Bread Party

Mormor with my sister on the left. I am on the right. Nice Dorthy Hammil hair I had. Lovin that green shag carpet. What kind of world did we live in when that was in style? Oh, yes. The Regan Years.


Mormor and Popop. I estimate this photo from 1982


Stacks of bread!




Sarah making her zucchini bread!


The playground.



It was organized chaos..



Yesterday was the pumpkin/zucchini bread party at my house. We each got 3-4 loaves to bring home and freeze. Everyone brought a recipe and after the loaves were baked, they were split up for everyone to bring home.
I decided to substitute apple sauce for the oil and decrease the sugar in my recipe. Not the greatest idea. It came out fine, but was not amazing. Everyone else had bread that turned out really well. Really I should have only substituted half the oil for applesauce, but I am coming to find out that baking is not a strong suite of mine like cooking. I would never bake without a recipe. I follow it exactly. Cooking on the other hand, I tend to not follow recipes, mostly making up my own. I felt way more comfortable yesterday roasting vegetables for everyone to eat! Every time a day like yesterday happens I feel really lucky to live where I live and have the wonderful friends I have. No one seemed to mind the 40 minute trek up to my house from town either (or did you? hee hee!). Of course it was almost 6pm when everyone left and I wondered how everyone's drive home was with car loads full of extremely exhausted children! M was so tired she did not even protest 2 books before bed instead of the strictly enforced (by her) law of the land rule of 3 books before bed. Most nights she is trying to figure out how to get 4 or 5 books before bed. Reading is such a big part of our life now. M and I go to the library almost once a week, and it is one of our regular haunts. My grandmother Mormor was the person in my family who read to my sister and I. My grandmother was the closest thing to a healthy, stable and nurturing mother I had. We had a collection of books at her farm house in Connecticut I looked forward to reading each visit. I imagine that many of those books were passed on from my father and aunt. I still remember books she had for us to read. Humbug Witch, Tikitikitembo, Georgie the Ghost and Santa's Workshop just to name a few. Another reason I am so thankful to my now passed grandparents. The magic of their farm in Connecticut, and the love and attention they provided me is still making a difference in my life, making me a better mother to my daughter. Thank you Mormor and Popop!

Pink Slip from School

Yesterday while picking up M at school, I was handed a pink slip of paper that told me Pinworms have hit her classroom.
I have curbed my desire to blog about this for risk that I might loose some readers. No one wants to know about worms that come out of your butt. So, now is your opportunity to go no further and be spared some grossness.
Turns out pinworms (a human roundworm) are a very common "childhood illness". In fact there are over 40 million cases of pinworm infestations a year mostly in the 5-10 year old age group. It is as common as lice! They are spread the oral-fecal route. You ingest the worm eggs and in 2 to 3 weeks, you have the little buggars coming out of your anus at night to lay eggs. When this happens, it can be very itchy, so children typically scratch their butt and get eggs under their fingernails. It becomes a vicious cycle. There is a simple and 98% effective prescription treatment called Vermox. You take one pill and it kills the worms by interrupting their life-cycle. It inhibits their ability to ingest sugar so they starve to death. Within 3 days they have died and are pooped out. The eggs however are not killed by this medicine, so another dose of this medicine is required 2 weeks after the first. Cleaning due to pinworms is much like the house cleaning with lice. If you don't get rid of all the lurking eggs in bedding, toys and surfaces, you will reinfect your self and have worms again in 2 to 3 weeks.
Most books and literature say a child with pinworms has an intensely itchy butt and may have nightmares. My child had no symptoms. In fact, I was permanently traumatized to find a live worm crawling out of my butt, which enlightened me to the situation, and figured I got them from my daughter (I did). How can you tell if your child has pinworms? Well, take a flashlight into your child's dark room about 2 hours after they have fallen asleep at night. Then check their butt. If you see moving white pieces of something that looks like a thread in their anus, you know for sure. The female worms wait until nighttime to crawl to the anus and lay eggs.
Discovering your own infection of pinworms is an instant creepy crawly feeling all over your body and for someone like me, this was an awful experience. The feeling never goes away. Luckily though, I check M about every week so I can stay on top of this ever happening again. And, because I am 45 minutes from the nearest pharmacy and the last time this happened the pediatrician on-call decided not to return my phone call until the next day (on a Sunday) I now have two extra doses at home. If you have worms crawling out of you butt, it becomes an emergency situation in my book. Kids don't seems to care so much. For me, it is just out of the realm of what is acceptable on a physical level.
I basically harassed M's doctor until she refilled the prescription so I could have some on hand in case we deal with this again.
I am lucky that some of my girlfriends have deep sympathy for this situation and have too experienced this awful parasite. Once the seal has been broken and you have dealt personally with pinworms, I believe life changes. Ask my sister and husband. I almost crumbled from disgust of the whole experience and they bore witness. My girlfriend and I were able to just dish out the complaining with sympathetic ears, knowing full well that adults are just not supposed to have to suffer the traumas of childhood afflictions. Didn't we already do our time? Wasn't that what childhood was all about? Getting these disgusting things like lice and scabies out of the way?
Well, just thought I would share the latest. So far, we are in the clear. But I have powerful worm medicine on hand just in case. And I busted out the nail brush last night. My daughter knows the drill. She wonders what the bfd is all about, but lets me just be the somewhat freaky mom I am. Bless her for that!

