2010 to-do list: in progress

i have been a bad blogger lately. i'm sorry. often i feel that there is not much interesting going on around here. we have been getting our farm boxes, and i love them still. and i am trying to make some very positive changes in my life.

one of the biggest changes i am trying to make is to be more disciplined. since that is kind of a vague goal, i defined it somewhat in my 2010 to-do list (aka new year's resolutions). specifically, i said i wanted to create and maintain a household management schedule and plan meals weekly and keep our grocery bill down. (i know "down" sounds kind of nebulous too, but trust me, there is a dollar amount attached to it as well.) so far i have been succeeding at both though i am hesitant to cross them off the list as "done" just yet. it's still early in the year.

my household management schedule was pretty simple. i am basically an overgrown five-year-old, and i like getting gold stars when i do things. so i made myself a chore chart and broke it down by day. this is what my week looks like:

monday: indoor chores
- wash sheets
- sweep tile
- mop tile
- vacuum
- clean toilets
- clean bathroom sinks
- clean upstairs shower (the others get used very rarely)
- dust
- bring in garbage cans
- water plants

tuesday: outdoor chores
- mow lawns
- trim roses
- pull weeds
- edge lawns
- sweep front porch
- sweep garage
- spa chemicals

wednesday:
- laundry
- iron brian's work shirts
- menu-planning/grocery list
- pick up csa box

thursday:
- grocery shopping

it became a lot more manageable when i realized that "running" the house is really just a lot of little tiny chores. cleaning the house is this huge big thing and where do you even start, but how long does scrubbing a toilet really take. i pull a bucketful of weeds each week, and they stay under control and i don't break my back. this way i also have three days "off" at the end of the week, when my chores are all done, though lately i've been doing my grocery shopping on wednesdays while we're out getting the csa box, so i've been getting four off days, which came in handy when the lawn was too wet to mow last tuesday.

getting the csa box is also forcing me to be more disciplined. we are eating healthier and i am forced to plan meals and shop with a grocery list, which is keeping our grocery bill down. it's still not under my target budget, but i'm working on that. i feel guilty letting all that good food go to waste (although we have gotten butternut squash four weeks in a row and while i like it, i'm getting kind of tired of it), so i have to plan for it. otherwise what would i have done with the turnips that were in last week's box, because we don't eat turnips on a regular basis. i have to plan for something to do with them.

so that is how i am doing on my new year's resolutions, so far. one of my other resolutions, to plant a garden, is coming along quite nicely and i will have pictures to share soon. i'm pretty excited about it. how are your new year's resolutions panning out?

yum.

hopefully hannah will be like me and love fruit desserts and such, because i made this blueberry pudding cake for breakfast on new year's day and would like it to become a tradition. brian is not big on fruit stuff. on the other hand, even if she doesn't, it just means more for me, and it is not difficult for me to eat the entire thing all by myself. over the course of a couple days, obviously, what kind of glutton do you take me for?


this is so insanely delicious and easy too. and the best part is, it is all stuff i always have in my house. well, not the whole milk, but i just use 1%. i usually have frozen blueberries on hand for smoothies, and that is pretty much the only "strange" ingredient. i found this recipe a couple years ago in an issue of gourmet magazine, i think, and oh my heavens is it ever good. yum yum yum.

blueberry pudding cake
serves 6-8 (breakfast or dessert)

1/3 c. plus ½ c. sugar
¼ c. water
1 T. lemon juice
1 tsp. cornstarch
10 oz. blueberries (2 c.)
1 c. flour
1¾ tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
1 egg
½ c. whole milk
1 stick (½ c.) butter, melted
1 tsp. vanilla

preheat oven to 375º and butter a 9-inch square baking pan. in a saucepan, stir together 1/3 c. sugar with water, lemon juice, and cornstarch, then stir in blueberries. bring to a simmer, then simmer 3 minutes, stirring occasionally. remove from heat. whisk together egg, milk, butter, and vanilla in a large bowl. whisk together flour, baking powder, salt, and remaining ½ c. sugar, then stir into the wet ingredients, whisking until just combined. spoon batter into the baking pan, spreading evenly. pour blueberry mixture evenly over batter; berries will sink. bake until a knife inserted into the center of the cake portion comes out clean, about 25-30 minutes. cool 5 minutes.

