wednesday afternoon. But it’s getting easier to go that far, and I’m grateful.

-That the two younger kids don’t have cavities. Yay! The kids had their semi-annual cleanings, and after the ordeal of all the crowns earlier this year, I went into their dentist appointment on pins and needles, wondering if, despite all that, they still had issues. Apparently they have very grooved teeth. But thankfully, there are no cavities. The 7 year old might need to see an orthodontist at some point, but we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.

Looking Forward to:

-Cherry blossoms! Peak bloom will be during spring break, so I might not be able to see them, but I’m hoping to go down to the Tidal Basin next week and get my fill.

-Having a friend over for dinner. Sometimes I think I want to throw a dinner party and invite witty people and cook all the things, but I think I actually prefer just having one or two friends over at a time. It feels more low-key and easier to connect. I think I’ll make chicken curry.

-Going back to rehearsal in April. I’m ready for someone to hand me a schedule every day and to know where I have to be and what I have to do. It’s nice to have a lighter schedule, but I think I do better with more structure in my life.

What we ate:

Saturday: Pizza and Next Goal Wins. It was my movie night and I admit that I was in no small part prompted to pick this movie because it starred the above-mentioned Michael Fassbender. In addition to that, though, it’s great family friendly sports movie about the American Samoa soccer team, which was known as the worst soccer team in the world when it lost 30-0 to Australia in a World Cup qualifier match. Fassbender is the down on his luck coach who is tasked with getting the team to score just one goal in a game. It hits all the feel good predictable notes of a family friendly sports film.

Sunday: Pasta and red sauce. Basic, simple, and filling.

Monday: Black Pepper Asparagus and Tofu, eaten with rice. I had some asparagus in our produce box to use up. I would use more black pepper next time.

Tuesday: Chicken on the Run – Peruvian chicken take-out after the 7 year old’s sewing class. He is now making a pillow.

Wednesday: Mac and cheese and kielbasa and green beans.

Thursday: pizza and fries before the show. The husband and the two little kids had eggs and toast at home. I had tickets to the dress rehearsal of the operetta that my company was producing and I took the 12 year old, and a friend and my work BFF’s 11 year old and her friend. So that was me driving carpool with 4 pre-teens in the car and it was a fascinating experience. Preteens are so full of confidence and enthusiasm and bravado, even the quiet ones, and I had the curious experience of being invisible – a fly on the wall – driving them down to the theatre, privy to all sorts of conversations. It was such a strange experience.

Friday: pizza leftover from last Saturday, and salad and Galavant. Finished the series. Soooo sad! We are all really sad that there was never a third season of Galavant, even though they did end things on a little bit of a cliffhanger, so maybe we can hope? What ever will we watch next?

Weekly Recap + what we ate: Good-bye February 2024!

Our last weekend in February was delightfully filled by a visit from my high school friend. She arrived on Saturday mid afternoon and was with us until Monday when I drove her to her hotel where she would be staying for her conference. She’s the only friend from high school that I still keep in touch with, and even though we only see each other every couple of years, we always pick up where we left off. She has children a few years older than mine, and she has such a chill approach to parenting that it’s so soothing talking to her about kids and life and how things turn out. She also used to date my brother so there are things that she just gets about me, even when she doesn’t know the details of my life ant any given moment.

Before my friend came in on Saturday, the 12 year old had a voice lesson, and since the voice lesson was closer to the airport than our house, we decided to have a little adventure in the two hours between voice lesson and my friend’s arrival. (The 12 year old had a hang out with a friend, so she didn’t come along). I remembered that the Gardens at Dumbarton Oaks are free during the winter months, and I had always wanted to visit. It was about 15 minutes from where we were, so we drove down to Georgetown, parked our car, stopped for some coffee, and walked down Wisconsin Ave to Dumbarton Oaks.

So funny story – the only reason I know that Dumbarton Oaks exists is because Igor Stravinsky wrote a chamber symphony called Dumbarton Oaks, which was commissioned by Robert and Mildred Bliss, who used to own the estate. The estate is now a research institute, library, museum, and gardens. Ever since I heard the chamber symphony in college, I’ve wanted to visit Dumbarton Oaks. So finally, twenty plus years later, we went. It’s so funny what random bits of information I know because it has a connection to music.

The gardens were quite extensive and there was lots to see, even though it was still pretty dormant. We played our “Find the Rainbow Colors” game. Though we didn’t really find blue because the sky, which is often our default blue, was pretty grey and cloudy. But there were these cool green-ish blue rocks in the pebble garden, so I took a picture of those. And I can never find indigo…

The purple and yellow flowers always remind me of the passage in Braiding Sweetgrass where Robin Wall Kimmerer said she wanted to study botany to know why purple and yellow flowers always look so nice together. Turns out there is a scientific explanation for that – I can’t remember what, to be honest – but it’s always struck me, this idea of wanting to understand beauty.

We wandered the gardens until it was time to go pick up my friend. The rest of the weekend was pretty chill. I loved having a friend visit who didn’t feel the need to be a tourist, so we could hang out and not traipse all over the city. She just tagged along with us on our normal life things and we had great conversations and connections. Looking back, Sunday was a great day – it checked a lot of soul satisfying boxes:
-Connection – hanging out for 48 hours with my friend, including dinner at my favorite hot pot place.
-Exercise – we went skating together while the kids were in lessons. So not super strenuous, but we got our bodies moving for a good two hours.
-Creative – I had to finish my watercolour homework, so in the afternoon, I worked on that while my friend hung out and hemmed her pants. How wonderfully domestic does that sound?
-Outside time – We took the two little kids outside after I was done my homework and watched them while they rode their bikes around the block for an hour. Again, not as active as a hike, but still some quality sunshine and fresh air time.

I think the only box that didn’t get checked was some knocking some big household organization project off my list. But… you can’t do everything and the day overall had a nice leisurely pace. The Husband did do a lot of work in the garden, though, so maybe I can have him check off the “household task” box for us?

March is my last month at a reduced work schedule before I go back into opera mode. I feel like February wasn’t super focused. I was on an 8 hr a week contract at work so I could do some admin and stage management department duties, but I couldn’t get into a good rhythm of when to be at work. I wanted to be available for at least 30-60 mind a day to handle email and tasks, so then the questions became how to spend the other hours a week. I did take the weekends completely off, like didn’t-even-check-email-off, which was really nice. I did periodically have a sense of panic that I was shirking my job responsibilities, but then I had to remind myself that an 8 hour a week contract means I only have to work 8 hours a week. I wasn’t being paid to be constantly available, and there were certainly enough people at work that nothing depended on me alone. I ended up mostly working two three hour days – usually Wednesday and Thursday – and then splitting the other two hours between the other three days, working from home. But even though a three hour day sounds short, it breaks up the entire day in such a way that I felt like unless I was super focused – which I rarely was – I lost a lot of time in commuting and transitioning. I find transitioning between activities is when I loose the most time – it’s when I’m most likely to get distracted, start scrolling and then loose and hour or so. So then little tasks – especially little computer tasks – got dropped because the last thing I wanted to do after being on my computer for 3 hours at the office was to turn on the computer at home and pay the bills and do the kid sign ups, research how to get rid of my car, etc.

This week’s work from watercolor class:
First the homework from last week – the assignment was “sunsets”

Then the lesson was painting poppies. I didn’t love this one – I felt like it was a little un-refined. The lady who sits next to me in class makes such delicate paintings.

Anyhow, February 2024 is now past and we are onto March. I don’t always do a monthly reflection, but I did for February:
February highs:
– Starting water color classes.
-Getting back on my bike.
– Seeing the kids thrive in the activities we had signed them up for. I worried that it was going to be too much, but they truly love what they are doing – except piano, no one really loves to practice, though they say they want to learn to play…
– Hosting Super Bowl Sunday gathering with friends.
– Visit from my high school friend
– joining a women’s Lenten reading group. Having that connection, but also the daily readings, which somehow give me much to ponder even though I’m not Catholic like the others in the group.
-Making baozi. I want more cooking adventures!
-As a family, we made it to a museum, a hike and some gardens in February.
-The wonderful weather. Mostly.
-Watching Galavant with the kids. Only three more episodes to go! What should we watch next???
-The vocal recital that I did titles for. Such a beautiful program, beautifully sung.
-Lunches with the Husband. A good use of my lighter schedule.

