But you're tired of words, I thought you said

Oh please. I'm so over that already. Ready to offer my opinions on anything and everything again!

Random thoughts, then:

Daisy already does this poke-your-fingers through the afghan (holes of the crocheted afghan, I mean, not trying to be racist or anything.  Oh dear, now I sound obscene.  I'll stop, but why is it called an afghan anyway?  Did they come from Afghanistan or something?) thing.  Do everyone's children do this or is it just mine?  I did it myself as a child.  I love the look of five toes poking out through individual holes.  So tidily charming.

Here are some people who are discussing the word "blog."  I am the type of person who thinks about these things.  I find it funny, alarming, and obscurely comforting that there are other people who debate such matters seriously.

Talking of which, I have written before about words I just have a hard time using.  There are also many words I simply do not like.  Let's add these things to the list:

• "round and round we go"
  
• "out on your ear"
  
• When. people. write. with. periods. for. emphasis.
  
• When people say "the emPHAsis on the wrong sylLAble."  (Just to be clear: people actually putting the emphasis on the wrong syllable is fine.  It's the phrase I don't like.)
  
• "drool-worthy"
  
• "well-edited," referring to something besides writing.
  
• "There are so few ingredients, it's important they be of the highest quality!"
  
• And for the holiday season, can I reiterate how much I dislike the formulation "to gift"?
  

Sometimes I get words in my head, like "Wernike's Area" or "Myanmar" and I don't know what they mean or how they got there. Probably from a former life but as you can see I retained no actual knowledge from that life.

Western Family plastic bags (sandwich bags---we call them "baggies;" is this correct, or something only terrible people do, like use "kleenex" for facial tissue and "xerox" for photocopy?) have undergone several changes!  I used to like them fine, and then a couple years ago they got terrible.  They split apart at the seams anytime you put anything in them, and they felt really brittle, like paper instead of plastic.  (I observed this scientifically, after buying several different boxes.)  So I stopped buying them, but then recently I accidentally bought them again, and they're fine again.  Good job, WF chemists!

 
There are few people that I dislike more than Elijah Wood as Frodo in the Lord of the Rings movies. I mean, just conjure up his white, wistful face in your mind's eye. Doesn't it make you want to hit him?

When I've been reading something for a while I start to write in that style. I don't mean to, but I do. So if you think I sound like Dickens or someone when I'm writing, I'm not plagarizing. I'm just that talented. It just happens. Deal with it.

It is bad that "deal with it" is a phrase I use so often, I even overhear Abe using it? I don't think it's something I heard from my mom EVER. Yet it sums up so nicely what I so often want my children to do!

Whenever something I'm baking needs "a few more minutes," I think I'll just remember to check it again in a few minutes. I don't ever think I need to set a timer for it. Sometimes I set one anyway. Coincidentally, these are the only times my food doesn't get burned.

Nepotism

I saw my sister-in-law Jane on Sunday and she was wearing this fabulous (not usually a word I use, but we're venturing into the realm of fashion here; deal with it) watch she made, and it reminded me I've been meaning to link to her jewelry site.  Here.  I love handmade jewelry, don't you?  Well, if it's cute, of course.  I wouldn't just like it non-discriminatorily; that would be like supporting "mom-n-pop" stores just because they're not THE MAN rather than because they sell something we actually want . . . right?  (And Katy---that hat/poncho set you made was super---I'd post a picture if I had one)

And speaking of my delightful family . . . Pam's post reminded me of something great I read (not by a family member. sorry).  I can't remember where I saw it linked recently, but I heard the guy who wrote it talking on KBYU a month or so ago.  Hilarious, I tell you.  I wish I'd written it myself.  (Well, I did write this! Same idea, less hiliariously executed.)  Behold: http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/97feb/frazier/frazier.htm

Oh and for goodness sake I might as well link this too.  Christy's book's "book trailer" (evidently that's a "thing" now).  What talented people I'm related to (and you don't know the half of it).

Just some words

Are we boring you, Malachi?

