July 29: Just the Baby and I

She ate all the red and blue M&M's first. Weird, I know. She also takes the caps off of every single marker we own and puts them on her fingers like hard, plastic, colorful olives.

The phone rang. It was Daddy.

As I watched her cook with her Play-doh at the kitchen table, I answered and said, "it's just the baby and I at home, and we miss you!"

The other kids were with grandma for the day, and the house was quiet. Without the regular whirl of activity, it was easy to discern the sounds of toddler chatter, clanging legos, and tiny feet running across the hardwood floor. Suddenly, it was like I stepped back in time to when I was a new mom, chasing a toddler around the house all day.

You're always one step behind them as you follow them around, just in time to clean up whatever they disasterized but not quite quick enough to stop them from making the mess in the first place. The clothes you spent your morning folding are now on the floor, and they've moved on to "unloading the dishwasher," i.e., putting the clean dishes back in the sink.

And although the house is filled with endless chatter, playing, learning and joy, it can be a very lonely job at times. It's hard when your only human connection during the day is two feet tall and speaks mostly gibberish. And I'm happy that I know now what I didn't back then--it's okay to take some time for you. It's actually a good thing and a necessary thing to preserve your sanity and your identity. Otherwise you can become a shell of who you once were, completely engulfed and swallowed up by the incessant needs and demands of motherhood.

I'm also finally to the place where, although part of me is still sad that the baby years are almost over, the other, larger half of me is so very glad that things like diapers and terrible twos and potty training will come to an end in the relatively near future. That I can finally see the horizon. Thank God I won't have to carry a diaper bag around for the rest of my life. Because I think if I had to deal with diapers and poop and pottys for the next twenty years, I just may loose my mind. Many, many kudos to you day care workers and nannies. There will be a special place for you in heaven among the saints. I'm sure of it.


So if I could offer some encouragement to all the young moms who are in the thick of it, who are running on coffee and no sleep and are busy all the live long day but have nothing tangible to show for it except a beautiful little baby who is clothed and fed and still breathing:


Hang in there!! You're doing a good job!


It does get better! They do eventually speak more then just gibberish and learn how to fold laundry. But they still throw the clean clothes out of their drawers and all over their room when they get dressed. Or undressed. Sorry to burst your bubble on that one. They will learn how to use the toilet. They will have thoughts and ideas and dreams of their own, and you get the privilege of watching them develop into unique human beings right before your very eyes.


Hang in there. It's worth it. I promise.

July 28: Poor Man's Alfredo

Ruby lost her FIRST tooth tonight!! Clayton lost another one, too. Busy night here for the Tooth Fairy!

I haven't posted a new recipe in a while, basically because I haven't been cooking.


What have we been eating then, you ask?


Well, I have been "cooking," which is similar to actual cooking, except without the recipes and hours spent in the kitchen. It basically involves pulling something out of the fridge and slapping it on a plate, having it delivered, or throwing it on the grill. And some days, if I absolutely must, I expend the extra effort required to put something in the crock pot ahead of time, and it cooks for me. Peanut butter and jelly, lots and lots of hot dogs {if you happen to notice my children glowing in the dark, this is probably why}, fruits and vegetables, lunch meat, hummus, pasta, cheese quesadillas, pizza, salad, and grilled chicken. Between baseball games/practice almost every night this summer and the thought of dragging four children to the grocery store, that's really the best I could manage.


Summertime food motto: If it ain't cheap, quick, and easy, it ain't happening.


But I came up with a random but very tasty concoction at lunch today that was instantly a HUGE hit, so I thought I'd pass it along. I called it Poor Man's Alfredo, because whether you can't afford the time it takes to make gourmet Alfredo sauce or you think the traditional ingredients are too expensive or you just don't feel like running out to the store, this recipe is for you. Instead of heavy cream, which I never seem to have on hand, this recipe uses the cheaper and more readily available substitute of milk and cream cheese. And at the first bite, it was unanimously kid-approved. :)

Poor Man's Alfredo

1 lb pasta cooked al dente

4 T butter

4 oz. cream cheese, cubed

1 cup whole milk

4 oz. Aged cheese {Parmesan, Romano, or Asiago}, shredded

Garlic powder, salt, pepper to taste

Cook the pasta of your choice according to the package instructions, reserving 1 cup of the pasta water before straining. Do not rinse or oil the pasta. Using the same pot or another heavy bottomed skillet, add the butter, cream cheese, and milk into the pot and whisk together on medium-low heat until combined. Slowly add in the shredded aged cheese, whisking continually. Once cheese melts and sauce thickens, add garlic powder, salt and pepper. Add the pasta back in and stir to combine with the sauce. Add reserved pasta water as necessary if sauce is too thick. Serve immediately. Great topped with grape tomatoes, balsamic drizzle, and grilled chicken breast. 

Enjoy!

July 24: A Cucumber is a Fruit??

Ok, so please tell me that I'm not the only one who didn't know that a cucumber is technically a fruit?? It is. An 11 year old told me that today, and I didn't believe him. So I asked Google, because that's what I do when I don't know something. And Google agreed. 

According to the Mayo Clinic: 

The following are technically fruits: avocado, beans, peapods, corn kernels, cucumbers, grains, nuts, olives, peppers, pumpkin, squash, sunflower seeds and tomatoes.