February not so highs. (aka lows, but really, life is pretty good, so I don’t feel right calling them “lows” – they’re just life, the tedious, repetitive, papercut stresses of life. Or maybe I need a re-frame. Or more sleep.)
-Tantrums and chore cajoling. Ugh. When will this phase end? Though I ask that and my kids are all at different phases, so…. I guess never? When they move out? Also I realize chore cajoling could also refer to the pep talks I give to myself to stop scrolling and fold the laundry.
-Making little progress on some house chores, losing momentum and focus.
– The first grader and some communication issues with his teacher. Essentially he’s having accidents at school at least once or twice a month, either because his teacher wants him to finish his work first, or the teacher doesn’t realize he’s asking to go. I’m a little stumped by the whole thing. Also frustrated. Also trying to decide if it’s a problem because he doesn’t seem to mind…
-New duties at work that are surprisingly harder than I had thought they would be and not yet knowing how to make things better.
– Not finding/making time to journal and then not remembering or savoring the memories of what I’ve been doing with my days.
-Laundry. So much laundry.

Some aspirations for March:
-TAXES. This is the big one. If I do only one thing in March, it will be to assemble everything for our tax preparer. This is not an aspiration, but a MUST DO!!!!
– Figure out what to do with my car.
-Sort through summer camp sign ups. We registered for some second choice camps, but then first camp choice had slots open up, so I just have to take a minute to look at everything and sort it all out.
-Spring break adventures – getting through them.
-At work – some desk organization. I need to move desks – to the cubicle where the head of the stage management department usually sits, but I’ve been in my desk for over 15 years and I’m partial to it so this is proving psychologically difficult. Kind of like the car. Maybe I don’t need to move desks?
– Organizing a) my sewing corner, and b) the toy room.
– Lunch with my mom’s group.
-maintaining life habits – reading, yoga and exercise, journaling, writing here regularly, making 2 vegan dinners a week.
– sort out my county rec center pass, and actually using it. The County is once again giving all residents free passes to the rec centers this year. I want to get my pass so I can start using the gym and introduce some strength work to my life.
-continuing to find time for lunches with the Husband.
-Listening to more musicals. This is a fun one. I’ve been on a binge lately of those unironic big hearted musicals from the 90s – those musicals that were huge spectacles of stage and emotion. I’m currently obsessed with Frank Wildhorn and Nan Knighton’s The Scarlet Pimpernel. Up next, I think might be Titanic.
– Going to bed at a decent time. ie. before 11:30pm. Constant struggle.
-make some dentist and doctor appointments.
–maybe get a hair cut. I was realizing as I was writing in my 5 year journal that the last time I got my hair cut was this time last year. What?!?! I think I had a bit of sticker shock last time since my hairdresser had raised his prices. I’ve been with him for over ten years so I don’t know if I have it in me to find a new person. (Like my car and my desk at work….)

Grateful For:
-Sunny, warm weather. There have been some rainy days too, but the weather has been really mild. The hyacinths have come up along our front walk, and when I walk to the front door, their sweet peppery smell reminds me that it is early spring.

-Impulsive playdates and kids who can run free at the park without being watched. The kids had a half day of school on Friday, so I texted the mom of two of the 7 year old’s friends (they’re twins), and asked if they wanted to meet up at a park. They did and she invited two other kids from her bus stop to meet us there. We ended up spending two hours at the park. The kids ran around and did I don’t know what and I got to chat with the other moms. I don’t always find it easy to talk to other parents, but that wasn’t the case this time. We chatted about all sorts of things, and not just our kids, which is always nice.

-My friend at our bus stop who invited me to the Lenten Women’s Group. I think it’s always awkward to invite someone to something new, but especially something that is based in religion. So I’m glad my friend had the courage to ask me to join. It was nice to get out of the house and talk to other moms about their spiritual background and how they try to incorporate it into their lives. I kind of feel like a fraud since I wouldn’t call myself religious – Lent wasn’t a thing when I was growing up. But religion is important to the Husband and two of the three kids are Catholic, so I do want to understand how it makes up the fabric of our life and support that. I also really like thinking about the group readings. The book looks at Lent through the lens of the Seven Deadly Sins. We’ve covered gluttony and lust so far. The readings have made me really think about what it means to have enough and what to do with my energy rather constantly accumulating/wanting more.

-That I don’t have to be in tech. I stopped by the theatre a couple days last week since the show that we’re currently producing, but which I’m not working on, is in tech. I love my job. I love making the magic of theatre and music happen. But once in a while, it’s nice to just sit and watch tech happen and not have the pressure of having to be the one to make it all happen. I find it also good to sit and watch tech from the house sometimes, just to remind myself what it’s like out front. When I’m in tech, I have a headset on and I’m communicating with all the other stage managers and I’m talking to the crew, so I usually know what’s going on. Sometimes, I forget, though, that the people out front don’t necessarily have the same voices in their ear as I do and might not know what is happening backstage. So what to me backstage might seem like a frantic scramble to get, say, a prop ready to come out onstage while the singer onstage waits for it, is, to the people sitting in the house, sometimes… nothing happening. Watching the process without a headset is always a good reminder to make sure that the people without headsets know what is going on. Anyhow, as much as I love my job, I’m grateful that sometimes I don’t have to be part of that stress. (and also jealous because the show is super cute and fun.)

Looking Forward To:
-We booked a trip to Maine/Acadia for this summer. We got a National Parks Pass and I very much want to make sure we use it this year. We’ve had passes the past couple years (including a free one given to all 4th graders when the 12 year old was in 4th grade – it’s a great program!), but I don’t think I use it to it’s full capacity. We go to Great Falls and Shenandoah regularly because those are all close, but I’ve always felt like I want to do more. So this year we are going to Acadia. I’m looking forward to sunsets and hikes and lobster. (I don’t think we’ll be doing sunrise at Cadillac Mountain because of where our airbnb is located, but I think it would have been a hard sell for the kids. Another time…)

-Theatre trips! I have tickets to a couple shows coming up! Yay. The Husband and I are going to see Company, and the dress rehearsal/ Opening night for the next opera (which I’m not working on, so I’ll get to see it! Yay!). And then the local high school is putting on Beauty and the Beast and I think that will be fun to see too. I feel like it’s good to see the professional shows and the high school ones – for a sense of perspective.

-I have a contract for my summer gig and I am SO EXCITED! It’s an opera I worked on six year ago, an opera written in 2017 about the Christmas Eve truce of 1914 during World War I. The opera is just. so. beautiful – in my top 5 opera jobs ever. And it’s very rare one gets to do a contemporary opera more than once, so I’m super thrilled.

-Listening to this audiobook:

I saw this audiobook recommended on the site Five Books, and I really enjoyed Alexis Hall’s book Boyfriend Material, so I thought I’d give this one a try. I’m very much loving it – it’s an amnesia romance novel where the amnesia victim doesn’t really have amnesia. How’s that for flipping a trope on it’s head? Amnesia romances usually aren’t my thing, but this one’s pretty great. And the audiobook is pitch perfect; it’s like an audio version of my favorite British rom com in the vein of Notting Hill or Four Weddings and a Funeral. Fluffy and and warm and hilarious. I’ve laughed out loud so many times.

What We Ate:
Saturday: Chicken Ginger Scallion soup from Deb Perelmans’ Smitten Kitchen Keepers cookbook. This was a super easy soup, and I even make it with frozen chicken, just cooking it a bit longer. Nice pantry type meal. Everyone loved it. We didn’t watch a movie because my friend was visiting, but we did watch and episode of the new season of Bad Batch.

