What There's Time For

The Problem with Bake Sales

The problem with bake sales is that they are a highly efficient way to take a donation of ingredients, time, electricity, and water, and turn it into a much smaller financial net for the organization holding the bake sale.

Or maybe the problem with bake sales is people like me who can't just enjoy them.

At least I've found a new favorite cookie - "Mexican Hot-Chocolate Cookies," included in the Martha Stewart cookie app, which I would link to (because it is rather fun), but I'm blogging on my phone and don't seem to be able to put in links...

Anyway, they're basically a chocolate snickerdoodle with cayenne pepper added to the cinnamon sugar mixture you roll the dough balls in before baking. Mmmm :)

I didn't buy cream of tartar - oops - but it turns out you can get by with baking powder instead of baking soda + cream of tartar, but the cookies spread less than they should. (Use less baking powder than the recipe calls for soda!)

Now, see, I learned something. That must be the saving grace of bake sales. :)

A Jacket for Shmoogie, with a Poll!!!!

The sewing "room" is still a shambles.

But Shmoogie's birthday is rapidly approaching and I want to make her something.  Plus, I got this pattern months ago in Vienna and it only goes up to size 2T.  Time's up! 

The fabric is a purple boiled wool, also from Vienna (just ask Mr. Right how much boiled wool I bought in how many colors and how much of it I've used for anything).  It's a bit thicker, I think, than the pattern's recommended fabrics, but I'm going to try it.  Probably with buttons instead of snaps.

But the lining.  What to do about the lining?  I dug out four quilting cottons from the sewing shambles and since I'm dithering, I thought we'd try a poll!  We've never done a poll before!  Fun, right?

Choice number one:  pink umbrellas.  Sweet, but I don't know if I can get over the fact that the jacket is NOT a rain jacket.

Choice number two:  bright yellow owls!  I picked this at the fabric store because it was so cute and bright, but now it's feeling a little too bright.  Like, she might be mistaken for a clown.

Choice number three:  moody grey owls.  I think this print is gorgeous and I think it goes beautifully with the purple wool, but... it just seems a bit sophisticated for my sweet little baby girl?  Although, she's got a scowl to compete with any of these...

Choice number four:  mushrooms!  I love this, but I don't think I have enough of it.  I could use it for the cuffs and hood lining and maybe a facing around the center front and bottom hem, piecing it onto some solid color lining yet to be unearthed/purchased, but that sounds like... work.  And I probably love the grey owls more.

Whaddaya think???

Birthday Coat Lining I think you should use... the pink umbrellas! Who cares if it will never be worn in the rain? the bright yellow owls! When else is she going to wear colors like that? the moody grey owls! Beautiful. the mushrooms, even if you have to piece them! Too cute. something else, please. view results --->

Now, should I go dig my way to the sewing table?  Or measure out the seam allowances on the pattern?  (How can they call something "Easy" if you have to add your own seam allowance?  Europeans!  Argh!)

MarMar Visiting

Step Right Up for the Tackling Show!

An introverted, bookish girl raised with one other sister in a pacifist household, you can imagine my shock when I first witnessed Mr. Right greet his younger brothers by jumping on them, jostling them into a wall, or otherwise horsing around.  They all tried really hard to convince me that it was OK,  they were having fun!  Showing their love!  But I was flummoxed for years.

Kind of like when we took our first dog to the dog park and all the dogs would go crazy wrestling in a big pile, snarling and baring their teeth and snapping their jaws at each other.  I'd be totally freaked out and the experienced dog owners would pretend as if nothing was happening.

Eventually, someone let me in on the secret — as long as tails are wagging and "fights" are interspersed with "play bows," no one's getting hurt.  I never quite got over my gut reaction, though.

Enter... my children.  I was on solid ground for a while with the admirably absolute, "Don't hit your baby sister."  Who can argue with that, right?

Then baby sister grew up enough to express herself and I've been caught in the following conundrum ever since:

ME:  No hitting!  Don't hit your sister!

MR. PANTS (with a grin):  But she likes it!

ME:  [silent look of stunned horror]

SHMOOGIE:  [giggles, strains to reestablish eye contact with her torturous older brother]

The way things stand now:  Hitting is not allowed, even if the person being hit "likes it," "thinks it's fun," or "wants me to!"  Problem being that Shmoogie does think it's fun (probably because he's never actually hit her hard enought to hurt her) and routinely attempts to get him to play with her by smacking him.

I suppose, given all this, that I should have seen it coming, but when I pulled Mr. Pants off his prostrate baby sister a few weeks ago only to realize they were both grinning, that Shmoogie's cries were cries of glee, and that she was lunging at him again as soon as I'd separated them, I was briefly at a loss for what to do.

"What are you doing?!" I stammered.  (I stammer that a lot, have you noticed?  So cliche!  I disappoint myself...)

"We're having a tackling show!!!!" crowed Mr. Pants, dropping to the floor again and taking Shmoogie with him.

