with love and squalor

When I was fourteen, my dad recommended I read his favorite short story, "For Esme - with Love and Squalor." I took his recommendation and discovered one of the greatest short stories in the English language. In remembrance of J.D. Salinger, I think I will read it again tonight. So contain your rage for having to read Catcher in the Rye in 10th grade and take a minute to remember Mr. Salinger by reading this brief, poignant masterpiece. You can find the full text (with some typos) here.

in which I am a patriot

I voted today! Today was Oregon's mid-year election day and I voted on two important measures for our fair state. Nothing makes me feel quite so American as voting.

Kind of anti-climactic to just drive up to a drop box and drop off my ballots - I wish they handed out stickers at the drop box - but, on the bright side, I may have been on the news. Like I said, these are two fairly significant measures for which many Oregonians are breathlessly awaiting the outcome, so there were some news crews down by the county offices. I recognized a local news commentator doing her spiel right as I pulled up! It was very exciting. I think my arm may have made the evening news. I tried to drop my ballots in the box very elegantly. And patriotically. My arm was experiencing a lot of complicated emotions, I tell you! At any rate, I may be a superstar.




On a slightly less patriotic note, I am a big nerdy fan of many things British. I'm also a big nerdy fan of many things PBS. So imagine my delight when I heard that Masterpiece Theater (I mean, Theatre) was doing Jane Austen's Emma for the next few weeks! Did you see the first part on Sunday? Are you a nerd like me and did you look forward to it all weekend? It did not disappoint, I tell you. Romola Garai is a vivacious and endearing Emma Woodhouse and Jonny Lee Miller is adorable as Highbury's very eligible Mr. Knightly. The sets and costumes are pure eye candy - I felt thoroughly and delightfully transported, just what I want from a good Austen movie.

Sunday was only part one of four, so you can still catch up and enjoy six more blissful hours. I convinced Jared to watch with me, but I neglected to tell him it would be an eight hour commitment. Hopefully, he won't read my blog before this Sunday!

happiest day of Sam's life

We came home from Costco today to find this in front of our house:

Apparently, the city is kindly redoing the mess of a sidewalk in front of our driveway. Hooray! It does mean that we won't be able to park in our garage for a week or two and our friends and visitors will have to scrabble up the neighbor's river rock to get to our front door, but it will so be worth it. Even if only for the constant entertainment. Sam will be doing a lot of this the next few days:

Sadly, he missed the cement mixer pouring the concrete because they rudely did it during nap time. But he watched the backhoe for nearly an hour with two matchbox cars clutched in his sweaty hands. Good times!

In other news, today was the day I bought a box of diapers, a box of wipes, a mega-pack of juice boxes, a flat of water bottles, and a 25 lb bag of flour at Costco. Not so much the day that I want to be parking half a block down from my house. I'm going to get some great work outs these next few days, I can tell.

delicious things I ate over Christmas

I ate waaaaaay too many delicious things over Christmas, but one thing that stands out in particular was this Cranberry Trifle we had for Christmas dinner dessert. I've always wanted to try it, but no one else in my family is as fond of cranberries as I am. Luckily, my mother-in-law is, so she promised to help me polish it off. And we did our best, I assure you!

It came together so easily and made a gorgeous dessert. Sadly, I don't have any pictures of it because I was too busy eating it, but it is a beautiful and very simple dessert to put together. And, to make it even better, when Costco was out of pound cake, we decided to make our own and my mother-in-law turned out two perfect loaves of the best pound cake I've ever tried. The sweetness of the cream, the dense pound cake, and the tart, gingery cranberries make for a perfect eating sensation.

Don't worry, I made a chocolate cream pie for the philistines who don't care for cranberries. (Love you, Jared! More trifle for me!)

In case you didn't click on the link, here is the pound cake recipe, courtesy of Martha Stewart. I love pound cake and it can be used for so many desserts and it is super easy, so I wanted to be sure I shared it:

Vanilla Pound Cake

2 sticks unsalted butter, room temperature

2 cups flour, plus more for pan

1 cup sugar

4 large eggs

2 tsp pure vanilla extract

1/2 tsp salt

Preheat oven to 350.
Butter and flour a 6 cup (8 1/2 by 4 1/2) loaf pan.

Beat butter and sugar on high speed until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add vanilla and salt. With mixer on low, gradually add flour beating just until combined (do not overmix.)

Bake until a toothpick inserted in center of cake comes out clean, about 1 hour. Tent with foil if it is browning too quickly. Let cool in pan for 15 minutes before inverting on wire rack to cool completely.

last day

Today is officially the last day of Christmas vacation. Eve goes back to school tomorrow (on Tuesday - weird, I know) and I am more than a little sad to see our fun break come to an end. We have been spoiled these last two weeks by sleeping in, staying in jammies till late, big breakfasts, no schedule, lazy afternoon movie parties, eating chocolates off the kitchen counter every time I walk by (oops! Did I leave something else in the kitchen?!), staying up late watching new movies and reading new books. But tomorrow we get back to our daily schedule and I just hate having to start my day before dawn. But it'll be nice to be back to the routine... the kids will be happier having a schedule... blah, blah, blah, whatever. I just want to mourn the loss of Christmas break for a bit.

While I'm mourning, is there really anything more depressing than taking down the Christmas tree? We decided to take down Christmas on Friday, mostly because the scouts were doing our neighborhood tree pick-up on Saturday and we didn't want to have to figure out how to get rid of our tree ourselves. Luckily, Jared was home to help, so in one afternoon all remnants of Christmas were stripped from my house and my Christmas tree was tossed out in the gutter by the curb. Wow, this is kind of a downer of a post! Clearly, I am suffering Christmas withdrawal! I have to say, it was nice to get every last decoration taken down and back up in the attic in the space of a few hours. Just like a bandaid - it's easier to just yank it off quick!

On a happier note, our little family New Year's Eve party was pretty much the most fun we've had as a family. After we put Sam to bed (sorry, Sammy! You can join us in a few years!) the real party began. The kids were surprisingly into the jigsaw puzzle we got out and Eve actually put a fair amount of pieces together. And when that got boring, we played a few rounds of The Ladybug Game, family Cranium, and many hands of Go-Fish. All while consuming goodies, of course. Then we watched the ball drop, toasted Martinelli's, gave big hugs, and fell into bed. I was surprised by how delightful the girls were, even at midnight. I sound like a terrible mother, but I was really suprised at how much fun we all had together! Eve said to me that night, "New Year's Eve is my second favorite day after Christmas!" so it looks like it was a hit. And a new family tradition.

I have pictures of New Year's and even of taking the tree down (Sam was helping me), but they are trapped on Jared's new camera. Jared's dad kindly passed down his "old" fancy schmancy camera when he upgraded to a fancier schmancier one and Jared is in seventh heaven. Unfortunately, I haven't figured out how to liberate the pictures yet - the camera is way to high-tech for me! But a big thanks to Jared's dad - we love it! So the pictures may be a while in coming.

In the meantime, happy new year! Hopefully you are dealing with the change better than I am. :) Wish me luck at 6 am tomorrow!