Sunday: We went out to Hot Pot with my friend. Our favorite place with a conveyor belt and a robot that delivers the food for you.

Monday: Chickpeas braised in tomatoes. This was leftover from the week before. I added some water and it was more of a soup than stew, but still tasty. We had it with bread. Vegan.

Tuesday: Beet burgers and tater tots. The beet burgers were this recipe from Post Punk Kitchen. We had beets to use up, so I tried this recipe. The burgers were really tasty, and pretty easy to assemble, though grating the beets did take a while and then because my food processor is small and only does 1.5 cups at a time chopping all the ingredients together took a couple of batches. If you had a bigger capacity food processor then these would be much faster to whip up. I highly recommend this as a veggie burger. The burgers also heat up really well, so I had them for lunches the rest of the week. vegan.

Wednesday: Take out Vietnamese – buns and noodle bowls. We had an afterschool playdate with a friend and her father brought dinner over afterwards. Tasty.

Thursday: Pork and tofu stir fry with udon noodles. The Husband cooked.

Friday: Pizza and Galavant.

(bi)Weekly recap + what we ate: Presidents and Valentines

A crisp clear day and the American Art Museum.

The kids had Monday off for President’s Day, but there were still activities that weekend, so we styed in town and did some in town fun things. Saturday there was snow and the 12 year old’s basketball game ended up cancelled. Since the morning opened up, we decided to take the Metro downtown to a museum. We chose the American Art Museum because there was an orchid exhibit in its courtyard. We got down there are 11:00am, only to find that the museum didn’t open until 11:30am. So we decided to go to the library, which was across the street.

The library was recently renovated and the new children’s section is huge. And there is a whole separate teen section which the 12 year old went to explore on her own. The children’s section has lots of tables and chairs and cozy nooks for kids to curl up and read and a huge section of picture books in different languages. There is also a slide from the 2nd floor, where the children’s section is to the floor below. What a fun idea.

After the library we went to pizza at Ella’s and then headed to the American Art Museum. The Kogod Courtyard is one of my favorite places in DC – it is a bright and sunny oasis in the city, and usually quiet and peaceful. However, this day they were having a Family Day to honor President’s Day, so it was decidedly not quiet or peaceful. There were lots of crafts and activities, and at one point there was a Fife and Drum corps from a school in Virginia. The kids ended up making stovepipe hats at a booth sponsored by the Abraham Lincoln Cottage (one of my favorite museums in DC, by the way. Though it is out of the way and you have to pay to go, so I’ve only been a few times. But if I have to recommend a museum for people who have exhausted the Smithsonian, I always recommend visiting this one and the Frederick Douglass House in tandem.) And there was some dressing up, and a collage activity. Though by the time we got to the collage activity, the only president left was Andrew Garfield or Chester Arthur or some such.

Orchid sculpture. There were real orchids too, but the place was so crowded it was hard to get good pictures.

We did wander through the galleries afterwards. We took in the gallery of “Self Taught Art”, or what the museum calls Folk Art. I like these galleries a lot, seeing things that people create just for the joy of creating, not because they are artists and it pays the bills – ordinary things like quilts and lawn ornaments. I always like looking at this work, which is mostly made of cardboard and tin foil.

The whole exhibit inspires me to make time for creativity in life.

All in all, not the museum visit I had expected, but still a nice outing.

Sunday we had Agility class for the four year old, church for the older two kids and then we went to the Dumpling House for a birthday lunch for one of my best friends. We ordered soooooo much food – dumplings and sauteed greens and noodles and cucumber salad and and garlic eggplant…. I think something got lost in translation and we also had a fried sweet potato dish (Snowfield sweet potato) that was almost like dessert – sweet potato, coated in crunchy rice stick and fried so that the outside was crispy and the inside soft and molten. So good! We always order the same thing when we go to the dumpling house, so it’s fun when something new shows up.

Monday we decided to go on a hike – we hiked from Great Falls north to Riverbend Park, about 5 miles round trip. This is farther north from the spectacular falls of Great Falls, but it’s a gentler hike with beautiful views of the Potomac. The kids have a game they play when we go hiking, called “Rock Kingdom” it involves each child claiming a rock to sit on and the oldest one calling for Rock Kingdom Counsels and then they gather and make plans on how to run their kingdoms. It’s super cute. I’m sure the 12 year old doesn’t always want to play with her younger siblings, so I really treasure these moments when she fully engages with them and leads them in such imaginative play.

Art Class: The past two art classes were spent on clouds and sunsets. Clouds are fun – one of the techniques we learned was to paint the sky then, using a paper towel, lift away the colour to make clouds. I thought that technique was pretty high impact for very low effort. Also, the teacher had us make clouds of all colours and even since I’ve found myself looking at clouds and realizing how many colours they contain. They aren’t just white. Even still, I think my efforts at clouds came out much too grey. Also I’m having difficulties blending my colours. Getting the orange/yellow of the sunset to blend up into the blue of the sky without turning green is tricky.

First effort on top. Second on bottom. Hopefully there’s improvement.

This is my in class effort of sunsets, though I think they look more like moon rises.

This is my homework sunsets. The pink and blue sunset on the bottom left of the quartet was kind a disaster. Then the next morning I woke up and looked a the pictures without my glasses on and it looked so much better and suddenly I could see what was wrong with it – I hadn’t allowed the paint to blend from pink to blue slowly. So I thought I’d give that one a second try.

Also – the pictures look muuuuuch better from farther away.

One other thing I realized when doing the homework that one trick to making things look brighter is to also have darker things in the picture to create contrast, which was what I was trying to do with the picture on the bottom right.

I think watercolor is interesting because it seems quite easy in principal to create something beautiful. Just a simple wash of colour can be so elegant. But once you get past the easy stuff, the really detailed work requires a lot of care.

Valentine’s Day – I’m not a huge Valentine’s Day person, so the big win this year was that the Husband ordered the valentines for the kids. I didn’t even have to say anything about it to him. Awesome. I did spend an hour cutting up fruit for the 7 year old’s class party, only to see an email the day of that said the school was banning all consumption of food in the classrooms for Valentines Day. Apparently there was an allergy incident in another classroom the last time there was a class party. Which I respect that decision – I just wished I had realized that before I peeled an entire Costco bag of mandarin oranges. I apparently am not the most diligent reader of school communication. wump wump. I did go volunteer in the 7 year old’s class for the party. I’m always impressed by the level of French in his classroom. I know it’s an immersion program, so that is in the point, but to see seven and eight year olds who a year and a half years ago didn’t know any French, communicate with each other in full sentences is really amazing. Also – Teachers are heroes to spend all day with our kids.

The Best Morning This Week. So I wake up on morning from sleeping on the futon in the kids’ room because the 12 year old and I had a COVID exposure, so she and I are sleeping in one room for the week while the Husband and the other two kids sleep in our room. The 12 year old desperately wants to be sick to stay home from school, so while I’m downstairs making breakfast, she tries to doctor her COVID test with a red pen. I am simultaneously impressed by her gumption, but also trying hard not to laugh at how inept she is being at faking a positive COVID test. It was pretty bad. So I send her to school. Then move on with my morning.

At 8:15 – 30 minutes before we have to go to school, the seven year old tells me his Black History Month project is due that day. (Which, if I bothered to turn on the notifications in the class Slack channel I would realize because the panic I felt was reflected in the many messages from other parents about this project. Only those panicked messages were sent two days ago…). I originally go all “strict mom” and tell him, “Tough hooey, you can tell your teacher that you forgot to do it.” But then there were tears and I’m a softie, so ten minutes before we leave for the bus, he’s is drawing Louis Armstrong and taping it to an old can, which I had to pull out of the recycling on the curb – thank goodness it hadn’t been collected yet.