Sometimes I start off the day reading through various things; news, stories, commentary, blogs, etc., and at the beginning I'm all excited with all these things running through my head, things I want to talk about and comment on and ask about.  And then I continue through my google reader, reading other people's comments and more, and by the time I'm done I'm totally tired of it all and I have nothing more to say because a. anything worthwhile has been said already and b. everything stupid has also been said and c. I'm totally annoyed by it all anyway, who are all these people who think anyone cares about reading their two cents on everything?

What is wrong with me?  Just information overload or what?

Goodbye forever. 
(Joke.  Ha.  As if you could get rid of me.)

P.S. Is that what my kids are feeling at the end of the day, having been a captive audience, stuck with me, scolded and talked at and preached to for 14 hours?

And that reminds me of a story.  We were driving around returning dishes after people brought us meals when Daisy was born (thanks everyone!) and Sebby went up to the door with one of them.  The lady opened her door and took the dish and then stood outside and talked to Sebby for several minutes.  They both appeared to be conversing quite animatedly, and when he got back to the car, I said curiously, "What was she saying to you, Seb?" 

He answered without much interest, "Oh . . . just some words . . ."

The Great Beyond

Picture doesn't do it justice, of course.  But I'm surprised we were able to get the camera to take a picture at all.  Isn't it interesting how colorful the stars look captured here?

A few nights ago we took a picnic dinner and drove up into the Uintas so we could see the stars.  It was cold but so beautiful.  So many stars!!  I wonder if you would ever get used to seeing so many stars, if you lived far away from the city, where you could see them like that all the time?  I can go for long periods of time without even thinking about the stars, let alone looking at them and pondering the significance of it all.  But it seems like it would be impossible to avoid thoughts of eternity if you saw a sky like that every night.

While we drove, Sam told the boys stories about space and the stars, (Sam loves astronomy. Just like he loves geology.) and the next day the four of them spent two hours on the computer looking up astronomy pictures and videos and talking about black holes and meteors and the Milky Way and Saturn and dust storms and the Great Red Spot and so forth.  They were all fascinated, of course (even Malachi).  The last few days they've been playing rockets and moon landings and black holes nonstop.

This is a picture Abe drew yesterday.  Labelled items are: the Milky Way, the moon, galaxies (spiral), space, Jupiter (note the red spot near the bottom), Mars, Saturn (with eight moons), Earth, a rocket, and a black hole.

It was cool to think about space. I used to think about it when I was little (I wanted to be an astronaut, who didn't?) but it's been a while and I've gotten all jaded and used to the idea of it, I guess. But it's just as amazing as it ever was. All those stars! The vast, incomprehensible sizes of things! Are there other planets like ours? Which of the stars has already burned out but the light is still reaching us? I got all excited, thinking about it, and started wanting to be an astronaut again.  Do you suppose I'll ever get my chance at that? :)

Bump

I make it a point never to do anything on Mondays, until dinnertime anyway, because I figure I should be applauded for having the fortitude to let Sam out the door to work (it's so hard to have him leave after we've been together all weekend) and the dishes, floors, etc. can wait.

Today it was sad because Malachi ran into the wall (or was pushed . . . I suspect it, but don't have "ocular proof," [Othello, thanks Mrs. Brown]) and got this huge bump on his head.  It looked so bad at first that I was really worried about it, but he seemed okay after a while; perhaps the 2-second intervals during which I was able to apply the bag of frozen peas before having him push them away and say "cold!" in a betrayed tone made the swelling go down. 

Anyway, it just reconfirmed my belief that Mondays should be spent in bed reading or cuddling.  So that's what we've been doing.

The decision had to be made

Friday miscellany:

1. I like passive voice.  It used to bother me, but now I find it charming, especially when used in an attempt to evade responsibility for something, as here:

I've already used it on my kids a few times.  "I'm sorry Sebby, but the decision had to be made."

2. This speaks for itself, I believe:

Words to live by!

3. From now on I plan to end all correspondence with the words "Goodbye Forever."

4. You've seen the grocery store musical?  And the food court musical?  Here's a new one (my favorite!).  I love the work of these guys.  It just doesn't get old to me.  I think because it's never mean-spirited like some of those hidden camera, try-to-embarrass-people things you see.

Goodbye forever.
--M.

Nice

This is the time of year that I feel grateful for nice weather rather than entitled to it.
Which is really much better for the soul, don't you think?

