From the Hive

Daisy, thrilled.

In 2005, Jeff purchased this fetching bee ensemble from Target for our dog Daisy. Yeah. I know.

This year, Bob insists on being a bee for Halloween. I of course hold Jeff responsible for this.

I have suggested other more butch big boy costumes to steer Bob away from this choice, knowing that when he becomes a surly 13-year-old he will look back on photos of himself as a darling bee and blame his mother for dressing him this way. I also understand that this is ridiculous and I should be ecstatic that our baby wants to look like a tiny stuffed animal this year. Next year, I‘m sure we’ll have a Ninja on our hands.

But anyway, my dear older Bob of the future, believe that I tried. This is my proof. Please address all complaints to your father.

Smacksy Sunday Link: Forgotten Bookmarks

30% of my 17 daily waking hours are spent in the management of poops. I mean this quite literally: potty training/cat box/doggie “lawn gifts.” This is just a fact and has nothing to do with today’s featured link except that in my number twos filled world, I look forward to a quiet little mystery sent to my email on most days – the latest post from Forgotten Bookmarks. The writer of this blog explains it like this, “I work at a used and rare bookstore, and I buy books from people everyday. These are the personal, funny, heartbreaking and weird things I find in those books.”

This site is fascinating, and addicting. and I can spend way too much time reading through the old posts.

There is also a new (beta) site by the same blogger called Handwritten Recipes, similarly highlighting recipes left behind.

Like I said, this has nothing to do with poop.

Smacksy Saturday Photo: Sleep

There was never a child so lovely but his mother was glad to get him to sleep.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Just the One

You may have read about some of my efforts to go a little more green. So just when I get all proud of myself for cutting our use of paper towels in half, (In half!) I read about these people and discover how lame I really am. In 2008 this couple in New Zealand challenged themselves to create no more than one bag of garbage for the whole year. You heard me, the whole year. And they did it. And not a giant Hefty Steel Sack of garbage either, they used a small grocery bag. I could fill that grocery bag in under an hour with just the help of one toddler, one Popsicle, and a package of Costco baby wipes

Sure, these amazingly greener-than-thou-will-ever-be people don’t have kids but I can hardly use that as my extreme garbage excuse since Bob is not the one in the habit of ordering a set of dessert plates on eBay that come packed in a box the size of an iron lung.

The whole one bag deal is inspiring and at the same time I get a little paralyzed by the idea of all the details that this project would involve. How much would we have to invest in laser hair removal to avoid a mass of disposed razors? Would we have to become those people that teach their pets to use the toilet? (Creepy, yet compelling idea.)

I’ve been getting all, “Worship my petite carbon footprint!” when I manage to fill only three of our four large outside garbage cans in a week. Thanks to a couple in Christchurch New Zealand, I’m now aiming to fill only two.

My Little GPS

Small Bob and I had plans to meet Mary and her son Ivan at the Natural History Museum. We left a little early but still hit some traffic in downtown. After we finally made it off of the 110 onto the 10, the traffic lightened up but we were still running a few minutes late. We exited at La Brea and then cruised up to Wilshire, pulled into the parking lot, paid our $9.00 and then climbed the mile or so of steps to get over the hill and then down another flight to arrive at the entrance. As I looked up at the museum’s impressive façade, I realized that we were standing in front of the George C. Page Museum at the LaBrea Tar Pits in Mid-Wilshire, not the Natural History Museum which is near downtown, 9 miles and 25 minutes away.

I have never been a fan of the term “brain fart,” in fact it has long been a peeve of mine, along with the phrase “It’s all good,” the Rachel Ray-ism “EVOO” and the word “peeve.” But a "brain fart" is what it was, stinky and annoying. The worst was breaking the news to three-year-old Bob. Whenever he gets an inkling that I have made a wrong turn, the backseat driving begins. A mistake of this magnitude would be epic.

“Bob, we have to go back to the car. We are at the wrong museum.”

“We are at the wrong museum? What did you do?”

“Just get in the car. Let’s hurry. Mary and Ivan are waiting for us at the other museum.”

“You are turning around? We are lost?”

“We aren’t lost, I just went to the wrong place.”

“I don’t know how to go there! What is the name of this street? You are making a left? No! No! Go the other way!”

“Bob, you don’t know where we’re going, you’ve never been there before. This is La Brea.”