“What does a trumpet look like?” he asks me. And I open the page from Picturepedia of musical instruments and try to talk him through how to draw a trumpet with all its valves and what nots. Meanwhile the “school bus” alarm is going off. And I finally just say, “F*** that. Just draw a cornet.”

So the follow up to last week’s laments on how I have no morning routine – this is exactly why there is no routine.

At any rate – yes, the 12 year old and I had a COVID exposure. It’s been kind of fascinating, and perhaps a little bit triggering, to pull the masks out again and swabbing our noses every morning to do the COVID tests, and to worry about whom we are spending time with. We personally haven’t had a brush with COVID in probably more than two years, and at first I was very self conscious about having to mask again. But then I realized that even though we aren’t masking all the time as we once were, it has become a very normal thing to do. And it’s the kind and prudent thing to do. So there we go.

Things I learned from This Week’s Crossword Puzzle: The playlist edition.
This week’s crossword puzzle discoveries were all musicians whom I had never heard of. So I made myself a little playlist of their music one evening:
– Tegan and Sara – (“Everything is Awesome” singers ___ and Sara) Okay, had heard that song, but didn’t know the group. Peppy, pop sound.
– Angie Stone – (Stone with the R&B album “The Art of Love & War”)
–Say It Ain’t So – (“___ It Ain’t So” Weezer Song). I knew Weezer was a band, one that was pretty popular when I was growing up. Could not name any of their songs to save my life.
–Ella Mai (“Boo’d Up” Singer). British R&B Artist. New to me. Actually R&B is a whole genre of music that I’m woefully ignorant on.

Watching:
Nai Nai and Wai Po. This short documentary film by Taiwanese American filmmaker Sean Wang was nominated for an Oscar. It documents the every day life of his two grandmothers. One is 94 and one is 83 and they have been roommates for years and live life with such a joyful pragmatism – they make music, they make dinner, they arm wrestle, the argue about farting, they talk about life and living a long one. From the first moment of the film, I recognized my own grandparents and my own parents, even. In less than twenty minutes, this little film made me laugh, cry, and feel seen and understand what it’s like to contemplate humanity with the perspective of nine decades.

Incidentally, there are two documentary shorts by Taiwanese Americans nominated for Oscars this year. That feels pretty special to me. The other one is about the Taiwanese Island of Kimen which is just off the coast of China. I guess now I can say I’ve watched at least two of the Oscar nominated films this year.

Watching, and a Rant:
Hallmark Binge Pass- I’ve discovered that with my Library card, I can get a Hallmark Binge Pass via Hoopla, which gives me access to a huge collection of Hallmark movies and tv shows – cue up the fluffy, heartwarming entertainment. It’s been perfect accompaniment as I wash dishes late at night or work on my painting homework. So far I’ve watched An American in Austen, a movie about a modern day librarian who finds herself living in Pride and Prejudice. The movie was cute, and as an ardent Darcy fangirl, it was hilarious to see their take on Darcy as an unbearably pushy and kind of annoying person. I’ve also watched a bunch of holiday movies because…. the heart wants what the heart want, right? Okay, but here is one huge vent though- I usually watch things with the subtitles on and I was watching a movie called Make Me A Match, a movie about ambitious Vivi, who works for a dating app. She meets an Indian matchmaker and strikes a deal with the matchmaker to learn about her methods so that she can distill the matchmaker’s success down into something she can use to improve her app. The matchmaker’s son Boom is tasked with helping Vivi. Predictable sparks fly… It’s a lovely movie and you know me, representation is my catnip, so I was really enjoying this one. Except, we get to the end of the movie when Vivi and Boom get married in a huge Indian wedding ceremony and when the officiant begins the wedding ceremony, the titles just say, “Chanting in foreign language.” Come on, Hallmark! You can do better. Tell us what language the guy is chanting in! Also… during the party afterwards, there are subtitles for the songs in English, but the songs in Hindi just say, “Singing in foreign language.” Why does the song in English get its words captioned and not the one in Hindi? If it even is in Hindi – I’m going to be honest, I’m pretty ignorant about Indian languages, which is why it would have been cool if the subtitles had told me what language it was and what was being said. I don’t know – maybe I’m being overly sensitive, but there are huge swaths of the population for whom this isn’t a “foreign” language and I kind of resent it being labelled as “foreign.” This is not how we normalize non-English languages and cultures, folks. AmI expecting too much of a Hallmark movie? I mean the whole thing might have been captioned by an AI bot for all I know. But in which case, surely the AI bot can figure it out without labelling something “foreign.” “Foreign” is relative.

Grateful For:
– COVID tests and masks. I’m glad we had a supply of masks and tests to use when we had our COVID exposure. It’s funny how the bin of tests in our linen closet that seemed like a lot, quickly can be used up. Luckily our library is still handing out free COVID tests, so I can stock up next time I go. Also grateful that we didn’t actually get COVID. Also grateful that we are no longer in the Spring of 2020.

-For the vocal recital that I got to do the supertitles for. A beautiful evening of music, plus getting to hear Barber’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915 performed live. It is usually performed with an orchestra; hearing it with just piano accompaniment really brought out the jazzy influences in the music – the piece had a certain swing that isn’t always apparent with orchestral versions.

-Museums and libraries and National Parks. Things I don’t begrudge my tax dollars at work for.

-Making it up the hills on my bike. And lower gears. Every time I brush my bike off after a pause, even of a week or two, I am a little defeated by the hills between home and work. This time was no different. However, by my second day of bike commuting, I could make it up those hills. I just put the bike in a lower gear and keep my head down and keep pedaling. I’ve also discovered that it helps to sit a little more upright in my seat when I go up hills. I’m sure there’s a scientific explanation for that.

Looking forward to:
– A visit from a high school friend. One of the nice things about living in DC is that every so often people come here for work and I get to see them! This friend is the only friend from high school that I still keep in touch with. Her parents, like mine, are from Taiwan, and we’ve always bonded over that. (This happened! this is what I get for being so slow to post. anyhow, it was a lovely visit – more later!)

– A cherimoya! My abovementioned friend brought some fruit from California among which was a cherimoya. My late grandmother loved cherimoyas and I always think of her when I have one. There are not very prevalent here – once in a while I’ll see them at HMart – so this was a nice treat and I’m looking forward to eating the last one. For those who haven’t had a cherimoya, it’s a fruit with a very soft inside that kind of tastes like banana-pear custard.

-Peak Bloom! Peak bloom forecasts are being released this week – I wait with eager anticipation. There are a few of the early blooming trees that can already be seen around town, a riot of pink.

– Lenten reading group. A friend invited me to join a Lenten reading group – we read a book that has a reading and reflection for each day of Lent, and then come together three times to discuss it. I’m not Catholic, so the invitation to join gave me pause, but I do like contemplating life and reflecting on my life choices, so I thought this group might be a nice social/spiritual activity.

-Cooking from these two cookbooks, which I picked up from the library:

What We Ate:

Monday: Crispy coconut rice. This recipe. Basically you crumble tofu into cooked rice, add curry paste and other spices and then fry it in a cast iron skillet until the bottom gets crispy. Wrap in lettuce leaf and top with mint to eat. Tasty and very flavorful and also comes together very quickly. The two little kids didn’t care for it as much, but I think it’s because it’s kind of a new concept. I would make it again – a great use for leftover rice. Vegan.

Tuesday: Sweet Potato and Black Bean Tacos. Roast diced sweet potato in a pan and then mix with black beans. We eat it with the leftover guacamole from SuperBowl Sunday. Quick and easy meal. Vegan.

Wednesday: Instant Pot Braised Chickpeas with Tomatoes. Since I was working this evening and we had an excess of dried chickpeas to use up, I was looking for an InstantPot chickpea recipe. The best part of this is the tahini swirl that you add at the end. Vegan.

Thursday: Pasta and meatballs. I had made and frozen meatballs in tomato sauce last December, so I pulled those out and we ate them with pasts. Thank you to past me for freezing meatballs.

