Stuology

Ada First Day of Dance Class

Anybody reading this follows me on Facebook, so none of what is to follow is a surprise. My little sis, Tess, passed away on January 5th. My other sister broke her ankle at my house during her wake and needed surgery. Then my FIL had a heart attack. Cooking and photography, the two hobbies that make up about 99% of my posts, have been shoved aside. It is taking me a bit to realize that the hobbies that I enjoy are important. I’m getting back to it slowly.

Ada started dance lessons on January 16th. This isn’t something I get to witness unless I want to stand on my tiptoes and press my face against the teeny window. Parents are allowed in on the last day of class for observing. I’m fine with that. It is her lesson, not mine. I bring a book. I ran to the cleaners. I am thinking about hitting a treadmill or elliptical with another parent once I found out it was free. Plus, it is a room lined with mirrors on all sides. I haven’t photographed anything in that situation. I used this occasion to get myself to use my camera, which has stayed tucked in the studio since Christmas photos. The first photo was a false start. We had to take a break and I had to tempt my model with make-up and a prop to make her happy. She did loosen up with the addition of the scarf, but I didn’t get really good ones until I told her to dance. Then I got this one, my favorite. After her first dance lesson, we took a gift card to the bookstore. We each picked out a book and one for her brother. Then had coffee/hot chocolate while we looked through them. After the second lesson, we went to The Toy Store — the happiest place on Mass. I tossed around getting fruit and yogurt or waiting a bit and getting noodles, but I wanted to run to Target, so we went there and then to Dillons and picked up a curry couscous, brown rice sushi and a white stilton with blueberries. You have no idea how much I love Ada’s taste in cheese. Except that I have to share now. I’m not sure what we will do next week, but I’ll be picking her up from a slumber party and carting her straight to dance. She might be too tired and just need to come home.

As for cooking, I’m trying to remember what interesting things I’ve made. I actually said, “Cooking is stupid!” one day. Yeah. I’m coming out of it, and have been looking through some of my new cookbooks. I did make a polenta stuffed pepper. The polenta needs to be season more than called for, and I even tasted it, but didn’t detect that it was under seasoned until the whole thing was together. I do like the polenta part, but I’m losing my taste for bell peppers, even sweet ones. It almost made me gag having to finish the pepper. I have no idea where this is coming from, but I think I’ll keep my bell peppers to tiny diced components of other dishes. The rest of the polenta I have pressed and refrigerated. I’m going to make breaded baked cutlets with it–crispy breading on the outside, soft polenta on the inside. Hmmm…

The next things I’m going to try are a Thai butternut squash soup — Butternut squash, coconut milk, spinach, red Thai curry paste and tofu. Then I’m going to meat it up with that Boeuf Bourguignon that I never made. I still have the Côtes-Du-Rhône that I bought for it.

I also realized a couple of days ago that I have neglected my sourdough starter. I was able to resurrect it and have a loaf on the rise now.

Chatting with a friend recently, I came to the realization that I may have finally filled up on kitchen gadgets. I’m sure there are more out there, but my limit is due to finally filling up my kitchen space. However, with the removal of the toddler seat that Jay refuses to use and a floor vase that is in my kitchen for decorative purposes only, I could insert a rolling cart into my kitchen. It will give me a little more prep space and storage space, and I can move it out of the way unlike a permanent island. Then I could get my unneeded, but would be nice, tortilla press. I’d like to think that 2010 would be the year of Not Buying More Kitchen Gadgets. I’d hate to set a unrealistic goal though.

I finally started getting on a cooking schedule again. I made two types of bagels, navajo stew and of course, black eyed peas. Today will be a sourdough boule using my new brotform^* that Santa was nice enough to order for me to take advantage of a free shipping sale. I also have a pork loin to cook. I’m stuffing it with a fruit compote, wrapping it with bacon and roasting it. The only goal I set in 2010 for cooking is to have 1-2 vegetarian meals a week. Thanks to people gifting me with three cookbooks that will help with that.