* my note: i might cut the sugar in the cake portion down to 1/3 c. in the future. it seems a bit sweet to me, almost overwhelmingly so, but not really in a bad way.

2010 to-do list

i did not get a fish for christmas. (YET.) but we did have a lovely wonderful week with visiting family, yummy food, sparkly lights, and lots of love. and i did get two new books that i have been dying to read. books always make me happy. one can never go wrong with books.

i sewed a bunch of reusable produce bags for christmas gifts this year. stupidly, i did not take photos of them before i boxed them up and gave them as gifts. i hope everyone loves them as much as i do. i did regular muslin bags for dry produce and a mesh bag for small things like green beans, snap peas, or cherries. they were made out of a polyester athletic mesh so one can rinse the produce through the bag. i also made wet bags out of a silicone-impregnated ripstop nylon. that stuff was a bear to sew on. it was practically lighter than air (each bag ended up weighing just over half an ounce after the tie at the top was threaded in) and slippery as all get-out. ripstop is slippery anyways, but the silicone made it even more so. and i did not want to stick pins in it for fear of making holes. oy.

as 2009 comes to a close i have been reflecting a bit on the past twelve months. it has been a good year, and in some ways a not good one. i did not accomplish everything on my to-do list nor did i make a sizeable enough dent in it to be able to feel proud of what i did. namely, i have struggled with enjoying being a mother and that disappoints me. on the other hand, if i did not tick off even half of everything on my list, it is partly because i have been using my time to raise a happy, healthy, beautiful daughter whom i do adore.

in 2010 i will be making changes in my life. big ones, i hope. i need to be learning to not take on too much, to be content with what i have been given, to be kinder to those i love when i am not feeling kind. currently the etsy shop is closed, and it will remain closed for the time being until i can figure out how to manage the shop without allowing it to take over my spare time. until then, i am creating a new to-do list for 2010, one that will be printed out and posted where i can see it daily to remind myself of my goals for this year:

- create and maintain a household management schedule
- fill the planter box with dirt and plant a garden
- manage the etsy shop without allowing it to take over my life
- create and maintain a system for dealing with the paper/mail/crap that comes into the house and collects in the kitchen (yeah, this one didn't get done last year)
- sew buttonholes into the guest room comforter and ties for the duvet
- hang "artwork" in the guest room
- finish the quilt for the master bedroom
- start (and finish!) kerry's quilt
- take swim classes with hannah this summer
- replace the toilet seat in the upstairs bathroom
- find a good church and start going regularly again
- give myself regular pedicures
- finish out the door frame in the upstairs bathroom
- move the "decor store" to the unused cabinet above the fridge
- create and maintain a healthy, reasonable exercise routine (yeah, this one didn't get done last year either)
- get hannah baptized/christened/dedicated
- plan meals weekly and keep our grocery bill down
- take the pacific northwest road trip with my husband and daughter
- support, encourage, and love my husband
- enjoy being a mother

the one thing notably missing from my 2010 to-do list is one that i have not yet decided on. kerry wants me to run a half-marathon with her in march. i am not a runner and have not run since about high school when i was required to for pe class. i detest running, so training for this half-marathon would be a tremedous undertaking on my part. i want to do it, partly as a point of pride. i would like to be able to say i did it, and maybe i would come to enjoy it. stranger things have happened. on the other hand, i don't know if it is reasonable to commit to training for a half-marathon with an almost-8-month-old baby. i know others do, but on the other hand others are not necessarily starting from scratch in the running department along with everything else. thoughts?

gobble gobble

i am thankful for so much more than just three things this year, but right off the top of my head i can think that i am thankful for:

1. my family, especially my fabulous husband who works so hard to provide for us (especially now that i am a sahm), and especially my beautiful daughter, even after she was up twice last night and took two hours to go back to sleep the second time. i am also thankful for my extended family whom i do not get to see as often as i would like, especially my grandfather who has lymphoma but is still here to celebrate another holiday with us.