Friday: Pizza (take out) and Galavant. I might have fallen asleep.

Saturday: Pizza (The Husband made) and Moana. I hadn’t seen Moana before despite making the middle child a Hey Hey costume for Halloween when when he was two. The kids, have seen it several times and love it. It is indeed a great movie.

Sunday: We didn’t actually have dinner this day. We were so full from dumplings and noodles at my friend’s birthday lunch that we just kind of weren’t hungry the rest of the day. There might have been popcorn or fruit or ample snacking.

Monday: Lentil Soup and flatbread. I’m trying to incorporate more lentils in our life because they are cheap and healthy and not terrible for the environment. I can’t for the life of me remember what lentil soup recipe I made, but I’m pretty sure I made this in the Instant Pot. To go along with it, I made this yogurt flatbread recipe from Smitten Kitchen.

Tuesday: Celery Cashew with Five Spice Tofu. We got two bunches of celery in our produce box. We aren’t huge celery people – usually it goes in soups or we eat it with peanut butter. So I thought I’d try this recipe that would put the celery front and center, though I didn’t have 5 spice tofu, so I pressed extra firm tofu, dusted it with 5 spice powder and then pan fried it. I thought it was pretty good for being a dish based around celery. Vegan.

Wednesday: Egg Sandwiches on bagels. Sometimes on Wednesdays when the kids have early piano lessons, I will pick up some bagels for breakfast, and then also enough extras so that we can have breakfast sandwiches for dinner. One of our easy go to quick dinners.

Thursday: Meatball subs. We had some frozen meatballs from the store to use up.

Friday: Pizza (take out) and Galavant. We re-watched one of the episodes from last week since I had fallen asleep. We have a nice Friday night routine now- after basketball practice for the 12 year old, they come home with pizza. We watch two episodes of Galavant while eating pizza. The kids go upstairs and get into pjs and brush their teeth, without help from a parent (that’s key), and the can come down and watch one more episode. Not sure what we are going to watch when we are done with Galavant – there are only two seasons and we’re halfway through the second. Any recommendations?

Well, I just realized that March is bearing down around the corner! Wow. But we do get a bonus February day tomorrow – that is always a fun thought, even though in theory it is just another day.

Weekly recap + what we ate: Art and celebrations

This year, Lunar New Year AND Super Bowl Sunday fell in the same weekend. I am a little abashed to say that the latter gets more attention in our household. However, I did call my father (My mother is in Taiwan with my grandfather), and the seven year old dressed all in red on Saturday (coincidentally, but my dad made a comment about it when we FaceTimed, so I’ll take it), and I made my first attempt at making baozi (pork filled steamed buns). We had dumplings at our Superbowl party, a nod to both San Francisco and Lunar new Year.

My parents also send us two boxes of oranges from their tree for Lunar New Year, including red envelopes for the kids. (Though there was a bit of a mix up and we got my niece’s red envelope, and my brother got the ones for our kids. Oops!) The oranges are amazing – really sweet and juicy. Our neighbors also gave us a box of pineapple cakes too, one of my favorite Taiwanese treats, and they brought red envelopes for the kids too. So I feel as if I haven’t totally neglected the holiday, though I can do better. Every year, I think I’m going to celebrate/participate more, but then Lunar New Year creeps ups on me. I do feel like I fail at being the good Asian daughter a lot of the time.

The weekend felt very packed. Saturday was a basketball game for the 11 year old, and then she had an audition for a children’s chorus. Apparently the audition didn’t go well – it was her first real audition experience and she said she got really “spooked” singing for the people in the room. I am feeling deeply conflicted as a parent about the whole thing – there is a part of me that is all Tiger Mom, thinking, “Well, she didn’t prepare adequately and if she had truly wanted to do this, she would have practiced more. She needs to develop a sense of discipline if she wants to do this again”, and there is a part of me that says, “Auditioning is hard! Good for her for going in there. Big Hugs.” I do want her to enjoy an activity and do things that serve her interests, and at the same time, I think there is a certain sense of discipline and determination that are a more long term takeaway from participating in activities. Or maybe I’m expecting too much? Or overthinking things? I think often of an interview I heard on Fresh Air with a lady who’s son was diagnosed with a fatal illness when he was still a baby, and she talks about wondering what is the goal of parenting when you know your child will not grow up to be an adult?

Super Bowl Sunday, there were classes and activities (agility class, Faith Formation, and skating lessons), a playdate, which I almost cancelled fearing it was too much to do, but which ultimately was quite nice because it was our only opportunity to go outside all day, and the kids got to ride their bikes to the park.

Then in the evening we had friends over to watch the Super Bowl. I thought the game was simultaneously slow and exciting. The half time show was a lot (as it should be). And there were some pretty great commercials. My favorites were the Ben Affleck/ Jennifer Lopez Dunkin’ Donuts commercial – hilarious!, and then commercial for Google Pixel’s new guided frame technology which helps people with impaired or low vision take pictures. I mean, if I was the type to cry during a commercial, that would have been the one. We sent the little kids to bed when the game went into overtime, though the rest of us stayed up to watch to the very end. Still a late night for all.

Other happenings of the week before:
I started my watercolor class! The day before the first class, I went to the art store to pick up supplies. Is there anything as exciting as the anticipation of new art supplies? Fresh paints, blank paper, and smooth brushes.

The first class was a lot of explanation of supplies. The teacher told us not to buy the very expensive supplies for an introductory class. Except for watercolour pencils. There is one inexpensive brand of watercolour pencils that she does not recommend – the colours are not saturated enough. “Did you keep the receipt?” she asked the students who came to class with that brand. I thought that was hilarious.

Our first in class assignment was to experiment with six different watercolour techniques. The homework is a repeat of the same techniques. Here’s how I did on the first try:

Things I learned from the week’s crossword puzzle – one of my favorite things that we did last year was get a Sunday newspaper. Hands down my favorite part is the crossword puzzle, that I work on through the week. I do them in pen, and I don’t look up clues. However, once I finish the crossword puzzle, or get the solutions the following week, I will google the answers that were new to me; I find it’s a fun way to learn random bits of knowledge. Things I learned from this week’s puzzle:
-Anne Meara (“Emmy nominated Anne”) – Meara was a comedian who had a comedy routine with her husband Jerry Stiller. I was particularly struck by the fact that they broke up their comedy act because they were afraid that the biting tone of their routine was hurting their marriage in the long run. I thought that was a pretty self-aware decision.
–Otoes (Native Americans based in Red Rock, Okla.) This Native American tribe was semi-nomadic, originally from the Great Lakes area but eventually settling along the Missouri River in the Iowa/Missouri/Nebraska area. They were decimated by small pox and the American government.
– Gaus sum (Gaus __, concept in algebraic number theory.) This is the method of adding consecutive numbers by adding the first and last, second and second last, and so on, and then dividing by 2. Quite neat and efficient.
–Adolph Rupp. (Kentucky coaching legend Rupp) University basketball coach with a storied career. Anytime I see the name “Adolph”, I wonder about the choice. Rupp was born in 1901, clearly before the name Adolph became practically taboo.
–Tealight (Candle originally used to warm a steeped drink.) Who knew? But makes so much sense. Tealights originally came from Japan and were used to keep tea warm, but also they helped tea brewers keep track of time since one knew how long they would burn for.

The hyacinths are poking their heads up. What the what???? It is alarming yet also how can I not love the hints of spring?

The “I’ll miss this some day” moment: One morning, I was woken up very early – not sure how early, but it was definitely before 5:30am – by the four year old standing next to my bed bawling at the top of her lungs. Let take a moment to reflect on how freaky it is to be woken out of a dead sleep by someone standing next to your bed, even a small and cute someone. And she was clearly upset.

Eventually I figured out what she was sobbing.

“You didn’t play Let it Go when I brushed my teeth!!!!!!” she cried over and over again.