Who knew. 

Apparantly I'm not smarter then a 6th grader. You learn something new every day. That's what the 6th grader said.

And on a related note, from these photos it seems that I survive on a steady diet of banana peppers, which are, as it turns out, a FRUIT. The 6th grader told me that he loves banana peppers, too. Back off, kid. You may have taken my pride, but you will have to pry the banana peppers from my cold, dead fingers. 

July 23: Boom! Pow! Bat Day at the Library!!

Did you know that it's the 75th Anniversary of the Caped Crusader, also known as Batman? I didn't either, until today. Aunt Amanda invited us to the Bat Day at the library, knowing that we have a full-blown Bat Fan who lives under our roof. He went in complete costume today. :) 

And as far as libraries go, this one was AWESOME! It's the Westlake Porter Library, and it's a separate entity from the local library systems. The library is complete with a Cafe and Gift Shop inside, and you're allowed to bring in your own food and beverages {coffee!!} to enjoy anywhere in the library. Not only is it enormous, but it has an proportionately large children's section, complete with a train table, toys, puzzles, board games, crayons and paper, dress up/imaginary play stuff, computer games, and a bristle block table {although those are as ancient as my childhood, I had to Google "blocks with tiny spikes that stick together" to find the name, and as always, Google delivers}. It was partially walled off to prevent noise from traveling is my guess, but not once while we were there did I feel like the children were being a nuisance simply by being children.

I was thrilled to finally find a library where I felt genuinely welcome with kids. Since Clayton has tutoring at the library, we have spent a fair amount of time there. Although the kids seem to enjoy looking for books and playing, it's an incredibly stressful time for me. This is probably partly due to past traumatic experiences at the library, which include but aren't limited to: 

• Being kicked out due to a screaming, running, defiant toddler while also trying to carry a carseat, diaper bag, and bag of library books. This one experience was a gem. Imagine me, red faced with embarrassment as I get with my Irish/Polak complexion, in a stand-off with my screaming son--him on one side of a book stack, me on the other, desperately trying to figure out how to catch him and run the heck out of there before more damage was done. Then imagine a librarian coming over to me and saying, "You really need to leave…He can't be screaming like that in the library." Really??????? I hadn't noticed. Then imagine me not stepping foot in said library for at least a year.

• The time that I stepped away from my children, who were playing calmly and quietly, for a matter of two minutes to find a book to read myself on a road trip, only to glance to my left and see my school-aged son {same one, just older now, mind you} lapping the stacks and laughing, while he encouraged his siblings to do the same. He's much harder to catch this time, and once I got him, I had to get the other two, as well. And then imagine me trying to keep them still long enough to have them all corralled at once. Imagine that this process takes a miserably long while, and I'm veeeeryy red in the face. Then imagine a librarian coming up to me towards the end of the herding process and saying, "Oh no… There is absolutely no running allowed in the library…" Again, really????? There are certain obvious facts that you should not state to an overwhelmed mother. Then imagine me never wanting to come back to the library ever again, at least with certain children.

So, there's that. But then I also feel like they have a children's section, and toys, but the kids can't really PLAY with the toys. Any play that involves speaking above a whisper, laughing, or noise of any kind, that is. The entire time we are there, I feel like I need to SHHHH!!! them and correct them and remind them to BE QUIET!!, to which they respond, "Mom, we're just playing!" or "Mom, we're just being kids!" And on some level, that breaks my heart. Because they are just kids, but somehow that's not okay there. Or I feel like it isn't. So it was really nice to find a library where it was okay, even encouraged, that they played and explored and were kids.

They also had a TON of books for sale, newer even and in excellent condition, and I was happy to find a copy of a book I'd renewed ad nauseam but never finished and a copy of the 2014 Writers Market Guide, which I've heard is must-have if you're seeking to get published, each for $1. That's a STEAL considering the $30 cover price {each!}. I'm excited to dig into them sometime soon. Anyone want to pay me to blog or write a book????? :)

Have you had any traumatic library experiences? Do tell. :)

July 20: Job Opening: In Search of Dishes Fairy

That moment you figure out that your house smells kinda funny because there's a pan of who knows what that has been buried for who knows how long at the bottom of your kitchen sink. And you try to wash it quickly without puking. Because that won't make the house smell any better. 

Gross.

I have this thing where I "do the dishes," which in Jacqui-speak is "I put everything that I could possibly fit in the dishwasher and ran it, and I left whatever didn't fit in the sink. For later." But the problem is, there are several LARGE pots, pans, and bowls that don't fit in the dishwasher, or wouldn't get clean that way, so sometimes they just live in the sink for a loooong time. Until I need to use them again. Or until we have people over, in which case I shove them all into the oven. 

#noyoucantusetheoven #sorry #itsbroken

Don't judge. My system is a well-oiled machine. And I need to hire a dishes fairy. #stat

How would that work, anyways? Would the dishes fairy know that they need to stop by the night dishes start falling out of the overflowing sink onto the floor, much like the tooth fairy knows they need to come when a tooth falls out of one's mouth? Or maybe when we put the dirty dishes into the oven. If that's not a cry for help, I don't know what is...

I think I might have a line on one, actually. His name is Clayton, and he can start tomorrow. I'll let you know how that goes.