2. our home, our beautiful home. i am acutely aware of money now that i am unemployed, and cringe a little inwardly every time i see the mortgage statement come in the mail, even though i know that brian manages our money responsibly and well and that we are not in danger of losing our home. i love this house and everything about it and i love making it a home for my family.

3. not having to cook thanksgiving dinner this year! i am so very uninspired this year and i think the kiddo is partly to blame for that and was not looking forward to the idea of cooking a big meal. brian has to work today (unfortunately) so that he can be off for christmas, so our thanksgiving dinner guests will consist of: me, him, and hannah. hannah has a little jar of baby turkey to try for the first time and brian is bringing home a plate of turkey dinner from his chef for each of us, so we can at least have a little celebration together. so no cooking and we don't even have to spend the grocery money either. win win.

have a happy and safe thanksgiving! what are you thankful for this year?

still here.

it's been a busy month, and i keep meaning to post, and it's not that i don't have anything to post about, i just keep forgetting. i guess this is what happens when your plate is maybe a bit too full?

i made our halloween costumes this year which i generally do though i have not made any in a couple years, just recycled the old ones. i have a stash of stuff that can make a pirate wench, a princess, or a gypsy. this year we wanted to do family costumes so there was much discussion regarding what we were going to be. someone in our family is not very creative and kept shooting down all the creative ideas from someone else, who granted is not as clever as this girl. in the end the kiddo ended up being a pumpkin.


of course, after i had purchased the pumpkin costume for hannah, kerry suggested a bunch of cute things. like, brian could be a polar bear, and i could be a penguin, and hannah could be a fish. the food chain! she also suggested that brian and i could be some sort of insects and hannah could be a grub. MY BABY IS NOT A GRUB thank you very much. i thought it would be clever if hannah was a pumpkin, brian was a frog, and i was a witch, but no one else seemed to think that was as amusing as i did. in the end we were just a jack-o-family.


i was not in love with our costumes though i guess they turned out cute. brian said he looked gay in his costume even though he got to be the scary pumpkin. i used felt for everything and after much ribbing from my sister, gave up looking for a pattern and made up one myself. basically they are just pullovers that i copied from old tee shirts, lined with tulle and stuffed with fiberfill with an elastic casing at the bottom. this was also my first attempt at applique-ing anything and i'm happy with the way the faces turned out. i used wonder-under first, i don't know if that is how appliques are usually done but that is how i did it. after i fused the felt face pieces on i zigzagged the edges. i used my walking foot for these costumes and really, i don't know how i've lived my life without it. i use it for so many things now.

i realized too late that we should have dressed hannah up like this (costume borrowed from a friend for a photo):


and brian could have been a gorilla and i could have been a monkey. HANNAH BANANA!! my good ideas always come a day late.

we also had a huge storm a couple weeks ago, the first of the season. it was hugely rainy and impossibly windy and almost all of the trees around here still had their leaves, including the beautiful japanese maple that was in our front yard. (it actually looks rather pathetic in that picture, which must be insanely old too, because the tree was quite a bit bigger than that.) i came home from work that afternoon to find this:


of course, it didn't even touch the pathetic, ugly tree that is also in our front yard, in a strange spot way too close to the rosebushes. i would have been happy to lose that tree. my husband was a champ and cut up the tree into pieces and even dug out the stump, which left us with a giant hole in the yard, two weeks before halloween when tons of children ignore the walkway and tramp up our lawn.


lawsuit, begone!

i don't know what we will do now that halloween is over. probably fill in the hole with some turf builder on top, though there has been talk of putting a pumpkin in it for thanksgiving and a snowman for christmas and making it a theme hole. we are also those people who take their baby to a rock concert. don't you wish we could be YOUR neighbors?

i am now a sahm officially - i quit my job because half of my income was going right back out the door to daycare, which sucks. technically i was let go as my boss changed my quit into a discharge the week before my last day, which is technically legal but in my humble opinion kind of jerk-ish of him, so i'm glad to be out of there.

i have also been working like a crazy girl on the etsy shop. there is a ton of cool stuff up if i do say so myself, go check it out! i am still ridiculously excited about it, and i even made a couple custom halloween costumes. also, i am going to be a vendor! how exciting is that! it's a super-tiny event - mil is a legal secretary, and they always have a couple vendors at their local annual dinner, and she got me a table. there will only be around 30 people in attendance, but the table was free (no vendor fee), and i don't have to share a percentage of my sales, so anything i make from this is gravy. it's in two weeks, and i am ridiculously excited, and we will even have tee shirts, if i can get some iron-on transfer paper that actually works!

sadly, bottle rockets are not permitted.

this week i am thankful for:

1. a husband who came home early tonight!