Turkey Mole

It was a low-key weekend. Yesterday M and I went to the Celtic Festival and I relished in the cool temperatures and costumes. M liked the face painting and the mermaid that gave her a treasure and let her make a wish in her fountain.
D could not be there due to his bluegrass band performing in a wedding. After the wedding though, they drove down to the local downtown area and did an impromptu sidewalk concert. He said they drew about 75 people in the street and loved every minute of it.
Today was the coolest day yet, only getting to 60 degrees. I pulled on my Frye boots with knee socks and remembered how much better life seems without oppressive heat.
Tonight I made Turkey Mole. I had seen Tyler Florence's episode for Ultimate Turkey Mole a few months back and have been waiting for cooler weather to try it out. Our local Coop even sold me a "not for sale" frozen turkey the deli department was going to use. It was not a complicated recipe, but it has lots of ingredients and steps. It turned out really wonderful. I actually like the mole by itself, and will keep it for future mexican dishes. The turkey carcass is boiling away on my stove as I write this, to be used for endless possibilities in the future. Have a good monday!

Typos

My typos are beyond measure.
Awful.
I re-read a post and keep finding them.
Forgive me.
Or use my blog as a tutorial for your children called "find the misspelled word"
At least I know that I excel at something.

Roasted Beet Salad with Baby Arugula

It has been 70 degrees the last two days. 70 degrees!! I think we have had about 5 cloudy days in the last 5 months, and heat, heat, dry hot heat. I am very excited, happy and giddy fall is finally here. I am not cut out of the fabric for heat. I say this having grown up in Florida. For ten years, I never got used to the heat. I complained for ten years about the humid, hot, seasonless weather. In case you don't know me very well, I take ANY opportunity to make fun of Florida. I never ever miss a chance to. It is just how I am. In fact, those close to me know I have a nickname for Florida..The Armpit State. And, because I put in my time, my tender growing years there, I have full rights to make fun of the state as I wish. In fact one of the only good things to come out of that state was the show Miami Vice. Enough said.
So, as I relish in the cooler temperatures, a wonderful thing happens in my kitchen. The oven gets turned on. Our local organic farm stand (that I love beyond measure and hope stays there year round) had beets today. Beets roasted in the oven are a most wonderful thing. In fact, if your children hate beets (and maybe you too?) if you roast them, they may change their mind. Mine did. The sugars burst out and they become tender. I roast beets, let them cool, then slice them up for salads. Extra goes in the fridge.

Here is how you oven roast beets
1. wash any dirt off and trim off green tops if possible
2. put in an oven safe dish like a pie pan or brownie pan
3. couple of glugs of olive oil
4. use your fingers to make sure they are all coated with olive oil
5. cover with tin foil
6. bake for one hour at 375 degrees
Take out of oven pierce with knife for doneness. Like you would a baked potato. Let cool. Then, rub the outside skins off with your fingers and trim the tops and bottoms. Sprinkle with salt and you are ready to use them!

Tonight's Salad

1 roasted beet thinly sliced
1 handful baby arugula tossed in a bit of olive oil and a small sprinkle of lemon juice
1 tbls. white corn sauteed for 2 minutes in a bit of butter and salt
sprinkle of Purple Haze Chevre (lavender scented)
fresh pepper

Cutenesss

The "Fort" made of tape and wrapping paper = a fun Saturday morning



Just big enough for one


She even made a window



Bedtime with Daddy is always a barrel of laughs


My daughter loves making faces


These two are the best of pals and get into lots of trouble together


No big news. Just a few of cute family photos.

Haiku

The latest is that swine flu is at our school.
Joy.
The good part of that is I was able to get a bargain shopping day in yesterday, so if I fall ill I will have nice new comfy clothes to wear.
Kidding.
Some girlfriends and I went out for the whole entire day without children. We were able to have lots and lots of conversations without interruptions. We were all able to focus. To spend a leisurely amount of time in the dressing room. To sit and eat salads for dinner and chew our food.
And, because we are such country folk, it is still somewhat of a novelty to actually go and shop for a day. I missed Anthropologie, but that is ok, because Gap and Old Navy had an extra 40% off clearance items and I had all the time in the world to look through as many sales racks as I wanted. Yesterday was all about the little things.
I am going to cook something this week. Tonight I made sauteed chard with shallots and mustard. I threw in a little rosemary and thyme too, but it was not post worthy. Last week was taken up with the hours and hours that apple butter takes up, so I did not have any extra energy.

Bedtime last night with M, her daddy was reading Basho and the Fox. Afterward, she had a go at writing haiku. D was very encouraging, but insisted she make it up completely by herself. When I got home from shopping last night he was one very proud papa.

Here are her two haiku poems:

The moonrise
the cherries fall
The fairies flutter
the eagle flies


The sunset comes
the owls hoot
the bells ring