Things to Do - Grateful List (December 2013)

Wow, December seems like forever ago. But here it is, Xmas and all . . .

THE ARTS
* Reading James Salter's All That Is
* Project Runway at night with the kids
* Matilda and Annie on Broadway as a family
* Listening to the Virgins, Strike Gently

FOOD
* Dan's venison spaghetti
* Dan's venison steaks
* Pearl Fine Teas (from Union Market) - 3 pm blend, ginger lemon, and makiki
* Bacon, greyer, ham strata (via Cooking Light)

PLACES
* Worlds Fair trains at the US Botanic Gardens
* MOMA with the girls
* Snow in Times Square
* Hiking the Turkey Run loop as a family

STUFF
* New memory for my imac from Crucial.com
* My new Roomba, it's amazing. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you, Margie!
* My new necklace with the kids' initials Thank you! Thank you! Thank you, Dan!

ETC.
* Spending Sunday afternoon reading books on the couch with the kids
* Finding the Light online photography class
* Our dog training session with WOOFS! - amazingly helpful
* Playing wii Carnival Games with the kids
* A 60 degree day in December
* T lining up his matchbox cars and stating "if I have called your name, please step forward. You are safe this week and you may leave the runway."
* P and Laney spending a rainy day making Lego Friends and T asking "mom, do they have lego friends for boys?"/ "yes"/ "well, what are they called?"/ "um, they're just called legos, T."
* F dressing T up and taking him out to play in the snow - "Guess what we did, mom? We climbed Mt. Mulch."
* F making T breakfast in bed
* The girls' playing together - "I have bad news, your parents died."/ "Wait, that means we're living with a pop star forever. Awesome!"
* F - "P, there are a lot of things that happen in the world that aren't your fault, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't try to help. like it's not my fault that people are homeless, but I still think we should try to help those people. And it's not your fault that my kindle fire won't stay charged. but if you were a person who cared, you'd help me by giving me your kindle fire. just like i try to help homeless people."
* The girls using all their souvenir money to buy presents for each other and T
* Surprising F by eating lunch with her in the cafeteria
* 3 kids, 1 dentist appointment, no cavities
* Our winter solstice party (70 degrees on the solstice) - 130 people is a lot of people for one little house, but keg stands, venison chili, Elf hats, and margaritas made it all worth it, plus T asking "mommy, can we have that party again?"
* T waking up and looking for Elford every morning
* The girls and my mom playing Snow-opoly
* A successful Xmas morning (T - walkie talkies and the Land of Nod fire station; F - Furbies and science kits; P - Furbies and lego friends)
* T asking Dan - "Are you sure you don't have to ask mom, because she's kind of the boss? Unless she sleeps in, then you get to be the boss."
* T asking - "Can we play the game where the guy always kills people?" / me - "HUH?" / Dan - "Don't worry, he means Clue."
* Me yelling (all Xmas day) - "Can someone please SHUT THOSE FURBIES UP?"
* Family games of Crazy 8s.
* P parking herself on Great Grandma's lap.
* My mom visiting and helping (so so much) with the kids.
* The neighbors' NYE party (all of our kids stayed up til midnight. wow).

THE KIDS' LISTS:

F - my family, a really great sister, a nice house to live in and food to eat, my first student council meeting, a great vacation in NYC, the M&M store and Toys R'Us, Grandma Troutman visiting, Xmas, going to tea [at the Ritz]

P - my family, our house, Elford, Monster High dolls, my room, the countdown to Xmas, my sleeping bag, MOMA, the M&M store, Toys R'Us, both plays on Broadway

T - our dog trainer, standing like trees, J's Xmas party, daddy being home, my family, that we went to NYC, a nice house to live in and food to eat, seeing Frozen, Grandma

Things to Read - Two Fantastic Alphabet Books

In my continuing attempt to teach T how to read, we've spent a lot of time checking out alphabet books from the library. Most start off fun enough, but 26 letters is a lot of letters. Usually, both T and I are crazy bored before we reach M. But these two books have kept us (miraculously) entertained for much of the winter. Magic, pure magic.





SuperHero ABC - T loves this book. The superheros described are bizarre and often gross ("the Volanco vomits on villians"), but entertaining. We spend a lot of time discussing the merits and detriments of each lettered character and Z comes before we lose interest. Nice.