2. fireworks this weekend! i love fireworks.

3. freedom. america was founded on an idea: that all men (and women) were created equal and are entitled to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. i love that. happy birthday, america.

2009 to-do list

2008's year of living gently will continue into 2009. i think it is not a bad theme for one's life instead of just one year. for 2009 i am giving myself a concrete, finite list of things to focus on.

- build a planter box or two (raised beds) outside and plant a vegetable garden and an herb garden.
- paint the downstairs bedroom.
- breathe once in a while.
- get a pedicure before baby arrives. can't have icky toes in the delivery room!
- send one card a week to a friend.
- create and maintain a system for dealing with the paper/mail/crap that comes into my house and collects in my kitchen.
- learn to manage roses.
- learn to enjoy being pregnant and being a mother.
- create and maintain a healthy exercise routine.
- let go once in a while.
- speak and act kindly and generously, even (epecially) when i do not feel kind or generous.
- cut our grocery bill by at least $50 per month.
- decorate our master bedroom.
- paint the family room wall.

oh yes, i even made myself one

they have all been given out! well, most of them. the ones that haven't don't read this anyways. (at least, i don't think they do, and if they do - hi dad! hi ellen! hi harry! stop reading unless you want your gift spoiled!) so i can finally post pictures of the christmas gifts i made this year. keep in mind that i am nowhere near as talented and creative as some others out there, namely jaimey, whose creativity and cleverness and resourcefulness i envy, possibly even more than i envy my sister's sense of humor and closet and shoe collection. or at least as much.

at some point this year my mother picked up the perfect mix and sent it to me, which at the time i thought was a little random, but then the november issue of cooking light had this mix recipe in it, and it just looked so pretty that i thought i can do that! which is usually how my crafty obsessions endeavors start anyway. i also hoped people would appreciate that in a recession we were giving them one less thing to pay for: a dinner on us, and hopefully a fun evening of cooking together. they were cost-effective for us (especially since i had to do 15+ gift bags, between my family, brian's family, work, friends, and our two lovely neighbors) which is also nice when money is tight like it is now. on the other hand, they were a bit labor-intensive with all that measuring, mixing, swearing when i realize i am out of something i thought i had, running to the grocery store more than once, bagging, ribbon-tying, and labeling. and of course, the recipes for each mix were included. so i guess it all evens out, what i didn't spend in money i more than made up for in time and energy and love, cue sappy music.

cozy caribbean dinner: black bean soup, corn bread, and red stripe beer. in many of the dinners the spices were bagged separately from the rest of the mix.


southwestern chili dinner: chili, corn bread, and a festive striped dishtowel


new england dinner: boston baked beans, heirloom brown bread, and molasses


winter night dinner: split pea soup, honey whole wheat bread, honey and jam, apple cider, and mulling spice


single guy's baking: whole wheat beer bread, beer, and jam


warm drinks: mocha coffee, cappuccino, spiced tea, minted citrus tea, spiced cranberry cider, and a mug


another winter night dinner: bean soup, honey whole wheat bread, honey, and jam


i don't know what happened to the pictures of the other two i took, the cajun dinner (red beans & rice, french baguettes, and louisiana hot sauce) and the italian dinner (mushroom risotto & chianti). they seem to have disappeared which is not surprising given my [nonexistant] technological prowess. that is also unfortunate because i gave them away also. the one i saved for myself was the bean soup, which sounded so darn good to me, and now brian knows why we have little bits of 86 different kinds of beans leftover in our pantry.

a very merry christmas

how was your christmas?