Mac is wrapping the kids up so he can throw them out into the snow. I need to start cooking some. I want to go re-org the photography room downstairs, but I also really want to just sit and have one day of relaxing.

Also, I started programming again a few days ago. I need to pick a project or make a project. Just to focus on something rather than random playing.

*Not to be confused with a bratform.

I wrote my last post minutes before I got the call from Mac about Tess. Most people follow on Facebook, so it isn’t brand new news that my SIL Tess is in ICU at KU Med because of acute liver failure. It has been 8 emotional days, most of it was getting one piece of bad news after another. It wasn’t until a couple of days ago that we got our first good news that it looks like her liver is starting to produce healthy cells instead of constantly dying. She is currently on dialysis and a ventilator. She’s still at great risk for infections and bleeding, but the news of her liver repairing itself was the first time we heard that she can have a full recovery instead of the news to prepare for the worst. She has a long road to a full recovery though.

I decided to have the kids open gifts early due to the snow reports. We decided to abandon Lawrence so we could be close to KU Med. We got a suite so the kids had room to romp. The hotel shop had Toblerone, so on Christmas Day while every one was snoozing, I went down and picked one each for the kids so they woke up with a Santa gift beside them in bed. I’m glad we did leave because the blowing snow was difficult to travel in, and having to only go from the plaza to KU Med was easier than Lawrence to KU Med. When we got home, the snow at the bottom of the driveway was almost one foot deep, and the drift up by the garage was above my knees. You couldn’t tell our porch from the front of our garage. It was just a wall of snow.

We are fortunate for our friends who immediately jumped to help, whether it was to bring food to family, support Mac at the hospital when I couldn’t be there, offers to watch kids and actually watching the kids so I could be there with Mac.

There has been no cooking since this happened. There has been no photographs (except for yesterday). Tonight will probably be my first cooked meal in awhile because I have to cook the meat that I got for Christmas Eve dinner within the next couple of days. I am looking forward to cooking a meal.

The kids are driving me completely crazy today. I want to get some more house chores done, but I need to get the kids out of this house to do something besides bicker and hang on me everywhere I go. I know Ada would love to build a snowman with me, but I have no appropriate snow wear. I still haven’t managed to replace my boots. Perhaps I should just bundle them up in their snow gear and boot them out the door. Or we could go shopping. I have about $40 in Build-A-Bear gift cards, and a $5 off coupon. And I could get some boots. And a friend of mine went to Lush yesterday, and now I’m jealous.

The recent good news is that Mac was finally able to go pick up the new car yesterday. We traded in the ailing Mazda for a 2009 Mitsubishi Eclipse Spyder. It was a program car, so it is the very base model without a lot of fancy extras. Mac is happy to have a convertible again. I wanted to take a photo, but he got back really late. It won’t be as shiny since he drove it to work, and it will still be dark when he gets home. I might have to go ahead and do a garage shot instead of a nice outdoor one. Now I have to learn how to pronounce Mitsubishi correctly.

Christmas is on Friday. It is always remarkable how fast the end of the year goes once we hit October. Christmas Eve dinner is at our house. I do love hosting it. My SIL is helping with cooking too. It will be fun. Mac doesn’t like it because it usually means he has to do house chores. This year will be a little different because as opposed to all the other ones, I’m not working. The house isn’t really in bad shape. The biggest clean-up that I need to do is our kitchen chairs.

I have quite a few things to get done today.

I’m cooking the beef stew and some pork. With leftovers, I won’t have to cook a meal again until Christmas Eve. I also have to cook a sourdough boule. It is a three day process of fermenting and proofing. Today is the cooking day.

I’m cleaning out the Mazda. We are getting a new car^* and the Mazda is getting traded-in. The Mazda is a 2000 Millenia S. The new car is a 2008 Mitsubishi Eclipse Spyder. Mac will be happy having a convertible again–staring in the late Spring/early Summer anyhow. Mac will probably purchase it this week. He test drove it, and the only thing stopping him is them not meeting his price requirements or someone else already buying it.