I paused a minute and then I surprised myself.  Instead of banning this abomination outright, I was setting ground rules:

1. "Tackling shows" are allowed ONLY IN THE LIVING ROOM (where I can see them, there is wall-to-wall carpet, and limited hard/sharp furniture).
2. If anyone cries, STOP IMMEDIATELY.

I rather thought Mr. Right would be proud of me — he was part of my inspiration afterall — but when he lept in to stop a "tackling show" (which term I *believe* derives from the "talent show" on one favorite Sesame Street episode) and I waived him off, explaining the ground rules, he looked at me like I was completely insane.

Ah, sweet, satisfying irony!

All Particle Board is Not Created Equal

Sadly, we're now far away from an IKEA.  So when the pile of shoes and baseball caps in the laundry-slash-mudroom finally sent me over the edge, I looked to Target for a solution.  (Actually, I went to Home Depot first, but they had next to nothing in organization.)

I came home with two shelf/drawer things for a not-extraordinary amount of money (one 15-cubby organizer and one two-drawer organizer the same size) and set about assembling the cubby one as soon as the kids were in bed.

"Oh," I thought as I opened the box (actually, after I opened the box, it was too hard to open), "this is going to be fine!  It's packed flat just like IKEA, so it will go together just like IKEA!"  (IKEA — Even more fun than Lego!)

Uh oh.  I couldn't tell you the exact difference, because all the screws and cam locks and stuff looked pretty much like IKEA, but it was way less fun than IKEA (hey, it was way less fun than Lego, too, come to think of it).  The assembly method was pretty similar (except that you had to provide your own screw driver where IKEA always gives you a nifty little alan wrench).  But the instructions were dumb.  The diagrams were cramped and unenlightening, which they tried to make up for with lots of words.

IKEA's diagrams have no words.  Because they're good.  (Same with Lego, come to think of it.)

So it wasn't quite a joyful experience of assembly flow, but I got the thing together fine.  And then I got to the part where I was supposed to nail the cardboard (seriously, thin cheapo cardboard) backing onto the shelf.  There were helpful pre-marked dots for the nails and all the instructions said was, "be careful not to angle nails."  Well, duh, I rolled my eyes to myself... and proceeded to split the melamine coating off the particle board in at least three places.

Two of those were my fault, I guess, in angling the nails?  Or not aligning the cardboard perfectly so the holes ended up a little too close to the edge?

But in one spot I had driven the nail just fine, exactly where it told me to, which was right at the end of a board with an unsupported corner.  With naked particle board edges on all abutting sides, the corner of white melamine just split right off in a nice big flap.

I was pissed.

It probably wouldn't be fair to say that I've never damaged an IKEA piece during the assembly process, but it's rare.  With ClosetMaid, it seemed impossible to avoid.

The upside is, the second unit went together more smoothly the next morning (thanks to more sleep and learning from experience, plus "help" from the kids!  whoop!) and the two together have seriously improved the laundryroom, even though the cubby organizer is much smaller than it seemed like it was going to be, so only the kids' shoes can actually fit a whole pair in one cubby.  Mine can only fit one shoe per hole and Mr. Right's gigantic shoes don't fit at all.  I cleared off the junk we'd stuffed on the top shelf of the closet and that's where he gets to keep his shoes now.

So, uh, you can probably tell I'm a little cranky (can you tell that the box definitely showed shoes in those cubbies?).  I wish I'd thought to take a "before" picture for you, it would have been more fun if I had.  But I'm not going to make the mess all over again just to show you.  :)  Here's the "after," split in two because the room is too narrow to get a full picture at once:

Henceforth all my particle board furnishings will be coming from IKEA.  And that's what I call standards.

Remedial Hugging

The first time Shmoogie leaned into me, wrapped her little arms tightly around my neck and laid her head down on my shoulder, I nearly swooned.

I also thought she was shockingly advanced because, at barely a year, she had just done something that Mr. Pants had not managed in 4 years: given a real hug.

Until his grandmother started hugging lessons* with him this summer, he would, when asked for a hug, stand next to you and lean slightly, *allowing* himself to be hugged. He might, if he really loved you, raise his face towards yours and allow himself to be kissed, as well.

Shmoogie, however, will give a hug nearly every time you pick her up (as well as asking you to give good morning kisses to her dolly, whose name is now "Goddy"). And she often wants to hug her brother, who does not often want to be hugged by his sister. This can be mildly comical, when she chases him at bedtime, gabbering, "Buhdah, huck! Huck!" Or rather heartbreaking, as one morning recently when she was awake before him, asked for him incessantly, and when he finally appeared, she ran to him, grinning with arms open wide, "Buhdah!! Huck! Huck!" and he totally refused the hug.

******************

* He now eagerly demonstrates a "squeezy hug" - gripping your biceps and squeezing them towards each other with all his might. He's very proud of himself.

Nerdzy Thurzdy — How much forgetting is too much?

The question recently came up whether I had ever taken Linear Algebra.

I do not remember.