mine was wonderful - my family was all here. not for long enough, of course. i would have everyone in my family and brian's family live within a mile of our house if i could, so i could see them all the time. (would i hate that after a while? it sounds so nice at the moment.) my mom drove up with my grandparents and picked up my sister in san francisco on the 23rd, and left on 26th. it was really only two days, because they got here the evening of the 23rd and left the morning of the 26th. not even the requisite three days (fish and family). mil was with us for four days so that was nice even if my other family had to leave so soon.

that was the best part about christmas. the second best part was finding out we are having a little girl. the third best was the goodies. grandma brought her famous pumpkin bread which is gone now of course. mom made a tea ring (gone) and cranberry scones, also gone. and of course we had scores of christmas cookies.

last but not least were the gifts, though that is my least favorite part about christmas i think. personally i vastly prefer thanksgiving to christmas on the holiday scale, because the shopping stress is removed. thanksgiving to me is just about the perfect holiday: good food shared with beloved friends and family. i get very stressed and anxious trying to come up with that "perfect gift" for everyone and i always seem to fall short and i hate it. i try to make up for it with good meals and try to create an environment where everyone is happy. maybe that is why i get so stressed, because i spend a lot of energy trying to please everyone.

as far as gifts go, my friends and family were more than generous this year and i think i really fell short in return. my sister gave me a beautiful handbag and some gorgeous earrings and mil gave me some really cute maternity sweaters, so now i am a chic pregnant girl instead of just a fat one. my mother made me a cute apron set and also gave me a knife sharpener which i have to highly recommend, it is so easy to use and works so well. and my husband... well, he always spoils me more than he should and more than we can afford, but i love him anyways, and he is the one whose christmas i wish i could have made more perfect. i love you, sweetie, and i'm glad i get to spend every christmas with you.

merry christmas!

2008 threw us some curves:
changed our jobs, moved to the 'burbs,
landed in "--- -----," bought our first home.
whaddya know, we won't be alone –
the roster's expanding with baby on the way.
our littlest giant will be arriving in may!

christmas cheer

we decorated the house this weekend but we still have to put up the lights outside. this will be a new experience for us as brian never did it as a kid and my dad always did it when i was a kid. nor have we ever had a home together where we could put up outside lights.

i really like these candy canes in our front yard. they were a housewarming gift from a coworker and i think they are very fun and cute.


this candelabra centerpiece was also a housewarming gift. it looks warm and cozy when the candles are lit.



i usually dread dragging out all the christmas decorations and i resist until after thanksgiving. if brian had his way, we would have had decorations up three weeks ago, which to me is just wrong. i always forget how much i enjoy decorating until i actually start opening the christmas boxes and finding the things that i love. it's like christmas early.

we have a fake tree which i detest on the grounds of traditionalism (real trees are how it should always be) but love because i am a cheapskate and it means we don't have to spend money on a tree every year. every year we vow to throw it out or goodwill the fake tree, and every year we put it back in the box because we can't bear to part with a perfectly good tree and spend more money next year. this year we threw away the cardboard box that it gets stored in, because it was falling apart. maybe that means we will get a new tree (or a real one) next year. we said it was because the box was dying so we would pack it into plastic bins like the rest of the christmas stuff.

i really hate putting lights on the tree. i try my best every year to wind them properly so they don't get tangled and every year they do, which inevitably leads to fights and headaches and general aggravation. along with getting rid of the current fake tree, every year i swear that if we have to have a fake tree, next year we are getting a pre-lit one. brian thinks stringing lights is half the fun but he always ends up pissed off too, so i'm not sure how much fun it really is to him.

we usually end up getting new garland each year because that stuff is so cheap and just falls apart at the end of the season. i could happily do without garland at all and brian would love to have so much garland that no tree shows through. i don't know where he thinks he would hang the ornaments then.

this year our tree might have a bit of an identity crisis because brian bought blue garland and we had some white and silver leftover from last year. is it hannukah or christmas? i think it is not sure. good thing it is a fake tree with no feelings. i really like my light-up star for the top. i just wish it was blinky and twinkly, but at least it lights up, which makes me happy.