The presents need wrapped. First the ones that belong to other people since Ada and Jay can see those. Then the ones to Mac since maybe Ada and Jay can see them. I’m not convinced that Ada can be secretive enough to not tell Mac exactly what they are.

I have the last shelf for the kids room. I have to put it together and stack it on top of the first one. These also are the kind that need/can be hooked to the wall. They aren’t that heavy, and I’m contemplating whether I want to actually do that. I added these floor shelves for more storage in their room, but also because I expect them to pick up their things more, and it is easier when they have shelves they can reach easily. It is the same reason I cleaned out the bottom of the coat closet for drawer organizers. They put their hats and gloves away because they can reach it to do it themselves.

And as always, I have laundry.

I want to dig through the storage closet downstairs. I have a Goodwill run to make, and I’d like to see if there are any more items I can add to it. Then I need to make the Goodwill run.

Plus I have to entertain Ada and Jay. Or at least, referee Ada and Jay. That’s what makes the above list, which seems small, last all day.

*A new-to-us car. This one is a program car with only 2000 miles. I have never in my life bought a brand new car. In college, I couldn’t afford it. Now I can, but it doesn’t make much financial sense. Cars depreciate so fast that if you look for a low mileage one that is a 1-3 years older, you are saving a lot of money and still getting a good car. Even at the special 0% interest for a new car, you can spend less money in the long run on a used one that is financed with an interest rate. It just takes more effort to find a used car.

LPR Form

First, this is a form for Lawrence Parks & Recreation. You create an account, and then add your family members. Ada and Jay were easy. I wasn’t sure about the highest grade when it came to Mac & I. I got an e-mail that said I was registered and I could now log in and use the site freely. Except when I tried to do just that, it told me I already had a session and I had to wait 10 minutes. Fabulous.

The reason that I’m here is because Ada will not stop talking about dancing. Particularly, ballet. I know she just wants to jump around in the outfit. While we were store grazing today, I looked over to see Ada scooting about on her butt. I told her to stand up, and she said, “But I’m doing ballet!” Okaaaaay.

My hesitation is Ada’s SPD, which includes Proprioceptive Dysfunction. It has only been recently that I even trust that she can go down the stairs without falling. My girl just has a horrible time coordinating her body enough to stay on her feet walking across a room.

I’m hesitant, but not that she’ll get hurt, just that instructors may not understand what they are dealing with. They are not OTs. I really do not want to take her to a dance studio where they are really serious about it because Ada does have a disadvantage that may make it not enjoyable. I also do not want to deny her the chance to try it out. I decided that Parks & Rec would be a good place. I’m trying, without much success, to use their crappy application to get Ada signed up for a pre-ballet class. I think she will enjoy the experience, even though she will be disappointed that it does not involve scooting across the studio on your butt. Or maybe it does. This is one of those things that I never got to do during my childhood.

Garlic Soba Noodles

What’s Cooking Friday
These come from 101 Cookbooks. I use minced garlic and not powder. I only had one scallion, so I compensated with Pensey’s Toasted Onion seasoning. Hmmm…I love these noodles. They really are quick to make, especially if you leave the tofu out.

What’s Cooking Saturday
Pizza. I asked Mac what he wanted, and he said pizza. He asked Ada what she wanted, and she said pizza. Good thing pizza is easy as well because next week is going to be a busy cooking week for me. I love my new pizza cutter.

I also cooked brussels sprouts while waiting for the oven to warm up for the pizza. I skipped lunch, so I was feeling hungry. I tried my first brussels sprouts at Ada’s Thanksgiving feast, and really, they weren’t bad at all. I decided to figure out how to cook them, and the key to having them not be bitter is to braise them. My plan is to try them three ways:

• The America’s Test Kitchen way – braised in water
• The 101 Cookbooks way – braised in olive oil
• The French way – braised in heavy cream

Tonight I did the olive oil way, following this recipe. I browned mine a little more, used a course salt and used piave vecchio. It was really, really good. Making these are great for a fast lunch. It took about 15 minutes including washing and cutting and peeling off loose leaves. I can’t wait to try the other two.