The transcripts that would tell me are in a file somewhere that I do not care to dig for and I was in a puckish mood, so I asked Google, "have i ever taken linear algebra," from which I got to the Wikipedia page on Linear Algebra, from which I quickly deduced that I have... some kind of familiarity with Linear Algebra.

Not like I could actually do any of it right now, but the notation and terminology ring a faint bell.  But does that mean I ever actually took it?  And if I can't actually solve any Linear Algebra problems anymore, does whether I ever took it even matter?

You know how when you get CPR certified or anything like that, you have to continually recertify?  Every few years?

Yeah.  So why is academic knowledge not like that (other than the purely practical reason that no one could keep up)?  I'm as likely to forget how to actually integrate a function five years after not touching Calculus (highly likely... that is, I have definitely forgotten how to integrate a function; although, to be fair, it's been more than five years) as I would be to forget how to do CPR after five years (possibly less likely, actually, although I'll admit the consequences would probably be more dire), so why is it that once I've got a transcript proving that I once studied Calculus, that's supposed to be good indefinitely?  Or maybe the point of these classes is not so much that you will forever after be able to manually solve equations, but rather that you will forever after retain the logical structures of the disciplines in your way of thinking?

Have you forgotten more than you'd wish?  Still remember odd things you never would have expected?

One Room Down

The moving-in process is still grinding away like the world's dullest dental drill, but somehow we did get Mr. Pants's* room pretty much done over the weekend.

Mr. Right bravely replaced the ceiling fan light fixture (the blades significantly encroached on the upper bunk area, a bad idea for many reasons) with a flush mount one I'd picked up from the hardware store a few weeks ago.  I'm sure he'd agree that it's terribly lucky I browbeat him into replacing the old ceiling fan in our kitchen years ago (I helped) because that meant we had some useful experience for this little project.  In fact, it went so smoothly that we didn't even notice there were directions included until after it was all done and we'd flipped the circuit breaker back on.  Our properly-installed-without-the-instructions light provided a nice clear light for perusing said instructions:

I slightly improved a bulletin board Mr. Pants has had in his room for a few years.  It's just three pieces of cork I found at the hardware store in Vienna (1 x 1.5 meters each) covered (not very methodically) with a quirky print from IKEA (it's like someone who'd never left Japan was assigned to do a design about Austria, or maybe Switzerland; it tickles my funny bone).

In Austria, I had tied some lengths of white elastic around each piece to give us a way of posting things up there without actually putting tacks in the boy's room, but that was pretty ugly and didn't work well, either.  This time, I used clear elastic to make one of those diamond grid weaves over the center panel instead.  I'm very happy with how little it interferes with the print and how well it holds stuff up.  I was less happy with how long it took to do (thus, only the center panel will be getting this treatment).  To mount the panels, we just drilled right through them with some bright shiny new screws.

Mr. Pants is pretty happy to have gotten back his favorite stuff and a new bunkbed with firetruck and train sheets.  He's a little sad about losing his "mosquito net" (also from IKEA, with a little princely pennant fringe around the top), but it really wasn't working with the top bunk and he really loves the top bunk, so...

And here is where I was going to put I nice big picture of the whole room so you could see how lovely and calm it is (as opposed to the rest of the house, especially our room; I come in here sometimes to sit in the rocker for a few minutes and soak up the order), but it turns out it's ridiculously hard to take a picture of a room this size.  I guess I'd need a fisheye lens or something?  Ah, well, one more partial, instead.  :)

 

Teach Your Children Well

In the focused, intentional surroundings of his pre-K classroom, Mr. Pants has finally begun producing artwork that actually somewhat resembles the things he says they are.

I find myself relieved (he's a little old to still be just scrawling randomly, right?), excited (what will he come home with next?  where will his journey with art eventually take him?), and self-obsessively worried about feeling relieved and excited.

We'll just assume that's because I was raised at the height of the true-art-must-have-NO-rules/abstract-expression-is-the-highest-form-of-creativity era.  As I remember it, real coloring books were a much-desired treat; we hardly ever had them because the idea of pre-provided lines inside of which to color was considered hideously stiffling.

Anyway, as dubiously thrilling as it was to unfurl a composition of squiggly green topped with a blob of yellow and think, It looks like a tall yellow flower just before Mr. Pants announced, "It's a sunflower!", my favorite so far is this abstraction in red and green:

It's my favorite because when I asked what it was, he explained matter-of-factly, "That's a whole bunch of apples falling from a tree; some of them have chemicals on them and some of them don't."

Look who's been paying attention at the grocery store, eh?  I might actually count this as the first time I've been depicted in his artwork.  ;)

The Best Day of the Year

The best day of the year came today, thanks to a ferocious wind that kept me up late into the night obsessively checking for non-existant tornado warnings.

Now the sky is blue, the breeze is cool and dry, and we all needed sweaters this morning.  Actually, sitting in front of the open window, I still need a sweater!

Whenever it comes, the first true day of Fall is my favorite.