I like this guy

The other day Seb was talking to me and I suddenly out of nowhere thought, "My goodness, that boy is handsome!"  That happens sometimes, but I guess I get caught up in being annoyed with the boys and wishing they would quit fighting with each other and breaking things, so those little flashes of amazement (whoa, THIS is MY SON?) still take me by surprise.

So I told him to keep talking (he was explaining to me how "the windmills turn, which genawates electricity"---his words---he is like those little boys who know the names of every dinosaur, but with machines) and took a million pictures.  Which led to quite a lot of pictures that look really like like him, if you know what I mean.  So don't be alarmed, but here they are.

And there's one more thing I should tell you about Sebby.  You know how when you're nursing your babies, the other kids are interested.  (My boys "nurse" their bears and monkeys all the time.)  So they know all about how the milk comes out of Mommy's nipples and Daisy drinks it and it makes her happy and so forth.  Except Sebby somehow got the idea they were called "nibbles."  Perfectly understandable, right?  But it leads him to say, in very business-like tones, things like, "Well Mommy, looks like Daisy isn't quite happy.  Give 'er the other nibble!"  And it just cracks me up every time.

Spooky

Since everyone is sharing spooky stories today, I'll add mine.

In the dark of night, when Sam and I are downstairs and everything is silent, sometimes one of us goes to put a disc in the DVD player.  So we push "open," and the tray opens, but before we can get the disc in . . .

THE TRAY CLOSES AGAIN!!!

Usually this happens two or three times.  It'll snap your finger inside if you're not careful.  And then, without warning, the tray will start working again . . . as if it never happened!!

Food and the senses

Sam and I have been trying to think of foods that exemplify (? I don't know the word I want---encapsulate?  represent? manifest?) each of the five senses.  Obviously more than one sense is involved in eating anything, but we were using this question as a guide: is this part of the food (the smell, the texture, etc.) an essential part of the experience?  That is, if that element was missing would the experience of eating still be basically the same?

I feel like we didn't come up with good ones for all of them, but here are some of our ideas:

• Sound: rice crispies; bacon (frying, and the crunch when you eat it); popcorn; root beer floats
• Touch/texture (in the hand or in the mouth): angel food cake; hot chocolate (cold chocolate milk=totally different experience); cream puffs; toasted English muffins; artisan bread
• Smell--(lots of foods NEED their aromas.  But which need them most?): onions/bacon frying; wassail; roast beef (in crock pot, for example); chocolate chip cookies; cheese; oranges/grapefruit
• Sight: rainbow jello; vegetable bars; kiss cookies; aebleskiver (little Danish pancake balls); braided bread; colorful salads; colorful pizza
• Taste--(what foods have a distinctive/intense taste that kind of overshadows the other elements?): lemon curd; truffles; curry; gingersnaps; pesto; chocolate basil cake

Okay, so, what did we leave out---what foods represent (? still not happy with the word choice) each of the senses for you?  And question #2: do we think about food too much in this family? :)

Funny ha-ha

Have you ever read a book where someone is trying to say that something is "funny," meaning strange, and they say,
"That's funny.  Not funny- ha-ha, but funny- peculiar."

"Funny ha-ha."  I don't know why but that really bothers me.

Also, I now know it was a mistake to get Seb a pair of red underpants.  He likes them so much that he won't change them.

Also, I think it's weird that they do advertisements for Blu-ray DVDs [It is "blu" without the "e", right? Like that makes it super cool or something; "We're so futuristic, man, we've totally moved past 'e' endings!"] with a split screen, to show you the difference between regular DVD and blu-ray: like, this side is the bad blurry regular way and this side is the cool hi-def blu-ray way---except you're watching this all (bad side AND supposed blu-ray-only "good" side) on a regular DVD, right?  So doesn't that sort of undermine their whole point?

May be truncated

Sometimes I like abbreviating things.  (So you'd think I'd be "down with" the latest internet slang, LOL!  Unfortunately I don't know what most of it means.) 