What’s Cooking Sunday:
I’m making Boeuf Bourguignon if we get back from shopping in time. This is a stew, so it needs around 2-3 hours to simmer. If we don’t, I will make it with dinner and serve it Monday, where it will probably be even more delicious. Stew works great that way. I’m almost thinking that I will do it that way anyhow to free up Monday for other tasks. Maybe we can go out to eat.

A note that has nothing to do with food: I’m deciding when I’m going to have the kids go to bed. I would like to sleep in tomorrow.

I don’t typically have Bad Days so close together. Today has been rated as: Terrible. There was the small banging into things or dropping things or stabbing myself the thigh with a big lawn ornament hook^*. The big thing was me falling while correcting a shelf that wasn’t placed on Ada’s wall correctly. Besides cracking my head on their dresser, I pushed something over that I intended to use to help catch my fall and created a big dent in the wall. Then to thank me for assembling even more shelving for them, they tore apart the styrofoam packing and left “snow” all over the bedroom and living room floor.

Short detour: I started off college life in the dorms. I was assigned a roommate that I ended up not being able to tolerate. If she wanted something, instead of asking, she whined. If her checking account got below $700, she would call her parents and yell. She would call her mother stupid and a b***ch if she said no. She was on her third new car, having totaled her other two, all provided by her family. She was a political science major that had her boyfriend write her papers. She as going to be a lawyer, but did not want to go to law school. The way she treated people was appalling, and I could not believe there was an actual alive human being that acted the way she did. She was an entitled, spoiled, materialistic brat.

Today was the day I designated for cleaning up the room. Jay does a pretty good job, and today was no different. He’s not really good at where he puts things, but when I say it is time to pick things up, he start shoving toys in whatever he can find to shove them in. For a two year old, that is fine. If I point to his boots and ask him where they go, he will pick them up and put them in the closet with the other shoes. At bedtime tonight, he got a puzzle out and when I told him it was time to put it away, he put it back where he got it. That was really good for him.

Ada is a different story. At her age, she has the ability to put her toys away. I don’t expect her to be able to do a great job at organizing, so I went in the room with them because I wanted to help re-organize a bit and to fix the above mentioned shelf issue. Ada was given her options on her responsibilities: pick all the blocks up and put them back into their storage container or find all the books and stack them in a pile. Instead, she chose to refuse to do anything. And then she chose to throw a fit and whine. Then she chose to demand that I do it. Then she chose to break something. All I could see was a version of my past roommate. As a consequence, Ada lost her toy privileges for Christmas. She has been informed that if she cannot appreciate the ones that she has by taking care good care of them, she doesn’t get any new ones. And I am following through.

Before I get the Aww Poor Child routine, listen to this: Ada isn’t poor. That’s part of the problem. She isn’t appreciating what she has because she doesn’t really go without. She thinks that anything can be replaced by going to the store. There are too many spoiled, whining, entitled brats in this world. My child is not going to be one of them. All of the toys she gets for Christmas will be confiscated until she has proven that she can take care of them. I’d rather her learn the lesson when she is four than when she is an adult and most of the world cannot stand being around her.

And if you think I’m being too tough, guess what? Life is tough and being a parent is hard. Is it easier for me to just pick up their things? Yes. Is it easier to just give her toys and say, “don’t do it again” so I don’t have to listen to her whine and cry? Yes. What will she have learned from that?

*I caved and got the kids a snowman that lights up for outside decoration. It is my very first, outside holiday decoration I have ever purchased^**.The snowman was cheap, and made just for his price point. His extremities fall off merely by looking at it funny. He came with u-shaped spikes to keep it hooked to the ground. Not intended for leg use.

**I’m not too thrilled about decorating for anything other than Halloween. Christmas was a time when I packed Halloween away. This is a monumental event for me.

