Restraint
From my diary:
Sometimes I am the picture of restraint.
Situation exaggerated to illustrate point.
Other times, not so much.
Situation exaggerated not so much.
That’s all! See you on Friday with NiFtY author Elaine Cantrell!
Momming Around
More Kitchen Capades
So. I have long held the belief that I have no value in the kitchen whatsoever, except perhaps as a dishwasher. Not only do I subscribe to this belief, but I gladly admit it to others.
Despite this belief, nay, this truth, that this woman’s place is definitely NOT in the kitchen, I continue to adventure into its depths in the hopes of concocting something worthy and edible that is NOT chocolate chip cookies.*
Part of my ineptitude is, I believe, a direct result of my belief that I am a failure of domestic culinary achievement. Another part of my ineptitude is the result of fear.
I fear the stove.**
I fear the oven.
And no matter what I’m making, on those rare occasions I am able to swallow my fear (and overcome my crippling laziness) something bad always happens.
Sometimes my misadventures are as minor as filling the kitchen with death-smoke resulting from drops of a leaky cheesecake (my one-time contribution to Thanksgiving dinner…which was in actuality contributed on the day following, as I’d forgotten the cake needed to hang out in the refrigerator overnight).
Other misadventures call for a disposal of the creation or, in the case with rice last spring, disposal of the pot.
Before
After. Note: this is after repeated washings.
Husband will never again ask me to get rice started for him.
I once had to throw away an entire double batch of pumpkin bread, misreading the “teaspoon” as “tablespoon” for both salt and baking powder. In my defense, the recipe was handwritten by someone else.
I’m thrown by recipes that refer to “bouquet garnis” and “cheese cloth,” and do not even ask me to fry something because if egads that grease splatters onto my bare skin I think I am dying. I put on more protective gear for cooking than I do for cleaning toilets, or visiting nuclear power plants.***
This has been great fun creating childish drawings for you, but I’ve got something in the crock pot and I think I smell smoke.
_______
Here’s Kitchen Capades I, if you’re interested. No drawings, but maybe that’s better.
*Chocolate chip cookies are a relatively safe assignment for my (un)skill level. I have been baking them with my mother since before I can remember, and worked out the hazardous kinks with BDawg, my BFF since 3rd grade. Our hazards were 1) neglecting to remove foil wrapper from margarine before microwaving, and 2) attempting to make cookie-sheet sized cookies, one for each of us, and ending up with twin liquid dough puddles. Fairly harmless, as hazards go.
**I made myself blue. Creative license. I like purple better, but the purple in Paint is kind of garish. And this blue is…not? Well, it’s less garish.
***No, I have not actually visited a nuclear power plant. Creative license.
Scrub Free or Die!
I don’t know what moron installed our shower. This is a good thing, because if I knew who that person was, I would make that person scrub the shower.
I actually don’t mind cleaning the bathrooms. It isn’t a chore I embrace, naturally, but I’d rather scrub the shower once a week than wash the dishes every damn day. (Fine, I’ll confess. I don’t scrub the shower once a week. We’re lucky if I do it every other week. But it’s only because the dishes will not go away!)
But this shower? This shower is stupid.
Now, I normally would not have such crude graphics, but at least this beats photographs of the real thing (ewww). Plus, our computer crashed (every precious word I ever typed on it was backed up, so no worries other than the $300 bill for fixing it). I’m at this moment using an ancient lap top that doesn’t have an SD drive ?! and don’t have a scanner hooked up to it either. So bear with me.
The Stupid Shower Viewed From the Side
This little dip between the shower floor and the drain reminds me of a moat dividing a castle from surrounding lands. But because the water just sits there, we end up with lots of yuckiness:
Nasty soap scum in stupid shower
Like a moat, there could be dragons in it. (Wait, do moats have dragons? Or monsters? Or something else entirely?)
Monster living in shower moat
So periodically (not once a week, mind you) I have to go into the bathroom armed with a rag, scrub brush, and Scrub Free, which is the cleaner that came with the house, and smells sort of like a combination of car exhaust and moat-dwelling dragon farts.
And when I’m done scrubbing, the shower looks pretty much the same.
Also, our house seems to be collapsing around our heads, and we’re feeling very discouraged. I would catalog our recent misfortunes, but I’ve used up my hourly allotment of complaints. Until next time.
Oh, and I actually am kinda proud of my Paint graphics. They’re not up to Hyperbole & a Half standards, but I like them so be gentle.
The Challenge of Turning 30
The clock is ticking and I’ve got six months left of my twenties. I want to do them right.
The thing is, I feel like a kid most of the time. There’re all kinds of things I don’t know how to do or even handle, and so like the bibliophile I am I turned to a book. I (rather smugly) gave this one to Husband when he turned 30:
30 Things Everyone Should Know How to Do Before Turning 30, by Siobhan Adcock.
Here they are (lifted from the back of the book) (with slight commentary as embellishment where necessary):
- wrap a present
- start a successful fire in a fireplace, at a campsite, and in a barbecue
- finish a piece of furniture
- get a raise (whahahaha!)
