The Sunday Evening Post, issue 8

Number Eight of the Sunday Evening Posts. Or, 10 things good about the world.

#1
A remote vault in NORTHERN Norway will be storing the world's seed biodiversity. You know, in case of a huge catastrophe, more extinction, "doomsday" or so the article reports. Not the first vault for preserving seed, but the first to house seed from just about every country in the world and in such a secure way. So, the we can get along about something after all. Ironically it's plan B...

#2
Ballet classes for three, four, and five year olds are alive and well. If you need some comic relief, head to the dance studio. Can I admit I wasn't exactly looking forward to her ballet class? She no doubt dreampt nightly of the stage. So, reluctantly I sign her up thinking how good this will be for her and glad all of her dreams can now come true at last. But no where on the papers were there any specifics on what she was supposed to wear. So, I called the school and asked. My apathy quickly turned to anticipation when the kind lady said they could wear whatever they wanted and that "most girls like to where tights." Seriously? Ten 3-5 year old girls wearing whatever they wanted? To a dance class. Reeeaaally? I took her to our favorite kids consignment store where she poured through the racks until she found what I'm sure was a costume from a previous recital or something. She danced that

pink tutu-costume-leotard-rosette-bearing-beribboned thing

around the house for days. And, I must say there was no disappointment in the assortment of netting, ribbon, and fluff from all the other girls first day of class either. One girl had on pink camo pants. Awesome, awesome, totally, awesome.

Trading in ballet slippers for snow boots to go home. Her teacher is amazingly good with these girls. This is amazingly good for her.

#3
Huddling by the heat vent in the morning. Remember doing this as a kid? Who am I kidding. Remember doing this, oh, yesterday? My kids refuse to eat breakfast anywhere else. They also eat lunch there...but that's because they're cats at lunch time and cats eat on the floor. Not at tables. Didn't I post something once about kids who pretend to be animals and "adjusting well"? And just what are they supposed to be adjusting to anyway?



#4
A winter garage sale? Oh joy!


#5
Because a garage sale practically means summer, I came home and made a tomato sandwich to finish off the festivities. Paired with a glass of milk it's near bliss. Tomato sandwiches are something good.


#6
The cold hard fact that anything photographed or viewed from an above angle looks smaller. Stretched out and fuzzy always helps too...




#7
Coming to terms with a certain 4 year old picking out her own clothes. A few mornings ago she came out of her room wearing this. (Complete with a purse!) I asked her if she was sure she wanted to wear that. Not missing a beat she put her hand on her hip and said, "I feel good!" And that's why I have no problem with her choosing her own clothes for the day. What mis-matched crazy combo results is a small price to pay for, "I feel good!"

#8

Powdered sugar and little boys with a case of the sniffles make an explosively entertaining combination.


#9
Lunar Eclipses. Did you catch it this week?


#10
Getting lost, I mean driving around for fun in a new part of town and discovering a sweet little shop the size of a large closet.

We brought home these. So good. Not so fizzy, sugar cane instead of corn syrup, and over 100 varieties of POP like huckleberry. Yum, yum, fun, fun.


And really if there are still pop shoppes in the world, what could be so bad I ask you?

Will the real ISSUE 7 please stand up

click here. long story...

Sunday Evening Post, issue 6

(I recognize that this might possibly be the worstest, most poorliest written blog ever. It's like word throw-up splattered all over the screen.)

I have nothing to write. I have nothing to write. I have nothing to write.

This week I read in a magazine you can mail order bees to make all your apiary dreams come true. The post office must love those shipments. "LIVE BEES: Handle With Care." (yes I will) They come in 3 lb. boxes. How many bees are in 3 pounds anyway?

I have nothing to write! Think, think, think. Something brilliant. Something clever. Something funny!
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I have nothing to write. I have nothing to write. I have nothing to write. Think. Think think think.

I guess my brain turned off.

I had a particularly nightmarish day on Wednesday this week. I simply lost it. Over and over. All day.

Put my kids to bed about the same time Jared came home (only to be called back into the hospital an hour later). Somehow I was able to laugh at all my misery with him even though I felt rotten. Continued to cry the rest of the evening, cleaned my kitchen through tears, and headed to bed with my emotions a wreck. I had to kick a whole lotta flotsam out of the way and all I could do before going to bed was fall on my knees, bury my head in my blankets and beg and plead.