Backstory: the night before, I had let the six year old pick the music for clean up time, but then I promised that four year old that she could listen to Let It Go while they brushed their teeth. Then I forgot, and we played Chompers, as we usually do, no one said a word or reminded me of my promise for Let It Go. Everyone went to bed. I moved on with life.

But I guess not everyone forgot. Or rather someone eventually remembered.

This is one difference between the Husband and me: At 5am when a small person wakes you out of a dead sleep, grief stricken that we’d forgotten to play Let It Go – I try to console her and explain that I had forgotten and that she also had a responsibility to remind me. The Husband, reaches over, picks up his phone, cues up the Frozen soundtrack, and rolls over and goes back to sleep. I’ll let you guess which tactic got the four year old to stop crying.

An hour or so later, when we were both truly awake, I said to the Husband, “Wow, she has a mind like a steel trap!”

“It’s a rusty steel trap,” he says, “Because you never know when it’s going to snap shut and bite you in the ass.”

Perspective: So back in September, I wrote a post entitled “A Litany of Complaints”, of many of the things stressing me that time, and I thought it would be interesting to revisit those stressors:
–The cavity ridden state of the two little kids’ teeth. This has been more or less resolved to the tune of many many crowns. We’ve given up gummy candy and are more diligent about brushing. I just got a notification that they are due for their semi-annual cleaning, which I’m sort of dreading but also curious as to whether or not we are truly cavity free.
–Unflattering passport photos, and an expired passport in general. My new passport just arrived. Yay. I was genuinely worried that my grandfather would suddenly pass away and I would not be able to go back to Taiwan because I had no passport. So that’s all squared away. Morbid, I know. (I had one cousin who missed out on a huge family reunion in Taiwan because she had put her passport in storage and couldn’t get to it. The family still constantly brings it up. So I’m glad I won’t be known as the grandchild who couldn’t go to Agong’s funeral because she didn’t have a passport.) I still hate the picture. I tell myself I don’t have to look at it, but even still, I know that it’s a terrible picture. Can’t take that away from me. AND it’s going to be there for the next ten years. That’s pretty much until the youngest kid is in high school and the oldest is graduated from college. So I guess I’ll get a new photo in time for a celebratory international trip with the oldest child.
–Not planning the three year old’s birthday party until the last minute. It was fine. She had a party, which I wrote about here. Only now I have neglected to plan the seven year old’s birthday party – his birthday was three weeks ago. There’s always something. Same stress different kid.
–Keeping track of the 11 year old’s activities. I have them all pretty straight now, but it’s been a bit of a shuffle this month with her playing rec league basketball and the Husband and I both working on one of the nights she usually goes to basketball clinic. On another front, luckily we share carpooling to the pool with the neighbors so usually someone will remember if there is not swim clinic that week. Also – the twelve year old is in the school play, which rehearses directly after school so she has been totally responsible for that. I just have to remember not to panic on the evening when it gets to be 4:45pm and I suddenly realize I haven’t seen her yet.
–Window treatments for the living room. Aside from some abstract contemplation, there has been absolutely no movement on this. I’d like to just throw my hands in the air and give up on it, but this is the current state of things:

*Very* ad hoc and improvised. There are at least four different stages of window treatment contemplation going on here.

–My 20 year old car. The car is still with us. We did however, get a new minivan back in October. By “we” I mean the Husband. I have yet to drive the minivan. Part of what we talked about in getting a minivan is that I would get rid of my car. But I’m irrationally attached to my car and have been putting things off. I had promised the Husband that I would take care of getting rid of the car in January. Then February. And now, the windshield wipers need replacing and we need to renew it’s parking permit and it probably needs an oil change. And I think – should I really do all that if I’m going to imminently get rid of it? Anyhow, change is hard, I’m having some kind of block against moving forward with getting rid of the car. The thing is – we could put more money into it and it would be okay, so it feels wasteful to get rid of the car. I’m investigating donating it to the high school’s automotive training program. This is still a huge stressor for me.
–Morning routines. Still feels like the mornings are interminable yet rushed. I came to a huge revelation about my morning routines last week. Part of the reason my morning routines are non-existent is because the kids are so erratic in the mornings. One kids is up at 6:30am, another sleeps til 7:00am, the other… something in between. Sometimes they want breakfast right off, sometimes they roam the house. Sometimes they will get dressed first, sometimes not til they’ve been up for an hour and a half. If they were more consistent about their mornings, I could feel like there is a routine – for everyone. Like maybe we would get piano practicing done, maybe we would put away some laundry, maybe I could get some journaling in… Maybe I’m asking too much. But it does seem like with almost 2.5 hours of awake time in the morning, I should be able to do more then, breakfast, pack lunch, get dressed. Work in progress.

Which is all to say – I feel like some of the things that were stressing me out in September are still stressing me out, some have been resolved, and some I’ve learned to make peace with. They’ve moved from stressing me out to just being irksome. I think this is a big component of adulting for me – managing stressors. Stressing about things until I manage them. I don’t know why I do it like this – it always feels better when things are resolved.

Grateful For:
– Superbowl Sunday with Friends. It’s nice to have people over who I don’t have to worry about impressing, who will bring tasty food, and who have kids that will entertain our kids.

–For the middle school teachers who keep the 12 year old (and all the students) safe: The 12 year old’s school had a lock down at school on Friday. Apparently there were some teenagers with BB guns who fi (or maybe there was more than one- it’s unclear), ran into the field next to school. The police came. Looking at the letter sent home the whole incident took about 20 minutes, but I’m sure it felt like longer to her in her classroom. All the nearby schools went into lockdown. It’s hard to conceive of what the real danger was to everyone at the school, but regardless, it must have been an incredibly stressful afternoon. Some part of my mind thinks, “Of course, everything turned out okay,” but I know I can’t take that for granted. Such is life in America. Sadly.

-Biking. It’s gotten warm enough (and dry enough) to bike places. I biked to work one day, though I did walk the bike up the big hill, and I biked to meet the Husband for lunch.

–Our neighbor for lending us a bamboo steamer: As I mentioned above, I wanted to try my hand at making bao for Lunar New Year. However, I didn’t have a bamboo steamer. I could steam in a regular metal steamer, but there is something about the bamboo smell that completes the bao flavor for me. So I texted our neighbor, and they had one which they dropped off that very afternoon. I think the buns turned out okay – they popped open a little when I steamed them, so I do need work on my folding technique. I also want to experiment with some vegetarian filling options.

Looking Forward To:
-A potential big trip. We’ve been doing some research for our winter break trip. One day over lunch, the Husband and I were to both come with three ideas to start discussing. I find planning for travel overwhelming, but just starting to research a destination (or three) is actually pretty fun.

-Long weekend adventures. Definitely a hike, and maybe a museum. (This all happened. It was a great weekend! More on that soon. )

-Reading more of Courtney Milan’s latest book, The Marquis Who Musn’t. Historical romance featuring an English village populated by Asian people? Yes please! I love Milan’s books – there are no idiotic people and her writing and plotting is generally very good. She’s also hugely outspoken on issues of race and inclusivity in the romance genre.

What We Ate:
Monday: Takeout from Chicken on the Run. The 7 year old had his first sewing class and I was going to make sandwiches for dinner when we got home, but sewing class is a block down from a really good Peruvian chicken place, so I called an audible and brought home chicken, and yucca fries and plantains and black beans and rice, and cucumber salad. No regrets.

Tuesday: Zucchini Boats. The Husband cooked. He stuffed the boats with ground turkey and covered it with cheese and diced tomatoes. Always a favorite.

Wednesday: Bacon and Egg pie. Recipe from Saveur Magazine. I used to subscribe to Saveur magazine and I loved it – the food writing was so evocative and homey, even when it was about far flung locations. I very rarely cooked out of it because the recipes often needed ingredients that I didn’t have on hand since a lot of the recipes came from other countries or cultures. Anyhow, I have a gentle aspiration to cook more from the cooking magazines that I own and I had bookmarked this recipe to try – it’s from New Zealand and quite easy – puff pastry, filled with chopped up bacon and eggs, drizzled with a sauce of Worchester sauce and ketchup, then baked. I think I overbaked it a little, though. The result, however, would be perfect for a portable lunch or breakfast.