Curious George Learns the Alphabet - Two weeks ago T found the "secret" Curious George corner at the library and since then the annoying monkey is all we read about. (On a total sidenote, what does it say about our culture when the most enduring children's books involve a monkey who f***s up a ton of sh** and then everyone tells him how great he is for trying to help make things better at the end? George is sort of like Banksy for children). Anyways, the Curious George alphabet book is pretty cool - every letter becomes an object or animal, some of which are quite creative.

And so go our days. What about everyone else? Any good alphabet books to recommend? We could use some more suggestions.

Things to Make - Apple Cake

I made a cake. This is sort of a big deal because I'm not much of a baker, let alone a cake maker. When the kids came home they said, "I didn't know you could make cakes, mommy. Is it someone's birthday?" Dan's reply wasn't much different.

But it's so cold outside. And cake tastes good. And this cake uses LOTS of apples, so it's practically a health food.

Anyways, we all loved my cake. It tastes like a rich apply coffee cake, so we ate some for breakfast too.

APPLE CAKE

Ingredients

* 2 cups sugar
* 1 cup vegetable oil
* 3 eggs
* 3 cups flour
* 1 teaspoon baking soda
* 1/2 teaspoon salt
* 6 medium apples (golden delicious preferred) cored, peeled and diced
* 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Topping

* 1 cup brown sugar
* 1 stick butter (1/2 cup)
* 1/4 cup milk

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly oil a 9x13 baking dish.
2. Mix sugar, oil, and eggs; beat well.
3. Add flour, baking soda, salt, apples, and vanilla; beat until thoroughly combined.
4. Scrape into the prepared baking dish.
5. Baked for 1 hour
6. To make the topping - boil together the brown sugar, butter, and milk for 2.5 minutes. Remove from heat.
7. Remove the cake from the oven and immediately poke the tines of a fork down through the cake (about 15 jabs).
8. Pour the topping over the cake.
9. Serve warm or let cool (note - this cake tastes especially good with vanilla ice cream; though, seriously, what doesn't?)

- Adapted from Apple Cookbook

Things to Do - Polar Vortex, Round II

I feel like we will remember winter 2013-14 as the time my kids stopped going to school. Even as an adult there is something magical about snow days - the lack of rules, the guiltless wearing of PJs all day, the break from errands and planning. But, like any good thing, too much is just too much. Last Wednesday I couldn't even feign excitement about our second "polar vortex" of the year. There's a difference between the occasional day off and a season that puts life on hold.

We don't own much snow apparel - random hand me downs coupled with accessories purchased at spring clearance sales. This is both because I'm cheap and because, up until this year, Northern Virginia hasn't received much snow. But given that the season's SECOND extreme cold spell has arrived, I purchased some sleds from Target and became a little more aggressive in searching for "gently used clothing" from friends with older kids.

As a kid my absolute favorite thing to do in the winter was sled with my dad - he'd stand, tumble, dive . . . crazy stunts. On a sledding hill, my dad never seemed like a dad, suddenly he morphed into my best friend, and a super cool one at that. Yet, up until last week, I never took my kids sledding, as Dan always works when it snows and I wasn't sure I could handle all three by myself. So we finally made it to the local hill where I was happy to realize we knew almost everyone there. We stayed for hours, despite temps in the low teens. And the snow day magic returned (even if it was our 4th this winter).

Things to Do - Cherish This Day & Random Links

Last week (or was it the week before? the days do seem to blend lately), T had a low fever at night so I kept him home from school for a few days. We tried to entertain each other, but after the first day he really missed his friends. On his last day home I walked into the front room and caught him playing with the shades and starring, wistfully, out the window. So go these winter days.

HAPPY FRIDAY EVERYONE (and, in Arlington, the kids even have school today. miracles. miracles)!! Now click on over to Cherish This Day and see what everyone else has been up to.


RANDOM LINKS:

* Judy Bloom and Lena Dunham curate a reading list.

* These are funny. Really funny. Trust me.

* 50 songs guaranteed to make you smile. They're right.

* Work spaces of great artists. I could spend hours in Nigella Lawson's study.

* Girl scout cookie/wine pairings.

* Everyday objects become awesome. I love these.

* 12 ways to get fit at home. Wonderful list. Now I just need to follow through.