I don’t know exactly what I said, but it went something like this (insert muffled sobs generously), “Please, please, pleeeease help me find peace. Help me be gentle with my sweet little kids and myself, too. Please help tomorrow be a better day. I can’t do it anymore. I need to feel calm. I need...I need...” (There must have been a whole lot more please and help me and I need than that, but those were the fundamentals.)

By the time I was done, my body had relaxed, my mind eased. I slept all night. Thursday dawned. My house was still on the brink although I was really glad to see my sink sparkling. A few of the more die-hard issues from the day before hanging out in the corners and under the couch cushions, but it was a good day. Friday: a nice, nice day. Saturday: another great day! Today: even better. This week’s forecast: promising.

I guess I did have something to write.

The Sunday Evening Post, issue 5

Laura! You're the winner and I'd say I'm surprised, but somehow this seems like something you would know. Most impressive.

Cyrus is a ho-hum sea serpent who after being criticized by a shark for being a wimpy monster decides to go after a ship and take it out. Only he follows his true nature and instead helps the ship cross the sea. Storm, pirates and doldrums Cyrus is there. So that's why I needed a Cyrus, because he could pull me out!

So my Cyrus the past few weeks have been cooking and stuff. Mostly cooking. A few weeks ago was National Soup Swap day. There are who two women started this soup swap thing and it's just grown and grown to be a nation wide event. So I thought it would a fun thing. And it was. I had one at my house on Wednesday evening (the official day) and one a few days later in the morning with some other resident wives. So fun and so yummy! Check out the website: www.soupswap.com
but here's basically how it works. You invite other cooks to bring 6 quarts (which is honestly is WAAAAY too much soup and next time I do it I would do 4 or maybe 5 because there are 4 cups in a quart and if making 24 cups of soup doesn't seem like a lot to you, it is, but anyway) and they you exchange with each other all going home with 6 different quarts of soup to freeze or eat right away. A couple of the soups I remembered to take photos of:

creamy white chicken chili with crusty bread

Texas chicken soup with tons of cilantro. So good.

Last but not least, made some yummy bread to give out to swappers and also a few prizes for first chosen/last chosen. This bread is amazing. Simple (4 ingredients) and delicious. Plus, it can rise for 2-5 hours. I think a busy mom invented this recipe! A HUGE THANKS to my friend Heather who found this recipe in her local paper. Props for trying it out, passing it along and seriously, thank you. We've made it no less than twice a day for the past few weeks. Maybe more...


Simple Crusty Bread (from the Charlotte Observer) makes 4 loaves

3 cups lukewarm water
1 1/2 tablespoons yeast
1 1/2 tablespoons kosher salt (or one 1 T. regular salt)
6 1/2 cups flour
Place water in large bowl. Mix in yeast and salt. Stir in flour, mixing until there are no dry patches. Dough will be much looser and sticker than normal.
(It will look like this: batter)


Cover, but not airtight and let dough rise at room temperature for 2 to 5 hours. Sprinkle dough with a light flour and cut off a grapefruit sized piece with a serrated knife. Turn dough in hands to lightly stretch surface, creating a rounded top with a lumpy bottom. Put dough onto clean surface sprinkled with cornmeal. Let rest 40 minutes. Repeat with remaining loaves. Place broiler pan in bottom rack in over and place pizza stone (or any other pan with cornmeal on it, but best on stone) on middle rack and heat oven to 450 degrees, heat stone for 20 minutes. Dust dough with flour and slash top with serrated knife three times. Slide onto heated stone. Pour 1 cup warm water into broiler pan and shut oven quickly to trap steam. Bake until well browned, about 30 minutes, Cool completely. If you only want to make only some of the dough, the rest can be stored covered in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks. Just let the dough rest on the cornmeal for an extra hour.

If you make this bread and don't eat again until the next day, pop it back in the oven to re-heat it. It's best crusty and hot! Aaaand, best with soup.

This was not the soup I made because after calculating the cost of making 24 cups...we wouldn't have been eating for the rest of the month. Cold berry soup. Can't go wrong with berries, juice and cream. I need to tweak this a bit and try yogurt instead of cream. Anyone have any recipes for cold berry soup?

So. Have a soup swap. It was make your day and several days after when you eat all the soup. I really missed certain people, though. I wish I could have soup swap with so many of you guys. Sigh. Funny side note. Natalie kept calling this my swamp swap or soup swamp. "Can I help with your swamp swap?"

