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Showing posts from November, 2008

Toiky Day

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Here Joss is hanging out in the backyard on Thanksgiving morning. He liked rolling around in the leaves better than the great and terrible meal. He was feeling most put out that he didn't get to eat much (we've been taking the whole allergy thing more seriously since he Rob gave him a biscuit and he subsequently had a big red rash on his cheeks). This was the first year that we put on Thanksgiving entirely by ourselves and we learned a lot (a 'building year' you could call it) about menu and timing. Sharing a toast in the midst of their cheers of "T-O-K-I! Toki! Toki!" Maddie, Will and Sebi celebrate the joy of the season: Martinelli's apple juice. As happens too often, Sebi is too young/small/short of arm to make either the picture or the toast. Rob did an upside down turkey with sage. We had mashed potatoes and gravy, but I slashed the yams from the menu for the anti-mush vote. We had an artichoke/parmesan/sourdough stuffing from Sunset and spicy kale

An Open Letter on Produce

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Dear Fellow Americans, and in particular, grocery store cashiers and produce stockpeople: With the holiday this week, it is time to talk about our food. Specifically I want to discuss food that does not come in a wrapper. We're starting to forget what those foods are and what they look like, and I'm concerned that we're actually afraid of food that doesn't come in a box, can, or plastic shrink wrap. A few weeks ago I bought a butternut squash. This, below, is a butternut squash. I bake them filled with sausage and apples, or with butter, brown sugar, or maple syrup. My friend Liberty calls them 'nature's candy' and it's an apt name. However, when checking out, my friendly cashier held up said butternut squash and said "This is a yam, right?" Um, wrong. This is a yam. Completely different. It's a tuber, so it grows underground and is what my brother calls one of the 'humble vegetables'. It figures prominently in your Thanksgiving me

Will's Great Eighth Birthday

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On Wednesday our man Will-O turned eight! Impossible to believe he's so old when we still think of him as a chubby, jolly baby. But here he is showing his Pokeball to Fluffy, who was having a grand time with the cast-off paper. Christmas will be lots of fun. Will chose to have meatloaf with mashed potatoes, gravy, carrots and broccoli for dinner. He really wanted the buffalo meatloaf, but we can't buy it here any more, so Mama made homemade Meatloaf for the first time and the Joy of Cooking came through for us. He got chocolate cake for the family party, and lemon for his friends. We ended up giving him an old-school Atari game complete with "Pong" and "Asteroids." We are such lame parents that even if we actually do give in and buy video games, they MUST be lame ones. We are forcing reverse nostalgia on our kids so that we all can sit around in 2040 and say "remember the sounds those Space Invaders made back in our childhood?" How economical

From Rob: Surrender the Pink! Scrooge Concedes Concert Battle

Dear M.A. and Blogging Regulars: M.A.'s Reign of Pink Terror can end now.  I have purchased tickets to two holiday concerts. One of them features Berlioz, and will be more Oct 31 than Dec 25.  The other one, though, promises to be a true holiday concert complete with "Dee-Dee-Dee Doot Doot Doodledoo " Sleigh ride music where they use the little slapping boards at the following point in the song: "There's a birthday party at the home of FARRRR - ( WHAP ) - mer Grey It'll be the perfect ending of a PURRRRR - ( WHAP ) - ect Day" They will also make lots of clippity -clop noises and the obligatory trumpet whinny, and shake Sleigh bells during the part that goes: "Just hear those Sleigh Bells ringaling , Jing -ting- Tingaling too.." Jing-Ting-Tingeling?  Oy Gevalt .  If I must sit through "Sleigh Ride" cheery x-mas music concerts to please my zaftig little jungle plum (And to de -pink her blog) then consider it my throwing myself on

Saturday Afternoon

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This boy deserved to do something besides work on the house yesterday. So we packed up and drove up the canyon to mess around in the beautiful light. It was high Christmas-card-photo-shootin' season and there were all kinds of groups in all kinds of attire taking pictures. So we took some too. This year we just have to try, try, try. Maddie is showing off the hat that I knit from the Harry Potter Knits book that I checked out of the library. We've been having too much fun with it. I guess that this is modeled after a hat Ron is wearing when they eat magic animal crackers in the fourth? movie. And here is the payment the kids demand for giving us smiles. They want to take crazy pictures, and lots of them. But crazy or no, those blue eyes and pink cheeks cry out for the camera. And I had to post this one just for the pudge. He was so happy even with an ear infection. I'm going to have to keep a close watch on this one lest he turn out not hearing for months on end like Se

Happy Half-Birthday

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This week, Joss turned six months. It has been a big milestone. Before he even got there, he got his two front teeth, one on either side of his cousin's birth: Emmeline Rose, born November 9th and 7 lbs 14 oz. Absolutely perfect! This makes Joss our latest teether of all four kids. If I'm remembering right, Maddie got her first tooth around five months, Will's was earlier than that, and Sebi's was earlier still. Joss is having a good time discovering what they're for -- Cheerios, and Papa's finger during sacrament meeting. Joss has reconciled himself somewhat to his [admittedly pimped-out] ride. I think it shows signs of maturity, don't you? He is really big on his evening bath in the new jetted tub. He grooves on the purple baby bath that we use on him -- he loves to chase the bottle around in the tub. This was his half birthday cake. It left a lot to be desired in its engineering, but who could argue with the sentiment? The kids are happy to celebrate h

The Music Party

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Last Friday the kids had another violin performance. This one was with seven kids playing violin and piano, and was nice because they got to show off their hard work for their peers. This is Maddie playing a duet with friend and neighbor C called Bunny Hop, Hop, Hop. I still can't get her part out of my head, complete with the painful slide to a G sharp. At the tune up, Maddie's string broke, so she's using her teacher's violin here. And I didn't get a picture of Will performing, but he had the best two pieces. One had fake rock distortion and if you asked him, he would do a rock concert dance to it while he played. The other one was in five eighths and seven eighths time and his Uncle Jeff would have grooved on that. Just yesterday, Maddie brought up her violin and played it for her grandparents over the webcam and it sounded great ! Sometimes I need to take a break from the practice for a short while so that I can see the progress they're really making. Toda

My Holiday Snark

Yesterday, I suggested to my DH (Dear Husband for those of you who don't make acronyms out of every living thing) that he purchase more discount tickets for events on campus. I said "how about some holiday concerts?" He said "Oh? Do you have a hankering to hear the clip-clopping of coconut shell horse hooves? You want to hear the faux whinny of a trumpet, do you?" I told him that just because he likes his entertainment edgy doesn't mean that we can't find some way to celebrate the season. "Perhaps they'll put on 'The Night Before Christmas' as beat poetry." I told him. Or it could be an absurdist Christmas Carol. Possibly they'll bring Mark Morris's The Hard Nut to campus. Could be a twelve-tone Messiah. It could happen . . . But in the meantime, I have no problem celebrating the season of coconut shells. So I've retaliated by making the blog pink. I think I'll keep it that way until he takes me out, whether or not w