the best part about unpacking the mountains of christmas crap and rediscovering the decorations i love is unpacking and rediscovering the ornaments. my favorite one is front and center, just below the star, where she always goes. that little stuffed angel is from my parents when i was 5 and i have always loved her the best of anything. some of the most special ones don't go on the tree anymore, like the dough ornaments my mother made when i was 4 or 5 that are now starting to disintegrate. otherwise it's fun to find them again. here is the one kerry gave us for christmas the first year we were married, from kazakhstan. here is the one we got on our honeymoon. here is the one we picked up last year in ireland, and the stuffed napoleon brian was so thrilled to find when we went to paris last year. the clay hearts i made when i was little and the gold family ornaments from brian's childhood, including grandpa's (who died in 1997). also every year bonnie gets brian that year's collector ornament from the giants and the 49ers so we have a lot of sports-themed ornaments. every year i threaten to get brian a 3-foot tree and orange halloween lights, so we can have a tree specifically dedicated to the giants. he complains but i think he secretly likes the idea and i think it would look pretty neat.

we also went to the christmas parade in old town on saturday night. it was colder than i expected and i wished i had brought a scarf. we were looking for the neighbor girls who were marching in the parade but couldn't find them which was disappointing.


there were a lot of classic cars all lit up and we really liked that. brian and i really love classic cars. three of the local high schools also had their marching bands and color guards in the parade, and there were a lot of girl and boy scout troops. when i was in elementary school my girl scout troop marched in the escondido christmas parade a couple times, but i remember it being in the daytime and hot and i didn't like carrying the banner. maybe i am remembering the wrong parade. anyway, this parade was fun and hometown-y and i rather hope it gets to be a tradition.

wishin' and hopin' and thinkin' and prayin'

every year i struggle to think of what i would like for christmas. generally i'd like to think that i am a relatively easy person to shop for, but i know some people (especially those of the husband variety) tend to like more specific direction. those people also tend to get tired of the old standbys for me, books and gift cards. (are gift cards not the absolute greatest invention ever? the giver gets the satisfaction of giving you a gift, and you can use it for a treat whenever you want to!) so around this time each year i rack my brain to think of what would make me smile and what would be useful in my life.

a couple rules for my gifts:
1. they generally need to be useful.
2. generally, stay away from gadget-y things that have only one function, like a garlic slicer (which i treated myself to one year and promptly scraped up my finger using).
3. pink is always good.
4. sparkly is always nice.

this year i am hoping to find under our tree:
- a pink garmin nuvi 200. i would even share it with brian.
- my sewing scissors sharpened. all three pairs, including the pinkers.
- my kitchen knives sharpened. the serrated ones are fine, but the plain ones desperately need sharpening.
- cute maternity clothes, especially blouses and tops. i'm kind of afraid that i will get very tired of the few things i have very quickly.
- a wii fit. oh yes, it's trendy. and i hear from coworkers about how much fun it is, and i think brian and i would have a blast. and we would get healthy!
- a new handbag. i'm tired of my old one but it is such a nice size, and i haven't found one that i love enough to justify spending $30 on. (probably my sister just choked on the thought of spending only $30 on a handbag, but she is single and works for nordstrom and has standards to uphold, and i am a cheap date and shop at places like target and kohl's and have a husband to answer to.)
- that mineral makeup starter kit from bare escentuals. i think costco carries it, even. how shallow, i know, but i've been wanting to try mineral makeup for a while and i generally don't splurge on makeup for myself, so this would be a treat.
- a gift card to joann fabics. i know there are way better fabric stores, but not close to my house. and i know that on the 26th i am going to want to get started sewing little blue or pink clothes.

my super dreams:
- an elna q6600 computerized sewing/embroidery machine. yeah, i know it costs more than my first car. just think of it as an investment. i mean, look at everything it can do! i'd never have to even think about a new machine again.
- a zap zapino electric scooter in sky blue. omg, isn't it cute? and it plugs in, saving money and gasoline (and the environment)! please note that i would also require a matching sky blue helmet. wouldn't i look great zipping and zapping down the street to work? yes, i think i would.
- a nissan murano le in platinum graphite. perfect for our family to grow into and brian fits into it comfortably (and likes it too). if it were just me, i'd get a sentra, personally.
- oh, and while we're on the subject of dreaming, i would also like a 1963 aston martin db4 vantage or a 1957 jaguar xk 140. man, aren't those pretty cars.

being thankful

this year i am thankful for:

1. my family. even though none of us is together for the holiday this year. i have a great family.