I know I've posted about this before, but check out Kids Craft Weekly if you ever find yourself twiddling your thumbs wondering how to enrich your kids' lives. Love this site. It's beautifully designed, simply, easy to understand instructions, and definitely not your typical preschool-type activities. Topics from space to wheels to sushi! So we did a couple of the activities from her mouse tutorial. Exactly what childhood should be and one of my favorite mornings in a long time. We made these two cute mice, Snick and Marble, and the kids crawled them all over the house.

Note: you'll probably have to suspend your knowledge of how mice really look to get a kick out of these guys.

We also made mouse scavenger bags and let the kids climb on the counters and dig out anything they could find from the cupboard in true mouse style. If you check out Kids Craft Weekly, you'll see her snack bags have this healthy all natural looking trail mix inside. Ummm...my kids found some left over Christmas candy canes, mini m&m's, colored marshmallows and I'm relieved to say some nuts and dried fruit. Whew. Almost won the mother-of the year award. Oh, how could I forget. Dried noodles. Desperate times, desperate measures.



I'm just so in love with these little mice. Both sets. And "Snick's" treat bag is adorable. I want to frame it. Shameless. Just shameless.

This is them in their "mouse hole" also the play tent enjoying their stashes. Look at Isaac clutch Marble. Like how they are still in pj's? Awesome. I may just win mother of the year award yet.
I promise I just changed them into clean jammies because that's what they wanted to wear and we were snowed in. Really. I was dressed, showered, hair done, and wearing perfume. Mother of the year. The dressed part might have included a pair of comfy scrubs...

Last but not least, we became famous. Local STARS! I don't know how much snow the past week, but tons! Enough to cancel school for a week. Jared built this train in our yard.
I don't know how tall the slide is, but you can only see the top in the background of this picture.

The next day the a local tv news crew knocked on our door doing a story about kids staying home from school. My kids don't go to school school, but they interviewed me anyway and I let me tell you it was a quality interview about how we stayed home from the library and how I thought snow days were great. I'd try to post a copy of the segment, but I think it would be better for you to imagine all the brilliance instead. We're famous now regardless.


We slept in the basement because I was paranoid after the watching top of a tree break off and fall into our neighbor's yard. So it's like terrifying beauty. That and I feel so lucky to have had electricity for the week when many people did not.


Sorry about no pictures last week. I reposted so hopefully they'll show up now.

Sunday Evening Post, issue 4

Winter. Anyone else want to petition it be officially over? I actually sat in front of my closet at one point this week staring at my sandals.

Tuesday found me half hearted after our car doors and locks were all frozen shut. A little cabin fever has been setting in and I've been dreading the winter crazies since the first leaves started changing color in fall. I stood at the sunniest window soaking in the light and warmth and dreamed of digging in dirt, walking in summer rainfall, and being ridiculously sweaty from the heat of a hot hot day. Then on Wednesday the kids and I lounged and played in the sunny patch coming through their bedroom window. It felt so good. All of our indoor fun as been done and redone. How many "rainy day" activities in a day...day after day can one mom handle? I need some spice. Sigh.

We waited one week exactly for guests at our birdfeeders. We even made birdseed trails from the bushes where they live...heh heh heh.



Natalie also made pictures and signs for them to know they eat there. She hung them on the window. We turned our couch around to face out the window and spent quite a bit of time there with a big pile of books and blankets.



Now we can't keep the feeder filled and the little hearts are picked to shreds.

It's all about birds at our house right now. The kids makes nests out of pillows and pile assorted "babies" (any stuffed animal or soft toy) then sit on them.

So that is life. I've hit the doldrums and am wishing for a Cyrus right about now. First one to correctly identify Cyrus...wins!

The pluses and minuses of this week:

- Our jeep, beloved jeep, has officially gone the way of all good cars and hopefully will rest easy at the local pick-n-pull. Here's to all other jeep owners looking for parts. May they be thrilled to find just what they need. Here's Natalie enjoying a few last moments while we clean it out.



+ Jared has a new pair of snow boots to replace said beloved mode of transportation.

-snowed 15 inches today
+ Jared had the day off, church was canceled, and we shoveled, played, shoveled, cooked yummy food, shoveled, built a "fire," shoveled, watched cross country skiers cross down the street, and shoveled. Jared made snow candy with the kids. Yum.


+ We still have power so this was for fun and not necessity.