Thursday: Pizza Takeout. It was the Husband’s birthday and he didn’t want to celebrate, but then changed his mind so he came home with pizza from his favorite place and a cake from his favorite bakery. We kept it lowkey, but the kids did make a sign:

Friday: Pizza (The Husband made) and Galavant. Friday night tradition. I don’t know what we’re going to do when we finish season two.

Saturday: Bahn mi (take out) and A Bug’s Life (the 7 year old’s turn to pick the movie). The movie was new to me, very cute.

Sunday: Superbowl Sunday. Lots of food! Our friends are both big griller/smokers. One brought brisket and one brought ribs. The Husband made guacamole. We ordered soft pretzels from the DC Pretzel Company. There was also dumplings, baozi, crudite, brownies, lemon cake, chips, fruit. I like having a good party spread and this one was pretty good.

(bi) Weekly recap + what we ate: Another Birthday week and a Museum

It’s February! January was a blur – there was a show for the first half of the month and then the second half of the month felt like I was picking up the pieces. I’m hoping the February will feel slower, more intentional and more balanced, less like survival mode.

Also – we’ve had weather in the high 70s and mid 30s, all in the span of a week. I cannot take this weather whiplash. On my walk the other day, I saw some crocus shoots starting to peak up. What? Not! And then I was talking to a stage manager who was coming in for our next show and she asked me what kind of weather she should pack for and I said, “I honestly have no idea what to tell you.” But… it got me thinking that she will be here until the end of March, which means that she will likely be here for peak cherry blossom season. I’m really excited – for peak bloom. (I just checked the website and it says it is yet too early to predict peak bloom… I wait with much anticipation…)

Anyhow – other adventures…

The big kids had last Monday off school (Teacher’s grading day), so the Husband and I both took the day off and we took the kids downtown to the Mall to visit the National Gallery of Art. There were two exhibits that I wanted to see before they closed in March – one exhibit was of the portraits by Dorothea Lange, and another of the works of Mark Rothko.

I thoroughly enjoyed both exhibits. The Lange was especially haunting as a large part of the exhibit was devoted to portraits that she took of families migrating during the Dust Bowl, including Human Erosion in California (Migrant Mother), the famous one of a Great Depression mother looking weary. (I just went down a rabbit hole and the story of the woman behind the photo is fascinating. She wasn’t actually a worker on the pea farm where the photo was taken; she was just stopped them when her family’s car broke down. Turns out the lady, Florence Owen Thompson, was quite resentful that the photo was taken without her permission.) There were also a series of photos she took at a Japanese relocation center that felt particularly poignant. I love how immediate and spontaneous and timely photography can be.

The other exhibit, works of Mark Rothko, was more intangible in it’s appeal, I think. Abstract art hasn’t always spoken to me – I like art of things and people and recognizable objects – but there is something about Rothko that I really like. Maybe it’s the bold unapologetic color? What I loved about seeing the Rothko paintings up close is that you can see how different blocks were painted with different techniques- some bold and rough, some quite smooth, some very orderly. It makes his work feel all the more deliberate. In addition to the familiar blocks of colour, the exhibit had some of Rothko’s early watercolors and they were definitely reminded me of the work of painters like Cezanne and early Picasso. Another favorite part of the exhibit was the giant easel that they had on display – to see where Rothko made his work really lifted to the painting for me, and reminded me that there is a person behind all this colour.

Taking to the kids to a museum is always a tricky excursion. The 4 year old didn’t have a lot of patience for looking at art, but one thing that did capture her attention was all the paintings of Mary and the baby Jesus. Every time she saw a painting of Madonna and Child, she would run up to it, pointing with glee, exclaiming, “It’s Baby Jesus!!!” I guess it all goes to show that art speaks to us, when we find something familiar in it.

In the lobby of the East Wing, there was an easel set up with a giant screen that people could “paint” on. The kids LOVED this. They would have spent the whole day there if they could. I had a moment when I thought, “But they have art supplies at home! Why are they so much more excited about this?” Oh well. As I was walking out, though, I saw a grown up with a child who looked to be about eight or nine, and the grown up was teaching the child how to draw and they were sketching the Calder mobile above them. I thought that was actually a brilliant idea of how to get children to engage in art. Sometimes I think that we spend so much time looking at art that we forget to actually make it ourselves. (This is one of my beefs about the kids’ school specials – they spend all this time learning about Beethoven and the Beetles, and not enough time making music themselves. Similarly in art class – they know about Van Gogh, but not about making their own creations.) So yes, in the same breath I have been irked at my kids for their obsession with a digital painting canvas and bemoaned the lack of creative opportunities. It’s irrational. I’m going to sit with that for a little bit.

I also thought this was funny – this layout of a future exhibit. The circles say, “Not Trash” I feel like that could be some kind of very meta art in itself.

Every time we go down to the National Mall, I’m struck with gratitude and amazement how all these great museums and works of arts are less than an hour away by train. This year I want to be more intentional about going down and making time for the the exhibits that I want to see. There is a show in September called Paris 1874: The impressionist Moment that I want to make sure to catch. But also there is an amazing permanent collection too that I should also remember to see – We walked by Degas’ sculpture Little Dancer on Monday and I had forgotten that this sculpture was even here. Such a lovely piece of work and I can walk in and see it for free anytime the Museum is open!

Also super fun was we saw two white squirrels on the Mall as we were down there! I heard that they are rare, but there were two frolicking about, so maybe they aren’t as rare as I would think? After the Museum we went to have dumplings and noodles and then went home. What a lovely day.

The week before we celebrated another birthday! The middle child turned seven. I can hardly believe that he’s already seven. And… he lost his first tooth the day before his birthday. Milestones all around! I bought some balloons, including this giant Grogu balloon that has weights on the bottom and an attached ribbon so you can pull it around like a pet. I realized afterwards that the same balloon without the weighted bottom and ribbon leash was five dollars cheaper. Did I really pay an extra $5 for a ribbon and weights? I guess I did. Well, the 7 year old loved it, so maybe it was worth it? The Grogu haunts our house now, floating around, peeking around corners in the evenings. It’s a little creepy of one isn’t expecting it.

Grogu watching me clean the kitchen late at night. Maybe he needs a cookie…?

I made a red velvet cake and we FaceTimed with my parents that night, singing happy birthday and blowing out candles.

“They just keep growing” moment – I’ve been trying to do some closet cleanouts and I had two bags of clothes to take to Goodwill. The bags had been riding around in my car, but then I realized that the 4 year old’s agility class is right next to a Goodwill. Yay! I love when errands line up. So after class one day, we I headed over to the donation center. Just as I was pulling up, though, I remembered that the 12 year old needed pants, and last fall I had put four pairs of pants that no longer fit me into the bag. And actually, those pants would probably fit the 12 year old. So I pulled them out of the bag before dropping the donation off at Goodwill and took them home to her. It turns out that they fit her pretty well. It was just such a moment for me to realize that the path of clothes that no longer fit now don’t automatically have to go into the donation pile.

A charming picture book and story from my past:

So funny story – when I was growing up in Canada, there was a radio show on the CBC called Basic Black, hosted by Arthur Black. I don’t remember much detail of it, but I remember it was funny and that my brother and I would listen to it every week. Arthur Black had a book in which he wrote a essay about how Winnie the Pooh was named after a bear named Winnipeg, because the bear was from Canada. In sixth grade, my best friend Gail was a huuuuge Winnie the Pooh lover. She one day told me that Winnie the Pooh was named after a bear named Winnie at the London Zoo. I said, no, actually it’s named after a bear named Winnipeg because Arthur Black said so. No, you’re wrong, Gail said. And back and forth and back and forth we went.

