Ordinary Time

If you are a long time reader, then you are familiar with L.'s rather strong and unique personality. She was an easily frustrated baby and toddler, which didn't always make for easy parenting. I had a feeling when she was very little that there was just a lot going on inside her head, and it was frustrating to not be able to do anything about it. As she got older, this very definitely proved to be the case. There is a lot going on inside that head of hers. Reading has been the very best thing for L. Here is a picture I took of her earlier today as she was reading. I know, it doesn't look comfortable, but she was quite happy. Being able to read as many stories as she wants to hear has been wonderful. I used to have to travel with books because when life got to be too much for her only a listening to a story would bring her back from the brink of total meltdown. Of course, being able to read also fills her head with even more ideas... for better or for worse. Take he...

Here is my other annual new year post; my (somewhat) annotated reading list. This year I read 66 books, which is down from 2018's total of 89. Since 23 books is a pretty significant difference, I admit to spending some time figuring out why. I think there are two reasons. The first is that in 2018, I spent a ridiculous amount of time reading light, fluffy, candy-like mysteries. Some of those I read at the end of the year were so poorly written that I decided to give them up and focus on reading better writing this past year. The thing about light, fluffy, candy-like mysteries is that I can crank through one in just a couple of days. Finishing a book every two days or so really does help the amount of books read in a year. Reading better writing means that it takes me a bit longer to read it. The other reason behind the lower total is R. For much of last year J. and I were getting very little sleep. Since I do most of my reading at bedtime, if I am exhausted then I'll read one...

As I have done before, I sorted through all my statistics to see what were the most popular posts from last year. Here they are counting down from 10, in case you missed them. 10. Transitions 9. I can breath again 8. Never too late 7. Why I didn't write a post last night 6. "I want to go somewhere" 5. Delayed grief 4. Halloween... in the hospital 3. Doctor intake form 2. The next wrong choice 1. Adoption 101: Attachment I also thought it would be fun to look back and see what the highest read posts were from the last decade. (Yes, I've been writing this blog for that long... longer in fact.) Some of these are from quite some time ago, so newer readers may never have come across them. 10. Friday bullets 9. Reality checks 8. Easier? 7. Advent hope 6. Christmas writings 5. Cat bonding 4. Costumes 2016 [I have to just pause here and make a comment. I discovered that these seven posts all came from a four month period in 2016 with in...

Well if the whole year goes as well as the first day did, it should be a very good year, indeed. J. and I drove up to my favorite yarn store to take advantage of a really good New Year's Day sale. Well, I took advantage of it, J. sat in one of the chairs with the other husbands who were waiting and read one of the new spinning books I picked up. I also got two pounds of merino wool for an outrageously low price. Look how pretty it is! This will make quite a bit of yarn and will take me quite a while to spin. I also got a new mindless project of some self-striping sock wool to knit a pair of socks. Mindless projects are for when I need something to keep my hands busy but am not in a place to have to count or pay attention to a complicated pattern. It was fun shopping. It was also a lovely drive on a sunny day, and J. and I got some uninterrupted time together. Younger people read books or played games or watched G.'s Christmas gift which was a DVD baking course from the G...

Yesterday was the big tamale making day. It was proceeded by the big tamale filling making day on Saturday. Actually making the tamales was more fun, though, because two friends joined me. We worked from about 1:30 until 6:30, and churned out probably close to 300 tamales. There were chicken with a green tomatillo sauce, pork with a red chili sauce, and a filling made of jalepenos, onions, and tomatoes. Of course, the best part was getting to eat them afterwards. Good friends, good food, a sink large enough to clean the pots... What could be better? All the pots were filled like this, and there were three of them.  We were just missing M., B., and TM Thank you, friends, for cooking with me for five hours!

Leaving my old kitchen and coming to this one was one of the most difficult aspects of our move two and half years ago. Oh, how I miss that kitchen! Especially when the one we moved into was not even close to being functional. We have continued to work to improve it. First was installing the refrigerator I bought before we moved because I knew I couldn't function with the one that was in the kitchen. Then nearly immediately I ordered a rolling kitchen island because the little bit of counter space just wasn't enough. These two things helped... a bit. In a month or so, I realized that the range, which I didn't love at first sight, was even more horrible than I had thought. I discovered this when I kept routinely ruining food. So, off to the Habitat ReStore I went to find a new one. We then discovered that the kitchen didn't have a 220 line , so the P. Family came out one weekend and we fed them while the P. Family dad did the electrical work for us. (It is handy to hav...

First the menu as I planned it this morning. Friday (We enjoy celebrating a night of Hanukkah... telling the story of the Maccabees and the oil in the temple, eating good food, and playing dreidel.) Latkes Jelly donuts      Bought from the store Saturday Butter chicken (in the crock pot)      I'm using the recipe I linked to Naan      From the store Basmati rice      I always keep this on hand as well as Jasmine rice Sunday TAMALES !!      Some friends are coming over and we'll be making them from scratch. I'll make the fillings the day before. I'm planning pork with red sauce, chicken with a green chili sauce, and peppers and onions Monday Ninth Night Lamb      For Christmas, M. got me a cook book called, The Italian Country Table . I had checked it out of the library before, and several of my favorite recipes came from it. We were talking and I mentioned I would love to...