- order wine at a restaurant without getting stiffed
- parallel park in three breathtakingly beautiful movements
- dance a “slow dance” without looking like an idiot
- use a full place setting properly, including chopsticks and Asian soup spoons
- clean your place in under 45 minutes, when friends, relatives, or prospective lovers (hahahaha) are coming by unexpectedly, and soon
- hold your liquor
- cure a hangover
- do the Heimlich maneuver
- use a compass
- change a flat
- jump-start a car
- open a champagne bottle
- send a drink to someone’s table
- cook one “signature meal” (I’m shuddering in fear at this one)
- whistle with your fingers
- take good pictures
- fold a fitted sheet (those damn things are so annoying!)
- remove common stains
- sew a button
- carve turkey, lasagna, and birthday cake
- hold a baby (hahaha!)
- change a diaper (if only I didn’t know how to do this)
- keep a plant alive for more than a year
- make dogs and cats love you
- help someone out of a car
- write superior thank-you notes
The rules for my challenge are simple. I have until my thirtieth birthday. I’ll write here about my successes and failures. I’ll try not to burn down any cities (#1–whoops, Dana pointed out this should be #2, not #1), bite off my fingers (#19), or make everyone else’s pets move to my house (#28). As much as possible, I’ll stick to my regular blog posting schedule, but if I have Breaking News, things might get switched up a bit. Breaking News will not include items I feel I already have proficiency in (such as keep a plant alive for more than a year, hold a baby, change a diaper, and a couple of others).
Wanna join me? No age requirements. You can be 30, close to 30, or nowhere near 30 (on either side of the number).
In totally unrelated self-promotion, come by on Friday for an interview with Vintage Veronica author Erica S. Perl, and my first ever Giveaway Awesomeness.
One Fish, Two Fish, Blue-fish, Blue-fish, Blue-fish
In which the Ever-Suffering Mother gets crafty.
Last year's Red-winged Blackbird costume. I'm smiling 'cause the sewing is OVER.
This Halloween, Z is old enough to choose what she wants to be. Her first Halloween she wasn’t even three months old, so I got to decide (butterfly). Second Halloween, I got to decide (Red-winged Blackbird). Third Halloween: she wants to be a fish (not what I would have chosen).
"Baby" as model.
So here’s how I made a very easy fish costume. Some assembly required. But no sewing.
Step One: Find a babysitter. You do NOT want to take your two-year-old into Jo-Ann’s Fabrics. Bad idea.
Step Two: Head to a craft and fabric store to gather materials needed. You will need:
- 2 pieces of poster board. I chose blue because she wants to be a blue fish, but it doesn’t really matter.
- fabric. Two yards total would have been fine for my two-year-old. I went overboard, buying four different shades of blue, some with bling, some shiny. It depends on what you want for the end result. One yard should be your “base” for the fish, so when scales don’t match up right, you don’t have poster board showing through. Note: I think I got extra mileage from my “yard” because the fabric is sheer and was doubled up.
- 2 9X12-inch foam sheets (the ones I bought are 2 mm thick)
- dark blue ribbon
- spray glue
- strong masking tape
- a lot of hope
- prayer won’t hurt
Step Three: Cut a toddler-sized fish shape (minus fins – so basically an oval) from both pieces of poster board (just grit your teeth and eyeball it, then cut away). I used Z to measure how long to make the ovals.
Step Four: Cut out the fins for the bottom. Z’s fins are one foot wide.
Step Five: Cut two ovals from your large piece of base fabric to roughly match size of poster board ovals
Step Six: Cut out lots and lots of “scales” from the fabric. I was not exact on this, and I think the more size/shape variation you have for the scales, the cooler it will look. The scales I cut were anywhere from 5 inches long to 6.5 inches long, and between 3 and 4 inches wide.
Step Seven: Using the spray glue, glue the base fabric onto the poster board. If it’s wrinkly, don’t worry, it’ll barely show after the scales are on. Trim off excess fabric.
Step Eight: Use masking tape to attach the fins to the bottom (tape them to the reverse side of the poster board so the tape doesn’t show).
Step Nine: (the fun part!) Glue on the scales. I started at the bottom and used spray glue. I glued the bottom row first, then moved up to the next row, trying to vary the ways the scales overlapped within rows. I don’t think it really matters.
Step Ten: Using whatever genius is left over in your craft-fried brain, figure out a way to attach the two pieces of poster board to make a front and back of the fish. I used ribbon (fixing it in place with extra masking tape), but I will probably change this before the Big Day, because I don’t think ribbon is strong enough to withstand a toddler running around. I might use leftover scraps from the poster board (and more masking tape. Love masking tape).
I am not worrying about extra fins or anything. The scales and tail fins peg it as a fish. I only lost one night of writing by working on it, and Z LOVES it, so I’m a happy mom.
Z modeling her costume at school
Beth Hull 