2. my mother-in-law. i so lucked out in that department. she is amazing.

3. my husband, even when he drives me nuts. these days that is more a product of my pregnancy irritability than anything he actually does. i really won the husband lottery and i know it (even though i forget to tell him sometimes).

thanksgiving dinner confessions

i have been to the grocery store twice so far and both times i have forgotten dr pepper, onions, and parsley. disclaimer: i know dr pepper is not a traditional thanksgiving dinner ingredient, but the b-man loves the stuff and our home is not a home without dr pepper.

we are only having three for dinner so i bought a turkey breast. i have no idea how to cook it. i did it once a couple years ago and it was dry and awful so i never did it again. i found this recipe that sounds yummy and pretty foolproof.

i don't like yams or sweet potatoes and have no clue how to make them "properly" (read: the way brian likes them). i have tried the joy of cooking recipe and the cooking light recipes with no luck yet. this year i'm going to try this one and see if it works.

i also don't understand why candied yams have miniature marshmallows in them. that just seems gross to me.

i am the only one this year who will eat green bean casserole, but we're still having it.

only my side of the family likes cranberry sauce, but i still serve it even though they won't be here. i feel like i have to and it won't be thanksgiving without it. why?

my husband complained about having to do the "traditional" turkey dinner this year and i think he would like something different. but last year when i tried to mix it up a little (mashed root vegetables instead of plain old potatoes, fig/sage/walnut stuffing instead of plain old regular dressing), he got annoyed.

thank heavens for pumpkin pie, is all i have to say.

halloween 2008

this year was the best halloween thus far in our married life, possibly since i have known brian. when i was in college living in san francisco, we did not get any trick-or-treaters. now i realize it was probably because i lived in kind of a ghetto area of sf (not super-scary, but not exactly the friendlist spot in town), though at the time it did not seem so ghetto to me. funny how much you can overlook in the thrill of being young and getting your first apartment. when i lived in daly city i didn't get any either. maybe there weren't a lot of kids in my building. when we lived in san francisco we didn't get any either, and we lived in the outer excelsior district which is not sketchy at all. maybe we did and i just always worked too late.

when we lived in marin we didn't get any trick-or-treaters either, which i always thought was odd because we lived in a nice suburban town in a nice apartment complex with lots of kids. i always thought if i was a parent that it would be great to just take my kids around the complex. it was safe and well-lit and i always thought you'd get a great take from the 100+ apartments there. maybe it was all the stairs to those second-floor apartments that were too daunting for little kids, who knows.


now that we are smack in the middle of a suburban development, this halloween was more like i remember as a kid. we even got to decorate the exterior of our home (something very hard to do in an apartment). i didn't dress up for work (it's kind of hard in an office, so i wore my orange sweater and black pants to be festive) but brian did for his residents. he usually doesn't do all the makeup or wear the cap, but he went all out this year. this costume cracks me up on him:


he stood outside behind one of our entry columns and mooed at people as they walked up to the door and scared them. our neighbors called him the mad cow. he is nuts, that man of mine.

i have not been very creative the past few years for my halloween costumes and have just been recycling my old ones. this pirate wench i made about 12 years ago:


i thought my gypsy/esmerelda costume would be warmer, but i couldn't get the cummerbund around my waist. boy, did i feel fat and pregnant friday night. brian really liked the eyeliner, though.

this the one guy in our house who did not appreciate halloween:


he didn't mind his "costume" but he did mind the doorbell ringing all the time and the kids yelling, "trick or treat!" at first he hid behind brian's chair but later he slunk upstairs and hid under the bed. he finally came out later when the doorbell stopped ringing so much, because brian and i hung out outside and chatted with our neighbors and gave out candy before the kids got to the doorbell. poor little man, he's really in for it when spot comes.

how was your halloween?