“We are lost! You have to call Daddy! Where we are going next?”

“We are getting back on the freeway and going towards downtown.”

“No! Go west! Go west!”

“Bob, I will remind you that you don’t even know what that means and also we need to go east.”

“No! We are very lost!

“We are not lost.”

“WEST!”

“If you will drop it I will get you an ice cream at the museum.”

“Which museum? Do you know how to get there? Can I have cherry?”

You and Your Quinoa

Now that my new hobby is my gluten intolerance (So sexy!) I’ve come to realize that quinoa is the go-to grain, right after rice, and the Trader Joe’s faux-Cheetos cheese crunchy things that I now consider a grain.

Quinoa is fantastic because it cooks in a fraction of the time of brown rice. Just typing that last sentence so earnestly has confirmed that I have become the kind of person I never wanted to hang out with. What is happening? Where is my Bloomin' Onion™ ?

The following Quinoa and Summer Vegetables recipe was adapted from one I found on the Karina’s Kitchen website. (God love that Karina. Without her I’d just be gnawing on stale rice cakes for all three meals.) And by “adapted” I mean that instead of sticking to Karina’s list of fresh organic produce, I put in whatever vegetables were last-gasping it in the bottom of the refrigerator and it was still great. Feel free to do the same. After trying this a few different ways, I will tell you that I believe the key ingredient here is the balsamic, you can get creative with everything else, if you must.

Quinoa and Summer Vegetables
(I'll call it that because Karina calls it that and it also sounds fancier than Quinoa and Whatever.)

1 cup dry quinoa
Water
Olive oil for sautéing

1/2 onion, diced

2 cloves garlic, chopped

1 yellow summer squash, chopped

1 zucchini squash, chopped
1/2 yellow bell pepper, chopped

1 cup white mushrooms, trimmed, sliced 

1 cup of grape tomatoes, halved

Sea salt and ground pepper

Handful of each - Fresh basil and Italian parsley, torn 

1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar

Extra virgin olive oil, to taste

Prepare the quinoa as directed on the box. For that you’ll need the quinoa and the water. I’m not re-typing that all here. Just read the box. They are the quinoa people. They know what they’re doing.



While the quinoa is cooking, in a separate pan sauté the onion until translucent, then add the garlic and heat for a minute or so, then add everything else that is vegetable, cooking until tender. Add salt, pepper, herbs and balsamic towards the end of the cooking time. Add the vegetable mixture to the prepared quinoa. Stir in just a little more olive oil.

Serve immediately, or refrigerate and eat it later as a cold salad. Before serving it cold, taste test again and adjust seasonings. When I have it the next day, it usually needs a little more balsamic.

It tastes good, it’s easy and now your fridge is cleaned out. Yay you.

Serves 4 people who better be doing the dishes because look how you slaved. *cough*





Never Say Never... Again

Not too long ago, my friend Karen said that somewhere along the way she had become the “fanny pack and visor mom,” something she had vowed would never be her deal, and that after a momentary freak out, she decided that she didn’t care. (She is also gorgeous and if anyone can rock that look, it’s her.)

Since becoming a mom, I have realized that when I put anything into the Never column of my mental list, it creates a gravitational pull on that "anything" that is so strong that it takes just moments for the Never to become a Habit.

Just a few of the things that are Formerly Known as Never:

Refer to Bob as “young man” when I am impatient with him.

Refer to Jeff as “old man” when I am impatient with Bob.

Refer to Daisy as “Bob” when I am impatient with the random barking.

Have a living room/kitchen/dining room/bathroom/car that resembles what it would look like if Santa exploded.

Consider our dog the first position vacuum, and our actual vacuum the back up.

Be on target to finish Bob’s “My First Year” baby book in time for his wedding.

Define sweat pants as “pants” and old string cheese in the bottom of the diaper bag as “lunch.”

Refer to the diaper bag as my "purse" and continue carrying it even though Bob no longer wears diapers.

Abandon the three-second-rule for a two-minute-and-shake-off-the-germs-rule.

Refer to comments I leave on Facebook status updates and my Good Morning wave at our neighbor Miss Belva as my “social life.”

Use Crest White Strips as a stand-in for an actual trip to the dentist.

Like Karen, I too am embracing my new habits/ideas/behaviors. By “embracing” I mean that if you ask me about any of this, I will become extremely defensive.