Rach and I used to habitually refer to a certain hymn as "F.T.B.O.T.E." [That's Rachael, not Rachmaninoff.  Abbreviating has its perils.]  Sam, bless him, continues to delight me with the way he abbreviates as well.  Some of our standards:

• What on earth="What on E.?"
  
• Pacifier="Pacifee" or "Fee"
• Aged parent (an affectionate title)="Aged P." (via P.G. Wodehouse, see also "Eggs and B.")
• Egg McMuffins="Egg McMees"
• Pillow=Pilaf (?)
• Camera="tramvai" (not an abbreviation . . . hmm)

What do you abbreviate . . . and what DON'T you?  (Michael Burns, for example---see comments)

Muffindom

This made me laugh:

Employee on phone with customer: Do we have any books about muffins? You mean how to make muffins? We have cookbooks... (pause) No? (pause) I don't think we have books... Just... About muffins.

Long Island, New York
via Overheard in the Office, Oct 13, 2009

Muffins!  They're everywhere! (Yay, Ginna!)

And so, here's another of my favorite muffin recipes.  We made these for a daddy-daughter luncheon in my church class when I was 11 or 12.  My teacher, a very reserved and proper lady who labored valiantly to teach us the womanly arts, was a great cook.  (We also made Chicken-Wonton Salad---another favorite recipe---for this luncheon.)  Whenever I get out this recipe, I still think of mixing these muffins up in my teacher's sunny kitchen and tasting the delicious batter---which she allowed---though it must have pained her.  She was a good lady.

Brown Sugar Muffins (I usually double this recipe for our family---one batch makes 12-15 muffins)

½ cup soft butter or margarine
1 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 c. milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 1/4 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt

Topping: (optional) (I never make the topping)
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons flour
½ teaspoon cinnamon

Cream butter and sugar.  Mix milk, egg, and vanilla together.  Then in a separate bowl, sift dry ingredients together.  Add milk mixture alternately with dry ingredient mixture to butter and sugar mixture. Fill muffin cups 2/3 full, sprinkle with topping if desired. Bake at 375 for 12-15 minutes.

Homemade Vanilla Bean Ice Cream

I've made lots of ice cream in my time.  (And eaten lots of it too, naturally.)  But whenever I saw a recipe for the custard-based kind, where you have to add egg yolks and cook it on the stove first, I just thought it probably wasn't worth the trouble.  I think I'd never tasted any of that kind (not homemade, anyway).

But recently I saw some recipes online that caught my eye, and finding myself possessed of some vanilla beans [I'd never used a vanilla bean before; have you?  They're cool.], I decided I might as well try the whole custard technique, just so I could know what it tasted like.  Well---it was AMAZING.  It seems sort of silly for me to sit here and rave about it, since if you're like me you've either already made up your mind that it can't be that great, or else you never make ice cream at all, or you've sworn off desserts, or whatever, but, I'm going to anyway.  If you're thinking of making any kind of ice cream, just try this kind first.  It is so good, and it is worth it.  WE LOVE IT.  We have made it several times now (and modified, in several other flavors---I'll try to post them soon) and it has been just unbelieveably good in every incarnation: with brownies, with lemon curd, with oatmeal fudge bars, with berry pie.  ("You eat a lot of desserts!" you are thinking.  "You are correct," I reply, smugly.) 

By the way (side note), I was so pleased today when I asked Seb if he was done with lunch and he replied, "Yep, I'm full and happy."  I want my kids to have healthy attitudes about food: try lots of things---stop when they're full---and most importantly ENJOY GOOD FOOD.  So I am glad when he shows he is learning those things, by being "full and happy" after meals. 

Okay.  Here is the recipe.  It's from the Pioneer Woman, so of course if you want lovely pictures to accompany your instructions, go here.

Vanilla Bean Ice Cream

1 vanilla bean, split and scraped

3 cups half-and-half

2 cups sugar

8 large egg yolks

3 cups heavy cream

Heat half-and-half and 2 cups sugar in a separate saucepan over low heat, adding vanilla “caviar” to the mixture. (You can also drop in the scraped vanilla bean, just to extract all the flavor. Discard before moving to the next step.) Turn off heat when mixture is totally heated.

Add heavy cream to a separate bowl.

Beat egg yolks by hand or with an electric mixer until yolks are pale yellow and slightly thick.