I had a pork top loin roast to cook, one that I picked up on sale. It is lean, hence dry when overcooked. I decided to slow cook it, shred it apart (which is easy when cooked all day in the slow cooker), then let it warm another hour soaked in Jack Stack BBQ sauce. I intended to make my own buns, but the dough did not rise in time, so Mac picked some up on the way home and I made rolls out of the dough later on in the evening. I roasted veges to go along with it: onions, garlic, turnips, sweet potatoes, red, yellow and purple fingerling potatoes. It was quite colorful.

I froze most of the extra meat, leaving a small amount for lunch today. I’m making pizza: one bbq pork and pineapple and the other pepperoni. This will also serve as dinner for the kids. Mac and I are going out for sushi for a friend’s birthday. If only everyone would celebrate the day of their birth with sushi. Yes, I like it that much.

I have not planned beyond today, but I’m thinking some sort of bean dish. I have leftover cooked ham in the freezer. I am going to take it out today and use it up in the next few meals.

All the StuDay^TM activities are over. I did score some goodies, which is never required and always really appreciated. I now have two Moosewood cookbooks, so I should be set on many more vegetarian meal options. I should smell wonderful with my new bath products. Mac surprised me with a bigger gift, and the kids got me a cookbook with 366 cookie recipes.

We hit brunch today with friends and family. Thanks for those who came. I’m so stuffed with food that I didn’t eat again until dinner. Tonight’s meal was a pineapple and chili stir-fry. This was a tofu dish. My meat gauge is still on full.

Ada and I flipped through the cookie book and finally settled on a hazelnut crisp. They are really thin cookies with roughly chopped hazelnuts. It was terrible. Hazelnuts go great with chocolate and really great with goat cheese but is gag-worthy with cinnamon. Mac noted that they looked like fake vomit which would be great for a gag, especially with the realistic reaction upon eating them. I redeemed myself by making Mexican wedding cakes. I know those are delicious.

I went to the store to pick up some veges for the next few days. I picked up spinach, broccoli, turnips and Brussels sprouts^*. The sad part was the teenager checker didn’t know what they were. Seriously, he had to ask me on all items but the spinach, and I’m guessing because that was in a bag with a barcode. You might be able to understand turnips and Brussels sprouts, but fresh broccoli? Really? I marked down another parenting goal: My kids don’t have to like all vegetables on the planet–few of us do–but they are going to be able to identify them.

*I had my first one at Ada’s Thanksgiving feast at school. They were not bad at all. I have no idea what everybody is so up-in-arms about. They were in a dish of roasted veges that also included carrots and purple cauliflower. The vinaigrette and added pomegranate seeds made the dish wonderful. I’ve been reading on how to cook them to avoid the taste that everybody seems to despise. Wish me luck.

Today is another 24th Annual StuDay^*! Activities today include getting the kids ready to take Ada to school, which is always a Christmas Story Event when it comes to getting snow pants and boots on Jay. Then I made Jay and I breakfast, a shiitake mushroom omelet w/ bacon. Then I sorted through kids shoes to make sure there were matching pairs for all, did two loads of laundry, one load of dishes, picked up Ada, ran a donation to Goodwill, took cardboard boxes to recycling, sweetened my sour dough starter, cleaned out the glass jar I keep the starter in, another load of laundry. Now I am about to put together lunch for the kids and maybe make brownies. Ada wants to help me do that. I’m a little tired and don’t really feel like it. Then I need to bathe Ada so she is ready for her slumber party tonight and birthday party tomorrow. What I’m not going to do is make dinner or clean anything. Well, except the countertops and sweeping the kitchen floor. Exciting, isn’t it?

I am having sushi tonight for dinner. Then tomorrow Mac and I are spending a kid-free evening on the Plaza, including dinner at Fogo de Chao. On Sunday, we are having brunch with family and friends at Maceli’s.

The kids are arguing, and they have already been banished to the playroom downstairs. I’m not sure where else I can put them that will not annoy me, except to bed. I’d love to have some gaming time, but I don’t think that will happen until after Mac gets home. I bought a bottle of Barrel Monkeys wine from Red Heads Studios last night. After seeing that label, how could I not? I’ll probably break that open tonight as well.