I eventually wrote to Arthur Black and asked him how he knew that Winnie the Pooh was named after a bear named Winnipeg. And he wrote me back!!!! Anticlimactically, he said, “I wish I could give you chapter and verse of where I heard about the bear named Winnipeg, but I don’t remember.” I’m paraphrasing, but that bit about “chapter and verse” is a direct quote – for some reason that stuck in my head.

Anyhow, fast forward thirty-five years and we borrow this book, Finding Winnie, from the library, mostly because I love the art of Sophie Blackall. And guess what? Winnie the Pooh was indeed named after a bear in the London Zoo. So Gail was right. BUT… the bear came from Canada and was named Winnipeg. So Arthur Black was right too. The story of how the bear named Winnipeg got to the London Zoo is actually quite a lovely story and I might actually have almost been close to tears at one point. And to have a 35 year old argument resolved… that was lovely too.

Cleaning out the Tupperware drawer I have a huge list of aspirational decluttering that I want to do and the list is overwhelming. Cleaning out the Tupperware drawer and Tupperware overflow seemed like low hanging fruit, so I tackled it one day. (I do note that I use “Tupperware” like “Kleenex” or “Xerox”. I don’t actually own any true Tupperware per se.) One of my pet peeves is when storage containers do not get put away with their lids. It irks me to no end when I go to use a container, fill it up, and then turn around and discover that there is no lid. ARRRRRGH!!!! Anyhow, the jumble was getting out of control so I pulled everything out, matched lids and then threw out anything that didn’t have a lid. And then I went to our basement where we have “Tupperward overflow” and did the same, also throwing out all those old crappy free water bottles that I had been collecting down there. I also threw out/recycled a bunch of sippy cups – made me a little wistful remembering the days before my kids could drink from a cup. Isn’t that crazy to think there was a time when drinking out of a cup was hard? Another thing in the “They just keep growing” category. Anyhow, organizing the Tupperware was a very satisfying task. Also – in our previous house, we kept all the Tupperware in a cupboard, and I have to say the deep drawers for storage in this house – I really love them. It would never have occurred to me to have storage drawers instead of shelves beforehand.

Grateful For:
–The Metro worker who filled up my metro card. On our way home from the museum, when I tried to tap out the 6 year old’s card, it didn’t have enough fare on it. Good lesson for me – always tap out after the kid so he’s not stuck on the other side of the gate. The machines at the gate you use to to refill metrocards only take cash. Well, the kid needed 0.15 on his card to make up the rest of his fare and as I was digging through my purse for change, the station worker came up behind me and put money in the fare machine for me. I know it was just 15 cents, but that little bit of generosity really brightened my day. And then on the way home, we took the bus and the bus driver told us not to tap our cards so we rode for free. Not sure why, but it always warms my heart a little when I get to ride for free.

–A Co-worker’s keys – One day I was working in my office all alone and I started packing up to get ready to go pick up the kids from the school bus. I went to the bathroom and then got back to my office and realized that I had left my keys inside. Panic! I had my car keys, and I thought maybe I could just go get the kids (without my coat or purse or phone). The building was pretty empty and I was starting to despair, but then I ran into someone who works in the costume department. She saw that I was clearly stressed and distressed and asked me what was wrong and I said, “I’ve locked my keys in my office and now I’m going to be late to pick up the kids!”
“I think my key opens your office,” she said. “Here take them and see.”
And her keys worked. And relief flooded me. And I wasn’t late for the bus. Well, I was a little late, but the bus was waiting for me when I got there, so it was okay.

–Wool Baselayers – I’ve gotten back into running, but some days it is just so cold – like in the 30s. But I also hate being too hot. I’ve been able to find some not so expensive wool baselayers on sites like Backcountry or Sierra Trading Company. They’re great for cold weather running – keeps the heat in, but doesn’t weigh me down or make me overheat.

-A beautiful Vocal Recital – I had one show to do supertitles for last week. There was a bit of kerfuffle a couple hours before the recital where there was an added song so I had to put together the translation slides very last minute. But it was all good. My favorite piece was a setting of Jamaican songs.

–The six year old who is now seven – What a creative, cerebral little guy he is turning out to be! He can make anything into a rocket ship; he finds endless possibilities in sticks. He loves to sit and think and ponder the world. He’s a little bit of a rule-follower, maybe too much. He’s learning to read and loves to read books and comic strips and the side of cereal boxes and the gps directions from the back seat of the car. He loves music and dance parties. It can’t be easy to be the middle child, but he loves his sisters and gives them lots of hugs. I’m so grateful that he’s part of our family!

Looking Forward To:
–Galavant – This is an enormously fun tv show is a fairy tale musical about a knight on a mission to rescue his lady love from an evil, yet misunderstood tyrant. I had vaguely heard of this show when it came out in 2015; I might even had watched an episode or two. But this was still back when network/cable tv and watching episodes as they were released were a thing, and I was working in Colorado without at tv that summer and couldn’t keep up. Now the show become part of our Friday night routine. Fridays used to be tv and pizza night, but because of the 12 year old’s basketball schedule, we don’t have time for a full movie, so we’ve been trying to find tv shows to watch instead. I’m finding that family friendly tv shows don’t really exist anymore. Either they’re super sophisticated or moronically infantile. This manages to be a bit of both and much more. There is lots of tongue in cheek humour and “spot the star” guest appearances – John Stamos! – but also sword fights and musical numbers. Very much recommend.

–Watercolor classes – Start this Tuesday! I got the syllabus last week and I’m excited to have homework again!

–Knoxville: Summer of 1915. I have another recital coming up the second week of February and I just received the program and texts/translations to prepare the supertitle slides. I am so excited because on the program is one of my favorite pieces of music ever – Samuel Barber’s Knoxville Summer of 1915, a gorgeous gorgeous piece of music, all about the sad beauty and nostalgia of childhood. (I may have mentioned it here before…) I’ve never had a chance to hear it perform live and I’m so looking forward to this recital.

What We Ate:
Monday: Orzo Salad with Peppers and Feta from NY Times Cooking. I had a whole bunch of red peppers in the Hungry Harvest box so this was a good recipe to use them up. I’m reminded yet again that I don’t actually like orzo that much. It’s just too small to chew satisfyingly.

Tuesday: My mother’s chicken wings, steam green beans and tater tots. Red Velvet cake. It was the middle child’s birthday, and this was his birthday dinner request.

Wednesday: Tofu Stir fry. I think the Husband made this.

Thursday: Not quite sure – for some reason I didn’t write down this dinner.

Friday: Cabbage stir fried with noodles from Tenderheart. I have a few heads of cabbage in my fridge to use up. (Though the 12 year old likes to eat cabbage raw and gets annoyed when I actually cook it into something.) This was a great pantry recipe because I could use up all the various yam noodles and rice noodles in the pantry. I’m determined to cook from the pantry the next month or so. This meal was also really quick to come together so we had it before basketball practice. After practice we also had a bonus dinner – pizza and Galavant.

Saturday: Pizza (take-out) and The Barbie movie. I thoroughly enjoyed the Barbie movie – it kind of reminded me of The Velveteen Rabbit, with it’s central idea of how real life with all it’s messy, hard, complicated bits is still worth living.

Sunday: Snack dinner while we watched the football playoffs. Guacamole, chips, crudité plate, brie in pastry.

Monday: Yu Noodles – a local chain. This was where we went to get dumplings and noodles and buns after our trip to the museum. So tasty.

Tuesday: Fried snapper, eaten din lettuce wraps, with cut up carrots and cucumbers. The Husband cooked.

Wednesday: Steamed Tofu and Bok choy with tahini cilantro sauce. Simple, healthy. One kid only at the bok choy, one kid only ate the tofu.

Thursday: Happy Hour after work at a Mexican restuaruant.

Friday: Guacamole snack before basketball practice. Pizza and Galavant after practice.

Onward into February now!