Though the Christmas decorations were all put away last weekend (except for the snowman that I noticed in the hall bathroom today), our Christmas vacation really didn’t end until today. Brooke left to go back to Chicago and Erin started back to school. It was really nice to have both girls here with us last night. Erin was a real trooper and spent the night with us so that she could get up at 5:15 to take Weber to the…
Wednesdays are my long day. I teach later than any other day and then have choir rehearsal in the evening. If we eat an evening meal out during the week, it is usually on Wednesday. Since we have run out of Thanksgiving leftovers and I didn’t have time to cook tonight, we decided to eat at Panera Bread. It is on the way to church, is generally quiet and they have the best selection of soup, which seemed a nice…
My friend Debra and I had a Play Date today. She and I see each other at least once a week because we are in a book group together. Though that is a fun thing, it is not a Play Date. We are there to study a book with four other women, not to play. Sometimes we even see each other twice a week because we attend the same church. All that really means is that on Sunday mornings we…
It seems that these days I need a list just to function in a nominally productive manner. To be honest, maybe “a list” is an understatement; I need many lists to successfully get through any given day – grocery list, chore list, reading list, to-do list for school, home maintenance list, errand list – and the lists go on . . . Without my lists, something gets forgotten. It’s OK if that overlooked item is something like dusting the door…
As far as I am concerned, crackers are the perfect food. First of all, they are a carbohydrate; that propels them way up there in the direction of perfection. Secondly, they are tasty by themselves and they serve as a luxury vehicle for the delivery of other delicious stuff like peanut butter, cheese, hummus, fruit . . . The one thing that has kept the crackers in my world from reaching absolute perfection is that I buy them pre-packaged. I…
They (whoever “they” is) say that the way to a man’s heart is through is stomach. I’ve also heard it said that men want to marry someone just like their mother. One conclusion that can be made from these two things is that men want a woman who cooks just like mom did. In this era of frozen and packaged foods and three ingredient recipes, this is a tall order for modern young women. I am definitely not a young…
I’ve gotten to the point where I don’t like to eat out at restaurants unless it is for a specific occasion or because my taste buds yearn for something whose preparatory process exceeds my culinary skills. I really hate the notion of “having” to eat out because there is not enough time to prepare a meal at home. Most food in restaurants these days seems to be primarily variations on a fried theme; little variety exists from one place to…
We have all known a child who can’t sleep on Christmas Eve because he or she is waiting for the arrival of Santa Claus and his eight tiny reindeer. For that child, the night is endless – lying in bed wide awake for what seems like hours to discover that only nine and a half minutes have passed; tip-toeing down the hall to find mom and dad still awake and wondering when they will go to bed so that Santa…
It is hard for me to believe that we are two weeks from the end of another semester and that I am writing the final assignments and tests for my classes. Though I like considering questions for tests, I really don’t like to “give” the tests. I would much rather just gather around and have a group discussion about the questions at hand. Unfortunately, undergraduate academic life does not work that way. So, I must write questions in such a…