Temper the egg yolks by slowly drizzling in 1 1/2 cups of hot half-and-half mixture, whisking constantly. After that, pour the egg yolk/half-and-half mixture into the pan containing the rest of the half-and-half mixture. Cook over low to medium-low heat until quite thick, stirring constantly. Strain custard through a fine mesh strainer into a bowl (to get any bits of egg or vanilla bean rind out), then pour into custard the bowl with the cream. Stir to combine.

Chill mixture completely (2 hours or overnight), then freeze in an ice cream maker until thick. Place container in freezer to harden for at least eight hours.

Prepare to be impressed.

This boy

doesn't need diapers anymore.
 
Now, now, I can't take all the credit.  He was ready (you can't toilet train a child till he's ready).

On the other hand, who was it that followed him around the house watching him like a hawk and doing nothing else for hour after boring hour?  And who said "Oh well, maybe next time" six billion times after he had accidents?  And who had to keep her countenance cheerful and encouraging while encountering strenuous resistance to the idea of "practicing" any more times?  And who had to maintain constant mental/emotional vigilance in order to hear any verbal cues faintly resembling the words "go bathroom" "dirty diaper" "toilet" etc.?  And who had to leap up to provide assistance while either a.) continuing to nurse a baby [difficult, but not impossible] or b.) extracting baby, mid-suck, from the breast and depositing her unceremoniously on the floor, thus inviting aforementioned baby's extremely vocal dispproval and/or bereavement? And who found herself repeating "do you still have dry underpants?" in her sleep?

Me.  That's who.  So go ahead and be impressed with me, too.

The mental vigilance is still needed (for occasional reminders), but the emotional vigilance (for remaining cheerful and positive after accidents, against all natural inclination) has become mostly unnecessary.  Hooray!

Or, as Malachi would and does say,
OO-WAY!

Leaves, more of them

Would you like some more leaf pictures?  Here they are.  From a few different days.  Some of the colors are so bright, they don't even look real.  So beautiful!

We've done a lot of driving this Fall, but there are still so many places I'd like to see!  And it's just about too late now.  I told Sam next year he'll have to take a couple weeks off work so we can devote our whole time to seeing the leaves. :) 

(Going on drives is one thing I really love. [If Daisy falls asleep instead of screaming, that is.]  The boys are generally good in the car, and even if not, they're contained---so we can listen to music, and Sam and I can talk.  And we can do it even if the weather is cold.  And we can eat muffins or cookies while we do it.  Yay!)

(Weird clouds?)

Helpful

Here is what Sebby made for me.
"A little place to feed Daisy, and you have everything you need."

Evidently I need 5 large books, including "The Myth of Self-Esteem" and 3 large volumes comprising the Standing on the Promises trilogy (about Black Mormon Pioneers) (which latter books I finished recently, by the way, and I recommend them highly).  And two pacifiers.  Just in case.

I don't know what to do

Brownie is missing.  I keep thinking we'll find him, but we don't.  Where can he have gone? 

We have a Backup Brownie.  But I'm afraid if we get Backup Brownie out, Real Brownie will turn up, and all will be revealed.  Also, Backup Brownie looks newer (although not totally new---he's come through for us in the clutch before).

I share my good ideas with you

It's a good idea to keep paper by your bed so that you can write down ideas that may come to you in the night.  For example last night while I was falling asleep I had the idea to cover my face completely with Elmer's Glue, and then when it dried, peel it carefully off like a mask and use it for a Halloween Decoration.  Brilliant.

So there you go.

Good

Do you know what it is Seb is holding up?  A muffin.  Yum.

Some good things.

I know where all three of Daisy's pacifiers are right now.  ALL THREE!

Sam and I are working on brackets this week.  It's the Playoffs of whatever we decide: what are the best Fall desserts, best places to see leaves, best ice cream, etc.  We are having great fun testing it all.  (Some day I will post some pictures of the ice creams we've been making.  You might think this isn't the time of year for ice cream, but if so, I feel sad for you.)

Do you like the TV show Psych?  We've been watching it on Hulu.  HiLARious.

And a note I got (wrapped with a bow on it) from Abe: